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HEY GAL posted:the fact that you people tried to sober up long enough to be a thing in the 30yw still amuses me Hey now, I've been sober for nearly two years now! They axed down my door and revoked my Danish card after a week  But yeah, you and everyone else. We fight well enough on a full tank, but nothing compared to a Russian.
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Dec 27, 2015 18:29
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spoiler: they're all terrible, all of them
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Dec 27, 2015 18:39
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Blut posted:I always wonder what would happen if a central government just granted autonomy to such provinces but cut all subsidies instantly - how long would the separatists remain in power in economic collapse? It's true for some separatist movements but not all. The more credible independence movements in places like Euskadi, Catalonia, or Scotland actually outperform the larger states of which they're currently part and could probably make their own way quite well, if not for the threat of exclusion from the EU and the Euro.
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Dec 27, 2015 21:10
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JcDent posted:Yep, Hingary is a legit (drunk phoneposting) typo, Rumania is the (silly) old way to spell it. I learned it from the ASL LP! So it was rum-mania...  Finland had a bunch of captured BT-7 light tanks and obsolete British hand down 114mm howitzers, so someone had the bright idea of combining those two elements into a cheap man's KV-2 bunker buster. This Frankenstein's monster was named BT-42. To fit the new gun the turret had to be enlargened, and all the extra weight strained the suspension so much that the new huge box turret could not be uparmoured and so it was vulnerable to Russian anti-tank rifles and anything above them. The gun optics and laying mechanisms were terrible amalgamations of systems from BT-7, 76mm M1902 light gun and the 114mm M1918 howitzer that provided poor visibility and made laying the gun slow, as the gunner could not adjust elevation and horizontal direction simultaneously. On the plus side, it had a powerful engine that made it really fast. But it was still a big HE lobber on tracks and Finland had uses for such tools, especially in destroying Soviet forward positions during the trench warfare phase of 1942-44. Combat trials were successful in that it could destroy designated targets quite well, but the supervising officer considered it overall a waste of resources and recommended a conversion to APCs instead. The project went ahead regardless and a Separate Tank Company of 14 BT-42 was formed as the Armoured Division didn't want them. Unfortunately someone thought that they could be used as tank destroyers and so the company was thrown to the defense of Viipuri in June 1944. Facing T-34's and IS-2's they had no chance: the gun was practically useless against armoured targets and aiming the gun was too slow. There also was no coaxial or bow machinegun, so the only anti-infantry close defense was to unbutton and spray bullets with a Suomi SMG. I'm just gonna quote jaegerplatoon.net here: quote:Finnish Army had hastily brought in 20th (Infantry) Brigade to defend the city in defensive positions earlier built in its eastern suburbs and Separate Tank Company was subjugated to this brigade for that task. 20th Brigade was inexperienced infantry brigade, which containing four infantry battalions and two field artillery battalions. The brigade was commanded by Colonel Armas Kemppi, who was capable officer, but like grand majority of Finnish officers he had very little experience about using armored vehicles. So it does not come as a surprise that apparently he did not grasp the difference in between tanks, assault guns or self-propelled howitzers – much less the differences in their tactical use. Hence once Lieutenant Sippel reported to his brigade headquarters and suggested that the nine remaining operational BT-42 assault guns of Separate Tank Company would take positions inside the city in Linnasaari Island and support the brigade with indirect fire, but his suggestion was denied. Instead Colonel Kemppi decided to spread out its BT-42 assault guns along the frontline and use them for direct-fire to boost up the (admittedly) poor antitank capability of his troops. When it came to Viipuri battle of June 1944, this proved to be just one of the many errors of judgment from Finnish Armed Forces GHQ and Colonel Kemppi. The brigade had arrived to Viipuri with very little ammunition and failed to acquire ammunition supply until too late. The battle of Viipuri is not called "the black day of Finnish army" without reason. But hey, anime! 
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Dec 27, 2015 21:35
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bewbies posted:spoiler: they're all terrible, all of them Why's that?
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Dec 27, 2015 21:45
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EvanSchenck posted:It's true for some separatist movements but not all. The more credible independence movements in places like Euskadi, Catalonia, or Scotland actually outperform the larger states of which they're currently part and could probably make their own way quite well, if not for the threat of exclusion from the EU and the Euro. Thats an optimistic view of Scotland, perhaps.
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Dec 27, 2015 22:18
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JaucheCharly posted:Afaik, they would not be a member of the EU anymore if they broke away. They had to reapply for membership, which needs to be approved by the European Commission and the Council of the European Union. The last one being the hard part, as they need not only 55% of the votes of the member states, but also the votes of the states representing 65% of the member's population. Any state dealing with a similar movement of separatism, will likely not agree to something like this. Well, if they're lucky we can convince the EU to become an actual federation of independent states, instead of independent states roleplaying a federation, then they could slip in even if some of us disagree. But yeah, looks like Catalonia and Corsica have the opposite problems of Scottland and Wales. If Britain exits the EU, Scottland and Wales would have no problem splitting and joining the EU, since the state most likely to veto their acception wouldn't be part of the EU anymore. 
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Dec 27, 2015 22:29
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Libluini posted:Well, if they're lucky we can convince the EU to become an actual federation of independent states, instead of independent states roleplaying a federation, then they could slip in even if some of us disagree. That wouldn't be lucky.
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Dec 27, 2015 22:37
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Why would these little bitty states go for amalgamating into one coherent mega-state if they were so keen on independence in the first place? I mean, I don't fully understand their reasons for independence in the first place, but that would seem to be working at cross purposes. I mean, that sort of voluntary unification of independent states happened with Germany, but only after centuries of cooperation and familiarity under the HRE and because Prussia spent a while gobbling up enough land to become the dominant state in the region anyways and they left out the other most powerful Germanic state.
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Dec 27, 2015 22:58
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States are not monolithic. There's always going to be subpopulations that want the security, freer trade, stability and global prestige of being part of a larger state, and subpopulations that want the sovereignty, exclusive access to resources, cultural/ethnic homogeneity, political dynamism of being a separate power. Over time the sizes of these populations shift.
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Dec 27, 2015 23:14
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i am in favor of many tiny states, and think there should be more germanies than there are right now
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Dec 27, 2015 23:15
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Personally I want there to be a global government one day, though there's a lot of work that needs to be done to make that work.
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Dec 27, 2015 23:16
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Fangz posted:Personally I want there to be a global government one day, though there's a lot of work that needs to be done to make that work. I don't know if this is relevant to the military history thread but I think global government is a terrible idea for the same reason I am a fan of relatively strong state governments in e.g. the US. Live in a state that supports your values or gently caress off to another state that does. You can't do that in a one-world government.
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Dec 27, 2015 23:24
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SlothfulCobra posted:Why would these little bitty states go for amalgamating into one coherent mega-state if they were so keen on independence in the first place? I mean, I don't fully understand their reasons for independence in the first place, but that would seem to be working at cross purposes. Because it gives them more power on their own matters. An independent Scotland would control how North Sea oil profits get distributed and if they want to have nukes on their soil, for instance. Likewise if independent and member of the European Union then Scotland would also have its very own representatives in EU. It's very much about identity as well, and EU doesn't want to culturally assimilate regions in the way that most central governments do - quite the opposite really.
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Dec 27, 2015 23:24
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Fangz posted:Personally I want there to be a global government one day, though there's a lot of work that needs to be done to make that work. So that's why you are reading this thread!
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Dec 27, 2015 23:25
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hogmartin posted:I don't know if this is relevant to the military history thread but I think global government is a terrible idea for the same reason I am a fan of relatively strong state governments in e.g. the US. Live in a state that supports your values or gently caress off to another state that does. You can't do that in a one-world government. I think you overstate the ease of people - especially the poor and oppressed - loving off to a different state and being welcome there. And understate the importance of a consistent policy that can't be exploited by people and companies that exist in-between them and can play them off against each other (indeed, I'd argue that the fact that the wealthy and their corporate creations can shift their assets whereever while the poor are mostly trapped makes the existence of this option of "leaving if you don't like it" more of a problem than a solution). And there's all too many cases of people in one country doing some dumb, selfish thing that dumps the consequences on to another, and not worrying about it because hey, that's not our country. But anyway, that's enough modern politics! Hogge Wild posted:So that's why you are reading this thread! Heheheh Fangz fucked around with this message at 23:54 on Dec 27, 2015 |
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Dec 27, 2015 23:50
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found this in a muster roll hehehe, 
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Dec 28, 2015 00:41
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HEY GAL posted:found this in a muster roll Hilariously, that castle not only has a funny name, the article also ends up explaining why the idea of a Ganerbenburg is a poo poo idea.
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Dec 28, 2015 01:06
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I am curious about the glorious military history of Hingaria.
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Dec 28, 2015 01:25
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Libluini posted:Hilariously, that castle not only has a funny name, the article also ends up explaining why the idea of a Ganerbenburg is a poo poo idea. edit: "the living room belongs to Schwartzenburg-Rothenfels but the foyer is Schwartzenburg-Rothenfels-Seyn territory, goddamnit" HEY GUNS fucked around with this message at 01:32 on Dec 28, 2015 |
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Dec 28, 2015 01:26
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bewbies posted:spoiler: they're all terrible, all of them Nonsense, it's the really cool looking ones that are terrible. Late response to "worst WW2 tank": I'm open to Italian/ Japanese tanks being terrible, because frankly I don't know very much about them. Still, T-35 / Panther I stand by. The Panther I've been reading a bit about simply because of EE's draft paper and that other paper posted here. The Panther is kinda wild in that you have a project that is viewed as very important by both the military and the Nazi party, and the Germans have some tank building experience, and maybe more importantly, a poo poo-ton of operational experience with tanks. They also have a extremely concrete goal for the new tank: "be better than the T-34." So despite all this, the Nazis gently caress up the Panther to an astonishing degree. It's to the point that for some flaws I was reading around just trying to figure out why, in the name of God why, were these flaws allowed to persist when they were completely crippling. Jobbo_Fett posted:Then again, that's because I don't care about faulty fuel lines or transmission issues. To be fair, if you don't care about mechanical reliability, I totally get why you'd disagree with me about the Panther. Though IMO that undercuts the point of the exercise, which is to identify the worst, most common tank. Jobbo_Fett posted:Panther is a decent design, there are far worse things out there. It had some potential, but the potential was utterly lost in execution. I know what you mean that if say, the Americans were given the task of making a Panther-like tank, it would be pretty good. Unfortunately for the Panther, the Nazis were in charge. Jobbo_Fett posted:I think its pretty well agreed on the T-34 is a good tank, but I'm not sure if people ignore or forget that it too had many teething issues at the beginning of its production life. True, and not just for the T-34, but the Soviets actually tried to fix these flaws. Part of why the Panther (IMO) remained terrible is that nobody even tried to fix these flaws. OK, so what are these flaws? Let's just go to switch to point form here. Let's consider the Panther using that Firepower, armor, mobility formula that the paper guy uses: Firepower [+] Panther's 75mm gun has good armor penetration and a high velocity shell. I don't know enough to compare it to other tanks of the time I SUMMON YOU, EE , or compare costs with other options, it did perform well in this role. [+] (And holy poo poo, this is worth underlining because this is like the only time Germany's strategic situation and the Panther actually meshes) the high speed of the round gave it a flat trajectory; thus making it easy for raw recruits to shoot accurately. [-] Traverse was weak (easily hung up on objects) and liable to not work on an angle, and also slow. This is partially a result of the weight of the large gun. [-] Not terribly good at supporting infantry. The high velocity round plus the muzzle break made the Panther a danger to troops not behind it. Not a deal-killer, but when the Pz.IV is better, a revision was needed. [-][- x 10] The Commander and even the loving loader get panoramic sights that are quite good, but the gunner gets his target sight alone, a total fuckup. In combat, the guy actually aiming/firing the gun is like a guy who's blind in one eye and the other has his high-powered rifle scope duct-taped to his head. On the move, this means it's going to take him a long time to pick out a target and fire. Avg target acquisition time was 45 sec, which meant the other guy almost always gets to shoot first. This means the Panther is useless on the offensive. This is a glaring, egregious flaw that should have been fixed, at the latest, after the initial D series. The fact such a dumb, bad situation was allowed to persist is damning. TL;DR - Had pretty good firepower, but this firepower was undermined by a stupid flaw in gunnery design. Mobility [+] Weight displacement was very good, even better than the Sherman. [+] Wide tracks big wheels made for very good off road performance. [+] While suspension was was very complex and somewhat maintenance intensive compared to peers, it worked quite well. Others will have to assess this tradeoff viz. other thanks. [-] Panther had generic problems with interleaved road wheels - mud/frozen mud/ice could cause wheels to jam. Like lots of other mobility stuff, it was maintenance-intensive. [-] Due to really bad decisions regarding fording, engine had persistent risks of fire. [-] High temps and poor ventilation necessitated complex cooling system, negating the whole point of a compact lightweight engine. [ - x 10] Final drive was a automotive disaster. Badly engineered in the first place, weight gains put extra strain, and final drive was 1) very fragile, and 2) would break anyway, on average 120 km. This is something else that should have been fixed at the latest after the initial D series. Once again, an egregious failure on the part of the Germans. This completely undermines the positives in mobility the Panther had, and made sure that any unit with Panthers not moving by rail would leave units behind. [-] When final drive broke, repair necessitated removing with a crane 1)the entire transmission unit 2) through the top of the tank. [-] General drive-train fragility necessitated careful driving, hard to do with 1) raw recruits 2) under fire. TL;DR - mobility like firepower was promising but completely undermined by final drive issues. So the Panther in this respect was far worse than the T-34, or the Pz. IV. Armor Probably the Panther's worst aspect. Even its single virtue imposed negative externalities elsewhere. [+] Forward armor was sloped and thick enough to resist common tank rounds of the era [-] Unfortunately, due to German manufacturing/material flaws, metal was brittle, and would spall (possibly killing the crew) and crack, meaning it wasn't really working as armor anymore. The former was a flaw shared by many tanks, but the latter was a unique German problem [-]this brittleness meant that damaged panthers were unfix-able in the field, unlike peers (comparisons would be very useful here) and had to be abandoned. An especially bad thing when you have more problems making tanks compared to your foes. [-] Side armor was hilariously thin (comparisons with peers useful) and easily penetrated. [-] In a bad flaw, the side armor concealed the magazines for the main guns, which meant the easily made side penetration would kill tank/crew in a fire/explosion. Shermans had a similar problem during Normandy, but this was a operational mistake, not a inherent design flaw. [-] Unexpected front weight negatively impacted mobility/ exacerbated the already bad final drive problem TL;DR - Aside from a single strength, the armor on a Panther was entirely screwed up. All this added up to a tank that broke constantly, couldn't protect its crew, and hampered the crew's ability to kill the other guy. Now I'm sure that the Japanese has some miserable tankettes that had a machine pistol in the turret and bamboo armor, but, I'm pretty sure the highest levels of Imperial Japan didn't see said tankette as a very important project that was critical to their war effort. And that's why the Panther is bad.
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Dec 28, 2015 01:56
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HEY GAL posted:a castle operated by more than one noble family at once may be the reductio ad absurdam of the HRE's deal So we're basically talking this, but with pikes, right? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aolMV0oNCBE
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Dec 28, 2015 02:23
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Trin Tragula posted:So we're basically talking this, but with pikes, right? edit: I suppose it's only an accident of history that our word for what the HRE does is "Balkanization," not "Germanization" HEY GUNS fucked around with this message at 02:40 on Dec 28, 2015 |
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Dec 28, 2015 02:34
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Nenonen posted:But it was still a big HE lobber on tracks and Finland had uses for such tools, especially in destroying Soviet forward positions during the trench warfare phase of 1942-44. Combat trials were successful in that it could destroy designated targets quite well, but the supervising officer considered it overall a waste of resources and recommended a conversion to APCs instead. You can't say that and not post a picture of said APC.  That's right, the soldiers go into that box two meters off the ground. The box is made of wood.
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Dec 28, 2015 03:26
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When you said 'armoured personnel carrier', you did not specify *where* the armour would go, did you? 
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Dec 28, 2015 03:30
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Ensign Expendable posted:You can't say that and not post a picture of said APC. It'll get them there dead or alive!
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Dec 28, 2015 03:40
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Ensign Expendable posted:You can't say that and not post a picture of said APC. So what was this thing called? Are there any pictures of it, or was it a 'paper panzer' ?
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Dec 28, 2015 03:52
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Panther tank had 40mm side armor M4 had 38mm (to 45mm on some variants? but no mention of which ones) T-34 had 45mm M4 had it at the vertical, and also had ammo stored in the sponsons so I don't know why that's classified as operational and not design.
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Dec 28, 2015 03:57
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It's a hunting platform. You put two dozen Simo Häyhä's in it and roll through the Soviet hordes.
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Dec 28, 2015 04:04
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Jobbo_Fett posted:Panther tank had 40mm side armor The panther is 33% heavier than both those tanks and has marginally better (or worse!) side armor than each. It's not complicated.
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Dec 28, 2015 04:07
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Jobbo_Fett posted:M4 had it at the vertical, and also had ammo stored in the sponsons so I don't know why that's classified as operational and not design. In Normandy somebody got the bright idea for tankers to carry extra rounds in the cabin and it meant it was way easier for a penetrating shot to cause a fire.
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Dec 28, 2015 04:08
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Devlan Mud posted:The panther is 33% heavier than both those tanks and has marginally better (or worse!) side armor than each. It's not complicated. K, I'll make sure to use this metric for all tank comparisons from now on. Is it heavier? If yes, check side armor. Nebakenezzer posted:In Normandy somebody got the bright idea for tankers to carry extra rounds in the cabin and it meant it was way easier for a penetrating shot to cause a fire. But you still kept rounds in the sponson which is a terrible design flaw.
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Dec 28, 2015 04:17
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Devlan Mud posted:The panther is 33% heavier than both those tanks and has marginally better (or worse!) side armor than each. It's not complicated. Centurion had 50mm, so did Conqueror and M103. All of those are significantly heavier than any Panther. The side armor on a Panther is definitely not terrific, but it's not unusually thin either, and it's still thicker than the side armor on anything it replaced. Placing ammo in the sponsons was pretty common at the time, simply because it's dead space otherwise and it's very easy and fast for the loader to reach. Kafouille fucked around with this message at 04:20 on Dec 28, 2015 |
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Dec 28, 2015 04:17
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Jobbo_Fett posted:K, I'll make sure to use this metric for all tank comparisons from now on. What is the constraining factor of the tank design? Weight? If so, see what was gotten by increasing weight. Checks out to me. It's really more the stowage location though, those sponson racks were bad enough the US first used applique armor and then wet ammo racks to mitigate resulting risks.
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Dec 28, 2015 04:19
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xthetenth posted:What is the constraining factor of the tank design? Weight? If so, see what was gotten by increasing weight. The constraint on tank design is cost, most of the time. Absolute weight is relevant only on bridges or for global shipping, the real issue is ground pressure and power to weight for mobility purposes. And Panther had a pretty decent power to weight, even with the derated engines, and very good peak ground pressure meaning it didn't tear ground up or sink into it very much.
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Dec 28, 2015 04:24
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That long winded posted seems rather biased against the Panther. Long story short, If I had to play a real life simulation and was told to pick any world war 2 tank to fight against other WW2 tanks, a late war panther would be near the top of my list, and every Japanese or Italian model would be at the bottom.
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Dec 28, 2015 04:28
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Kafouille posted:The constraint on tank design is cost, most of the time. Absolute weight is relevant only on bridges or for global shipping, the real issue is ground pressure and power to weight for mobility purposes. And Panther had a pretty decent power to weight, even with the derated engines, and very good peak ground pressure meaning it didn't tear ground up or sink into it very much. Absolute weight is pretty important for the suspension design. The primary factor behind the main flaw of a unit is very much the constraint, and shaving it down is a good idea. Even then, the whole weight->larger engine/suspension and other components ->larger volume->larger armor area spiral is a serious constraint. You could just as easily say that weight isn't a constraint on any ship designs except for the treaty designs and yet naval architects habitually talk in terms of what their design choices cost in weight. Saint Celestine posted:That long winded posted seems rather biased against the Panther. And if I had to play a real life simulation and was told to win WW2, I'd be prioritizing very different things than one where I'd have to fight like they fought in WW2, and even more different from tank duels. xthetenth fucked around with this message at 04:34 on Dec 28, 2015 |
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Dec 28, 2015 04:32
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Kafouille posted:Centurion had 50mm, so did Conqueror and M103. All of those are significantly heavier than any Panther. The side armor on a Panther is definitely not terrific, but it's not unusually thin either, and it's still thicker than the side armor on anything it replaced. 
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Dec 28, 2015 04:33
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The M103's 51mm side armor on the hull is also at 40 degrees, which really helps it from the side. Part of the problem with the Panther's armor is that the front hull could have shaved off about 20mm and still be almost as good, and take some needed weight off of it. Oh, and a pretty mediocre HE round, a problem that the 76mm M1 had as well.
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Dec 28, 2015 04:35
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| # ? Jun 2, 2024 20:35 |
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Kafouille posted:The constraint on tank design is cost, most of the time. Absolute weight is relevant only on bridges or for global shipping, the real issue is ground pressure and power to weight for mobility purposes. And Panther had a pretty decent power to weight, even with the derated engines, and very good peak ground pressure meaning it didn't tear ground up or sink into it very much. Weight also pushes into a bunch of other factors as well. - It increases fuel consumption, which hurts because Germany was running out of oil. - It puts stress on components in the transmission, which decreases reliability - It consumes more resources, in particular rare metals for alloys in the armour - It becomes more physically awkward to build and maintain
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Dec 28, 2015 04:35
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