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The Tanks of May 1940

Discussion in 'The Tanks of World War 2' started by canambridge, Apr 6, 2007.

  1. canambridge

    canambridge Member

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    I'm currently reading a book on the May 1940 Battle of France and once again came across the oft repeated statement that French tanks were not only more numerous, but that they were technically superior to the German tanks.
    But were they really?

    The French 37L33 and 47L34 tank guns were capable of defeating the 15-30mm armor of any German tank (Pz 35t, Pz 38t, Pz III and Pz IV) at ranges of 500m or less. The 25L73 used in the armored cars was also a very capable anti-tank weapon. The 37mm guns were used in about 400 of the H-38/39 tanks and the 47mm guns were used in the S-35 (about 250 available; "the best French tank") and Char B1 bis (around 300 available; it also carried a hull mounted 75L17 gun which could take out any German tank).
    I've left out the 400 or so H-35 tanks and all the others with the short 37L21 (FT-17, R-35, FCM36) and the 90 small, slow, lightly armored D-2 tanks with 47mm guns. No tto mention the machinegun armed tanks adn the AMC & AMR vehicles.
    The Germans 37mm guns of the 35t (37L40 gun; 118 tanks), 38t (37L48; 207 tanks) and MkIII (37L46; 349 tanks) and the 75L24 of the Mk IV (281 tanks) had to be under 500m to deal with the 60-34mm armor of the comparable French tanks. I've left out the 1500 Pz I and Pz II
    German tanks had superior HP/Wt numbers (15-65% greater) and slightly higher road speeds in general.
    It seems that the majority of French tanks did not have radios, although all should have. For example it seems that only 20% of the S-35's were equipped, although all B-1's may have had radios. By comparison, all German tanks had reliable radios. I haven't seen anything about intercoms in French tanks, but again all German tanks had them.
    Reliability also appears to have favored the Germans, Although both sides suffered high breakdown rates, the Germans appear to have had fewer, and where able to get them running faster.
    German tanks have 4 (Pz 35t & Pz 38t) 5 man (Pz III and PZ IV)crews, while only the French B-1 had a four man crew. The S-35 had three and the H-38/39 had a two man crew. Hte French tanks suffered from one turrets that lacked a hatch. At least the H-38/39 (not sure about S-35 an B-1) had a hatch at the back of the turret on which the commnader could sit exposed, but this was not useful during combat. The German tank turrets could accomodate the commander, a gunner and loader, which should have greatly aided rate of fire, accuracy and situational awareness.

    So were the 950 or so "capable" (by my defintion) French tanks agianst 950 or so capable German tanks.
    Were the French tanks really better?
     
  2. Christian Ankerstjerne

    Christian Ankerstjerne Member

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    You are forgetting to include the Belgian and British tanks into your equation - the German forces were fighting both the French, Belgian, British and Dutch forces, and thus comparing only the French and German tanks seems somewhat unfair.
     
  3. canambridge

    canambridge Member

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    Okay, you've goaded me into action. I've been trying to find more reliable information on the numbers and types of British tanks that actually fought. The 1st Army Tank Brigade would have had as many as 100 Infantry tanks, but I don't know how many were Matilda I (A11) with MG armament and how many were the 2 lbr armed and heavily armored Matilida II (A12). The complete British 1st Armored divison never arrived in France, essentially only the 2nd Brigade, which would have had a TO&E strength of 178 cruisers and the 3rd battlion of 56 cruisers arrived in France. The 2nd brigade operated south of the Somme and the 3rd battalion was at Calais.
    The British 2 lbr (40mm) was a very capable anti-tank weapon for 1940, and was able to defeat any German tank fo the day, but it lacked an HE/anti-personal round and was not useful against soft targets.
    The armor of the Mathilda II was up to 75mm thick and was pretty much proof against the German tank guns. It was relatively slow with top speeds of 24kph on road and 13 kph off road. It had a crew of four, giving good divison of labor. I believe they were all equipped with radios.
    The Cruiser tanks (A9=I, A10=II, A13=III) were also armed with the 2 lbr, but their armor was light, generally not exceeding 15mm, although the turret face of the A13 was 30mm. Top speed of the Mk I was 40kph on road and 24 off, 25/14 for the Mk II and 64/40 for the Mk III. Crew size was 6 for the Mk I, 5 for the Mk II and 4 for the Mk III. I tbelive all were radio equipped.
    The British light tanks were equipped with MG's only.
    So the British may have added as many as 330 capable tanks, although most arrvied late and away from the critical action.
    The only real tanks the Belgians had were 8 ACG-1 tanks (French AMC-35) with the 47mm gun in a Belgian turret. Three man crews, 25mm max armor, top speeds of 42/30kph. Incidentally the French had 100 AMC-35 with 25mm or 47mm guns and about 70 AMR-35 with 25mm guns.
    The main Belgian AFVs were 174 five ton T-13's, an early tank destroyer on a Vickers artillery tractor chasis, with a 47mm gun. They had a crew of three, 9mm armor and a top speed of 40 kph. Belgian armor was dipsresed in company sized packets (12 vehicles). No one division had more than 24. So the Belgians had 182 "capable" AFV's, and to be fair, the French AMC/AMR-35 could have added another 170.
    All these additions would have given the allies about 350 more "capable" tanks than the Germans. But none of the British tanks had a good dual purpose gun and most arrived too late to affect the outcome of the 1940 campaign. The Belgian AFVs and French AMC/AMR were never used in groups larger than 15. So could these AFV's be considered "capable"?
     
  4. FNG phpbb3

    FNG phpbb3 New Member

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    you see a lot of the german tanks were mark 1's and 2's and thus fairly poor. Most people only focus on the heavier stuff

    the tanks were fairly comparably with I beleive the matilda being the most armoured and the char b1 being the best.

    But the germans had far better radio comms fitted to their armoured vehicles and of course, better tactics.

    FNG
     
  5. Christian Ankerstjerne

    Christian Ankerstjerne Member

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    You could also just ask me about the numbers:

    France
    • FCM2C: 8
    • FCM36: 90
    • Hotchkiss H35: 328
    • Hotchkiss H39: 474
    • Renault D2: 45
    • Renault B1 bis: 206
    • Renault FT17: 462
    • Renault R35: 945
    • Somua S35: 264

    Belgium
    • ACG-1: 8
    • T15: 42
    • T13: 228

    United Kingdom
    • Cruiser Mk I: 24
    • Cruiser Mk II: 31
    • Cruiser Mk III: 95
    • Matilda I: 77
    • Matilda II: 23
    • Vickers Mk VIb: 342

    (I've included the British 1st Armoured Division, which arrived on 1940-05-17, in the numbers above).

    LEHMANN, David. Number of AFVs on 10th May 1940. 22 p.
     
  6. canambridge

    canambridge Member

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    Yes and the same is true when people speak of the allied tanks. They talk about the "huge" superiority of numbers and better guns and armor of the allied tanks. Which I why I tried to artifically segregate them into capable (Char B-1 bis amd Pz 38t for example) and non-capable (FT-17 and Pz I for example). In terms of capable tanks, especailly if you consider those consolidated in mechanized divisons, the numbers are about even. On the French side you had about 950 B1 bis, S-35 and H-39 types against about 950 Pz 35t, Pz 38t, Pz III and Pz IV. The British add 173, the Belgians 236, which does give the allied side a 50% advantage. But the Britsih 1st AD never really got organized and the Belgians were dispersed in small groups.
    When you compare the tanks on technical merit only a few things stand out in favor of the Germans:
    Larger crews, particularly in the turrets, and better communications and in some cases speed. When compared to capable British tanks of 1940, about the only advantage is the dual purpose main gun.
    Factors such as reliability are difficult to assess, but the anecdotal information I have read seems to favor the Germans.
    Maybe the Germans were just lucky that French mechanized divisions went north into Belgium and they never had to face a coherent armored force.
    Is this a case of it really is better to be lucky than good?
     
  7. canambridge

    canambridge Member

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    Thanks Christiane!
     
  8. Canadian_Super_Patriot

    Canadian_Super_Patriot recruit

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    The dutch didnt have tanks. At the beginning of the war they had one Ft-17 with a driver trained to drive it.
     
  9. Christian Ankerstjerne

    Christian Ankerstjerne Member

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    They did have quite a few armoured cars, though.
     
  10. crossbow

    crossbow New Member

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    What we missing out on here is : deployment!

    Even though Allied armor in may 1940 may have been technically better in some areas, the main problem was their deployment.

    Where the Germans used indepent armored "breakthrough" divisions with small heavily mechanised infantry support, Allies used their armor as infantry support. Thus strongly reducing the advantage.

    On the few occasions the allies used their armor as "indepent" fighting forces they were (reasonably) succesfull, i.e. the British counterattack at Arras.

    Kris
     
  11. TISO

    TISO New Member

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    At the beggining of this forum David Lahmann posted few very good articles dealing with French tanks of 1940 and tank battles in French campaign. Use search function.
     
  12. canambridge

    canambridge Member

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    Deployment of the whole allied army was a problem.
    But I was mostly interested in finding out if people agree with the statement that allied tanks, particularly the French B1 bis and S-35, really were better than the Germans tanks in May 1940, and if the were, why were they unable to influence events.

    2nd and 3rd DCR were in the French GHQ on May 10 1940. 1st DCR was with 1st Army, along with 2nd and 3rd DLM and 1st DLM was with the 7th Army. All these formations advanced in Belgium (and Holland for 7th Army), away from the German advance.
     
  13. crossbow

    crossbow New Member

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    Well, you gave the answer yourself... Most French and BEF troops were send to take up positions on the KW-defence line. Leaving the Ardennes gap ligthly defended. Allied command assumed that the Ardennes country was not suitable for tank operations, which for slow heavy infantry tanks is true, but the nimble fairly light German tanks had minor problems with the terrain. Therefore the technical superiority of the Allied tanks was lost. As was the momentum for counter attack.

    Both parties gambled, the Allies expected the Germans to do the same as in WW1, the Germans expected the Ardennes region to be lightly defended.
    We we all know who made the correct gamble..

    Kris
     
  14. FNG phpbb3

    FNG phpbb3 New Member

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    going off on a complete tangent did the germans use the French tanks to pad out their armoured divs like they did the czech tanks?

    If not why not given that they were no worse than there czech tanks which I believe served into 41 and even 42?

    FNG
     
  15. Ricky

    Ricky Well-Known Member

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    Asked (and sort of answered) here
     
  16. jeaguer

    jeaguer New Member

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    .
    the french designed their tanks in the role of infantry support , for defence and attack , the spanish campaign especialy torrejo in october 36 had proven the importance of infantry escort to protect the tanks , the polish campaign was still being debated ,

    all the participants in 1940 had the same views
    heavy , infantry paced, breaktrough tanks for assault support , B1 bis , pzkw4 , KV1, matilda , with low velocity , large caliber guns
    lights or cruiser tanks, faster than infantry, for pursuit and chase BT ,S-35, crusader , PZK3

    This was the accepted armored theory ,nobody in its right mind would conceive of armored divisions operating alone behind enemy lines for days on end ,
    this was simply not even imaginable


    .
     
  17. canambridge

    canambridge Member

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    I disagree. This is one of the reasons why the Germans were so successful, they did concieve of Panzer Divisions acting alone (or more properly, in tandem with other Pz Divs and Mot Inf Divs).

    The Pz Mk IV wasn't an ifantry paced tank, it was part of the panzer battalion along with the Pz III and the 2 lbr (40mm) gun on the Matilda II was not only not a large caliber gun, it was a single purpose, AT only, gun.

    The German revolution was to make the tank the centerpiece of a combined arms force, and not seeing them as specialty (infantry supprot or breakththrough) weapons.
     
  18. jeaguer

    jeaguer New Member

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    .

    It's true that I'm being a teetsy bit too shematic ,
    but wasn't the PZKW4 stubby gun made for infantry support , the french and russians definitly had the breaktrough tanks in mind , the british introduced the cruiser tank concept, the russians the fast tank
    as for the armored divisions, in spring 1940 the initial break went as well as hoped, with a superb interarms coordination
    followed by the panzers disappearing over the horizon , with reluctant an infrequent radio contact ,
    I'm sure it's not quite what the OKW had in mind
    their reaction is not unlike the one of the hunter who unleash his dogs only to see them running off , blisfully ignoring any attempts to call them to a stop and very afraid of having lost them for good :p

    .
     
  19. FNG phpbb3

    FNG phpbb3 New Member

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    The original P4 gun was a short barrelled 75mm designed primerily for firing HE shells to supress infantry and fixed dug outs whilst the Panzer Grenadiers could attack.

    FNG
     
  20. canambridge

    canambridge Member

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    The short 75mm on the Mk IV was intended to provide the panzer forces with tanks capable of handling soft (infantry, artillery, etc.) targets that the 37mm could not. But the Mk IV was an integral part of the panzer division, whereas the allied vehicles were generally supposed to fight separately. The Matilda’s were originally in the Army Tank Brigades, an infantry support formation, and not part of the British Armoured division, which was made up of Cruisers. The French B1’s were concentrated in the DCR’s, to be teamed with infantry for breakthrough, and the S-35’s were in the DLM’s, for exploitation.
    To be fair, the German StuG battalions were originally set up as infantry support formations.
     

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