tanks

1. Design and development

Tracked Armoured Fighting Vehicles (AFVs, called tanks by the British) were first used in battle in 1916 as a weapon system incorporating firepower (two 57 mm./2.2 in. guns plus machine-guns), protection (10 mm./.39 in. armour plate) and mobility (a 105 hp engine driving endless tracks to give a maximum speed of 6.4 kph/4 mph across country and obstacles). But after the First World War the original British 28-ton, rhomboid tanks were replaced by lighter types armed with anti-tank guns up to 50 mm. (1.95 in.) calibre mounted in revolving turrets, with 14 to 20 mm. (.54 to .78 in.) homogenous steel armour, speeds up to 29 kph (18 mph), and marginally improved mechanical reliability. Most were modelled on the Vickers Medium of 1922 and were similar in layout to Second World War tanks (see table for principal types).

Experiments in tank warfare during the 1920s and 1930s centred on infantry support tactics, long-range so-called independent operations, and tank versus tank action, all controlled by radio communications. The first role called for ‘infantry tanks’, proof against existing anti-tank weapons but slower than those for the second role which demanded tanks with lighter armour and a wide radius of action. The size of anti-tank weapon dictated a tank's size—the bigger the gun, the larger the turret; therefore the heavier the vehicle and the more powerful the engine. But increased complexity in search of a universal machine, capable of fulfilling all roles, only placed extreme demands on technical feasibility and manufacturing capacity—as well as cost when governments were insisting upon cheapness. Compromise ruled.

British and French tanks in 1939 were either very light (up to 10 tons), fast, and machine-gun armed; slower 20-ton mediums with light armour and an anti-tank gun; and very slow 30-ton machines armoured against 37 mm. (1.44 in.) high velocity (HV) guns. The Germans also built light tanks but no heavies yet; instead their mediums, the Mark III with a 37 mm. gun and Mark IV with a short 75 mm. (2.9 in.) piece firing only shells and smoke, had only 30 mm. (1.17 in.) armour, or less, compared with opponents up to 60 mm. (2.34 in.). The Soviets, on the other hand, built light and heavy tanks (mostly based on British Vickers designs) and 48 kph (30 mph) mediums based on the designs of the American J. Walter Christie (whom the British also copied for one of their medium types, the so-called cruiser tanks). Both the Japanese and Italians were influenced by pre-war Vickers designs and concentrated on infantry support vehicles which, in due course, fell well below the standards of other major combatants in all respects.

After gaining experience in the battles of 1940, the Germans and British accelerated the classic gun versus armour contest. The first German reaction was to equip their infantry, instead of tanks, with the improved 50 mm. anti-tank gun. The British aimed to mount 57 mm. guns and also fit 80 mm. (3.1 in.) armour to their newest medium tanks. The Soviets meanwhile, in great secrecy, produced in quantity in 1941 two revolutionary models—the 43-ton KV 1B, with 110 mm. (4.3 in.) armour, and the 26-ton Christie medium T34/76A with 45 mm. (1.75 in.) sloped armour. The former was proof against the German 88 mm. (3.4 in.) dual-purpose gun and both were armed with the dual-purpose 76 mm. (2.9 in.) gun. These tanks shook the Germans into emergency up-armouring and arming of their Mark III and IV mediums, and hastening the design and production of the 56-ton Tiger I Tank, with 88 mm. gun, and the 45-ton Panther with an extra-long 75 mm. gun.

Tanks: Armoured fighting vehicles, 1939-45

2. Tank warfare

Tracked Armoured Fighting Vehicles (AFVs) made their battle debut in September 1916 during the First World War. At first they were used as auxiliaries to infantry, operating within the limits of their slow speed, short range, and poor mech anical reliability. But as improvements were made Colonel J. F. C. Fuller of the British Tank Corps advanced ideas for penetration in depth of the enemy lines by armoured forces, supported by aircraft: a concept he expanded in his celebrated Plans 1918 and 1919 which were blueprints for blitzkrieg (see also land power).

In the 1920s, while most armies regarded AFVs as infantry adjuncts alone, the British experimented with the so-called ‘independent’ role of all-arms mechanized forces, in which the tank was the dominant weapon and from which horses were excluded. In the 1930s, while the French and the Soviets were forming mixed divisions either for infantry support or in the traditional cavalry roles of reconnaissance and exploitation of success, the Germans (inspired by Guderian) copied the British by creating armoured (Panzer) divisions. Armoured divisions were organized for all phases of land warfare—reconnaissance, advance to contact, attack, exploitation, defence, and withdrawal by day and night. Ideally, their combat vehicles were to be fully armoured, although this, for economic and industrial reasons, was never achieved. Essentially, however, their flexibility and ability to concentrate rapidly against decisive points, was dependent upon efficient radio communications enabling fluent command and control with maximum economy.

Tank tactics at their most sophisticated, under Guderian's tutelage, revolved around close co-operation by tanks, armoured cars, infantry, artillery, and engineers within ad hoc battle groups, supported by aircraft. After careful reconnaissance they would seek out and attack the opposing side's weak spots to occupy vital ground. This ground they would then hold with infantry and anti-tank weapons as a pivot for further offensive action. Although most tanks were armed for tank versus tank combat, it was hoped to provoke the opposing side into expending tanks against the pivot's anti-tank guns. This conserved the more valuable tanks to spearhead thrusts into their opponents' rear with mobile columns, logistically self-contained for three or four days, which were aimed at strategic and politically sensitive objectives.

In the Polish campaign of September 1939 these methods proved themselves, although the Germans found (as the British and French had realized when providing special infantry support tanks) that the ordinary infantry divisions needed AFVs to stiffen their offensive spirit. Prior to the German invasion of western Europe in May 1940 (see FALL GELB), therefore, a number of armoured assault guns (self-propelled guns) were produced for infantry support—with a significant outcome. For thereafter assault guns, with tanks, played a dominant role in tank warfare, particularly in tank versus tank combat as far larger, high velocity guns were needed to defeat improved armour in the classic gun versus armour race.

Tank warfare dominated campaigns in open terrain—in western Europe, the Eastern Front, the Western Desert, and North Africa—where freedom of movement was least impeded and static defences were easily outflanked and logistical support relatively easy to sustain. It was also effective in the mountains during the Balkan campaign in 1941 when the Yugoslavs, Greeks, and British were hopelessly outclassed. The tank thrived against smaller opponents, even in defensively favourable surroundings, but this superiority tended to diminish once forces of rough equality were pitted against each other in built-up areas, such as Stalingrad, or in adverse terrain.

As the Axis forces lost the initiative after 1942, and their initial offensive superiority was eroded, they developed highly effective anti-tank defences. These were founded upon the maximum utilization of employing counter-strokes within a framework of strategically located static defences keyed to natural or man-made obstacles. The laying of mines, to delay tanks and channel them into killing zones dominated by artillery and anti-tank guns, meant expensive and time-consuming Allied set-piece attacks by all arms; and attacks also frequently needed specialized AFVs to create gaps in minefields, cross water obstacles, and demolish obstructions and strong points (see engineers, 1(d)).

Having at last refined the blitzkrieg technique, the Allies were frequently compelled to indulge in attritional warfare to wear down their opponents' tank and logistical strength before achieving the breakthrough and thrusting enormous armoured forces deep into their opponents' rear. The second battle of El Alamein, successive Soviet offensives from Stalingrad onwards, and the latter phase of the Normandy campaign are outstanding examples of tank warfare in the modern style—offensives which as often as not were halted more by logistical factors (notably fuel shortage) than by force of arms.

Notwithstanding the magnetic drama of massed armoured forces in motion, the effects of small groups or even individual tanks in special situations must not be overlooked. On narrow frontages, such as the jungle trails of Burma, the effect of a single tank pushed forward by immense engineer effort, could be as decisive as a regiment of 60 tanks in a European setting. Regardless of improved anti-tank measures, the mobility, firepower, and protection of tanks, regardless of numbers, was as potent in 1945 as in 1939.

Kenneth Macksey

Bibliography

Macksey, K. , Tank versus Tank (London, 1991).
—— Guderian (London, 1992).
Orgorkiewicz, R. , Armour (London, 1960).

Tanks. The tank, invented in World War I out of military necessity, immediately captured the popular imagination. The machine's raw power, gadgetry, speed, and size, along with the secrecy with which it was developed, created for it a mystique. Initially, the very name tank was employed as part of a deception to shroud its true nature as a weapon.

The British first developed this mobile, armored war machine in a program initiated by E. D. Swinton and Maurice Hankey; Winston S. Churchill, then first lord of the Admiralty, also supported the program. The first British tank, the Mark I, was a rhomboid‐shaped, tracked heavy vehicle weighing 26 tons, with two 57mm guns and a speed of 3.7 mph. On 15 September 1916, at the Battle of the Somme, after horrific infantry losses, forty‐nine Mark I tanks were sent in to support infantry attack across no‐man's‐land. Early critics charged they were committed in insufficient numbers to make a difference. In September 1917, the French introduced their Renault FT 17, a smaller (6‐ton), lighter‐armed (one 37mm gun), faster (4.8 mph) tank, with what became the classic tank design of a swivel turret. The Americans used mainly Renault tanks in France.

During the interwar years, the limited role assigned to tanks by U.S. infantry generals, as well as budget limitations, imposed serious constraints on design and development in the United States. J. Walter Christie, an American automotive engineer, developed a suspension system that allowed tanks high speed and overland performance. His M1919 tank, which evolved into the M1928/1930 or T‐3 medium tank, weighed 9 tons, carried a 37mm gun, and attained speeds of 27 mph. But the U.S. Army failed to continue Christie's contract.

In contrast, the Soviet Union used Christie's design and production techniques to develop by 1939–40 the T‐34, a highly reliable and balanced tank weighing 29 tons, armed with a 76.2mm gun, and reaching a maximum speed of 34 mph. It became the Red Army's main battle tank in World War II and was used by North Korean forces in the Korean War.

In Great Britain, military theorists J. F. C. Fuller and Basil H. Liddell Hart envisioned a small but mobile army with tanks as the centerpiece. After many problems, the British introduced the Crusader (22 tons, 57mm gun, and 26 mph maximum speed), used early in World War II. But defects and battle experience led to its replacement in 1943 by the Cromwell (31 tons, 75mm gun, 31 mph).

French experimentation before 1939 developed the Heavy B (CHAR) tank, probably the best in the world at the onset of World War II. Huge for its day, it was heavily armored, weighing 34 tons, had a 75mm gun mounted on the front hull and a 47mm gun on the turret, but sacrificed maximum speed to only 17 mph. The tank's firepower and armor advantage were, however, offset in 1940 by French doctrinal and organizational failures.

In September 1939, when the German Army invaded Poland, it had not yet accepted Gen. Heinz Guderian's ideas about armored warfare and used tankette‐type vehicles more suitable for training. But before invading France in May 1940, the Germans achieved great advances in doctrine, unit reorganization, and tank manufacture, incorporating superior Panzer tanks (23 tons, 24 mph, and guns increased from 37mm in the Panzer III to 75mm in the Panzer IV tanks). To counter the Soviet's effective T‐34s, the Germans produced the Panzer V. This “Panther” tank, probably the best overall German tank, weighed 50 tons in later versions, with speeds of up to 28 mph and armed with a 75mm gun.

By 1942, the Germans fielded the Tiger tank, which challenged established ideas about armored warfare. Despite problems in maneuverability, serviceability, and speed (23 mph on roads, 12 mph cross‐country), this heavy tank provided extraordinary armor protection (63 tons) and firepower with its 88mm gun.

In the United States, the M4‐A Sherman replaced the awkward Grant early in World War II to become the main American battle tank. More than 45,000 of these reliable, rugged, and versatile medium tanks were produced for the U.S. Army, as well for Great Britain and the Soviet Union. The early model weighed 33 tons, had a speed of 23 mph, and was armed with a 75mm gun. Subsequent modifications in the A‐3 increased weight to 35 tons, speed to 29 mph, and the gun to 76.2mm. Though the Sherman was no match individually with any German tank, and its gasoline rather than diesel fuel was highly explosive, it proved highly successful, due to the numbers committed and its reliability. In various forms Shermans were used by the United States in the Korean War and by the Israel Defense Force in the Six‐Day War of 1967 when a “Super Sherman” was mounted with a 105mm gun.

In 1945, the British produced a remarkable tank based on their war experiences, the Centurion, which became the backbone of British armored forces for a quarter of a century. This tank was noted for its reliability and proved itself in combat in the Korean War. The Centurion I mounted a 17‐pound gun and was produced in thirteen versions, the last manufactured in Israel. It was considered the best all‐around tank in the West in the 1950s and 1960s. The final Israeli version weighed 54 tons, sported a 105mm gun, and traveled at 21 mph.

Tank design was revolutionized in 1945 by the new Soviet JS‐3 Stalin heavy tank. This eventually evolved to the T‐10 heavy in the 1950s. Its design allowed a tank of 51 tons at 23 mph and supported armament of a 122mm gun. During the Cold War, the JS‐3's low, sleek design was perpetuated by the West German Leopard, the French AMX 30, and the British Chieftain. The same turtle turret design characterized the Soviets' medium tanks, evolving from the 1950s through the 1970s from T‐54/55, T‐62, and T‐64 to T‐80. Weight increased from 42 to 46 tons, speed from 31 to 46 mph, and armament from 100mm to 114mm and finally 125mm on the T‐64 and T‐80.

The United States pursued a different design approach. Its M‐48 (1952) and M‐60 (1960) main battle tanks sacrificed low weight and silhouette in favor of an excellent 105mm gun system and reliability. The M60A‐3 version weighed 57 tons and attained 30 mph.

In 1973, man‐packed wire‐guided missiles caused massive tank losses in the Arab‐Israeli War, which, along with NATO's new “Active Defense” doctrine demanding high‐speed lateral movement, resulted in major changes in tank tactics and development. When first produced in the mid‐1970s, the U.S. Army's M‐1 Abrams tank weighed 68 tons and was unique in using a multifuel turbine power plant and innovative suspension system allowing speeds over 45 mph. Initially armed with the reliable M‐68 105mm gun, the Abrams in its subsequent models increased combat weight and armament to mount a smoothbore 120mm gun. The Abrams proved its technological superiority in NATO war games and in actual battle during the Persian Gulf War.

In the 1990s, the tank of the future was being designed using such techniques as automatic loaders to reduce crew size, more efficient power plants, new reactive armor to defeat larger gun size and anti‐tank missiles, and special armor to increase protection and reduce weight for faster deployment.
[See also Armored Vehicles; Army Combat Branches: Armor; Tank Destroyers.]

Bibliography

Ralph E. Jones,, George H. Rarey,, and and Robert J. Icks , The Fighting Tanks Since 1916, 1969.
Duncan Crow and and Robert J. Icks , Encyclopedia of Tanks, 1975.
Chris Elliot and and Peter Chamberlain , The Great Tanks, 1975.
R. E. Simpkin , Tank Warfare, 1979.
Christopher F. Foss , Jane's Main Battle Tanks, 1983.
Richard M. Ogorkiewicz , Technology of Tanks, Vol. 1, 1991.
Christopher Chant , World Encyclopaedia of the Tank, 1994.

George J. Mordica II

military tank armored vehicle having caterpillar traction and armed with machine guns, cannon, rockets, or flame throwers. The tank, together with the airplane, opened up modern warfare, which had been immobilized and stalemated by the use of rifled guns (see mechanized warfare ). It was developed by the British and first employed in World War I in the battle of Flers-Courcellette, on the Somme (Sept., 1916), but it was used piecemeal, without any overriding strategy, and seemed a failure. In Nov., 1917, the tank achieved a major success at Cambrai, when 300 British tanks made a dawn attack on a 6-mi (9.7-km) front and shattered the German defenses.

Before World War II tanks and tank tactics were greatly improved, and in the first campaign of that war German tank armies conquered Poland in less than a month. Whole armored divisions and corps of tanks were soon formed on both sides. In mass tank battles in Europe and N Africa the tide often tended toward the side with the most effective use of armored units. Among the great armor commanders were Erwin Rommel and George Patton . There were also specialized tanks for amphibious landings and clearing mines. Antitank weapons were developed, such as bazookas, armor-piercing shells, recoilless rifles, and antitank missiles, as well as airplanes armed with rockets and bombs.

Since World War II the basic features of tanks and tank tactics have remained unchanged, but there have been refinements such as reactive armor that explodes out when hit, laser rangefinders, automatic loading, and computer systems for fire control and navigation. Antitank weapons have also been greatly improved; they now include specialized munitions capable of attacking dozens of tanks at once that are delivered by artillery or aircraft, as well as powerful infantry weapons. Tanks are particularly effective in desert fighting, as demonstrated by their use by the Israeli military and in the Persian Gulf War .

Bibliography: See B. H. Liddell Hart, The Tanks (1959); D. Orgill, The Tank (1970); H. C. B. Rogers, Tanks in Battle (1972); D. Jeffries, Battle Kings (1987); P. Wright, Tank (2002).

tank / tangk/ • n. 1. a large receptacle or storage chamber, esp. for liquid or gas. ∎  the container holding the fuel supply in a motor vehicle. ∎  a receptacle with transparent sides in which to keep fish; an aquarium. 2. a heavy armored fighting vehicle carrying guns and moving on a continuous articulated metal track. 3. inf. a cell in a police station or jail. • v. 1. [intr.] fill the tank of a vehicle with fuel: the cars stopped to tank up. ∎  (be/get tanked up) inf. drink heavily; become drunk: they get tanked up before the game. 2. [intr.] inf. fail completely, esp. at great financial cost. ∎  [tr.] inf. (in sports) deliberately lose or fail to finish (a game): the lackluster performance prompted speculation that he tanked the second set. DERIVATIVES: tank·ful / -ˌfoŏl/ n. (pl. -fuls) . tank·less adj.

tank

tank Tracked, armoured vehicle mounting a single primary weapon, usually an artillery piece, and one or more machine guns. Modern tanks have an enclosed, fully revolving turret and are heavily armoured; main battle tanks weigh from 35 to 50 tonnes and usually have a crew of four. Developed in great secrecy by the British during World War I, tanks were first employed at the Battle of the Somme (1916).

tank1 in India, reservoir or water for irrigation, etc.; artificial receptacle for liquids in large quantities. XVII. — Indian vernacular word such as Gujarati ṭākū, Marathi ṭākē.
Hence tanker vessel for conveying oil. XX.

tank n. a heavy armored fighting vehicle carrying guns and moving on a continuous articulated metal track.
from the use of tank as a secret code word during manufacture in 1915.

tank2 armoured military vehicle. XX.
So named for reasons of secrecy.

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