As Woody mentioned, a quite brilliant demonstration of the realities of tank warfare discounting who has the bigger gun. Phil expertly conveyed the massive logistical, maintenance, and support network needed in tank warfare. S0 much never thought of by most, but critically important.
A friend of mine worked in a rebuild depot in England during the war rebuilding Shermans that had been shot or shot and burnt out. They were pushed over a pit and the belly hatch opened and flushed out with a fire-hose. The tank was completely stripped out, a one inch thick patch welded over the penetration and the tank completely rebuilt. Great show, Woody and Phillip, love the nerdy details!
@@wbertie2604 my understanding is they replaced what was needed to get them back in action. Burnt out tanks would be a major re-build in most cases and progressed with when possible, maybe cannibalized more often than not, repairable tanks getting priority. The patch was visible and appears in some photographs but I can't remember where I saw a couple. My friend was injured during the war (slightly pinched by a couple of tanks, left him with a limp) and mustered out of the army and finished the war and for a time post-war, working for a contracting shop. I think it was the private contractor's crew that refused to work on the tanks until they were 'cleansed'.
@@TrainmanDan Thanks. I was wondering because it might be disconcerting for a new crew to see that the tank had already been taken out. One of the strengths of the Allied effort was the ability to replace tanks on the battlefield AND rebuild them. Ditto aircraft in the Battle of Britain, for example.
I always learn so much from videos such as these. Phillip is the kind of subject matter expert we've come to expect from this channel. I must watch it again.
What a great presentation. For me really fills in some blanks/penny drop moments and provides a key frame work about the bigger picture of war that the "popular" information can sit within.
Outstanding presentation. Gave such a great explanation of British Tank evolution without mentioning the size of guns, thickness of armour or power of engines! Engrossed throughout.
Brillaint talk, shame I missed it live, would have loved to join in the chat. This changes everything we like to think about armour in the SWW and if we are not including the criteria 'durability' to the trio of protection-mobility-gun in assessing an AFVs effectiveness then we're missing the point completely. Great work Mr Knight.
great talk. Love seeing these underappreciated aspects of war given the attention they're deserved. would put this up there with my channel favorite The Red God of War? Soviet Artillery in WWII
That was an amazing presenation. Give that guy a medal and bring him back again. As a British guy brought up wih having to drive crappy austins and morris and ford cars from England with their constant breakign down, I was amazed how they managed to produce many more serviceable tanks than the Germans. Of course having access to rubber and oil helped a lot
What an interesting angle to look at the difference in how tanks perform, with the durability and serviceability of a particular tank. This added a new dynamic to my understanding of tank warfare, great detailed presentation from Phil, thanks for this Woody.
I really enjoyed Phil’s presentation, great knowledge and such research is to be applauded. Great facts and figures, many thanks for putting this together, Phil and Woody. Bring Phil back again if you can.
A great show and discussion Woody and Phil. I really enjoy learning about topics from an angle I hadn't looked at before. And I suppose that the one-on-one which tank is better myths will persist because individuals have to fight those fights, and their stories will always be framed as "we were outclassed, that tank was better than ours" etc. without any larger strategic context. And those are real human stories that we should also be mindful of.
So many gems in this episode. The Field Force … Plan 36 percentage slide was something I have always wanted to see. Also, the first rule of Pilfer Team is we don’t talk about Pilfer Team. No distinctive headgear or badges will be authorized or tolerated. Strategic view of what is sexy at a tactical level, which is great to know.
Amazing presentation, the importance of maintenance really is huge, those overhaul hours were amazing statistics. Please come back and do similar for Europe, both Allied,Soviet and Germans armour.
Very interesting episode. From the title I expected more of a design procurement kind of video from the early war to late war British armour. Instead it was basically a logistics study with a discussion of tank mechanics on top. An excellent reassessment of British/American armour from a big picture logistics level.
I really enjoyed this presentation, plenty of food for thought, especially for the North African campaign, how 7th Armour survived, what effect did the dash to the wire have on the German armour etc. Also explains why the Russians loved the Valentine.
Phil really knows his subject. IMO Brit tanks playing catch up was caused by losing all it's equipment at Dunkirk. So kit due to be phased out had to be kept. The cupboard was bare, so the 1940 planned cut of 2pdr production (upgrading it to 6pdrs) was postponed. This happened to many items but the retention of 2pdrs hamstrung Brit tank performance until long after Overlord.
This issue with the 2pdr was made much worse by the decision to not make it's HE round. It may have a small payload but isn't something better than nothing? How is it that the Americans (40grams of HE) & Germans had an HE round for their 37mm but the Brit 40mm 2pdr was too small? The ANZACS put 40mm Bofors HE projectiles on the 2pdr brass. Fun(?) fact there were 6 diff breach/brass sizes of 40mm caliber ammo called "2pdr"
The 2pdr did cause some issues but was a relatively minor factor compared to the tactical incompetence of British armour and failure to properly implement combined arms into armoured doctrine. A side effect of institutional capture by messianic tank theorists like Fuller and Lidell-Hart.
@@jonathanewer5910 de Gaulle was also fairly messianic (and from my reading, at least of parts in translation, a source for Guderian). I don't think he had enough influence to affect the combined arms doctrine of methodical battle, though. I'd mention the Russian general if I could spell his name...
@@jonathanewer5910 I completely agree on the Brit tactics. "No combined arms here, we're British." The pre-war efforts of Liddel-Hart, Fuller & later O'Connor saved Egypt/Suez from a string of poor tacticians exemplified by Auchinlek/Dormant-Smith. But with the 2pdr initially fitted to virtually every Brit front line tank, up to 3yrs after it's thought obsolete gives the use of Napoleonic tactics serious competition for "biggest cock-up." The 2pdr's retirement being delayed almost 3yrs, meant its demotion was concurrent with the Germans phasing out the PAK 38, 50mm L60, a far more powerful contemporary that had HE ammo. (I am lucky to have copies of several books & articles written by Liddel-Hart).
A fascinating presentation. Regarding the REME workshops : for each of the 4 echelons, how many people would have been in each, what sort of equipment would they have had and where would they be located in respect to the front-line. Also how easy was it for the workshops to keep up with the front line during times of rapid advancement and how long would it take to set-up a workshop and be fully equipped and operational ?
Totally brilliant presentation (OK, right). Would have started with the final slide (1h 14mins). Great insights into maintaining an armoured force capacity and capability.
The lack of skilled workers reminds me of my grandfather, who signed up at the beginning of the war and then returned to industry in late 1940 for a couple years and them fought in Normandy till the end. I've no idea how common this was?
The French called up everyone in 1939 and then culled through the military a few months later to send men back to the factories. When it was evident that heavy fighting wasn't about to happen, the war of production was more important. Kept them on active duty, though, and I believe they only got their small military pay.
Thank you for a brilliant presentation, Woody , PM Knight, it explains a great deal that I struggled to understand. Any idea about the durability of the centaur?
I would have guessed that given their fairly limited role, there wouldn't really be a need for a Centaur to cover many miles / engine hours. They were quite swiftly replaced weren't they?
This is an extremely interesting take on the effectiveness of British tanks used in NWE. It is however a little mistitled as it skims over the actual development of those tanks and concentrates on why they ended up being fit for purpose despite years of failed designs beforehand. In stark contrast the Americans developed their light and medium tanks much quicker and without most of the failures and dead ends that the British had suffered. It is the failure of the British to get a viable cruiser tank into service before June 1944 that really defines how poor British tank development was for most of the war.
@@rosbif4960 the USA had the advantage of finding a reliable and easily maintainable suspension system it stuck with, apart from scale and strength, through most of the war, bar M18, M24 and M26 in limited numbers. Ditto tracks - incremental improvements but no reinventing the, er, wheel each time. Plus its automotive industry was the most advanced in the world, combined with the use of well developed aero engines. Well, the UK made use of the Liberty, but that was a bit long in the tooth. Use of the Rolls Royce Kestrel was considered in committee around 1937/8. Whether that could have been developed into a Meteor equivalent with the same sort of power, given typical derating for tank use we'll never know.
Blame protectionism. The brits had an vehicle tax based on engine displacement ( US truck engines generally had a larger displacement). There was no indigenous pressure to devellop better automotive engines
I have enjoyed most of these shows, but the acoustics and strong accent of Mr. P.M. Knight did not work for my American ears. He would have benefited from a better microphone and proximity to it. If I had time, I would just watch with the Closed Captions enabled and the audio off, but I usually just have time to listen to videos. Thank you for the great contributions you are making to preserving the history of World War 2.
Well it’s their language. Just listen to the British presenters and it will suddenly click in. I can even understand my friends from Glasgow. Only took a couple of weeks, but they forgave me anyway.
@patrickwilliams6567 I listened to one key line at least three times and could not understand it. Ran it again with CC on and the closed captions couldn't understand that part either. I was blown away at the motorized vehicle TO&E comparison early in the video.
The 6-Ton was a dead end. None of its users (or users of its derivatives) continued along that development path. The Soviets had committed to the KV as the infantry support tank and the T-34 as the bulk of their tank force before 1941.
@wbertie2604 Total light tank production during the was was in the 15,000 range; T-34 (76mm) around 35,000. While the T-70 was used as an an infantry support tank, it was also much faster than the T-26 and was able to conduct scouting. With a one-man turret, torsion bar suspension, and much heavier armor, I'd argue that the T-70 had no evolutionary relationship to the T-26 and a partial conceptual relationship at best.
@@ethanmckinney203 I wasn't suggesting it was related to the T-26, just pointing out that even in 1943 it wasn't all T-34s and KV-1s. There were quite a lot of T-70s at Kursk, for example, about 1/3 of the total. That was basically the end of the T-70 as a significant tank, though.
It's rather sad that after perfecting reliable tanks with decent range in 1944, the UK seemed to immediately go backwards in 1945 with the Centurion. Range is particularly baffling. Yes, I can understand that putting more inside the tank is more volume to armour, but surely not THAT much more? And external fuel tanks would seem to be better than innovative but awful "trailers".
All of Mr Knight's arguments about general levels of mechanisation, durability and logistic support notwithstanding, the table at 30.33 demonstrates clearly the result of the utter failure of the UK to produce tanks that were up to the job. Specifically, read note 2. Even in 1941 the UK relied heavily on the supply of US vehicles such as the Stuart, then the M3 Grant and then the M4 Sherman to support their campaign in Nth Africa. The other giant elephant in the room is the total failure of the British Army to develop any understanding of combined arms warfare, even after 4 years of fighting. Even in Normandy (Goodwood) Montgomery sent in hundreds of tanks with no effective infantry support. Even the best equipped army in the world won't achieve much if they don't know how to fight effectively. For goodness sake, prior to late 43 the Brits couldn't even produce an infantry support tank that carried a weapon capable of firing HE.
How good was that..!! Very well told, gives you an entirely new avenue to consider, just am wondering if the bsst tank in the desert would be a motorcycle n sidecar..😂😂
As Woody mentioned, a quite brilliant demonstration of the realities of tank warfare discounting who has the bigger gun. Phil expertly conveyed the massive logistical, maintenance, and support network needed in tank warfare. S0 much never thought of by most, but critically important.
A friend of mine worked in a rebuild depot in England during the war rebuilding Shermans that had been shot or shot and burnt out. They were pushed over a pit and the belly hatch opened and flushed out with a fire-hose. The tank was completely stripped out, a one inch thick patch welded over the penetration and the tank completely rebuilt. Great show, Woody and Phillip, love the nerdy details!
Was the patch obvious to new crew? Did they bring the tanks up to the latest standards where applicable, or just patch them up?
@@wbertie2604 my understanding is they replaced what was needed to get them back in action. Burnt out tanks would be a major re-build in most cases and progressed with when possible, maybe cannibalized more often than not, repairable tanks getting priority. The patch was visible and appears in some photographs but I can't remember where I saw a couple. My friend was injured during the war (slightly pinched by a couple of tanks, left him with a limp) and mustered out of the army and finished the war and for a time post-war, working for a contracting shop. I think it was the private contractor's crew that refused to work on the tanks until they were 'cleansed'.
@@TrainmanDan Thanks. I was wondering because it might be disconcerting for a new crew to see that the tank had already been taken out.
One of the strengths of the Allied effort was the ability to replace tanks on the battlefield AND rebuild them. Ditto aircraft in the Battle of Britain, for example.
I always learn so much from videos such as these. Phillip is the kind of subject matter expert we've come to expect from this channel. I must watch it again.
What a great presentation. For me really fills in some blanks/penny drop moments and provides a key frame work about the bigger picture of war that the "popular" information can sit within.
Outstanding,
Last week the IWM's video changed the tank triangle into a diamond by adding in RELIABILITY as the fourth side.
It’s needs ergonomics too. I think the chieftain may have added that in one of his videos .
Outstanding presentation. Gave such a great explanation of British Tank evolution without mentioning the size of guns, thickness of armour or power of engines! Engrossed throughout.
Another absolutely brilliant discussion, highlighting oft-overlooked details. Bravo and thank you.
Brillaint talk, shame I missed it live, would have loved to join in the chat. This changes everything we like to think about armour in the SWW and if we are not including the criteria 'durability' to the trio of protection-mobility-gun in assessing an AFVs effectiveness then we're missing the point completely. Great work Mr Knight.
great talk. Love seeing these underappreciated aspects of war given the attention they're deserved. would put this up there with my channel favorite The Red God of War? Soviet Artillery in WWII
Just watched live, brilliant full of detail. If you are interested in tanks you should watch this show. Great talk on great channel. Superb.
really cool stats, thanks!
Amazing look at how military needs and outlook affects how machines are designed and used. All knowledge revealed all questions answered
That was an amazing presenation.
Give that guy a medal and bring him back again.
As a British guy brought up wih having to drive crappy austins and morris and ford cars from England with their constant breakign down, I was amazed how they managed to produce many more serviceable tanks than the Germans.
Of course having access to rubber and oil helped a lot
I really enjoyed that perspective from Phil.
What an interesting angle to look at the difference in how tanks perform, with the durability and serviceability of a particular tank. This added a new dynamic to my understanding of tank warfare, great detailed presentation from Phil, thanks for this Woody.
I really enjoyed Phil’s presentation, great knowledge and such research is to be applauded. Great facts and figures, many thanks for putting this together, Phil and Woody. Bring Phil back again if you can.
An excellent presentation of the realities of Mechanized / Tank warfare and the impact of different terrain between the Desert and NWE
Brilliant! Really insightful!
That's what I thought too
A great show and discussion Woody and Phil. I really enjoy learning about topics from an angle I hadn't looked at before. And I suppose that the one-on-one which tank is better myths will persist because individuals have to fight those fights, and their stories will always be framed as "we were outclassed, that tank was better than ours" etc. without any larger strategic context. And those are real human stories that we should also be mindful of.
Excellent analysis
That was superb! Thank you both
So many gems in this episode. The Field Force … Plan 36 percentage slide was something I have always wanted to see. Also, the first rule of Pilfer Team is we don’t talk about Pilfer Team. No distinctive headgear or badges will be authorized or tolerated. Strategic view of what is sexy at a tactical level, which is great to know.
Amazing presentation, the importance of maintenance really is huge, those overhaul hours were amazing statistics. Please come back and do similar for Europe, both Allied,Soviet and Germans armour.
Mr Knight is only a British armour expert, but I will try and find some other guests for the other nations
Very interesting episode. From the title I expected more of a design procurement kind of video from the early war to late war British armour. Instead it was basically a logistics study with a discussion of tank mechanics on top. An excellent reassessment of British/American armour from a big picture logistics level.
Good show as always!
Glad you enjoyed it!
Really enjoyed that.
As usual, I was in the forest with the ferret. Now to watch and enjoy.
I really enjoyed this presentation, plenty of food for thought, especially for the North African campaign, how 7th Armour survived, what effect did the dash to the wire have on the German armour etc. Also explains why the Russians loved the Valentine.
Very informative.
Panzer IIII used leaf springs! Great show!
Phil really knows his subject. IMO Brit tanks playing catch up was caused by losing all it's equipment at Dunkirk. So kit due to be phased out had to be kept. The cupboard was bare, so the 1940 planned cut of 2pdr production (upgrading it to 6pdrs) was postponed. This happened to many items but the retention of 2pdrs hamstrung Brit tank performance until long after Overlord.
This issue with the 2pdr was made much worse by the decision to not make it's HE round. It may have a small payload but isn't something better than nothing? How is it that the Americans (40grams of HE) & Germans had an HE round for their 37mm but the Brit 40mm 2pdr was too small? The ANZACS put 40mm Bofors HE projectiles on the 2pdr brass. Fun(?) fact there were 6 diff breach/brass sizes of 40mm caliber ammo called "2pdr"
The 2pdr did cause some issues but was a relatively minor factor compared to the tactical incompetence of British armour and failure to properly implement combined arms into armoured doctrine. A side effect of institutional capture by messianic tank theorists like Fuller and Lidell-Hart.
@@jonathanewer5910 and ironic, given the UK's role (although arguably more Commonwealth with Monash as well as Foch) in birthing combined arms.
@@jonathanewer5910 de Gaulle was also fairly messianic (and from my reading, at least of parts in translation, a source for Guderian). I don't think he had enough influence to affect the combined arms doctrine of methodical battle, though. I'd mention the Russian general if I could spell his name...
@@jonathanewer5910 I completely agree on the Brit tactics. "No combined arms here, we're British." The pre-war efforts of Liddel-Hart, Fuller & later O'Connor saved Egypt/Suez from a string of poor tacticians exemplified by Auchinlek/Dormant-Smith. But with the 2pdr initially fitted to virtually every Brit front line tank, up to 3yrs after it's thought obsolete gives the use of Napoleonic tactics serious competition for "biggest cock-up." The 2pdr's retirement being delayed almost 3yrs, meant its demotion was concurrent with the Germans phasing out the PAK 38, 50mm L60, a far more powerful contemporary that had HE ammo. (I am lucky to have copies of several books & articles written by Liddel-Hart).
A fascinating presentation. Regarding the REME workshops : for each of the 4 echelons, how many people would have been in each, what sort of equipment would they have had and where would they be located in respect to the front-line. Also how easy was it for the workshops to keep up with the front line during times of rapid advancement and how long would it take to set-up a workshop and be fully equipped and operational ?
Totally brilliant presentation (OK, right). Would have started with the final slide (1h 14mins). Great insights into maintaining an armoured force capacity and capability.
The lack of skilled workers reminds me of my grandfather, who signed up at the beginning of the war and then returned to industry in late 1940 for a couple years and them fought in Normandy till the end. I've no idea how common this was?
I dont know, not very common i would think
The French called up everyone in 1939 and then culled through the military a few months later to send men back to the factories. When it was evident that heavy fighting wasn't about to happen, the war of production was more important.
Kept them on active duty, though, and I believe they only got their small military pay.
Thank you for a brilliant presentation, Woody , PM Knight, it explains a great deal that I struggled to understand.
Any idea about the durability of the centaur?
I would have guessed that given their fairly limited role, there wouldn't really be a need for a Centaur to cover many miles / engine hours. They were quite swiftly replaced weren't they?
@@WW2TV Centaur only really existed because the air force was hogging all the Merlins/Meteors
I want to know how long does a tank barrel last. How many rounds can it fire before it needs to be replaced?
Maybe a future show
This is an extremely interesting take on the effectiveness of British tanks used in NWE. It is however a little mistitled as it skims over the actual development of those tanks and concentrates on why they ended up being fit for purpose despite years of failed designs beforehand. In stark contrast the Americans developed their light and medium tanks much quicker and without most of the failures and dead ends that the British had suffered. It is the failure of the British to get a viable cruiser tank into service before June 1944 that really defines how poor British tank development was for most of the war.
@@rosbif4960 the USA had the advantage of finding a reliable and easily maintainable suspension system it stuck with, apart from scale and strength, through most of the war, bar M18, M24 and M26 in limited numbers.
Ditto tracks - incremental improvements but no reinventing the, er, wheel each time.
Plus its automotive industry was the most advanced in the world, combined with the use of well developed aero engines. Well, the UK made use of the Liberty, but that was a bit long in the tooth. Use of the Rolls Royce Kestrel was considered in committee around 1937/8. Whether that could have been developed into a Meteor equivalent with the same sort of power, given typical derating for tank use we'll never know.
I went with the title Mr Knight gave me
Blame protectionism.
The brits had an vehicle tax based on engine displacement ( US truck engines generally had a larger displacement).
There was no indigenous pressure to
devellop better automotive engines
@dwwolf4636 very good gearing, though.
I have enjoyed most of these shows, but the acoustics and strong accent of Mr. P.M. Knight did not work for my American ears. He would have benefited from a better microphone and proximity to it. If I had time, I would just watch with the Closed Captions enabled and the audio off, but I usually just have time to listen to videos. Thank you for the great contributions you are making to preserving the history of World War 2.
Well it’s their language. Just listen to the British presenters and it will suddenly click in. I can even understand my friends from Glasgow. Only took a couple of weeks, but they forgave me anyway.
@patrickwilliams6567 I listened to one key line at least three times and could not understand it. Ran it again with CC on and the closed captions couldn't understand that part either. I was blown away at the motorized vehicle TO&E comparison early in the video.
@@amerigo88 It was a very interesting talk. It’s hard to find enough time with the breadth of information. Peace.
The 6-Ton was a dead end. None of its users (or users of its derivatives) continued along that development path. The Soviets had committed to the KV as the infantry support tank and the T-34 as the bulk of their tank force before 1941.
Pete Blanchard would disagree with you. Check out his Vickers show on WW2TV
Italy seemed to continue with it until it signed an armistice.
Wasn't, even in 1943, the T-70 most numerous?
@wbertie2604 Total light tank production during the was was in the 15,000 range; T-34 (76mm) around 35,000.
While the T-70 was used as an an infantry support tank, it was also much faster than the T-26 and was able to conduct scouting. With a one-man turret, torsion bar suspension, and much heavier armor, I'd argue that the T-70 had no evolutionary relationship to the T-26 and a partial conceptual relationship at best.
@@ethanmckinney203 I wasn't suggesting it was related to the T-26, just pointing out that even in 1943 it wasn't all T-34s and KV-1s. There were quite a lot of T-70s at Kursk, for example, about 1/3 of the total. That was basically the end of the T-70 as a significant tank, though.
It's rather sad that after perfecting reliable tanks with decent range in 1944, the UK seemed to immediately go backwards in 1945 with the Centurion. Range is particularly baffling. Yes, I can understand that putting more inside the tank is more volume to armour, but surely not THAT much more? And external fuel tanks would seem to be better than innovative but awful "trailers".
All of Mr Knight's arguments about general levels of mechanisation, durability and logistic support notwithstanding, the table at 30.33 demonstrates clearly the result of the utter failure of the UK to produce tanks that were up to the job. Specifically, read note 2. Even in 1941 the UK relied heavily on the supply of US vehicles such as the Stuart, then the M3 Grant and then the M4 Sherman to support their campaign in Nth Africa. The other giant elephant in the room is the total failure of the British Army to develop any understanding of combined arms warfare, even after 4 years of fighting. Even in Normandy (Goodwood) Montgomery sent in hundreds of tanks with no effective infantry support. Even the best equipped army in the world won't achieve much if they don't know how to fight effectively. For goodness sake, prior to late 43 the Brits couldn't even produce an infantry support tank that carried a weapon capable of firing HE.
There was no plan.
But ultimately it worked
Lovely stuff - thanks. Anyone want to join my campaign to get John Buckley to write "British Army in Germany"?
Where do I sign
Loving the content so far, but wish Mr Knight was banned from saying Okay!
It's just a mannerism
@@WW2TV 😀
How good was that..!!
Very well told, gives you an entirely new avenue to consider, just am wondering if the bsst tank in the desert would be a motorcycle n sidecar..😂😂