Were heavy tanks worth the cost in WWII?

[DGuller]

To what extent did the MBT concept also need associated technical advances before it could mature?

The Centurion, for example, really comes into its own post-war with the Royal Ordnance L7 gun.

But for the right blend of mobility and protection, you also need powerful engines of some degree of efficiency.

I don't know the answer or if this is even a pertinent question, so would be very interested to hear thoughts.

That's what I had in mind when I said that MBT concept wasn't ready during the war.  I can't imagine the Allies being able to design a tank that satisfied all three criteria that Berkut mentioned.  At best you could satisfy two of them, which is why you had different classes of tanks based on which two out of three qualities they emphasized.

[Viking]

It probably bears remembering that between the Tiger and the heaviest IS tanks at the end of WWII and the Challengers, Abrams and Leopard 2s of the 1980s (this applies to russian tanks til this day) the only operational tank to be significantly heavier than 40 tons was the british chieftain at 62 tons with it's 120mm rifled gun that didn't fire HEAT rounds. Basically the germans went up to 60 tons in 1944 and thought better of it, the brits went up to 60 tons in 1965, the rest of NATO did the same in 1980. The IS tanks are still (afaik) the heaviest tanks the russians ever built.

The NATO troika in the 80s (Abrams, Leopard and Challenger) all got their huge 120mm guns, layered chobham armour and their monster 1500 hp engines. Mobility, firepower and protection. My impression was always that they were built as part of a design and strategy decision back in the 1950s. That there was no real point in spending money on new tanks unless they were sufficiently better than the soviets to win the ground war. So they kept the post WWII tanks and upgraded them slightly.

[Capetan Mihali]

And I agree with Malthus, this has been informative. 

[grumbler]

Great post, Berkut, but I think you may not fully comprehend the bureaucratic side of design and production decisions.  In the case of the US, for instance, there were two agencies building AFVs:  the armor branch, and anti-tank branch.  The armor branch grew out of the cavalry trunk, and the anti-tank branch from the artillery trunk.  That they happened to converge on nominally similar designs: the M2/M3/M4 series for armor, and the M10/M18 series for tank destroyers, was a case of form following function, rather than any decision to produce similar vehicles with different strengths and weaknesses. Neither the armor nor the anti-tank branches ever considered giving way to the other, despite the results from the battlefield, because that would have wrecked the careers of the giving-way decision-makers themselves (abandoning the TD concept would have been a disaster for the TD guys brought into the armor branch; no way they could have competed for promotions and citations against guys on the "inside track") .  It kinda reminds me of Japanese Army versus Navy aircraft design and production during WW2, or the whole German issue of the Luftwaffe Land Forces versus Das Heer; you have adversarial bureaucracies locked into their own battles against each other, which are immediate and personally significant.  Battles against external national enemies are more remote and so less pressing and less personally significant.  God help the grunt!

[mongers]

It probably bears remembering that between the Tiger and the heaviest IS tanks at the end of WWII and the Challengers, Abrams and Leopard 2s of the 1980s (this applies to russian tanks til this day) the only operational tank to be significantly heavier than 40 tons was the british chieftain at 62 tons with it's 120mm rifled gun that didn't fire HEAT rounds. Basically the germans went up to 60 tons in 1944 and thought better of it, the brits went up to 60 tons in 1965, the rest of NATO did the same in 1980. The IS tanks are still (afaik) the heaviest tanks the russians ever built.

The NATO troika in the 80s (Abrams, Leopard and Challenger) all got their huge 120mm guns, layered chobham armour and their monster 1500 hp engines. Mobility, firepower and protection. My impression was always that they were built as part of a design and strategy decision back in the 1950s. That there was no real point in spending money on new tanks unless they were sufficiently better than the soviets to win the ground war. So they kept the post WWII tanks and upgraded them slightly.

There was an even heavier british tank, the Conqueror and that was already deployed by the mid-late 50s.

[PDH]

There was an even heavier british tank, the Conqueror and that was already deployed by the mid-late 50s.

The US also had it's IS-3 busting tank, the M103/T43 tank.  Both had 120mm guns, both were slow and less useful than the MBTs of the time.

[mongers]

There was an even heavier british tank, the Conqueror and that was already deployed by the mid-late 50s.

The US also had it's IS-3 busting tank, the M103/T43 tank.  Both had 120mm guns, both were slow and less useful than the MBTs of the time.

Indeed, I was just point out to Viking that the british got to the position of super heavy tank earlier than he thought and after having designed the fledging mbt centurion.

edit:
Now that I've looked up the US tank, it's like their blood brothers, very similar.

[dps]

To what extent did the MBT concept also need associated technical advances before it could mature?

The Centurion, for example, really comes into its own post-war with the Royal Ordnance L7 gun.

But for the right blend of mobility and protection, you also need powerful engines of some degree of efficiency.

I don't know the answer or if this is even a pertinent question, so would be very interested to hear thoughts.

That's what I had in mind when I said that MBT concept wasn't ready during the war.  I can't imagine the Allies being able to design a tank that satisfied all three criteria that Berkut mentioned.  At best you could satisfy two of them, which is why you had different classes of tanks based on which two out of three qualities they emphasized.

I also largely agree with Berkut, but I think it's important to keep in mind that the design impediments weren't primarily technological.

[Admiral Yi]

What was that embarrassing little tank the Brits unveiled at the Berlin victory parade?  Comet, something like that?

[grumbler]

There was an even heavier british tank, the Conqueror and that was already deployed by the mid-late 50s.

And the US M103 (almost the same tank, with the exact same gun and very similar weight and armor) that served in larger numbers and even longer in time.

But, we are quibbling; "Viking facts" are never based in actual facts.

Edit:  PDH beat me to the mention of the M103.

[grumbler]

What was that embarrassing little tank the Brits unveiled at the Berlin victory parade?  Comet, something like that?

The Comet was a fine pre-MBT tank.  Good gun, good armor for its time and role, reliable, and fast.  It was just too late to see much service. 

[Viking]

But, we are quibbling; "Viking facts" are never based in actual facts.

Yes, I was completely wrong because I didn't know about two novelty tanks who seem to have never had more than one full tank battalion deployed (in addition to small groups spread out among regular tank battalions).

Was I wrong in the argument I was making that regular tanks did not exceed 40 tons in general until the 1980s with the exception of the Chieftain? Was I wrong when I observed that those who had deployed heavy tanks for the most part stopped doing so?

[Neil]

The resources the British used on large tanks would have been better spent on completing the Lion-class battleships.

You know, it's funny how the Washington Treaty destroyed the British naval shipbuilding industry.  Still, I suppose it probably worked out better than having to build a fortune's worth of new battleships in the mid 1920s to defeat Japan and the US.

[Agelastus]

The resources the British used on large tanks would have been better spent on completing the Lion-class battleships.

You know, it's funny how the Washington Treaty destroyed the British naval shipbuilding industry.  Still, I suppose it probably worked out better than having to build a fortune's worth of new battleships in the mid 1920s to defeat Japan and the US.

The Great Depression did more damage to the naval shipyards when it killed the "keep the capability" subsidies.

[grumbler]

Yes, I was completely wrong because I didn't know about two novelty tanks who seem to have never had more than one full tank battalion deployed (in addition to small groups spread out among regular tank battalions).

Yes, you were completely wrong when you said that "the only operational tank to be significantly heavier than 40 tons was the british chieftain" given that there were tanks that did, in fact, weigh significantly more than 40 tons.  Weaselling won't get you around being wrong.

Was I wrong in the argument I was making that regular tanks did not exceed 40 tons in general until the 1980s with the exception of the Chieftain? Was I wrong when I observed that those who had deployed heavy tanks for the most part stopped doing so?

Those who deployed heavy tanks did so until 1974.  And, yes, you were wrong when you said that "regular tanks did not exceed 40 tons in general until the 1980s," given that the M48, M60, and Centurion all exceeded that weight. I'm not even sure why you are making this stuff up.  What point are you trying to make?