57ATG ammunition available

Reading my book on allied anti tank guns it said that allied command totally misread German tank performance and units available. Anti tank units were mostly armed with the 37 which proved ineffective a few 57s were there but not enough, within weeks 57s were brought in and replaced the 37s but most commands complained that hardly any HE rounds were available. Soldiers would encounter pill boxes or fortified units and needed direct fire HE but hardly any stocks were available. I don't understand why that would be the book stupidly doesn't say why. I would think that if we are mass producing the guns we would have massed produced the ammunition as well. Like if the British needed us to build the gun they couldn't make ammunition for two armies. Also it showed that towed weapons could not cope with mobile units the gun could not be moved fast enough to deal with fast moving enemy tanks and most towed gun positions were over run. Mobile guns did very well and so the anti tank command decided to make all units self propelled. But there were still lots of 57s handed to infantry who had the same problems. The Germans took lots of there light tanks and put big guns on them. We had lots of light tanks we should have mounted the 57 on some of them or the M8 tank replace the 75 pack with the 57. It would have giving troops another mobile tool.

 

The 57mm gun was for area defence of the infantry areas against tanks. It5 was fine in that role and AP or APDS was the main ammunition. Mortars and field artillery have better HE rounds and can deliver these from distance and indirectly.

if you are going to engage a target such as pill boxes bunkers or fortified houses you need an AP shot rather that penetrates rather than HE round that detonates on a hardened surface.

These are the comments in the 15th Army Group Encyclopedia

It was a decent strongpoint or house buster, but lacked mobility in the conditions of the Italian campaign. But why make an SP 57mm when you can have an SP 76mm or 90mm

 

The problem here is that the Germans were using their light tanks as main battle tanks, whereas the M3/M5 was meant for reconnaissance. I listened to one Stuart platoon leader say he was dismounted more than he was mounted, with all the foot reconnaissance he performed. Anything he found that the stuarts could not handle was a radio call for Shermans, artillery, or air strikes.

 

That was not true doctrinally and was only true in a minor sense in NWE in the last stages of the war. The American light, medium, and heavy tanks were designated primarily by weight class rather than by function. The light tank was considered more mobile and so was believed more suitable for maneuver, supported by the medium tanks, but was still a battle tank and was not normally tasked with reconnaissance missions, which was the function of mechanized cavalry.

 

Sorry! I might have missed it. North Africa, Normandy or where? In North Africa Rommel used 'Pak Front' a million times and the Allied went into it every time.

 

Yes but sometimes those vehicles were not around, I'm just saying we had the guns and lots of light tanks so make them more useful. The Germans were using light tanks to mobilize everything they could some a bit ridiculous like the 150 howitzers like the chassis must have been pushed to the limit like how mobile could it have been really in cross country. I'm just saying at a time when we were still building up our tank destroyer forces that might have been a quick stop gap until we had the numbers we needed. Plus another tool is helpful. It did say within six months we had shopped in large numbers of TDs and the need dropped considerably. If the Germans could have good success with there panzer II and 38t with the pak38&40 I think we would have had just as much success with a light tank TD of our own.

 

It is amazing the guns they put on those little tanks. I wasn't able to get the wesp and marders before they sold out but one day they might reissue them or I'll figure out how to make them.

 

Hitler ordered after France to set 50 mm cannons to. PzIII's but the cupola was too small.

 

Yeah read that too and was angry when he found out they didn't do it and ordered it be done immediately and probably had one one of his tantrums and headheads.

 

Excuse me KP, but by "cupola" did you mean "turret"?

Actually, "they" did put in the 50mm, but it was a rather underpowered cartridge. They justified this on the grounds that the infantry were using the less powerful 50mm so they put in the same gun so as to simplify the supply problem. Hitler wanted the long 50mm and after he went postal they started putting that one in the Mk III. By the time it got into service it was rapidly becoming obsolete.

The problem with the 50 or 57 mm projectiles is that they are only about 2" in diameter and that was too small to have a useful HE shell. The 75mm guns were about the smallest platform to have a useful HE performance.

 

Turret that is.

 

Yeah I read this thing on he projectile performance the 105 was number one the 75 was number two then the 76 then the 57 then the 37. I would have thought the 76 and 75 would be the same but it said the 76 was quite lower something about the shell design for the higher velocity. Which in another series it said is why most tankers kept their 75 and not upgrade to the 76 because they felt the better he performance helped save them from enemy ATGs having more effect against the crews. I guess the M7 inspired the push for the M4/105. A more effective spg. Some of the old M7s were repurposed as ARVs or carriers. The German 75 I'm guessing had a similar performance to our 75. The started putting their 75 L24 in all sorts of vehicles like the III N as support weapons and anti personnel. It is amazing how fast in wwii the face of war changed. Tank warfare changed so much from the tanks used to conquer France to what he needed in Russia. Air war the planes kept advancing to the jet age and we keep changing advancing some of the anti personnel weapons of today are really devestating almost inhuman but war is the worst and engineers develope new deadly technology. I hope we never have to use the rods of God. I wonder if the Chinese and the Russians have a similar satellite in orbit. The Russians might not have the funds but the Chinese have been launching stuff like crazy I would be surprised if they didn't and bigger than ours as the keep boasting about building bigger more powerful. They didn't build that bigger carrier they bragged about but their carriers have been getting bigger. Their still learning carrier operations read the first batch more than half killed in operational and training accidents the survivors are now the instructors. They have jumped up in technology in all fields people say it's because they steal everything but not really in a way we have been giving our technology to them. The Chinese send more government sponsored students than any other country to our schools they take back what they have learned to waiting government jobs in all fields. Their huge leaps in aerospace is obvious and building new water assault craft ahead of anything we have so far, interesting concept sank pretty fast but it was a prototype and they say it's been working rather well. I think Taiwan has it tough the Chinese has been build a number of assault craft and ships. I read Taiwan has built bunches of shore missile and rocket batteries along the shores they expect to be assaulted. I still don't get the rebuild of m60 tank chassis with the replacement of the m48 turret. They even bought decommissioned tanks from other countries to rebuild, wonder if we sold a bunch of our old moth balled stuff.