Um you do know that the Tiger I had an 88mm right?  The 88L56 not the 75L48.  If you want to see a really good gun made in quantity look at the 75L70 that was on the Panther.  Now that was the cats ass, there was a reason why the Israelis mounted them on their Shermans.

It really wasn't CAS, it was close interdiction and strike.  The USSR didn't have the equivalent of FACs during WWII.

He was talking about MkIV Panzers, and Tigers.

I posted the 75L43 and 75L48 data as a comparison. 75/76 mm guns Sherman vs T34 vs MkIV.

The part in blue is for an 88L56 gun.

Ok.

I don't think they had forward anything. They just designated map squares to be obliterated. Using air power, artillery, or rockets.

And the only reason why their air force suceeded was due to the failures of the Luftwaffe and not being able to keep theirs supplied with gas ammo parts and most importantly trained pilots.  The US didnt have that problem.  IL-2s would have been dead meat against P47s and P51's.  As for CAS the P47's did a number on the Germans as well as the 51's to a lesser extent.  Typhoons and Tempests were in the mix as well.

The Luftwaffe had the same problems against the US.

The IL-2's didn't go places alone.

Remember their aircraft were optimized to fight below 10,000 feet our were better up high.

La-5's, La-7's, Yak-3's, Yak-9's, would all need to be dealt with, and they were pretty good aircraft.

The IL-2 "concrete plane" wouldn't be easy to shoot down with just .50 cals, there's a reason why every other air force used cannons.

IL-10's were starting to replace the IL-2's, they can do 340 mph 9,000 feet.

It would be a costly struggle.

Our strategic bomber could fly virtually uncontested. Which is good since they would have to get to Moscow or beyond to be able to hit Soviet heavy industry. Kinda of a long flight.

The issue with the Panther was it was rushed into production as a result of the rude surprise the T-34 gave the Germans. Panthers suffered from significant QA issues throughout the war. Some of which was due to sabotage from the slave laborers involved in it's construction.

As for the Sherman even in the late up gunned and up armored variants they were still gasoline powered which as the Brit's said "brewed up" nicely.  T-34 pretty much owns it no matter the comparison.

Really now?  Care to expound.

The fact that the Israelis used Sherman variants up until the 1970s while the T-34 was basically shunned by the end of the Korean War tells me the Sherman was the better tank.

Of course, this post is worth precisely what you paid for it.

Remember that the Luftwaffe aces had kills in the 300+ ranges after flying on the Eastern Front.  The reason that they got that many kills was not simply the sheer volume of the Soviet AF, but that the pilots were bad at their jobs.  Few stood out, because standing out was a good way to get you and your family in trouble.



 

The Cubans used T-34s in Angola in the 1980s, though by the end of the war they had switched to T-55's and T-62's.



 

Sadly have to agree.  While we gave our boys the BEST infantry fighting rifle of the day (Garand), we did not field the best tank in the world during WWII.  Certainly inferior to BOTH Russian and German tanks of the day.

Yes but the Grants using the M2/M3 had a 29 caliber long barrel, the Shermans were 40.  Though using the same rounds they did not have the same performance





But the sides of a Tiger were 80mm on the upper hull and turret, 60mm on the lower hull.  Even the 75mm was capable against the sides of a Tiger.



Max armor for the Pz IV was 80mm vertical and that was on the hull and not until models that were started production until mid 1943..  The turret was a pitiful 50mm @ vertical (even worse 30mm on the sides through all models!  In fact the roof of the turret was almost as thick as the turret sides).  The Ausf H used FH armor while on the Ausf J it was switched to RHA armor.  Your stats are against RHA, against FH the M61 jumps up to 88mm.  As you show with your stats above the turret of a Panzer IV is easily penetrated by the 75mm, while the 80mm hull is very close for the Ausf J but easy for the M61 against a Ausf H.  Even moving out to 1000 yds against FH armo the M61 will have a chance.





The most the Panzer III had was 70mm and that was on the lower hull and mantlet and that was on late model Ausf L/M/N, which I’m not sure saw much action on against the US.  The most widely used versions of the Panzer III the armor was typically 50mm or 30mm with 30mm bolt on armor (which is not equivalent to 60mm plate) which was no problem for the 75mm M3 using M61 or M72.  The tests conducted in Cairo against a Panzer III with the 30+30mm armor using M61 and M72 showed it could be easily penetrated.



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I believe you are thinking of HVAP ammo.  Those went to the TD, but even then there was only 10,000 rounds of the stuff made.  It was a shortage of tungsten to use in ammo that was the issue.  Tungsten was allocated to go to machinery first, then lots of other priorities, and lastly to be shot up as AP ammo.







Which is tough for the low velocity L/24 and it wasn’t effective if the angle was >30 degrees.  HEAT was used in the L/24 in 1940 but was soon withdrawn from service since early version penetrated <50mm of armor.  100mm of penetration didn’t come along until 1943.  Further the Allies were happy with the performance of the APCR and were working on APDS rounds.  Even the 76mm APCBC was just about as good as a HEAT round.



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Not true.  When comparing tanks made in the same time span they are close with the Sherman being better protected than the Pz IV all the way up to the Ausf G, but that was only on the hull.  The Shermans turret was always better protected than the Pz IV.



The Tiger I was far better armed, and armored than an M4. 110mm penetration at 2,000 meters with Pzgr 40 APCR ammo, which is probably enough to make it entirely through the Sherman, at 2,000 meters, and probably has enough power to kill a Sherman at 3,000 meters if they can hit it.







Very true statement.

You know it sounds like the later model Shermans weren't actually that bad, what they probably should have done was screw building tank destroyers and allocated those resources to building M26 Pershings.  An M26/M4 Hi-Lo mix sounds like would have been a better idea.

T34 would win it.  

Yes.  But America had a very peculiar armor doctrine which got a lot of good guys killed in POS Shermans.





Remember the nickname of "Ronson"?  It got that nickname for a reason.  I know, they fixed the issues later, but still.  T34 kicked ass straight outta the gate, and the sloped armor certainly helped.  It would take later Shermans to really rival the T34.





Sherman sucked.



 

The T34 earned it reputation for toughness against PzIIIs with short 37mm guns, and PzIVs with short 75mm guns. The Sherman was just as well protected against the same weapons on early Panzers. Once the long 75mm was installed on late PzIVs the Sherman was better protected with an immunity zone on the front arc beyond 500m, meanwhile the Shermans 75 could kill a PzIV up to 2000m out

It's true that early Shermans had a reputation for catching on fire (due to ammo fires, not fuel fires) but once the wet ammo protection was in the field they had a less chance of burning then the diesel powered T34 or the PzIV. Despite that a Sherman crew had a better chance of surviving a k/o then a T34 crew.

Sherman haters don't want to know this, but a post war Army study showed that the Sherman was 3.6 times more effective then the Panther in all roles, and more then 8x as effective when defending.

In Korea Easy-8s were ~7x as effective as T34/85s.

Sherman 75s had a better gun and better armor then the T34/76.



from Wiki


So it took more hits on average for an early Sherman to have about the same chance of burning then a PZIV. So for every 10 tanks, it took 4 more hits to force the same number of Shermans to burn as PzIVs.

Later water-jacket Shermans only had a 10-15% chance of catching fire.

more

Does anyone have any detailed information of Sherman vs T34 engagements post WWII?  Maybe even during World War II?  I think the Germans sent some captured Soviet equipment from the Eastern Front to France to aid in the defense of the Normandy sector.

The T-34 has the advantage based on just the tank.  Crews and supply of petrol/ammo can make up the rest.  Ask that professor just how far those T-34s would have gone without American trucks for infantry and supply.

I could see this


T-34 vs M26 Pershing

Can anyone address the maneuverability and range?

Not even in the same class.  That's like M4 vs Tiger I

didnt the sherman crews have colts and the t34 crews have bushmasters?  that right there would tell you who would win in a fight

IS-2 says "Tank obstacles? Fuck your tank obstacles!"


 

http://www.acesofww2.com/soviet/Soviet.htm

http://www.acesofww2.com/USA/USA.htm

http://www.acesofww2.com/germany/Germany.htm

Our top 3 aces IIRC flew in the Pacific, 40 was the top.

USSR had aves with 70+ confirmed kills.

The 75mm did exactly what it was designed to do...have a life expectancy of 10,000 rounds, which isn't a bad plan if you are going to use your tanks as mobile field guns to support infantry.

I don't think the US ever really bought in to the idea of a tank having significant anti-tank capabilities until well after WW2.  Even the Pershing was only a half-hearted effort IMO.

You are correct, the US Army doctrine was that tanks were used to support infantry, not fight other tanks.

The Sherman was well armed when it came out, compared to the 75L24 MkIV's and 37 or 50mm MkIII's, or British 2 pounder equipped tanks.

But, it didn't keep pace with the improvements other countries made.

The 76mm gun was decent, but not enough of them were built.

I think the Pershing, as far as armament was a good tank. The Super Pershings were very interesting. The Pershing's failing were in it's drivetrain.

The t34 was arguably the best tank of ww2...the Panther is up there too...There is a reason tankers called Shermans 'rolling coffins' and the like, as long as you were using them against lightly armed/armored targets you were fine.

Cannons on German and Japanese Aircraft (as well as British) predate the IL-2 and probably had more to to with the attack of Bombers and ground attack than anything else.

Interestingly enough, the T-34 (as you say, almost universally considered the best MEDIUM tank of the war) never managed to achieve so much as a 1:2 exchange ratio against its primary opponents, even when those opponents were considerably out-gunned and out-armored by the T-34.  It had very good armor and a good gun, but in the field it proved to be less effective than .  According the statistics here 54,550 T-34s were produced during WWII, and a whopping 44,900 of them were lost in combat.  The T-34 seems to have proven to be a strategic success rather than a tactical one- that is, the strategic advantages of being able to produce over 50,000 of them was what won the war, not the relatively poor tactical performance that they showed in the field.

In the instances where T-34s and Shermans met in actual combat (Korea, Arab-Isreali conflicts), the Sherman came out on the winning side more often than not.

Mike

Sure, it's not that the Il-2 was the only tough plane.

But WW-II fighters had armor, it made them tough to kill.

That's why the British went from .303 MG equipped planes to planes with cannons and MG's.

It could take many MG rounds to take down a plane.

A few cannon hits could take down a plane.

The reason I think the US stuck with ,50 cal armaments. is that all the MG's would hit in the same area, the beaten path so to speak was a more precise area. The .50 had good velicity and range.

The planes with mixed MG and cannon armaments, even some with different cannons, meant that their MG's had one trajectory, their cannons had another, and an "alpha" strike (If you will) would fire weapons that would hit different places due to the trajectory difference.

In the hands of the truly skilled, that would be easy to compensate for. Most were not truly skilled however.

But against well armored planes like the IL-2 cannons were surely more effective.

The German's 30mm cannons on the ME262 is a good example of a weapon picked to hit bombers, and not fighters. Low rate of fire, low velocity, limited their effectiveness at any range but point blank, and against a small manuevering target. But against bombers they were awfully effective.

Why WWII fighters went to cannons

Cannons or Machine-guns

Who were their primary opponents?

Because when you consider the Tigers I/II, Panthers, Jagdtigers, JagdPanthers, Elephants, Nashhorns, etc, that the Germans threw at them, the T-34 was not very well armed or armored comparitively.

I think that the training of crews, ant the tactical doctrine and training the USSR employed limmited the T-34's effectiveness, not the tank itself.

So you are admitting the .50 would not be a good weapon against well armored planes.

So the T34 is the best thing ever made in russia besides vodka.

AK47s.  Vodka and AK47s.

Well since a 50 cal can penetrate a BTR at twice the range a typical WWII dogfight occurred at, I wouldn't be too worried about it .

WW-II ammo isn't as effective as ammo made 20, 40, or 60 years later.


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The US didn't have air superiority early in the N African campaign, and it caused a lot of problems. Including US AA gunners that would fire at anything they say flying.

Once the Allies invaded Italy, and France, the USAAF and RAF dominated the skies.

If the US had to deal with not dozens of planes, like they did in N Africa, but thousands of VVS fighter or ground attack planes, it would be a very difficult experience.

Thus, my point.  The Soviets had quantity, but the quality was quite poor.  It took a long time to get to where the Germans had been worn down enough to not be able to train good fighter pilots, especially when if the pilots bailed out over their own lines they were likely to survive to fly another day.



Unlike the Japanese and US in the Pacific where if they were shot down over the ocean it was almost blind luck if they were found, by either side.  This had the effect of draining the Japanese supply of trained fighter pilots after Midway & the Coral Sea, in addition to the loss of carriers at Midway, which pulled the teeth of the Japanese Navy without breaking its back.



 

The Japanese were allegedly quite good at recovering downed pilots, at least early in the war.

The VVS aces outscored the USAAF aces, when both were figthing the Luftwaffe.

Neither racked up the score the Luftwaffe did.

Good post.



The US stuck with the .50-cal because A) it was time-tested design available in large quantities, B) it simplified logistics, C) our 20mm designs were plagued with reliability issues throughout the war, and D) for use against single and twin-engine aircraft, which comprised the majority of our enemy's air forces, it was good enough.



Furthermore, USAF fighter doctrine always stressed volume of fire over weight of fire. That's why they stuck with the .50-cal well into Korea, even though by then it was clear they should have moved on to the 20mm, as the Navy had.



If we had to face fleets of 4-engine bombers as the Japanese and German air forces did, the .50-cal's deficiencies would have been quickly made apparent.





 

You should get Tony Williams book rapid fire, page 166 specifically discusses the German rational behind their aircraft guns and which shells proved most effective.  HE was best at taking down bombers, but didn't work well against armor, and aircraft fired AP was abandoned for AA work because it was found the angle of impact in Dogfights reduced AP effectiveness.

Oh my.



 

When you have the ocean to yourself, it makes it much easier to recover your pilots, as we were later in the war.



I should think that with more stick time against fighters, fighter to fighter and not protecting the bombers (once they could even get that far) the USAAF might have gotten better ratios.  My personal opinion is that with the strictures of protecting the bombers where most fighter pilots came into contact with the Luftwaffe made for fewer kills.



Last note from me on this:  Not to be forgotten is the fact that the USAAF was more strict than the Luftwaffe, don't know about the Soviets, who only had to force a plane down, smoking, to count a kill.  Where the USAAF it had to be witnessed either going into the ground or the pilot bailing out.



 

Nah, The P-47s and the Tempests would have had a ball with them.

Gee, what could be another great Sherman vs thread all "F"'d up by Aircraft posts again. Too Bad  

M4A3E8 is a better thank than the T34 85, sorry.  

Better Ground Pressure, Better powerplant, better turreting, Frontal Armor, Optics, crew comfort, communications and so on.

You know there is a reason why Soviet crews loved when they could get out of a T-34 for one of the M4A2's provided by lend-lease  

50% of the Tank vs Tank kills in Korea were taken by the Easy 8. You can't even throw the caveat of much better trained American crews into the mix, since there is a percentage (exact pct still unknown) were direct Soviet crews and veterans of WW2, just like with the Mig vs F86.

Of course it varied throughout the war, but in 1941 more T-34s were on the front line than all of the German tanks/TDs combined, and faced Pz III, IV, and Stug III.  The Pz III was the most numerous of the German AFVs, and had either the 37mm or short 50mm gun.  The IV had only the short 75 during that period as did the Stug III.  Through December of 1941, just over 3000 T-34s had entered service on the front lines vs. about 2700 German tanks.  2300 T-34s were lost by the end of 1941 (almost 80% of those fielded).

In 1942, Pz IIIs with both short and long 50mm guns, and Pz IV and Stug with a very small number of long 75mm guns.  This site refers to a Red Army study which indicated that over 60% of T-34s losses up to the end of 1942 were to 50mm guns (mostly to the later, longer barreled 50mm).  The 88mm accounted for less than 4% of T-34 losses, with 75mm guns accounting for 10% of losses.  In 1942 6600 T-34s were lost in action.

The owner/author of that site seems to believe that the T-34 was deficient primarily in its ability to identify and engage enemy targets.  Specifically, the author cites the combination of the duties of tank commander and gunner which would hinder the ability of the tank commander to maintain awareness of what was going on outside the tank.  This was reportedly made worse by poor gunsight optics, and even more so by lack of vision devices to allow the TC to see outside.

Mike

I'd go with the Sherman if I could have the Brit' "1C Hybrid" ("firefly")

With Sabot rounds that gun could punch through almost 8" of RHA at 1,000 mtrs ( Battle-sight range).

With "old -fashioned" APCBC it could do over 5" at 1,000 yrds.  

The varying reputations of the Sherman v. T-34 is due to perception more than reality.  When the T-34 was introduced against early model Pz III and IVs, it outclassed them.  But the 75mm Sherman did as well in North Africa.  It's just that American popular history never really paid much attention to the North African campaign.  Americans start paying attention in Normandy when the Germans had moved onto Panthers and Pz IVs with the long 7.5cm gun, which outclassed the early model Shermans.  But the exact same thing happened on the eastern front as well as these new German tanks raped the early-model T-34s, it just doesn't seem to make the popular American history of WWII.  Both the Americans and Russians adapted in a similar manner, upgunning their medium tanks and fielding heavier tanks like the IS and the Pershing.  What you have to remember is that technology was moving so fast in that war that equipment was quickly becoming obsolete.  When you look at the actual statistics, the Sherman compares very well to the medium tanks fielded by other powers.