Armoured Warfare: A Military, Political and Global History 9781441179180, 9781441142504, 9781474217736, 9781441198136

Citation preview

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ARMOURED WARFARE

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ARMOURED WARFARE A MILITARY, POLITICAL AND GLOBAL HISTORY

Alaric Searle

Bloomsbury Academic An imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

LON DON • OX F O R D • N E W YO R K • N E W D E L H I • SY DN EY

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Bloomsbury Academic An imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc 50 Bedford Square 1385 Broadway London New York WC1B 3DP NY 10018 UK  USA www.bloomsbury.com BLOOMSBURY and the Diana logo are trademarks of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc First published 2017 © Alaric Searle, 2017 Alaric Searle has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as Author of this work. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publishers. No responsibility for loss caused to any individual or organization acting on or refraining from action as a result of the material in this publication can be accepted by Bloomsbury or the author. British Library Cataloguing-​in-​Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. ISBN: HB: 978-​1-​4 411-​7918-​0 PB: 978-​1-​4 411-​4250-​4 ePDF: 978-​1-​4 411-​5 805-​5 ePub: 978-​1-​4 411-​9 813-​6 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Searle, Alaric, 1962– author. Title: Armoured warfare: a military, political and global history / Alaric Searle. Description: London; New York: Bloomsbury Academic, [2017] | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2016029664| ISBN 9781441179180 (hardback) | ISBN 9781441142504 (pbk.) Subjects: LCSH: Armored vehicles, Military–History. | Armored troops–History. | Tank warfare–History. Classification: LCC UG446.5 .S369 2017 | DDC 358.1/84–dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016029664 Cover Design by Catherine Wood Cover Image © Rentmeester/​The LIFE Picture Collection/​Getty Images Typeset by Newgen Knowledge Works (P) Ltd., Chennai, India

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This book is dedicated to the CMIH Family, and to those who helped defend what had been built up, when the forces of Mordor sought to destroy us.

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CONTENTS

List of Photographs List of Maps Preface Abbreviations Introduction

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1 The new warfare: The First World War, 1914–​18

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2 Innovation versus stagnation: The interwar period, 1919–​39

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3 Blitzkrieg: The initial German armoured successes, 1939–​41

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4 Quality versus mass: The Soviet-​German War, 1941–​45

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5 Difficult terrain: Deserts, mountains, hedgerows, jungles, 1940–​45

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6 The Cold War (I): Armour in Korea, Indo-​China and Vietnam

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7 The Cold War (II): The central European battlefield

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8 The Arab-​Israeli wars, 1948–​2006

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9 Iraq and the Gulf wars, 1980–​2016

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10 The ‘political history’ of the tank

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Conclusion

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Notes Bibliography Index

217 240 259

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PHOTOGRAPHS

1 Medium A Whippet tank on the Western Front, 1918. Royal New Zealand Returned and Services’ Association, World War 1914–​1918. Ref: 1/​2-​013536-​G. Alexander Turnbull Library, Wellington, NZ. http://​natlib.govt.nz/​records/​23063821. 27 2 Nationalist Panzer I tanks advancing on Bilbao, June 1937. Courtesy of Dr James Corum and the von Richthofen Family. 50 3 French Char B1 captured by the Germans, May 1940. Creative Commons: https://​commons.wikimedia.org/​wiki/​File:B1_​bis_​tank_​260_​ Ouragan_​Guise_​1940.jpg?uselang=en-​gb. 61 4 The formidable Tiger I tank. New Zealand. Department of Internal Affairs. War History Branch: Ref: DA-​09611. Alexander Turnbull Library, Wellington, NZ. http://​natlib.govt.nz/​records/​22867465. 82 5 Sherman M4 tanks advancing, Northern Italy (1944/​45). Courtesy of the Tank Museum, Bovington. 99 6 US Army M113 in South Vietnam (around 1966). Courtesy of the Tank Museum, Bovington. 121 7 T-​55 tanks during stand-​off at Checkpoint Charlie, 28 October 1961. Creative Commons: http://​10otb.ru/​content/​history/​berlin/​1961_​ friedrichstr_​1%20.html. 148 8 IDF Sho’t Centurions on the Golan Heights, October 1973. Creative Commons: photo taken by Nir Keren Tzvi, Yom Kippur War (October 1973), in the Valley of Tears. 163 9 An abandoned Iraqi T-​62, Persian Gulf War, 1991. Courtesy of the Tank Museum, Bovington. 180 10 Mark V tanks in the Lord Mayor’s Procession, London November 1918. Royal New Zealand Returned and Services’ Association. Ref: 1/​2-​014078-​ G. Alexander Turnbull Library, Wellington, NZ. http://​natlib.govt.nz/​ records/​22716440. 196

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MAPS

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Battle of Cambrai, November/December 1917 Battle of France, May/​June 1940 The German invasion of Russia, 1941 The Cold War: The opposing forces in central Europe The Six-​Day War, 1967: The Israeli advance in the Sinai US Army advance on Baghdad, March/April 2003

The maps were prepared by Amanti Lulo.

23 59 75 136 158 186

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PREFACE

Many books have been written on the history of armoured warfare, still more on the technology of fighting vehicles –​not just tanks, but every conceivable type of tracked vehicle. It is, therefore, extremely surprising that there has been to date no single-​volume history which provides an overview of the subject throughout the twentieth century and beyond. There are, of course, a number of works which consider specific aspects of what is often referred to as ‘the history of the tank’, or ‘combined arms warfare’. While scholarly and military journals continue to publish articles on many aspects of the history of armoured warfare, a university student taking a military history or strategic studies course will search in vain for one book which provides a comprehensive introduction. While teaching a course on the history of armoured warfare at the University of Salford over several years, I became only too aware of this gap in military literature. All I could do was to point my students towards several different works which purported to provide a survey. But each of these was either too unsystematic to provide a real introduction or focused on events during one particular era, or in one particular country. It is in response to the lack of a complete history of armour that this book has been written. While a one-​volume study of such a vast subject will inevitably contain many omissions, whether these are battles or vehicles, the aim here is to consider ‘armour’ as far as possible from a global perspective. As this work is intended to provide a thorough overview of the role and development of armour for those studying the history of land warfare at university level, it has an extensive bibliography to allow the reader to pursue specific subjects in more detail. While it is common in books of this nature to avoid using references and provide a guide to further reading at the end of each chapter, in the case of this work, however, references appeared to be a more useful tool. Although not every piece of information will directly match an individual endnote, the intention is to steer the reader through some of the most important literature on each theme. Archival material and printed primary sources such as field manuals have been referenced as well, since they provide additional insights and fill gaps in the existing literature. In the course of researching this subject, and this book specifically, I  must record my indebtedness to three individuals who I have unfortunately never had the pleasure of meeting, but whose writing on armour has been of immense value. David Fletcher, George F. Hofmann and Steven J. Zaloga are three writers who combine deep technical knowledge and understanding of armoured vehicles with the perceptive insights of first-​ rate historians. This would have been a much poorer book had the publications of these unsung masters of armour history not been available to me.

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Preface

In writing this study, I have been well supported by an understanding publisher; my thanks are due to Emma Goode and Claire Lipscomb in particular. Dr Steven Main provided material on armour in the Red Army, Dr Markus Pöhlmann on the German Army. Drafts have been read and ably critiqued by my colleagues in Salford –​Dr James S. Corum, Dr Brian Hall and Michael Cubbin. The final draft was read in detail by Prof. John L. S. Daley of Pittsburgh State University who made many useful suggestions. I have received continual insights through teaching this subject to students at the University of Salford. The greatest debt I owe, however, is to my family (Angelika, Chiara, Sean), who tolerated my continual absences from home life not only during the ‘normal academic teaching weeks’ (if there is such a thing anymore), but at weekends and in holiday periods as well, as I tried to finish this book alongside many other tasks. Any errors of fact or judgement are, of course, mine alone. Salford, March 2016

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ABBREVIATIONS

AAV ACAV AFV APC APFSDS ARVN ASRL ATGM BA-​MA BEF CENTAG CMH DTIC DRZW EEF EUCOM FOFA FRG FSR GDR Gen.d.Pz.Tr GHQ GQG GSFG GSO GSWW HEAT IAF IDF IED IFV IISS ISIS JCS LAW LHCMA

Assault Amphibious Vehicle Armoured Cavalry Assault Vehicle Armoured Fighting Vehicle Armoured Personnel Carrier Armour-​Piercing Fin-​Stabilised Discarding-​Sabot Army of the Republic of Vietnam US Army Armor School Research Library, Fort Knox, KY Anti-​tank Guided Missile Bundesarchiv-​Militärarchiv, Freiburg i.Br. British Expeditionary Force Central Army Group Center for Military History, Carlisle Barracks, PA Defense Technical Information Center Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg (10 vols) Egyptian Expeditionary Force US Army European Command Follow-​on Forces Attack Federal Republic of Germany Field Service Regulations German Democratic Republic General der Panzertruppe General Headquarters Grand Quartier Général (French GHQ, 1914–​18) Group of Soviet Forces in Germany General Staff Officer Germany and the Second World War (translation of DRZW) High-explosive Anti-tank warhead Israeli Air Force Israeli Defence Forces Improvised Explosive Device Infantry Fighting Vehicle International Institute for Strategic Studies Islamic State in Iraq and Syria Joint Chiefs of Staff Light Anti-​armour Weapon Liddell Hart Centre for Military Archives, King’s College London

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Abbreviations

LNA League of Nations Archive, United Nations Office at Geneva LVT Landing Vehicle Tracked MBT Main Battle Tank MEF Marine Expeditionary Force MGFA Militärgeschichtliches Forschungsamt MMAS Master of Military Art & Science NATO North Atlantic Treaty Organization NBC Nuclear, Bacteriological, Chemical NORTHAG Northern Army Group NVA North Vietnamese Army OKH Oberkommando des Heeres OKW Oberkommando der Wehrmacht OMG Operational Manoeuvre Group ORO Operations Research Office PGM Precision-​Guided Munition PIAT Projector, Infantry, Anti-​tank PKK Kurdistan Workers’ Party PLO Palestinian Liberation Organisation POW Prisoner of War RKKA Workers and Peasants’ Red Army RNAS Royal Naval Air Service RPG Rocket-​Propelled Grenade RTC Royal Tank Corps RTR Royal Tank Regiment SAM Surface-​to-​Air Missile TMARL Tank Museum Archive and Research Library, Bovington, Dorset TNA The National Archives of the United Kingdom, Kew TOW Tube-​Launched Optically-​Tracked Wire-​Guided UMI University Microfilms International UN United Nations UP University Press USSR Union of Soviet Socialist Republics WO War Office YPG People’s Protection Units

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INTRODUCTION

Although the subject of armoured warfare is vast, this study aims to provide an overview of over one hundred years of a very particular type of warfare. It could be argued that the beginning of the story is to be found in September 1916 when the first tanks went into action on the Western Front. However, as the history of armoured fighting vehicles (AFVs) has been inextricably linked with visions of future war, a better starting point might be 1903, the year that H. G. Wells published his famous short story ‘The Land Ironclads’ in the Strand Magazine.1 While the evidence is not absolutely conclusive, it does seem that several individuals involved in the early development of the tank in Britain had read Wells’s story when it first appeared, including Winston Churchill, who later acknowledged it had had an influence on his thinking.2 Although one hundred years after Wells’s story the last large-​scale employment of armoured forces took place in Iraq, tanks and other AFVs continue to be used in combat, so this history will include some mention of developments which have occurred since 2003. By way of introduction, there are several themes which need to be considered: first, the origins of the weapon and the extent to which precursors of the tank can be identified; second, the importance of terminology; third, essential technological considerations; fourth, debates on armoured warfare; fifth, the experience of the crews; sixth, the basic principles of armoured warfare; and seventh, the ‘political history’ of AFVs and how the symbolism associated with the tank has changed through history. Apart from the first, these themes will run to a greater or lesser extent through each of the chapters. What this book intends to do which is different from previous histories is to consider the development of armour from a global perspective.

Origins When the first reflections on the invention of the tank were being written shortly after the conclusion of the Great War, several writers peered back into history to try and identify tactical and technological precursors to the tank. Arguably the central figure in the early evolution of the tank, the then Colonel J. F. C. Fuller began his history of the tank in the Great War by examining precursors of the new weapon. Medieval knights clad in armour he thought to be ‘living tanks –​a combination of muscular energy, protective armour, and offensive weapons’. There had been other attempts to create protection for men on the battlefield: as early as 1200 BC the Chinese had made use of ‘war cars’; military manuals from the late fourteenth century show drawings of ‘battle cars’;

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Armoured Warfare

one drawing shows a Scottish war cart of 1456, with horses propelling men on a raised platform; in Italy in 1472 a battle car designed by Valturio featured wheels propelled by wind-​driven paddles. For Fuller, these various contraptions, which obviously had limitations wherever rough ground was encountered, demonstrated that the problem which the tank had finally solved had been around for 4,000 years. It was the task of closing with the enemy, striking him from a distance and at close quarters, while seeking to avoid receiving blows or fire.3 One reason why writers on the tank in the 1920s were so interested in delving into history was that examining past tactical experience seemed to offer the chance to think more closely about how tanks might be used in the future.4 In studying the progenitors of the tank, particularly instructive is the use of war elephants in ancient and medieval warfare. The employment of elephants in battle shows a number of remarkable parallels to later experience in the use of armoured forces. Infantry were assigned to protect the elephants, once it was realised that cutting the tendons on the back of an elephant’s leg would cause it to collapse; this was essentially the role which infantry would later be given –​protecting their own tanks from enemy infantry armed with anti-​tank weapons. Some elephants were designated as ‘command elephants’ from which a battle could be better directed; in November 1917, at the Battle of Cambrai, several British machines, equipped with wireless, were employed as signal tanks. Exactly how to employ groups of elephants in battle was not understood by everyone in the ancient world, so those who captured them did not comprehend the need for the ‘drivers’ to train with the animals over a long period of time; much later in history, civilian leaders in war were often seduced by numbers of tanks, or the availability of new machines, without grasping the need for training and preparation.5 As such, then, the tactical roles of the tank, often compared by early armour theorists to the tasks assigned in the past to heavy and light cavalry, as well as siege engines, predated the actual invention of the machine itself. The revolution which the tank ushered into warfare was, though, something different: it was the invention of the internal combustion engine and the caterpillar track which made the tank possible. While armoured trains had appeared in warfare well before the tank did,6 the tank possessed crucial characteristics which the trains obviously lacked, the main one being cross-​country capability. In fact, the various technical elements required to produce a tank were already present before the outbreak of the First World War, but at the time they did not seem entirely practical.7 This point is illustrated by the Motorgeschütz, a patent for which was issued on 25 April 1912 to its inventor, an Austrian officer, Gunther Burstyn. The initial prototype had been constructed as a form of armoured car in 1906, which was demonstrated at the Imperial manoeuvres. What was significant about the design which Burstyn produced was that it anticipated the characteristics of later tanks: he thought that his combat vehicles would be required to traverse all types of terrain, cross obstacles such as trenches, move at speed along roads, be equipped with a quick-​firing gun so as to engage enemy artillery, and possess armour to protect the crew from shrapnel and rifle fire. In order to give the Motorgeschütz mobility, it was proposed that steel-​cable tracks should 2

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Introduction

be used. According to Burstyn’s design specifications, the vehicle would attain a road speed of 19 mph and a cross-​country speed of 5 mph, while it was to be equipped with a 30–​40mm cannon, mounted in an ‘armoured hood’. The chief problem was that the four-​cylinder engine of 1910 would have been unlikely to have created the necessary power to drive such a vehicle; moreover, the cash-​strapped Austro-​Hungarian Army did not have the funds to pursue the idea further.8 It took the conditions of the Great War, and the resources of larger and richer empires, to create armoured machines which were able to cross the battlefield.

Terminology What are tanks and armoured fighting vehicles? Before ‘armoured warfare’ can be considered, the word ‘tank’ requires some discussion. The term was first coined in the British Army during the First World War. Initially, in the early developmental stages in 1914 and 1915, the machines under development were referred to as either ‘land ships’ or ‘machine-​gun destroyers’. After a conference on Christmas Eve 1915, however, the term tanks began to be used. By February 1916 Sir Douglas Haig was using the term. The reason for the change was that an order had been given to find a suitable cover name and, after toying with ‘water-​carriers’, the term tanks was adopted. Since the new lozenge-​ shaped weapon looked like a water tank, it was hoped the enemy would assume it was just that. The need for secrecy was still evident after the first action on the Somme on 15 September 1916. In his official despatch after the offensive, Haig referred to ‘our new heavily armoured cars, known as “Tanks” ’.9 The French, for their part, were determined that they should have their own name for tanks, the char de combat, as they wanted to make it clear they had also ‘invented’ the tank.10 The appearance of the new weapon did lead, though, to arguments over how to define the term tank. In the interwar period some intense debates occurred over the precise definition of a tank, such as at the 1932 League of Nations Conference for the Reduction and Limitation of Armaments. The documents which the War Office Commission in Whitehall produced prior to the conference are particularly interesting because they attempted to work out in advance a definition of the tank. In March 1932, a War Office Committee on the Abolition of Tanks concluded that the problem of providing a definition of a tank had yet to be overcome: ‘The best definition which the committee can put forward is that “a tank is a fully armoured vehicle that employs tracks, and from which it is intended to employ the guns with which it is armed.” ’11 As the conference progressed, it became clear that it would be virtually impossible to reach an agreement, particularly as the French denied there was any such thing as a light tank and insisted that a heavy tank could only be a defensive weapon. Their view was that heavy tanks should not attempt to break through a defensive line, but rather destroy the fortifications in that line, so that fast, light tanks could exploit the breach. This led an armour expert in the British delegation to observe: ‘The fundamental difference between us is really the two views on the employment of tanks in war.’12 3

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Armoured Warfare

Nonetheless, there were also some interesting attempts to consider the nature of armoured fighting vehicles as opposed to tanks. The British delegation considered that all AFVs were ‘capable of effecting surprise, initiating flank attacks against defensive positions, and penetrating the territory of an opponent to a considerable distance’. It was noted as well that the ‘essential quality to carry out such missions is the mobility of the vehicle’. In fact, they even argued that as long as the necessary firepower was carried to a certain point, it was immaterial whether a vehicle was armoured or not. As the conference progressed, it was at least agreed that tanks possessed, to a greater degree than armoured cars, the capacity to move across any terrain. The British introduced a suggestion into the discussions that many vehicles, tracked or otherwise, could be converted into tanks or armoured cars, which added a further dimension to the debate over definitions –​that of the possible construction of improvised armoured vehicles.13 This high-​level altercation over definitions is but one example of a problem which has existed since the invention of the tank and its support vehicles. Some of the best attempts at definition have, in fact, come from mechanical engineers concerned with designing new vehicles. One of the most common is ‘a mobile weapon platform’.14 The one advantage of this definition is simplicity –​yet, this is also the problem. There are armoured cars which have been used to mount quite powerful guns. There are AFVs similar to tank destroyers which are nonetheless classified as main battle tanks (MBTs). Take the Swedish S-​Tank:  it was a turretless AFV, with a height of 2.14 m, designed to blunt a Russian armoured attack. It had a crew of three, while the gun itself jutted out from the hull and could only be moved several degrees to the left and right.15 Thus, a better definition would be: ‘A tank is a fully tracked armoured vehicle, mounting a gun which can be traversed 360°.’ Even with the changing requirements of the twenty-​first century, however, the participants at the Geneva disarmament conference may well be proved correct that it will be almost impossible to ever achieve a universally agreed definition of the tank. It is perhaps for this reason that the use of terminology has been directed more towards trying to describe a specific type of warfare, or at least a broad concept which encapsulates the employment of significant numbers of armoured vehicles. During the debate on this new form of warfare in the interwar period, two terms which were used frequently were mechanisation and motorisation. The former referred to a gradual process of introducing tracked vehicles into armies, whether these were tanks, infantry carriers or supply vehicles, while the latter process was one which involved giving the armed forces wheels, in other words, reforming the transportation of troops and supplies through the introduction of lorries and, hence, by implication, the phasing out of horse-​drawn transport.16 Both processes were well underway –​but by no means complete –​by the end of the Second World War. Ultimately, the distinction which was made between mechanisation and motorisation was one between armoured tracked vehicles and unarmoured wheeled vehicles. In a sense, mechanisation was a revolution in warfare which was ushered in by the cooperation of tanks with aircraft. During the interwar period, military writers talked of ‘air-​mechanisation’ and a ‘mechanical force in the air’. This idea of a dynamic new type of warfare is perhaps one reason why the term Blitzkrieg has become so widespread in 4

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Introduction

studies of armour. It is, however, extremely problematic given its close association with German campaigns in the period 1939–​41. It may be better, therefore, to view Blitzkrieg as one particular type of warfare using armoured vehicles which are supported by aircraft. Hence, in professional military literature, the most commonly used term when referring to mobile war employing a variety of steel-​protected vehicles is ‘armoured warfare’. According to one definition by J. P. Harris and F. N. Toase, ‘an armoured force means a mechanized unit or formation containing a substantial proportion of armoured vehicles’; and it is asserted that: ‘Armoured warfare may be loosely defined as the employment of such units and formations in war on a significant scale.’17 While it is probably correct that any absolute precision is extremely difficult, there are some alternative, and more illuminating, attempts. An unpublished study, produced in the mid-​1970s at the US Army Armor School at Fort Knox, considered that: Armor is a concept of employing the characteristics of mobility, firepower, and shock effect to defeat an enemy force by a combined arms team characterized by a predominance of mounted combat. The team consists of tanks, armored cavalry, attack helicopters, mechanized infantry, artillery, and engineers, all supported by a flexible and rapid communication network and a mobile logistical system.18 While the composition of the armoured force, its support elements, communications and logistical organisation evolved dramatically in the course of the twentieth century, this definition comes quite close to identifying what armoured warfare encapsulates. To reduce it to an even simpler formula: it is about a combined arms team in which mechanised vehicles predominate. Other military documents manage to capture the essence of armoured warfare as well. Take, for example, a US Army field manual from 1966, Armor Operations, which states: ‘Armor operations are conducted by fire and maneuver and are combined and controlled to create a preponderance of combat power that culminates in a powerful and violent action at the decisive time and place.’ The definition goes on to warn about the need for commanders to avoid ‘rigid adherence to the original plan’ as the situation can change quickly in mobile warfare. It is pointed out that communications and mobility allow the commander ‘to rapidly mass or disperse his combat power for the accomplishment of any given task’. Mechanised forces should be concentrated in mass against the enemy, while it is concluded: ‘Armor operations are mobile in nature, violent in action, and calculated to achieve decisive results.’19 This definition is interesting because it was clearly written with the experience of the Second World War in mind, suggesting that definitions of armoured warfare may change, at least in their nuances, following a particular conflict.

Technology The technological development of tanks and other AFVs has undergone a series of dramatic improvements since 1916. In the First World War, British and French tanks 5

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Armoured Warfare

were originally invented as a means of crossing trenches, flattening barbed wire and protecting the crew from machine-​gun fire while they completed these tasks, with the additional job of machine-​gunning enemy soldiers and destroying fixed emplacements. Even before the first tank with a turret had entered service, however, the early machines still conformed to the designers’ formula that all tanks reflect a balance between three interrelated factors –​firepower, mobility and protection. The principle is a simple one: if the designer wishes a tank to be fast, a sacrifice needs to be made in firepower and/​or protection. Speed can, of course, be used as a means of protection. If a designer is developing a tank with a powerful gun, it will not be as fast; if a tank is to survive, it will need a reasonable amount of armour, which is again likely to slow it down. The design of a tank will always require a trade-​off between the three central design factors of firepower, mobility and protection.20 The tank itself consists of several complex technological elements: the main gun; the turret and mantlet; the hull; the engine (often referred to as the power plant); and the running gear, consisting of tracks, suspension gear, wheels, sprockets and top rollers over which the tracks run. The main gun will fire a specific type of shell in an attempt to destroy another tank: kinetic energy, hollow charge or high-​explosive squash head. The accuracy of the gunner depended for many years on a variety of optical range-​finding devices, which have been gradually replaced by laser range-​finding equipment; these new devices have more or less eliminated the previous sources of error. The design of major components needs to be calculated with an understanding of the way in which they are closely interrelated within the vehicle. A specific percentage of space within the tank is required for the power plant, the crew, ammunition storage, communications equipment and the main part of the gun which is housed inside the vehicle.21 Whereas a tank aims to maintain a balance between several design factors, the triangle of firepower-​mobility-​protection ceases to have the same significance when it comes to AFVs designed for specific tasks. In the Second World War, for example, the German Sturmpanzer IV, which used a Panzer IV chassis, and the Sturmtiger, which used a Tiger I chassis, were both designed to perform tactical roles in close combat (mainly demolishing buildings), so they did not require turrets. The Western Allies also developed a range of specialist tanks and other vehicles, including flamethrower tanks. The British introduced the Churchill Mark VII ‘Crocodile’ in 1944 during the campaign in northwest Europe, which could shoot a jet of flame 80–​120 yards, while the US Army used eight Sherman flamethrower tanks on Iwo Jima in 1945. During the Cold War, anti-​aircraft platforms mounted on a tank chassis became more sophisticated weapons systems than their often improvised counterparts from the Second World War. Bridging vehicles also grew in sophistication after 1945. In other words, vehicles designed for special tasks required the equipment to accomplish the task to be mounted on a tracked vehicle for which either weapons or armour protection were, to varying degrees, lower priorities.22 The means by which infantry, or rather mechanised infantry, go into battle has developed continuously since 1945. In the late 1930s, the first infantry half-​tracks began to appear. During the Second World War, the United States produced around 41,000 half-​ track vehicles compared to the 25,000 produced by Germany. The British and Canadian 6

7

Introduction

armies used the Canadian Ram tank as the basis for an infantry carrier, known as the Ram Kangaroo (with an M4 chassis), which pointed the way towards heavier infantry carriers, although the high cost led to only limited numbers. In the early 1960s, one of the most widely used armoured personnel carriers (APCs), the M113, began to be produced. This vehicle and others like it were useful, but had obvious weaknesses: the vehicle commander was required to fire the main machine-​gun partially exposed, with half of his body outside the vehicle, which also detracted from his command function. Warsaw Pact vehicles, such as the Russian BMP-​1 and the American Bradley M2/​3, represented a new generation of vehicles, generally referred to as infantry fighting vehicles (IFVs): they possessed a small gun capable of firing armour-​piercing shells mounted in a turret, while they were also designed with firing ports, so that the infantry inside did not have to dismount to engage in combat.23 The technology surrounding AFVs necessarily includes the requirement for an individual vehicle to possess some form of mobility. For the individual tank, IFV or self-​propelled gun, this mobility is, essentially, of a tactical nature. But it should not be forgotten that there are different levels of mobility for armoured forces. Tactical mobility usually refers to units when in contact with their opponent on the battlefield. Operational mobility, on the other hand, refers to the movement of units within a theatre of war: often it refers to their transport from an assembly area to the front line, sometimes accomplished on tank transporters or by rail. Finally, strategic mobility is the term used to describe the transport of AFVs to a theatre of operations, in some cases by sea or air. The weight of any AFV will clearly exert an impact on the ease with which it can be transferred to a theatre of war, or its capacity to cross bridges. Finally, logistics (in other words, supplies) exert a major influence on mobility at the tactical, operational and strategic levels of war.24

Debates If disagreements over the role of AFVs and their design within NATO during the Cold War were fractious affairs, earlier debates were just as heated. During the interwar period, the emergence of the tank appeared to spell the end of the traditional way of life of cavalry officers; and it threatened the previous status of artillery organisations. It is hardly surprising that many officers felt threatened by the emergence of the tank. In the case of the horsed cavalry, it was not simply that their previous military prestige had been called into question. A whole way of life was under threat. Throughout Europe, the cavalry had traditionally been drawn from the landed gentry, who spent a great deal of their time involved in equestrian pastimes. Worse still, the armoured cavalry of the future would be maintained not by grooms but by ‘garage mechanics’ from the cities. Controversies over armoured warfare have not, however, been restricted to military organisations. During the 1932 Geneva Disarmament Conference, the danger of armoured attacks was a subject of international dispute among several European nations. The British delegation had expected the minor powers to call for the abolition of medium tanks; yet, it 7

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Armoured Warfare

emerged that what they were worried about was a rapid advance of light tanks and armoured cars before a declaration of war over territory on which no defences had been prepared. Several smaller states were also concerned about the possible rapid conversion of tractors into tanks, clearly fearing the rapid emergence of an unforeseen threat.25 This view was reflected in a proposal by the Italian delegation in Geneva which stated: ‘The essential characteristics which render certain armoured fighting vehicles specially menacing to the civil population are speed and radius of action.’ These were characteristics which made it possible ‘to penetrate rapidly, by surprise action, far into the enemy’s territory’. The Hungarian delegation was even more strident in its assertion that AFVs, ‘not only constitute a serious material danger to the civilian population, but are liable to create a state of demoralisation which may render a successful war of defence impossible’.26 It was against this background that a debate emerged over whether the tank could be classed as an ‘aggressive weapon’. According to J. F. C. Fuller, it was not possible to make a division between defensive and offensive weapons because every weapon was by its very nature aggressive. Although some weapons possessed a higher power of aggression than others, were they to be abolished, older, less effective weapons would return. Any attempt to ban the three newest weapons to emerge from the Great War –​the tank, gas and the aeroplane –​would not lead to less bloodshed; all that would happen would be that wars would become longer, and thus bloodier, with older weapons. In fact, ‘by attempting to abolish the knockout blow we may actually be facilitating its delivery’, because mechanical and motorised weapons could be easily produced by any industrial society. But Basil Liddell Hart argued that qualitative disarmament (in the context of land warfare, abolishing heavy artillery and heavy tanks) would prevent any attacker from succeeding because the defence would be too strong to allow him a quick victory.27 The early debates on tanks revealed that officers who had traditionally aspired to serve on the General Staff would find those posts more challenging in future. Tanks and AFVs complicated warfare. Logistics became more complex, as did the organisation and administration of spare parts. Technical specialists were now individuals who could also rise through the ranks. This growing complexity led, in fact, to a long-​running debate over whether new technology would render the tank obsolete. During the interwar period much was made over the threat to the tank posed by anti-​tank weapons. During the Cold War, several new anti-​armour weapons, such as the Sagger anti-​tank missile, precision-​guided munitions, projectiles launched from aircraft and helicopters, regularly led to claims that the tank would no longer be able to survive on the battlefield. Other arguments have centred round the spiralling cost of armoured vehicles, considered as a possible reason why heavy armour might have to be replaced by lighter forces.28

The experience of armoured warfare What is it like to sit inside a tank? At the same time, what is it like to be on the receiving end of a tank attack? During the first action of tanks on the Somme on 15 September 1916, some of the later features of tank warfare could be observed. There was a light haze 8

9

Introduction

on the morning of that day which, according to British Army reports, seems to have added to the psychological effect of some of the individual attacks. A new term was subsequently coined in the Great War –​tank fright. In many actions, it was the slow speed of the tank, sometimes 1 mph, which contributed towards the panic. But if there was terror on the German side when tanks attacked, there was a strange fascination on the part of the British soldiers who observed the machines for the first time.29 During the First World War, tanks with crews of sometimes nine or more men had to carry out their tasks in extremely hot conditions. Sometimes men would strip almost completely due to the heat caused by the engines. ‘Bullet splash’ sent small fragments of metal flying into the interior of the tank causing skin wounds to the crew. The noise was extreme, not simply of the battle outside, but of the engine, the machine-​guns firing and orders being shouted by the commander. The crews usually emerged after action, blackened from smoke and oil, completely spent from the exertions of operating their tank and breathing in carbon monoxide fumes. And, once the Germans discovered how effective their armour-​piercing bullets were against the Mark I tank, as well as artillery firing over open sights, life became extremely dangerous for crews.30 Where the experience of tank crews differed between the two world wars was in the field of maintenance. During the Great War, the crews simply struggled to learn how to operate the tank correctly in battle and to keep going despite the fumes and the noise. Maintenance was taken care of by mechanics at large depots behind the front line. During the Second World War, however, the crews were responsible for many aspects of the maintenance themselves. A passage from the memoirs of Ken Tout, a British Sherman gunner in Normandy, fighting with the 1st Northamptonshire Yeomanry, makes this plain. Oils and fluids needed to be checked constantly, as did the tracks and wheels. He described the 75mm gun of the Sherman as ‘a hard master’. A stiff brush was required to clean the barrel, with a very long handle, which required two men to use it. Once the barrel had been dealt with, then the breech needed to be tackled. The breech block was ‘a heavy, uncooperative lump of polished steel which, if carelessly handled, has been known to crunch fingers beyond repair’. The .303 Browning machine-​guns had to be checked and maintained, as did the wireless set.31 Another new development for tank crews during the Second World War was that with the growing importance of armoured vehicles for driving offensives forward, or acting as the anchor points in defensive battles, came the requirement to keep fighting for as long as possible. Long marches often required the crews to survive longer than 24 hours without sleep. One solution, trialled by the British Army Medical Corps in the Western Desert in 1942, was to supply tank crews with Benzedrine tablets. Interviews with crews revealed that the majority of men approved of the tablets, reporting that any sense of sleepiness was lost with apparently no side-​effects observed. The British discovered that German units had been taking an equivalent form of tablet, Pervitin, which produced similar effects, dulling feelings of fear and keeping troops awake.32 In addition to the fatigue produced by continuous fighting, tanks were extremely dangerous places to be in the Second World War. Although well-​armoured tanks such as the Panther and Tiger could provide extremely good protection against most 9

10

Armoured Warfare

weapons, every tank has its weak spots. The rear of the tank has always been an area which virtually guarantees an opposing tank a ‘kill’ from close range. The sides of many tanks were also a point of vulnerability. The fear of being hit increased the psychological tension for the crews, not least of all as being trapped inside a tank which had been hit usually meant being burnt alive. If a tank which had been hit could be abandoned, normally through a hatch in the floor or the side, the crew were often machine-​gunned by enemy tanks as they tried to ‘bale out’. Tank manuals emphasized the need for ‘utmost speed’ when evacuating not only the injured but also the uninjured if a tank was hit because ‘a tank set afire by an enemy hit can trap its crew in a matter of seconds’.33 The crew were not only subject to such horrors, they could inflict a gruesome death on their opponents too:  sometimes tanks would simply drive over enemy soldiers, crushing them, or park themselves on top of trenches, then spin round by putting one track in forward gear, the other in reverse, burying the soldiers beneath alive. If a tank was carrying infantry riding on its hull, a practice which was common in the Red Army, the crew would hear or see the grisly results if a shell burst too close to the tank riders, while shells exploding close to the tank could burst the eardrums of the crew. So, while tanks could unleash death and destruction they could very quickly become death traps for those manning them. Of course, while tank crews in the Second World War often had the feeling they were living on borrowed time, tanks were capable of inflicting unbelievable slaughter on infantry caught in open terrain. This was an experience repeated after the Second World: in Vietnam whenever US armour caught the Vietcong or North Vietnamese Army without cover it could wreak terrible casualties and devastation within minutes.34 The experience of armoured warfare for crews was similar in many of the post-​1945 conflicts, with the possible exception of the 1990/​91 and 2003 Gulf Wars due to the technological superiority of the US-​led coalition over their opponents. For the student of armoured warfare considering the terrifying but exhilarating experience of mounted combat, the memoirs of former crew members are an important starting point.

The principles of armoured warfare What is surprising about the principles of armoured warfare is the speed with which they were identified during the Great War. The use of tanks on the Western Front set up a number of clear signposts for the future. The importance of the cooperation of tanks with infantry, artillery, engineers and aircraft was established beyond reasonable doubt. Surprise was crucial: in the preparations for the Battle of Cambrai in November 1917, the noise of tanks moving up to their start lines was concealed by aircraft flying overhead. The British Tank Corps concluded quickly that tanks require infantry to protect them from the threat posed by enemy infantry and anti-​tank units. It discovered that the effectiveness of tanks on the battlefield can be enhanced if they are supported by aircraft in a ground-​attack role. And it was shown –​albeit more through actions conducted by individual tanks –​that once tanks break through a front line they can spread confusion 10

11

Introduction

and panic, and wreak havoc with their machine-​guns. There was another legacy of the Great War, namely, that it planted the idea firmly that tanks are most effective in open, undulating country.35 The notion that certain types of terrain should be avoided by mechanised forces has been a persistent one. While there are obvious difficulties to be overcome in mountains, forests or snow, frequent planning errors have been committed due to assumptions that tanks can never operate in certain types of terrain. The German success in 1940 grew partly out of French commanders’ belief that tanks could not pass through the Ardennes forest. Even after the Second World War, some commanders continued to argue that tanks could not operate in jungles, in snow, in forested areas, in marshes or in desert. While these conditions restrict mobility in different ways, tracked vehicles have shown themselves to be remarkably versatile, providing that the armoured force in question can adapt its tactics and modify equipment to the challenges of the specific environment. In many ways, tanks provide the chance of, if not a decisive battle, then at least decisive combat action. Most Western armies were in agreement after 1945 that an armoured force needs to be employed in mass. Armoured units fight as a combined-arms team, with at least two arms, often more, participating. The worst use of tanks is dividing them among infantry units and scattering them along a linear front line. The division of armour was the mistake the French made in 1940, although the causes of this were long term and structural, and the result of faulty doctrine, rather than some last-​minute error committed on the eve of battle. One of the key requirements for fighting as a combinedarms formation is the ability of commanders not to adhere rigidly to the original plan, but to react flexibly and exploit opportunities as they present themselves. Nonetheless, the basic tactical and operational missions of armoured forces continue to be classified by most armies in a similar fashion: deep penetration of the enemy’s front and wide envelopment; exploitation and pursuit; mobile and static defence; destruction of enemy armour; reconnaissance and security; close support of infantry; and economy of force missions to allow the commander to mass the bulk of his unit at the decisive point. The characteristics of armoured units have been identified as armour-​protected firepower, mobility, shock effect, flexible lines of communication, flexibility in organisation and an acceptance of mission-​oriented orders. Armoured units if well commanded have achieved dramatic successes in large-​scale offensive operations, delaying actions and in the pursuit of a demoralised opponent. There are, though, other principles to which commanders of armoured formations need to adhere. Without proper reconnaissance an armoured force can run into serious trouble and suffer ambushes. Given the blind spots of AFVs, combat in cities usually requires supporting arms, such as infantry, artillery and combat engineers to ensure success and reduce casualties. Cities offer the chance for well-​armed infantry units, or insurgent forces with anti-​tank weapons, to stalk tanks and attack their weak spots at the sides and rear, or fire down on them from buildings. Tanks can only operate in an urban environment without the risk of sustaining significant losses in cooperation with supporting arms. Still, the success of an armoured force often depends on the willingness to 11

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Armoured Warfare

take the enemy by surprise, overwhelm him by sudden action or rapid moves, or disrupt and destroy him through concentrated firepower.36 Even if the principles for armoured warfare had been essentially identified by the end of the Great War, it took two decades before the potential of armoured units had been fully grasped. The combination of the internal combustion engine and tracks gave the tank the mobility to cross the battlefield; but it was the use of radio communication which enabled commanders to exploit the speed and flexibility of the new weapon and elevate it beyond simply a means of providing infantry support.

The need for a global perspective The history of armoured warfare has often been directed towards the study of national success or failure. There is, however, an urgent need to consider the subject from a global perspective. This is not just because wars beyond Europe have more recently started to attract greater attention, but also as the development of mobile forces has, on occasions, been influenced by combat experience which has gone largely unnoticed. One example is the French counter-​insurgency war in Algeria (1954–​61), which involved the use of armoured cars and light tanks due to the huge operational area which had to be covered. The French Army learned important lessons during this conflict: the suitability of the AML armoured car for low-​intensity operations; the need for detailed intelligence before an operation; and the importance of radio-​telephone links and ground surveillance devices in counter-​insurgency.37 A global perspective allows, furthermore, the opportunity to understand tactical trends in armoured warfare which appear to have been established by well-​known conflicts, yet where the conclusions are open to interpretation. One important moment in the evolution of armoured warfare is widely considered to be the Yom Kippur War of 1973 which seemed to indicate that anti-​tank guided munitions (ATGMs) had made the battlefield more dangerous for tanks than ever before. In fact, this was a lesson which could already have been drawn from the brief Indo-​Pakistan War of 3–​17 December 1971. When a Pakistani armoured brigade counter-​attacked in the Zafarwal area of Sialkot, failing to achieve its objectives and suffering heavy losses, it was partly through lack of reconnaissance but also as a result of the destructive power of Indian ATGMs.38 Such examples from lesser-​known conflicts allow analyses of why armoured forces fail when attempting to conduct certain missions. Likewise, the quality of certain types of equipment can be better considered within a wider range of contexts rather than merely on the basis of one war. In considering the many sub-​themes in the history of armoured warfare within a global context, there are in addition to secondary sources at least five types of useful forms of primary documentation available to the armour historian. First, although they vary in reliability, accounts of the experience of armoured warfare can be found in the memoirs which have been written by officers, AFV crews and inventors: some are unpublished, while others have found their way into print. Second, the field and training 12

13

Introduction

manuals produced by armies are one of the best sources for investigating tactics and new concepts. Third, the thousands of official military documents generated by armies, especially after-​action reports and tactical studies, remain the basis for any serious research. Fourth, the articles and books published by theorists and commanders, in which the principles and techniques of armoured war have been debated, offer numerous insights. Fifth, the greater accessibility of historical photographs and films, not to mention video clips of front-​line combat posted online, have opened up new possibilities for investigating not just the battlefield employment of AFVs, but also the political and cultural symbolism surrounding them. In aiming to provide a complete history of armoured warfare, this book will seek to reconsider some of the ways in which the subject has been analysed. Although some studies have dealt with the development of combined arms formations, they often assume a certain level of background knowledge.39 As well as reflecting on the role of armour in major wars, this work intends to highlight several broad themes which can be identified as important throughout the twentieth and early twenty-​first centuries: the reasons for success or failure in particular operations, campaigns and wars; misunderstandings of the capabilities of armoured forces and the technology upon which they are dependent; the experience of armoured warfare; and the ‘political history’ of armoured forces, especially the way in which armoured vehicles have taken on symbolic qualities in propaganda and in national and international political controversies. In order to provide an account of the subject of armoured warfare within a military, political and global context, this study will not just attempt to bring together material to be found in the many published studies which consider different armies, fighting vehicles and commanders, it will also draw on the varied types of primary source material which are available. By pursuing a global perspective, the intention is to avoid adopting too quickly the perspectives of national armies which have often been anxious to minimise their own failings and at the same time inflate the significance of their successes.

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15

CHAPTER 1 THE NEW WARFARE:  THE FIRST WORLD WAR, 1914–​1 8

Many books have been written about the emergence of the tank during the First World War; but the majority of these concentrate on the British tank force; moreover, the early British pioneers often created the impression that Britain was the nation which ‘invented’ the tank. In fact, by 1915 both the British and the French were working simultaneously on the basic concept of a tracked armoured vehicle. The Germans arrived late to the production of their own tank, although they did make use of captured machines. Thus, given the need to consider the three nations most involved in the early history of the tank, this chapter will consider the following themes: first, the early development of the tank to the close of 1916; second, the tank battles of 1917; third, the use of a small detachment of tanks by the Egyptian Expeditionary Force (EEF) in Palestine in 1917; fourth, the tank battles of 1918; and fifth, the significance of J. F. C. Fuller’s seminal document, popularly known as ‘Plan 1919’.

The early development of the tank In the case of Britain, the origins of the tank in the First World War have been identified in the employment of armoured cars by the Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS) in the first year of the war. With the First Lord of the Admiralty, Winston Churchill, championing the idea of a forward naval base at Dunkirk from which reconnaissance would be conducted to identify the location of German airfields, the director of the Admiralty Air Department, Murray Sueter, had created an armoured car division within the RNAS. Taking the Silver Ghost touring car as the basic vehicle, he created the Rolls Royce armoured car, which had a machine-​gun mounted in a revolving turret. By early 1915, the RNAS possessed 70 armoured cars and lorries, as well as its own aircraft. But by this time the war had sunk into trench stalemate and armoured cars could no longer play any significant role near the front line. Still, Sueter’s awareness of the possibilities of mobile war led him to make his own contribution to the emergence of the tank. In a parallel development, an army officer, Ernest Swinton, suggested the idea of a fighting vehicle to Colonel Maurice Hankey in a conversation on 20 October 1914. In a memorandum for the cabinet, dated 28 December 1914, Hankey first articulated the idea of an armoured, tracked vehicle, equipped with a Maxim gun, which would crush barbed wire with its weight and provide cover for infantry advancing behind it. The suggestion immediately stimulated Churchill’s interest and he wrote on 5 January 1915

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Armoured Warfare

to the prime minister, Herbert Asquith, extolling the virtues of the idea. However, the War Office did not pursue the matter, so it was Murray Sueter who began experiments with caterpillar tracks in an effort to develop an armoured shield which was to be used to help troops cross no-​man’s land. A chance conversation then led Churchill to establish the Director of Naval Construction’s Committee, which was also referred to as the Admiralty Landships Committee. The first meeting took place on 22 February 1915. After some preparatory design work on two different types of ‘landship’, at the end of March Churchill authorised the construction of 18 vehicles.1 The first ideas for the employment of the landships, or machine-​gun destroyers as they were also known, revolved in 1915 around the use of these machines as siege engines. They were to cut through barbed wire, crush machine-​guns and destroy enemy strong points either with their tracks or through the use of their guns. These requirements did, in fact, dictate the rhomboid shape which characterised British tanks in the First World War. The exploitation of the breach in the enemy line was, though, to be executed by the traditional means: cavalry and infantry. The first British tank, the Mark I, of which 150 were ordered, had a crew of eight: four manned the guns and the other four were occupied with driving. Conditions were so bad from exhaust fumes that headaches and dizziness led to combat action lasting six hours rendering the crew incapable of further action for another 48 hours.2 According to J. P. Harris, during the first discussions on the possible use of the tank, both general headquarters (GHQ) and the commander-​in-​chief in France, Sir John French, were quite upbeat about the potential of the new weapon under development. The main opposition appeared to come from the Secretary of State for War, Lord Kitchener. Nonetheless, work continued to the end of 1915; and it was in December 1915 that not only the term tanks began to be used, but that Sir Douglas Haig became aware of the existence of these new weapons, reading a memorandum by Churchill entitled ‘Variants of the Offensive’ on Christmas Day. During the course of 1916, the emphasis began to shift from technical experimentation and development to the founding of a military organisation capable of manning the new weapons and training crews for their use.3 The actual evolution of the formation which used the tank in combat was, initially, governed by the need for secrecy. The first name, ‘Tank Detachment’, was changed very quickly to the Armoured Car Section of the Motor Machine-​Gun Service. In May 1916, the name was changed to the Heavy Section, Machine-​Gun Corps, before it became in November 1916 the Heavy Branch, Machine-​Gun Corps. The formation was only renamed the Tank Corps in July 1917. The first organisation saw the establishment of six companies, with a total of 184 officers and 1,610 other ranks. Four of the six company commanders came from the army, two from the Royal Naval Air Service.4 Before the first tanks went into action on the Somme on 15 September 1916, some thought had been given to their employment. Ernest Swinton wrote a seminal paper entitled, ‘Notes on the Employment of Tanks’ in February 1916. Given that the first tanks were not yet ready for action, he succeeded in identifying some of the key points for future armoured warfare: the importance of all-​arms cooperation; the vulnerability of

16

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The New Warfare

tanks to shell fire and the need for tactical countermeasures; and the need for a signalling system for tanks, including the suggestion that one machine in ten could be provided with a wireless set. He also asserted that: ‘Since the chance of success of an attack by tanks lies almost entirely in its novelty and in the element of surprise, it is obvious that no repetition of it will have the same opportunity of succeeding as the first unexpected effort.’ The idea that there would be one chance to win the war with a mass attack by tanks was with hindsight clearly wide of the mark. Yet the statement that ‘these machines should not be used in driblets’ did, inadvertently, point towards perhaps the central principle of armoured warfare in the future.5 The first employment of tanks on the Western Front during the Battle of Flers-​ Courcelette, and the answer to the question of whether or not Haig should have waited until he had received more tanks in order to conduct an all-​out tank assault, is answered largely by the details of the very first action. At the outset, two companies, C and D, totalling around 40 tanks, were sent into action with very little training. All told, 48 machines were available prior to the battle; some broke down or became stuck on their way to the start line; 36 appeared to have reached the start line; and, of these, 30 actually started. Paul Harris estimates that only around 21 did any actual fighting. The attack was launched on a seven-​mile front, so that the tanks involved could only have a limited tactical impact on the progress of the battle, particularly since they were employed spread out over the length of the front. Due to the lack of training, some crews became completely disoriented and fired on their own infantry. The first action, in fact, holds many parallels with the early teething troubles of gas warfare. The general attack in itself, which gained only six miles, was a typical First World War example of failure. However, those tanks which took part in the battle did achieve some spectacular, individual successes, considering the limitations on their effectiveness which training, terrain and technology inevitably imposed. Nine tanks managed to advance further than the infantry and were of considerable assistance in neutralising strong points. Casualties among tank crews were surprisingly low. Two tanks assisted in the capture of Thiepval. One ‘female tank’ (i.e. equipped solely with machine-​guns), working together with infantry, succeeded in clearing a trench north-​east of Flers. Around 400 prisoners were taken, and many more were killed with a minimal loss of British life. The first day of action had, though, exhausted the crews, and it was discovered that the expenditure of ammunition was much higher than had been expected. In some cases, German gunners kept their nerve and engaged these new, slow-​moving targets, but in others, infantry panicked and fled in the face of the tanks. An indication of the wear and tear on men and machines was the fact that on the following day, only three machines were available for further action, although they did make a major contribution towards disrupting a German counter-​attack. Still, overall, the balance sheet was positive enough that at a conference in Whitehall on 19–​20 September it was decided that an order for another 100 Mark I machines and 1,000 of a modified type were to be placed.6 Meanwhile, the French had also begun work on their own idea for a mobile, tracked vehicle, largely as a result of the dynamism of an artillery officer, Colonel Jean Baptiste

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Armoured Warfare

Estienne. He had not only a talent for invention, but had in August 1914 identified the need for ‘a safe, mobile and permanent shelter’ which could challenge modern firearms. French tank development did, however, lag behind the British experiments. It took until 1 December 1915 before Estienne wrote to General Maurice Janin and General Joseph Joffre to explain his idea for a mechanised vehicle, equipped with a cannon, and armoured to protect the infantry which it would carry at 6 km per hour. It was to be armed with a 37mm cannon to deal with strong points, while it was to be tracked to enable it to cross the battlefield. Estienne met with Joffre and other generals on 12 December at French General Headquarters (GQG) who were supportive of his idea. Following consultations with engineers, on 18 January 1916, Joffre gave his consent to the development of an armoured tracked vehicle to be produced by the Schneider Company. On 26 March 1916, Estienne dispatched a project memorandum on the establishment of ‘land battleship’ units to GQG. In September, Estienne was assigned to GQG to command the new ‘artillery department’; he named it the Artillerie Spéciale, although later it was to be called the ‘Assault Artillery’. The fact that Estienne was an artilleryman influenced his tactical thinking on the employment of the new weapon: in particular, he emphasized the firepower which the new weapons were to employ. On 26 August 1916, the first memorandum on the tactical use of tanks was produced and distributed by the Planning and Operations Department of GQG. This followed the creation on 15 August of the first tank training centre at Marly-​le-​Roi at which crews would learn driving skills. Upon completion of the training, they would progress to a camp at Cercottes to learn shooting skills. On 17 November, the first Schneider unit was established. The final key organisational development was the creation of the Advisory Committee for the Assault Artillery on 18 December 1916, which was tasked to examine everything which might improve the new sub-​branch of the artillery. Although by the end of 1916 French tanks had not yet seen action, the basis had been laid for their employment by the army.7

The tank battles of 1917 Following a series of individual actions in the wake of the first employment of tanks on the Somme, British tanks were involved in a series of smaller actions during the first months of 1917. The first of these was the Battle of Arras, which began on 9 April 1917, for which none of the new Mark IV tanks were as yet available, with only 60 Mark Is ready for action. However, even these machines had been subject to some adaptations, including the removal of a two-​wheeled ‘tail’, originally intended to assist in the steering, and the replacement of the Hotchkiss by the air-​cooled Lewis machine-​gun on the basis of the recommendation of an officer with experience of machine-​guns; these alterations were sufficient to allow for the designation of the machines as Mark IIs. The Heavy Branch Machine-​Gun Corps was also improving as an organisation, with pre-​ battle preparations including the proper training which had been missing from the first improvised actions. For the offensive, eight tanks were assigned to First Army, 40 to Third 18

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The New Warfare

Army and 12 to Fifth Army, but the ground was boggy in places and too much of the plan had depended upon the tanks achieving initial successes.8 The chief criticism which can be made of the use of tanks at Arras was the way in which they were strung out along the front, violating the principle already identified by Swinton of the need to employ a tank force concentrated en masse against a specific objective or section of the front. Moreover, the eight tanks assigned to First Army, operating with the Canadians at Vimy Ridge, all became ditched, bogged down in no-​man’s land or in the enemy front line. There was worse to come. On 10 April, 11 tanks assigned to lead an attack on Bullecourt together with Australian infantry were first delayed; then the following day, both the tanks and infantry stood out against the snow; nine machines were knocked out, while two other tanks and 200 Australian infantry advanced too far, were surrounded and captured. For months after, the Australian infantry deeply distrusted tanks. Still, on 3 May a group of eight tanks, which had been repaired, launched another attack on Bullecourt, and reached their objectives, even if they were later forced to retire.9 The first French employment of tanks took place at the Battle of Chemin des Dames on 16 April 1917, during the ill-​fated Nivelle offensive; the attack was hindered by bad weather in a similar fashion to British actions around the same time. Opposite the French Fifth Army were four Bavarian divisions in well-​echeloned defensive positions. In fact, the Germans were aware that French tanks were in the area; and the march to the start line proved difficult due to the number of infantry and artillery units trying to move forwards. By 10.15 the tanks of one unit, the AS2 (AS referring to Artillerie Spéciale, then the number of the specific company), had become separated from their supporting infantry. By 11.00 am one of the main French commanders, Major Louis Bossut, had been killed after his tank was struck by artillery fire. Several tanks broke down, while further delays were caused by the difficulties of the tanks in signalling to the infantry. The following unit, AS6, suffered similar problems; between 11.30 and 12.30, five of its tanks were hit by artillery fire and caught fire. Although by 16.00 lead units had captured the third line of defence as well as prisoners and enemy equipment, when another tank received a direct hit, the remaining tanks of AS2 and AS6 withdrew. AS5 suffered significant losses, while AS9 lost all its tanks. Groupement Chaubrès (the 48 tanks of AS3, AS7, AS8), like its counterpart Groupement Bossut (the 80 tanks of AS2, AS4, AS5, AS6, AS9), suffered comparable losses to artillery fire. The balance sheet at the end of the first action of French armour was a sobering one. The Artillerie Spéciale had lost 34 killed, 37 missing and 109 wounded, with 31 tanks from Groupement Bossut and 26 tanks from Groupement Chaubrès destroyed by German artillery. Tank losses amounted to 43 per cent of the force. In addition to the lack of adequate staff work for the approach march, and command-​and-​control problems, one of the difficulties encountered had been the tendency of the Schneider CA1 tank to catch fire due to the position of the main petrol tank towards the front of the vehicle (relocated in later models). However, the failure to employ a third groupement on 16 April meant that the lessons learned could be analysed and taken into account for the attack by Groupement Lefebvre on 5 May. The going on the ground was much 19

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Armoured Warfare

better than on 16 April and the assembly areas were hidden from German observation. Planning this time considered the need to prevent German reconnaissance aircraft from identifying the location of the tanks. As a result, the casualties of the tank battalion which attacked on 5 May were lower: 13 officers and 40 men, with only three killed. AS1 sent 15 tanks into action, losing three to breakdowns; AS10 sent four tanks, all returned; AS31 sent ten tanks of which nine returned, with only one machine destroyed by artillery fire. The one major negative point was the frequency with which the St Chamond tank broke down.10 In June 1917, the British tank force was ready for the Battle of Messines, equipped with newly delivered Mark IV machines. The battle itself was one of the best executed limited operations of the war conducted by Britain and her Commonwealth allies, dependent upon infantry, artillery and tunnelling companies; since the success would have probably occurred without tanks there was little reputational benefit for the new machine. But it was significant because the Mark IV was now available; it incorporated corrections to some of the early design flaws discovered in the Mark I. Its armour had been improved to the extent that the German armour-​piercing bullet, known as ‘K’ ammunition, could no longer penetrate it; the gun sponsons had been improved; and the danger of fire breaking out had been reduced by moving the petrol tank to outside the machine and protecting it with special armour plating. The increase in the size of the fuel tank also extended the range of the tank by ten miles. Production of the Mark IV had begun in March 1917, once the final upgrades of the Mark I (the Marks II and III) had been completed. In all, some 1,220 Mark IVs were built, with 1,155 used for combat or training.11 At Messines, 72 Mark IV machines were available, with 12 Mark I and II tanks in reserve as supply machines; 40 tanks were to cross the start line at zero hour; the remaining machines were to be held in reserve. But, once again, the tanks were distributed across the attack frontage, with 12 machines allotted to X Corps, 16 tanks to IX Corps and 20 tanks to II Corps; 48 tanks became ditched or bellied at some point during the operation; 17 broke down, although some returned to the battle after repairs. In fact, mechanical reliability had improved since the tank’s debut the previous year. The difficulties encountered were largely because months of shelling had turned the ground into a moonscape, which meant that the contribution of tanks was restricted to actions fought by individual machines. In particular, tanks proved useful as anchor points for the infantry whenever the Germans attempted to launch counter-​attacks, even if this involved the crew removing the Lewis guns from the tanks and firing them from shell holes. A further point of significance at Messines was the improvement in staff work, which set a new pattern for tank operations for the remainder of the war.12 On 26 July 1917, the British tank force received by Royal Warrant the new designation ‘Tank Corps’, a form of official recognition which showed at least some faith in its future prospects. Commanded by Brigadier-​General Hugh Elles, who had been joined at the end of 1916 by Major J. F. C. Fuller as Chief General Staff Officer (GSO1), it had grown rapidly as an organisation, with improved staff work contributing to the development of its tactics and operational planning. Yet, the proficiency of its senior personnel could not prevent the Corps becoming a victim of the disastrous Third Ypres offensive 20

21

The New Warfare

which opened on 31 July, with three brigades of tanks to be employed as part of the British Fifth Army. II Corps was to receive 72 tanks, XIX Corps the same number, while XVIII Corps was to be allotted 36, which were to be held in reserve. The tanks fought a series of actions until 9 October, but the atrocious, muddy conditions put an immediate limit upon what could be accomplished, even if individual tanks often performed useful service to the infantry, destroyed strong points or cleared villages. But there was a lack of understanding among higher commanders as to why the tanks had failed.13 There were, however, two large-​scale battles in the final three months of 1917 which were to play a major part in the revival of the fortunes of the new weapon of war: the first of these was the Battle of Malmaison, which opened on 23 October 1917. This was an attack with limited objectives in the Chemin des Dames area, undertaken by General Philippe Pétain, in an attempt to provoke the Germans into a counter-​attack and cause them disproportionate casualties. By 26 October the attack was over, with French Schneider and St Chamond machines involved primarily on the first day of the battle, although some minor tank actions occurred on 25 October. The battle saw a technological innovation for the French tank force, with two Schneiders and two St Chamonds employed which had been converted into radio-​telegraphy tanks. Malmaison proved successful in its objectives with the French advancing up to 6 km, capturing over 11,000 Germans, substantial quantities of equipment, with total casualties of just under 12,000 men. Tank crew casualties were: 20 killed, with 62 wounded, much lighter than previous French tank engagements. However, of the 63 tanks engaged, only 21 made any meaningful contribution to the battle. So, was this battle a success or not? According to all but one of the French after-​action reports, Malmaison was a significant success. Improved planning, in particular counter-​battery work to neutralise the German anti-​tank defences, had kept the number of tanks hit by artillery fire to a minimum. Cooperation with the infantry had been practised prior to the attack; communication between the tanks and the infantry had likewise been prepared in much more detail. The difficulty had been the intensity of the artillery bombardment, and heavy rain, which had made certain areas of the battlefield impassable to tanks. The St Chamond tanks had, once again, fared badly due to the flaws in their design and mechanical unreliability (of the 28 machines employed, 24 ditched or broke down before reaching the combat zone). A further problem had been the contaminated petrol supplied to some tanks which was the source of many of the breakdowns. But in those instances where tanks did manage to reach the first line of the enemy’s trenches, they usually performed excellent work in silencing German machine-​guns, assisting the infantry in fighting off counter-​attacks and taking prisoners (40 Germans surrendered to one tank). While the performance of the tanks had not been outstanding, the results were positive enough: not only had the tank crews’ faith in their machines been restored, it was apparent that where no tank support was available infantry casualties had been much higher.14 Of much greater significance, however, was the Battle of Cambrai the following month, prepared within the space of four weeks by Tank Corps Headquarters. Like Malmaison, it was originally intended as a limited operation, although it appears that Hugh Elles encouraged Sir Julian Byng to turn the original plan for a raid into 21

22

Armoured Warfare

a breakthrough operation. The plan envisaged a surprise attack between the Saint Quentin Canal and the Canal du Nord with the intention of capturing Cambrai. The Tank Corps GSO1, J. F. C. Fuller, thought that the lack of reserves was a significant problem; in addition, he considered it a mistake to place the majority of the tanks in the forefront of the assault. Apart from the concept of operations, the major tactical difficulty was that in the area of attack the German trenches were 15 feet wide. The problem was solved through the use of ‘fascines’, bundles of branches bound together with chains, which were mounted on the front of the tank, to be then released into the trench, which allowed the tank to cross by preventing the tail losing traction. An important factor, which contributed to the initial success, was that the ground over which the attack was to take place provided good-going for tanks. Finally, for the first time, British tanks were to be used en masse. The total number of combat tanks available was 378: of these, 216 were allotted to III Corps, with 108 assigned to IV Corps; 54 were held in reserve. Each of the three brigades was given 18 supply tanks, while three signal tanks equipped with wireless were used to send bogus signals which were, as intended, intercepted by the Germans. A further 32 tanks were equipped with grapnels to rip away sections of enemy barbed wire. This brought the total number of tanks to 476. As the number of supply tanks was considered insufficient by the Tank Corps, 110 sleds were constructed to be pulled behind tanks, so that petrol, oil and other supplies could be brought forward to the front quickly. Tank Corps Central Workshops worked around the clock for three weeks to make the necessary preparations for the attack along a six-​mile stretch of front, which was held by only two German divisions. Surprise was achieved by avoiding a long artillery preparation, the presence of mist and the use of smoke shells. The commander of the Tank Corps, Brigadier-​General Hugh Elles, issued his famous Special Order No. 6 on the day before the attack, which announced that the Corps would have the chance for which it had been waiting for months, and that he proposed to lead the attack. His GSO1 advised against this, given the difficulties which would have ensued had Elles been killed or wounded; but the gamble paid off, and Elles was able to inspire his men by leading from the front. When the Battle of Cambrai opened on 20 November 1917, surprise was complete. In the words of one tank commander, D. G. Browne, ‘The triple belts of wire were crossed as if they had been beds of nettles, and 350 pathways were sheared through for the infantry.’ At the end of the first day, the Germans had been forced back four miles on a six-​mile front. The tanks had been instrumental in breaking into the German defences. However, the commander of the 51st Highland Division, General George Harper, proceeded to ignore the instructions given to him by the Tank Corps staff. Instead of the infantry advancing in a file behind the tanks, he ordered them to stay 100 yards behind the tanks and advance in a line. His refusal to cooperate may have contributed to the first setback at Flesquières Ridge, where 16 tanks were hit by a German gun battery. Moreover, the collapse of Masnières Bridge had a negative effect on the development of the operation. While the progress on the first day had been impressive, the Germans regained their equilibrium on the second day as some gun batteries and machine-​gun posts

22

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The New Warfare

Cities/Towns

Map 1  Battle of Cambrai, November/December 1917

23

24

Armoured Warfare

had not been silenced by the counter-​battery fire. A  halt was called after just over a week on 28 November, with GHQ jubilant at the scale of the success. On 23 November, the bells had been rung at St Paul’s in London in celebration. The sense of elation was premature, however, as a German counter-​attack was launched on 30 November; by 8 December the Germans had recaptured half the ground they had initially lost. The end result was a draw, with each side losing around 40,000 men; in the area of III Corps around the village of Villers-​Guislain the British had been forced back behind their original start line. Much of the historiography on the First World War is in agreement that the battle had proved the future potential of tanks but that some British commanders committed some serious errors. A later despatch by Douglas Haig cited the fictitious case of a ‘lone German gunner’ who had destroyed 16 tanks single-​handedly; in fact, batteries belonging to the German 54th Division had trained in anti-​tank techniques and already gained experience against tanks during the Nivelle offensive earlier that year. This legend, spread through an official communiqué, was used later to emphasize the vulnerability of tanks to anti-​tank defences.15 Tank Corps HQ was, though, quick to exploit the apparent evidence of the efficiency of a massed tank attack through memoranda which it circulated. The following month, Fuller pointed out that the ground had not been damaged through an artillery bombardment, the infantry attacks had succeeded wherever the tanks had succeeded, while the gains on 20 November had been achieved with tanks manned by 690 officers and 3,500 other ranks, whereas the number of artillery personnel alone at Third Ypres had been 121,000. Casualties to tank crews on 20 November had been 23 officers and 63 other ranks killed, and 91 officers and 432 other ranks wounded, with 39 missing. The message which now started to be pushed by Tank Corps staff officers was that tanks represented a means of saving time and manpower. The Cambrai operation had seen the lowest casualties for an operation of this magnitude at any time during the war. The tank reduced the number of men required for battle, protected them better, reduced physical exhaustion, protected weapons and increased mobility.16

Tanks in Palestine in 1917 Any consideration of 1917 would be incomplete without a brief excursion into the employment of tanks in two major battles in Palestine. The origins of the employment of tanks in this theatre lay in a request of 30 October 1916 to the commander of the then Heavy Branch, Machine-​Gun Corps, Hugh Elles, to find an officer with front-​line experience to accompany a detachment of tanks which was to be sent to the Egyptian Expeditionary Force. The intention appears to have been to test the capabilities of the new weapon in another theatre. At this stage in the development of tanks, it is not surprising that Elles wrote back, warning of the limitations of the new machines: ‘Egypt must adapt our experiments to their conditions which I imagine are quite different both as regards ground and opposition.’ He added that, ‘machinery won’t do more than a very definite amount –​and it cannot make an extra effort as a man can’.17 24

25

The New Warfare

The war diary of the Tank Detachment shows that 15 officers and 123 other ranks disembarked at Alexandria on 9 January 1917. After some tactical training with the eight tanks which had been shipped out, they went into action during the Second Battle of Gaza (16–​20 April 1917). The brief instructions which were issued indicated that the tanks were to operate in pairs, with six tanks to be allotted to the right wing of the attack and two to the left. It was anticipated that they would contribute to the offensive by cutting lanes through the cactus hedges which predominated in this part of Palestine. Before the attack, a new plan foresaw that two tanks were to be held back in reserve at the disposal of the commander of the 52nd (Lowland) Division, who was to begin by using four tanks, while the remaining two tanks were assigned to the 54th Division. The fate of the tanks, which were a mixture of Mark I and II machines, was closely linked to the overall failure of the offensive itself.18 On the night of 18/​19 April four tanks moved to take up position near Kurd Hill. At 7.30 the next morning, the tank ‘Otazel’ became ditched on a Wadi and had to be dug out. Another tank, ‘War Baby’, moved in advance of the infantry, shifting its objective to Outpost Hill, which was taken and casualties inflicted upon the Turkish defenders; but a track broke, the tank was then hit by a shell, although the crew was able to bale out. At 11.30, the tank ‘Kiaora’ arrived at Outpost Hill to find no infantry; due to mechanical difficulties it had to return to its start line. At 1.30 the tank named ‘Tiger’ recaptured the El Arash Redoubt, which it held for 20 minutes before retiring, with all the gunners wounded, and the commander and driver slightly wounded. The total casualties for the tank detachment amounted to one officer who died of his wounds, seven men taken prisoner, nine men killed in action, with three officers and nine men wounded.19 In an after-​action report on the battle, it was concluded that the 155th Brigade had failed to achieve its objectives due to ‘the intense concentration of the enemy’s artillery and machine-​gun fire and the nature of the ground, affording as it does, concealed protection and immunity from shell fire’.20 That the attack did not succeed could not be ascribed to the failure of the tanks to reach their objectives.21 Following the failure of the Second Battle of Gaza, the tank detachment was placed in a base towards the rear, where three inspections took place in September, which indicated an attack was being prepared. Prior to the opening of the Third Battle of Gaza (1–​2 November 1917), which led to the long-​awaited final breakthrough against the Turkish front, the detachment received three Mark IV machines from England, bringing the detachment back up to its original strength of eight. This time, the commanders of the tanks were able to conduct reconnaissance, a preparatory measure which had been missing at Second Gaza. While the attack in which the tanks were involved was intended to distract the Turks from Lieutenant-General Edmund Allenby’s manoeuvre inland, 29 different objectives were given to the six tanks which had been designated to participate in the offensive, with two held in reserve once again. On the early morning of 2 November, all the tanks reached their start lines. The two which had been directed to attack the El Arish Redoubt expelled the defenders, but one received a direct hit while traversing a trench system, while the other had to be abandoned after it became stuck. The sixth tank captured its objective, then cleared enemy trenches before attacking three strong points. 25

26

Armoured Warfare

Only one tank failed to reach its first objective, four reached their second, third and fourth, while another reached its fifth. Although five tanks were damaged, these were later salvaged.22 Casualties by the conclusion of the second tank action in Palestine had been light: one man was killed and one wounded. The improved result over the first action was, though, as much a question of the overall level of success of Third Gaza. For some reason, tanks were never used again in the Middle East during the war, even if there had been the idea that Whippet machines might be employed. But the mission despatched to France to argue for machines to be sent arrived on 21 March 1918, the first day of the German spring offensive, so the plan was not pursued. If the only two actions of tanks in Palestine had been unspectacular, it had been proved that the machines could operate under desert conditions.23 However, the small number of machines used in both offensives, and the fact that the majority of the force consisted of the more primitive Mark I and II tanks, meant few meaningful lessons could be drawn.

The tank on the Western Front in 1918 The final year of the war was to see the Franco-​British forces pushed to crisis point, then to turn the war around in a series of offensives which finally drove the Germans back to their frontier and prepared the way for final victory. The year 1918 was not only notable for the combat operations which took place –​it saw new machines appear on the battlefield: the French Renault FT-​17 light tank, the British Whippet, the more capable Mark V and Mark V* tanks, and the cumbersome German A7V tank which, together with captured Mark IV machines, made up the modest German Tank Corps. In the period after Cambrai, the British Army’s Tank Corps began to train for the coming German spring offensive, which was designed to win the war before American manpower began to turn the military balance against the Central Powers. Once the German Army’s desperate ‘all or nothing’ offensive was launched on 21 March 1918, the Tank Corps was unable to make a major contribution to operations. The reasons for this were varied, but the overall unpreparedness of the British Expeditionary Corps’ (BEF) Fifth Army, the failure to anticipate the nature of the German attack (which relied heavily on storm-​trooper units, trained to bypass centres of resistance), and the lack of a clear defensive concept, prevented the Tank Corps from launching a coordinated counter-​ attack. Tank units had been divided and distributed along the frontline; many were held back so far that they could not participate in the opening phase of the battle. In addition to the problem of the disposition of the tank units, infantry commanders had no clear understanding of the limitations of the machines. From a total of 370 tanks available for combat operations, only 180 saw any action on 21 March 1918, although some of these machines did assist in the disruption of German attacks, often when their crews left a stranded tank, taking their Lewis guns with them, and continuing to fight as infantry. The opening phase of the March offensive saw the first combat actions of the Whippet Medium A tank. The 3rd Tank Battalion, based at a camp at Bray, lost some 26

27

The New Warfare

Photo 1  Medium A Whippet tank on the Western Front, 1918 of its Whippets which were suffering from engine trouble; as there were no spare parts, and no time to conduct repairs, the machines had to be destroyed to prevent them falling into enemy hands. On 26 March, however, two companies of 3rd Battalion conducted reconnaissance at the village of Mailly-​Maillet. The Whippets surprised around 300 German infantry and succeeding in scattering them. During the German offensive, Whippet tanks performed well, with few cases of mechanical breakdown. Manned by a crew of three, with a speed of 8 mph, it was only armed with machine-​ guns, but it was much more mobile than the British heavy tanks; and it was to prove its worth later in the year.24 As the series of German offensive thrusts continued, on 24 April 1918 another event of significance took place at Villers-​Bretonneux: the first tank-​versus-​tank clash in history. After the war, competing accounts of the events were published, with the number of German A7V machines involved varying from two to four.25 A report produced by the Tank Corps two days after the action provides one version of events. The Germans had attacked through the town of Villers-​Bretonneux with two tanks, while four others were engaged to the south of it. The two German tanks advanced on the village of Cachy, where they were engaged by three British Mark IV machines. The leading German tank knocked out two female tanks quickly, but was then hit three or four times by the one male Mark IV, which itself was then put out of action by shell fire. The two rearward German tanks attempted to engage Whippets south of Villers-​Bretonneux, but did not score any hits. As British heavy tanks moved forward, the German machines withdrew. 27

28

Armoured Warfare

In a separate action in the vicinity, seven Whippets killed at least 400 German infantry, although one was hit by a shell, killing the crew, with three others damaged but later recovered. While Tank Corps HQ noted the ‘extreme value’ of the Whippet in more fluid warfare, there was a warning that the Germans might not make the same mistake in the future of employing their tanks in small numbers.26 In fact, since late 1917 British intelligence and Tank Corps staff officers had been warning of the likelihood that a German tank was under development. In early February 1918, Fuller argued that the tank should be seen as one of the key anti-​tank weapons, partly because the Tank Corps was facing a cut in manpower prior to the commencement of the German March offensive. He even called for the construction of ‘tank destroyers’ as the best way for the Tank Corps to counter a German tank threat.27 The worries among the staff of the Tank Corps remained, however, just that. The German Army had failed to move quickly enough in deciding upon one workable tank design. As a result, only 20 of the A7V machines were ever built. With a crew of 18, it had a poor trench-​crossing capability, although it was armed with a 5.7cm gun and three machine-​ guns. In fact, the small German tank force was reliant on repaired and reconstituted British Mark IV machines, many of which had been captured at Cambrai. Its first action on 24 March 1918 went largely unnoticed by Allied intelligence. Ultimately, the German units were too few, and employed in too dispersed a fashion, to achieve anything other than local, tactical successes.28 On 31 May, the French Renault FT-​17 light tank made its debut on the battlefield as part of an improvised counter-​attack made to halt the advance of the German Seventh Army which was moving forward southwest of Soissons in what came to be known as the ‘Charge at Chaudun’. The operation was a mixed success, but the new two-​man tank proved remarkably effective, as only five tanks were lost out of the 31 sent into action. The speed of the machine had been impressive, as had the power of the 37mm gun against German strong points. Despite a lack of organisation, and a failure to achieve any form of tank-​infantry cooperation, the new tank had performed well and contributed to the halting of the German advance. Casualties among the crews had been relatively light, with only three killed, six seriously wounded and two missing. In another action in the same area on 3 June, mounted again in considerable haste, five Renault tanks disrupted an entire German division in less than three hours, at the cost of two killed, two wounded and two tanks abandoned in German-​held territory.29 At the Battle of Hamel on 4 July 1918, another machine went into action for the first time –​the British Mark V. This tank appeared, superficially, to be very similar to the Mark IV, but there were several key differences which made it superior: the layout of the rear of the tank was much improved, which made it easier to operate the gun; the fuel tank could carry 15 gallons more, which increased the range; the Lewis machine-​guns had been replaced by the slimmer Hotchkiss air-​cooled types; one man could now drive the tank entirely on his own; it could travel faster than its predecessor and was also more manoeuvrable. In total, 200 male and 200 female Mark V tanks were sent to France. In August the Mark V* saw action for the first time; in total, 432 male and 200 female versions were produced. It was longer than the Mark V, with wider tracks, as an answer to 28

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The New Warfare

wider German trenches; it could also carry 14 or 15 men. 579 Mark V* tanks had been completed by the Armistice. Both tanks were to play a significant part in the decisive Allied tanks battles in the second half of 1918.30 Hamel was, though, just one of several smaller actions involving Allied tank forces in June and July, each in their own way contributing to the further development of the use of armour against the Imperial German Army. On 22 June 1918, the first night raid launched by the British Tank Corps took place at Bucquoy. The tanks were forced to proceed without infantry support, but succeeded in achieving their objectives and returning unscathed; not a single tank was damaged during an especially heavy trench mortar barrage. At Hamel two weeks later, cooperation between the 60 tanks sent into action with Australian infantry also proved successful, as did the support provided by a squadron of the Royal Air Force. A mere 13 tank men were wounded, 57 of the 60 tanks suffered no damage at all, and 1,500 German prisoners were taken. On 23 July at the Battle of Moreuil, which saw French infantry cooperating with British tanks, another success was achieved, one which showed that the Mark V was a considerable technical improvement over the Mark IV.31 French tank forces conducted two small operations, at Cutry on 28 June and at Antheuil on 9 July, both of which assisted the French Army in improving its combined-​ arms tactics. The Cutry battle, which saw four Renault companies employed, was launched without artillery preparation. At one level the attack had been a success, with only five tanks left on the battlefield (and two of these were recovered later), with six tankers killed and 23 wounded. Furthermore, the overly positive after-​action reports by crews led to a reform of the way the AS approached such reporting. At Antheuil, the Germans only saw the advancing tanks at the last minute due to mist and the use of smoke shells, although it did raise questions about how infantry officers could be made to comply with the official tank regulations. These surprise attacks were but two examples of several actions which were closely analysed at army level and at French GQG. Between 18 and 23 July 1918, the biggest employment of French tanks during the war took place –​the Battle of Soissons (also referred to as the Second Battle of the Marne). The attack was launched once Ferdinand Foch was convinced that the German offensive had finally blown itself out; the goal was the central rail junction at Soissons. Once again, surprise was to be achieved through the absence of a preparatory artillery bombardment, with the heavy tanks moving forward in the first wave; anti-​tank guns were to be identified by a surveillance aeroplane. The French Tenth Army received 67 Renaults, 86 Schneiders and 85 St Chamonds; Sixth Army was allotted 100 Renaults, while the Fifth and Ninth Armies deployed 100 Renaults and four Schneiders. The lack of preparation for the attack, while assisting in the initial surprise, meant that the light tanks missed the first day’s fighting. On the first day, of 226 tanks sent into action, 61 were knocked out by artillery, with 290 crew members becoming casualties. By the evening of 22 July, the numerous, small-​scale tank attacks had largely ground to a halt; there were not enough serviceable tanks left for a full-​scale attack. Even so, 85 tanks were committed the following day. While, overall, the tanks had kept infantry casualties down, the attack had been botched from the perspective of the Artillerie Spéciale because their tanks had not been 29

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Armoured Warfare

used en masse. From the total of 462 tanks sent into action, 209 were destroyed and 57 damaged and/​or recovered later.32 The British Tank Corps performed much better, though, at the Battle of Amiens which saw the first example of a truly combined-​arms offensive. The battle consisted of two offensives launched on 8 August and 3 September; by the end of the first day, the Allies had advanced 10 miles into enemy lines, had captured 15,000 prisoners and 400 guns. The whole battle cost the Germans 50,000 killed and wounded, and 33,000 prisoners, at a cost of British and Colonial losses of 22,000 and 24,000 French. Of the 324 tanks committed, by the end of the first day around 20 per cent had become casualties. The fighting saw tank-​armoured car cooperation, as well as aircraft being employed in a ground attack role against enemy anti-​tank batteries. The move of tanks to their start line was concealed by aircraft flying overhead. Although Fuller had advocated using Whippet tanks to create havoc in the German rear, GHQ was too nervous to adopt such a plan, although armoured cars achieved something similar on a smaller scale. Although tank losses mounted very quickly, their use at Amiens did contribute to the decisive moment in the collapse of the Germans’ will to resist.33 Both British and French tanks continued to be employed after the Battle of Amiens in a variety of actions, in particular by the French Tenth Army as it advanced on the Hindenburg Line from mid-​August to early September. While historians continue to argue over the contribution of tanks to the Allied victory in France and Belgium, there seems little doubt that they played a significant part in the final three months of the war.

‘Plan 1919’ Understanding the role of the tank in the final months of the war does require some reference to J. F. C. Fuller’s ‘Plan 1919’, a memorandum first entitled ‘The Tactics of the Attack as Affected by the Speed and Circuit of the Medium D Tank’. Dated 24 May 1918, it combined many of the ideas which he had already been circulating via Tank Corps memoranda since the Battle of Cambrai. Often described as a ‘blueprint’ for future mechanised operations, the memorandum has attracted considerable attention as a key signpost in the evolution of thinking on the tank. The memorandum repeated many of the points which had been made previously by Fuller: that the tank increased mobility by replacing muscular with mechanical energy; it increased security by reducing the power of the bullet; and a powerful tank army would be able to defeat an infantry army. What lay at the centre of Plan 1919 was the argument that instead of trying to wear the enemy down by attrition, its organisation and control systems needed to be attacked. One of the targets of a future attack ought to be the army, corps and divisional headquarters. Tanks and aeroplanes would aim to attack these command-​and-​control centres during the course of a general offensive. Infantry would be used to gain the second enemy defensive line; thereafter, they would be carried forward in mechanical vehicles; artillery would be brought forward by tractors rather than horses. The main premise was that the Allies would need to build a large tank force 30

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The New Warfare

for a decisive offensive in 1919. Fuller’s plan envisaged the employment of 2,592 heavy tanks and 2,400 medium tanks.34 The first question which needs to be considered here is whether Fuller’s memoranda exerted any impact upon the future course of British and Allied operations on the Western Front. The ideas expressed in Plan 1919 do seem to have been taken up by General Sir John Capper in a paper entitled ‘Memorandum on the Requirements for an Armoured Striking Force for an Offensive in 1919’; he sent this to the Chief of the Imperial General Staff, Sir Henry Wilson, on 1 July 1918. Two War Office conferences discussed this paper on 3 and 6 July; it was approved by Wilson who sent it to Ferdinand Foch on 20 July, then to Sir Douglas Haig the following week. While Fuller’s memorandum cannot be seen to have decisively influenced the planning for Amiens, it did contribute to a broader awareness among Allied commanders that tanks offered definite possibilities against a demoralised German Army. Nonetheless, Fuller did persuade Sir Henry Rawlinson to commit most of the Tank Corps to the Amiens offensive: in other words, the basic principle of the mass employment of tanks had now been accepted.35 The historical debate over the extent to which Plan 1919 exerted any impact upon subsequent British Army operations during the final three months of the war on the Western Front is of further significance. Those who argue that the British High Command recognised the potential of armoured warfare, but within certain limitations, have dismissed Plan 1919 as an irrelevance, a plan which was never put into operation because the German Army collapsed quicker than the Allies had anticipated in May 1918. Others, though, in particular the Canadian historian Tim Travers, have seen the tank as a weapon which had greater possibilities after Amiens than was realised at the time. Those historians sceptical about the possibilities of the tank in late 1918 have failed to recognise that the losses reported by the Tank Corps were not tanks destroyed; rather these were machines which it was possible to repair and bring back into action later. Thus, of 1,993 tanks and armoured cars engaged between 8 August and 11 November 1918, 887 were salvaged after being struck by fire or being ditched. According to Travers, tanks could have been used more efficiently after Amiens had the British High Command shown a better understanding of the best way to employ them and if infantry commanders had been more willing to listen to Tank Corps officers and understand the limitations as well as the capabilities of tanks.36 It is interesting that Fuller’s claims for Plan 1919 in his memoirs conclude with a scathing attack on the British commander-​in-​chief in France, Sir Douglas Haig, whom he accuses of being ‘one if not the most unimaginative and unseeing of Generals who has ever commanded a British Army’. For his defenders, Haig’s approach to the tank was entirely rational; he was supportive throughout the war; and the high tank casualty rates during the Hundred Days do not suggest an underutilisation of the new weapon.37 However, the question is the extent to which Haig was still exerting personal influence over the use of tanks in mid-​1918. By the beginning of the final year of the war, the General Staff had started to rationalise the process of doctrine to a much greater extent. As a result, a new manual was sanctioned by the General Staff, S.S.124. Tanks and Their Employment in Co-​operation with Other Arms (August 1918). It included material 31

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Armoured Warfare

from Tank Corps memoranda which remained unaltered, building at the same time on S.S.204. Infantry and Tank Co-​operation and Training (March 1918). Although it seems unlikely that the tactical procedures S.S.124 espoused would have been taken notice of by all commanders before the end of the war, it did represent a degree of acceptance of some of the thinking which had been developed by Elles, Fuller and other Tank Corps officers.38 As such, Haig’s influence by mid-​1918 had waned as the management of the British war effort in France became more complex and better organised. Finally, despite all the flaws which can be highlighted in it, there was a wider significance to Plan 1919. For the first time, the operational possibilities for future armour operations had been identified by Fuller. While Plan 1919 looked to the future because it was based on the Medium D tank, a prototype for which was not yet in existence, it argued that future tank operations held the possibility of launching a large-​scale attack which would create opportunities to attack the enemy’s communications and logistics system simultaneously with fast tanks and aircraft, using psychological shock as a means of breaking his will. The important point to be made about Plan 1919 was that Fuller understood that the tank was improving rapidly; its speed and shock effect would increase in the future. The memorandum built to a great extent on a number of innovations introduced by the Tank Corps, from supply tanks to experiments with various forms of communications, regardless of the many obvious technical limitations still in evidence in the final year of the war.

Conclusion Much of the debate on the history of the tank in the First World War conducted during the 1920s and 1930s focussed on the ‘what might have been’ controversies. One of the first of these was Ernest Swinton’s claim that a substantial tank force should have been built up in order to maximise surprise, an argument which was repeated by Winston Churchill. Yet even Fuller dismissed this thesis since, as he argued, the new weapon was untried and considerable experimentation was required to improve not just the tanks but also their tactics.39 However, one of the ‘might have beens’ which was not discussed in any detail was the issue of whether greater cooperation might not have taken place between the Allied armies in the field of tank production. The attempts at coordination of tank production between the British and French have generally been regarded as a spectacular failure. In late 1915 and early 1916 the two sides had at least made an effort to keep each other informed of what they were planning. On 6 September 1916, an Inter-​Ally Bureau of Munitions was established, but cooperation stagnated during 1917. There was an attempt in December 1917 to establish an Allied tank factory at Neuvy Paillox, but this made poor progress. Although Estienne proposed an Allied tank training school to the Inter-​Allied Tank Committee in April 1918, it was only at the Battle of Moreuil on 23 July 1918 that any combined Anglo-​French operation took place.40 The difficulties of the proposed cooperation should not be underestimated, however. Moreover, there was a form of inter-Allied cooperation as the American 32

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The New Warfare

Expeditionary Force’s Tank Corps went into action for the first time in September 1918 with 144 Renault light tanks supplied by the French, cooperating with French Schneider and St Chamond tanks, while the 301st Heavy Tank Battalion fought alongside the British Tank Corps and was equipped entirely with British Mark V and Mark V* tanks.41 In terms of the effectiveness of the contribution of British and French armour to the Allied victory, tank production and casualties sustained provide a useful perspective. The casualties for the AS were 302 killed, 2,350 wounded, 253 missing presumed dead, just over 13 per cent losses; this compares with infantry combat casualties of 22–​44 per cent. Considering its total strength, the British Tank Corps always remained under 1 per cent of the total strength of the British Army; on 17 September 1917 it was but 0.39 per cent of the total army strength. In tank production, Britain produced 2,818 tanks in total during the war; but the French outstripped them, producing 800 medium tanks, with over 2,500 Renaults in the French inventory by the Armistice. To put this in perspective, around 35,000 tonnes of steel and other metals were used in French tank production; but, in 1918, 100,000 tonnes of steel was used per month for artillery munitions alone. The total cost of French tank production amounted to 450 million francs; the attack on Verdun on 20 August 1917 cost 700 million in artillery ammunition.42 Thus, in both war production and manpower costs, British and French tanks provided a high return overall in terms of manpower and industrial production. It would be an exaggeration to claim that the combined combat power of the British Tank Corps and the French AS won the war in 1918. Still, both forces did make a major contribution to victory. What is most remarkable, though, is the extent to which the tactics and techniques of future tank warfare emerged in less than three years of war. This can be seen at the level of individual tanks: for instance, a photograph of a British Mark I in Palestine shows that the crew had attempted to reinforce the armour through the use of spare track and a piece of the trunk of a palm tree.43 But it can also be seen in several memoranda of the British Tank Corps which, by mid-​1918, had already developed a clear vision of the tank as a weapon of operational decision on the battlefield.

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CHAPTER 2 INNOVATION VERSUS STAGNATION: THE INTERWAR PERIOD, 1919–​3 9

Following the First World War, there were conflicting views over the future of the tank:  some officers thought the conditions of the war would not be repeated again; others argued that mechanisation would change armies forever. While the British and French led the way in the development of the tank in the 1920s, it was the two pariah states of the Soviet Union and Germany which advanced most rapidly during the 1930s. In terms of theory, doctrine, new organisational forms, vehicle technology, as well as several conflicts in which tanks saw action, the period was an immensely dynamic one in the evolution of armour. The different conclusions reached by the five major armies –​the British, French, German, Russian and American –​all had significant consequences for the successes and failures of mobile forces during the Second World War and beyond. The era between the wars is, in fact, regarded as the single most important period in the development of armoured forces.

The role of theory While British and French officers had written numerous internal memoranda on the employment of tank forces during 1917 and 1918, it was not until after the war that works of theory on the future of armour began to appear in print. In the armies of the major powers, studies by officers of both the lessons of the Great War and future mechanised operations provided an important stimulus to many developments in the period. Such writings, whether they were books or articles in military journals, were especially important in the 1920s in countries which possessed either no tanks or poorly equipped forces. While the theory of armoured warfare should not be confused with military doctrine (put simply, official ideas contained in field manuals), theory without doubt contributed to the thinking of influential officers; especially noteworthy is the fact that many works were translated into other languages, just one example of the ‘international traffic’ in ideas which took place. Any study of the theory of the tank between the wars can only begin with one writer: Colonel J. F. C. Fuller (who was promoted to Major-​General in 1930). One of his most influential books was much less a work of theory and more a study of the tank in the recent war. Tanks in the Great War, 1914–​1918 (1920) made extensive use of war diaries to present a picture of British tank operations in the period 1916–​18. But in the final chapter he summarised his new theory of warfare: weapons form 99 per cent

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of victory; the tank increased mobility by replacing muscular force with mechanical; it improved security by cutting out the effect of the bullet; and it increased offensive power by making guns more mobile, replacing horses and increasing the quantity of ammunition which could be carried. He thought science would solve the problems of future warfare, and tanks would act together with the aeroplane and the submarine to deter war in the future due to their terrifying powers of destruction. Finally, mechanical weapons would herald the end of small wars; in fact, they might be the solution to preventing civil disturbances.1 Fuller’s ideas on mechanisation conditioned the debate for the next 20 years, while his dramatic and colourful language, and his deliberate exaggerations, inspired younger officers to think about this new type of warfare. The views he communicated to military audiences were extremely controversial, such as his Gold Medal Prize Essay for 1919, in which he declared that tanks would replace infantry. In his widely discussed book, The Reformation of War (1923), he argued that the tank of the future would deal with many of the threats which would exist in the next war: it reduced the target offered to aircraft because it meant the end of concentrated battle formations; it could be made secure against gas; it would be bullet-​proof; it would be able to achieve speeds of 20 mph or more and cover distances of 200 miles without refuelling; and it would free itself from roads as it could move cross-​country. Nonetheless, it would be a caricature of his theories to reduce them simply to crystal-​ball gazing. Many of his articles which appeared in military and other journals were reasoned pieces which considered tactics, the employment of tanks in India and reviewed the lessons of the Great War.2 Arguably, his single most important contribution to the theory of mechanised warfare was Lectures on F.S.R. III (Operations between Mechanized Forces) (1932), in which he adopted a slightly more measured approach. His aim was to ‘jog the mind of thinking soldiers’ and to show ‘not what will happen, but what might happen’. This intention can be applied to many other books and articles he wrote. But central to this work was his view that infantry had lost its former significance: ‘To combine tanks and infantry is tantamount to yoking a tractor to a draught horse. To ask them to operate together under fire is equally absurd.’ While he sought here to provoke debate, there is no doubt from his other writings that he was aware of the importance of tank-​infantry cooperation and accepted the need for infantry to provide anti-​tank forces. What he was referring to was the gradual decline in the operational significance of infantry as the decisive arm in open terrain; the tank had become the weapon of decision at the operational level of war. The book did have some impact in Britain: Fuller had called for a third volume of the Field Service Regulations to be devoted to future warfare. In 1936, a third volume was issued which dealt with the operations of larger formations, an indication that Fuller’s message had been understood.3 Evidence of Fuller’s huge influence can be found if one of the most significant works of theory to appear in France is considered. Charles de Gaulle’s Vers l’armée de métier (1934) painted a dramatic picture of a future war in which tanks would play a prominent part. The book does demonstrate that he had grasped the basic principles of armoured warfare –​speed, surprise, combined-​arms cooperation, the importance of attacking the 36

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enemy’s communications and cooperation with aircraft  –​but it also suggests he had drawn heavily on Fuller’s work. However, in his advocacy of quality instead of quantity, which in terms of the French defence debate meant abandoning the idea of the nation-​ in-​arms, de Gaulle argued against the French strategic concept of an army designed purely for the defensive. He thought there would be occasions when France would have to strike beyond its borders, launching possibly even a preventive strike. He also questioned the fighting value of the citizen soldier. In short, he called the entire philosophy of the nation-​in-​arms into question.4 The problem with de Gaulle’s argument was that he linked his support for a powerful armoured force to the creation of a professional army  –​and this enraged French Republican feeling. Hence, the reaction to his book was concerned much more with the political objections to a professional army than it was with a discussion of the merits of armoured forces. The timing of its publication could not have been worse. The book appeared just when the French parliament was trying to amend the law of 1928 and increase the service period in the army from one to two years. On 15 March 1935, in a debate in the Chamber of Deputies in Paris, Léon Blum cited the book as evidence that the army high command was actually out to try and create a professional army. There was little political support from Eduard Daladier, war minister from December 1932 to January 1934 and from June 1936 to May 1940. Military leaders felt de Gaulle was trying to split the army into two parts, armour and infantry, to the detriment of the larger infantry component. While some politicians and officers were willing to support the creation of armoured forces along the lines suggested by de Gaulle, the overall effect of his book was ultimately negative.5 In Germany, on the other hand, works of theory played a more positive role in the development of mechanised units. Although it is always difficult to draw a direct connection between military reform and theoretical studies, the ideas propounded by German armour theorists did not differ greatly from what was later put into practice. Ernst Volckheim, who had served in the small German tank force in the Great War, succeeded in communicating some of the lessons of the war in a work entitled The Combat Vehicle in the Conduct of War Today (1924), as well as various articles in military journals. His views were essentially those of a tactician, but he did argue for medium tanks in a period when the light tank was favoured. At a time when German officers were largely forced to rely on translations of foreign authors, among them J. F. C. Fuller and Basil Liddell Hart, his work kept interest in the tank alive.6 In the mid-​1930s, however, several major works of theory appeared. One important book was published in 1934 by an Austrian, Ludwig Ritter von Eimannsberger, under the title Der Kampfwagenkrieg (roughly translated as ‘The War of Armoured Vehicles’). This work is noteworthy because its author was obviously familiar with the works of Fuller, he had thought seriously about the potential of armoured forces in a future war, and had done so by analysing the performance of the tank in 1918. The core of the book consists of two chapters contrasting attack and defence in which the Austrian argued that the best anti-​tank weapon was the tank itself, and that the flow of battle would be much faster and more decisive in the future through the creation of tank 37

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Armoured Warfare

divisions. It was not just Eimannsberger who looked abroad for inspiration: one German officer, Walter Nehring, published a work entitled Tanks and Motor Vehicles in Foreign Armies in 1935, which demonstrates that even in the mid-​1930s the German Army still placed great value on monitoring developments in foreign armies.7 The works of Nehring, including Tanks to the Front! (1934) and Antitank: An Analysis of Its Possibilities (1937), are interesting for two other reasons. In these books, he displayed a rational and balanced approach to the subject of armoured warfare. He was aware of the potential of anti-​tank weapons, but unlike French military writers this was not used as an argument to dismiss the offensive potential of tanks. It is interesting that two of his works appeared before Heinz Guderian published his first important journal article in 1936, followed a year later by his famous work, Achtung –​ Panzer! According to Guderian, who referred to Fuller’s writings, combined-​arms cooperation, especially between tanks and infantry, was essential. Moreover, he was convinced that the defensive potential of traditional weapons would not be enough in a future war to defend against an attack by strong armoured forces; but speed would be required to exploit the initial surprise so that a tactical advantage could be translated into an operational one.8 Guderian had clearly read Nehring’s work and, more than likely, it had contributed to his own ideas. In the Soviet Union, there were many officers who published articles in military journals on the tank and mechanisation, both present and future. But it was not until the 1930s that Soviet military theory started to make up ground on Western armies, even if a small group of officers around Mikhail Tukhachevskii had already recognised the possibilities of armoured forces in future war. In his book The Nature of the Operations of Modern Armies (1929), V. K. Triandafillov argued that infantry and artillery would predominate in a future war, but that tanks would replace some of the artillery. The views of Fuller were dismissed for largely ideological reasons. Given the poor state of the Red Army’s armoured forces in the 1920s, Triandafillov’s views were not surprising, and he had no opportunity to revise them as he was killed in an air crash on 12 July 1931.9 However, within only three years, theoretical writing on armoured forces in the USSR had advanced considerably. One significant work was The Evolution of Operational Art (1932) by G. S. Isserson, who agreed with Fuller that the tank had ‘changed the correlation between defensive and offensive means in favour of the latter’. The tank had made machine-​guns and artillery pieces mobile and it had solved the problem of deep-​march columns, which were vulnerable to air attack, by creating a transition to off-​road movement. Not only did off-​road movement contribute to the maximum rapidity of the assault, these new ‘off-​ road tactics alone condition the transition to a new epoch of military art’. It was the case, though, that some of the most important theoretical work was produced by officers issuing semi-​official statements, as in the case of Mikhail Tukhachevskii’s commentary on the Red Army 1936 Field Service Regulations, published on 6 May 1937. Here he argued that ‘artillery and tanks can ensure the complete success of attacks provided that they are employed in sufficient mass.’10 Although the Red Army kept much of its military thinking on tank and mechanised warfare within the confines of official studies, it did not ignore theory completely. 38

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Innovation versus Stagnation

Triandafillov, Isserson and Tukhavevskii had read Fuller and other European authors, and foreign works were translated into Russian. Eimansberger’s 1934 book Der Kampfwagenkrieg was published in a Russian edition of 10,000 copies in 1937, while an abridged translation of Fuller’s The Reformation of War was published in 1931 and Lectures on F.S.R. III in 1933.11 The Germans were even more open to foreign ideas, with a string of translations of British military writers’ articles and books, made available through an internal military publication first issued in 1924, renamed Wehrgedanken des Auslandes (Military Thought from Abroad) in 1931. Fuller’s Tanks in the Great War, portions of The Reformation of War and all of On Future Warfare were translated into German, together with many of his journal articles, and those of other British and foreign authors.12 What the translation activities in both the German and Russian armed forces seem to indicate is that the nations which were bereft of modern armoured forces in the 1920s were determined to make up for lost time by studying foreign military authors closely. And what even a cursory study of the theory of tank warfare in the interwar period reveals is that it contributed to military debates over the organisation, tactics and the future direction of all-​arms combat. Theoretical studies were, of course, not restricted to books: the majority of contributions were articles in military journals, although memoranda also communicated new ideas. As the case of Charles de Gaulle in France illustrates, theory could on occasion play a negative role in developments. But in Britain, the Soviet Union and Germany, theory played a significant part in encouraging new ideas, the desire to experiment with new organisational forms, as well as influencing the revision of military doctrine.

The evolution of armoured doctrine Any comparison of the armour doctrine of the major nations which developed mechanised forces reveals that there was some agreement on the basic principles. These principles had been established by the early 1930s and could be found to one degree or another in the field manuals of Britain, France, Germany, the USSR and the United States. It was considered necessary to use tanks in mass and to concentrate them during an assault both numerically and in terms of frontage under attack. While tanks were to rely on speed and shock action, in combination with their firepower and protection, cooperation with infantry and artillery was required. It was understood that though the tank was the most important AFV, there were a variety of other mechanised vehicles whose levels of vulnerability dictated their respective roles. Tanks and AFVs were sensitive to terrain and it was essential to employ them on favourable ground if they were to exploit their mobility to the full. But there were disagreements over the degree to which armies should mechanise and motorise and over the respective role of the tank in relation to the other arms. The way in which the senior military leadership accepted or rejected views on armoured forces was often reflected in the teachings laid down in field manuals. Still, manuals which 39

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Armoured Warfare

were produced specifically for armour could differ in nuance or even their message, even if the ‘final word’ was delivered in the field service regulations, which covered all branches of each respective army. The significance of the military manuals is that they conditioned, at least to a degree, the way in which armies attempted to employ their mechanised forces during the Second World War; indeed, doctrine gave clear direction to the approach taken to tactics, vehicle design and the organisational structure of regiments, battalions and divisions. The British proved to be the early leaders in doctrine, although this occurred in the face of considerable opposition from senior officers. The lessons of the war were codified in the manual Tank Training. Vol. 1 (1920), which argued that there were two main roles for tanks: first, to assist the infantry in overcoming enemy defences, especially where barbed wire was in place; and second, to exploit successes and disorganise the enemy, acting either with cavalry or independently. While the 1924 Field Service Regulations noted the role of the tank in facilitating the forward movement of infantry, and that it could be used with cavalry in flanking attacks, it largely emphasized the limitations of the machines.13 Postwar doctrine was updated with the publication of Tank and Armoured Car Training, Vol. II (1927), but more significant was the 1929 manual, Mechanized and Armoured Formations, also known as the Purple Primer. The author of the latter manual was Charles Broad (assisted by another tank officer, George Lindsay), who had been instructed to draw together the lessons of the 1927 and 1928 military exercises. It explained in detail the parameters of mechanised mobility, technical, logistical and combined-arms questions, and argued that tanks were usually more powerful than infantry. The manual side-​stepped the role of infantry in the process of mechanisation, and it avoided reference to tanks leading infantry into the attack, even though this was implicit in many of the ideas expressed.14 The de-​emphasis of the infantry among tank officers was partly because they believed that any collaboration would be harmful to the cause of mechanisation and their radical ideas about battlefield mobility. The tragedy for Britain’s armoured force was that after a strong start, conservative opinion in the army reasserted itself during the 1930s and doctrine began to stagnate. Although a proposal had been made for an armoured division by George Lindsay in 1935, this was not realised until 1938. Doctrine was also affected by the decision to mechanise the cavalry, which led to their ideas finding their way into some manuals. But in Operations –​Higher Formations (1936) the ideal targets for mechanised attack –​the enemy’s headquarters, flanks, reserves and gun positions –​ were seen as subsidiary to the main attack. Although armour was identified as important in the counter-​stroke, cavalry ideas had actually overturned the Tank Corps’ belief in the importance of armour in a breakthrough against heavily defended enemy positions.15 The problem with French doctrine was a very different one. They had failed to analyse the lessons of the Great War systematically and as a result they continued to adhere to the idea that firepower paved the way for the infantry. So, in their view, tanks were present on the battlefield to assist in the advance of the infantry; this assumption was reinforced by the fact that over 3,000 Renault FT-​17 tanks were in the French inventory in the early 1920s. The postwar tank doctrine of infantry support remained essentially 40

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unaltered until the mid-​1930s, beginning with the provisional instructions of 1920, which was reprinted in 1929. The idea of the tank as an infantry support weapon was repeated in the 1930 manual, Instruction sur l’emploi des chars de combat: ‘Tanks are only a supplementary means of action placed temporarily at the disposal of the infantry. They considerably reinforce the action of the infantry, but they do not replace them.’16 The cavalry, on the other hand, did manage to innovate to a certain extent, as can be seen from their 1921 manual, which defined mobility less narrowly than the infantry arm. By 1935 the cavalry had formed four light cavalry divisions and one mechanised division, while they had drawn up the forward-​looking, provisional 1935 manual on the employment of mechanised and motorised cavalry units. But the difficulty was that the stranglehold which the infantry maintained over manoeuvres meant it was extremely difficult for cavalry officers to advocate the creation of combined-​arms formations. As a result, they were driven increasingly towards the use of tanks in a light, high-​mobility role. The difficulty for those advocating the creation of armoured divisions was that the General Staff sought to manipulate facts, especially concerning anti-​tank weapons, in order to bolster a defensive doctrine which could not be challenged. The irony of French doctrine was that, of all the major nations, they published the largest number of field manuals. The problem here was that no internal debate was permitted, so the over-​estimation of the power of anti-​tank weapons distorted discussions for most of the interwar period.17 Doctrine for the employment of armoured vehicles in Germany was influenced by very different challenges to those facing the British and French:  the biggest of these was the Versailles Treaty which forbade the German Army from possessing any tanks. Nonetheless, the basis for later German thinking on the employment of AFVs as part of a balanced, combined-​arms force was the 1921 field service regulations, Führung und Gefecht der verbundenen Waffen. Experimentation with dummy armoured vehicles during the Weimar period did not breach the terms of the treaty but did have a negative effect because many soldiers did not take armoured warfare seriously as a result. The need to conduct serious thinking about mechanisation in secret did, though, have one positive effect: conservative military opinion remained silent as the army was attempting to avoid the restrictions of the Versailles Treaty. Doctrine was then updated in 1933 with the new edition of the field service regulations, Troop Leadership. At a moment when Germany still had no armoured forces, opinion was already favourable towards the future possibilities of the tank: ‘Combat vehicles and infantry, as a rule, will be assigned the same objective; this, if possible should be the hostile artillery. The principle of the combat vehicle is to thrust towards there, where the decision of the attack is to be sought.’18 The first armour manual, published in 1936, only examined the offensive possibilities of tank forces within the context of their employment within an infantry division, although it considered carefully their relationship not only with the infantry, but with artillery, anti-​tank forces, smoke troops, engineers and communications units. Cooperation with the air force was dealt with in a specific chapter. Moreover, the general principles for the employment of mechanised forces indicated that the essence of armour had been understood: there was an emphasis on employment in mass at the decisive point and full use 41

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of the moment of surprise.19 A further leap forward in doctrine was taken just two years later with the first divisional manual, Richtlinien für die Führung der Panzer-​Division, published by the General Staff on 1 June 1938. Unfortunately, no copy of this manual appears to have survived; the only indication of its existence is the updated version, the Regulations on the Command and Employment of the Panzer Division, published after the French Campaign. It can thus only be speculated on the basis of the later version how far the second peacetime manual went in terms of propagating the idea of a panzer division. But considering journal articles which appeared shortly before the outbreak of the war, it seems reasonable to assume that military planners had come to the conclusion that panzer divisions would be employed in the future as part of a panzer corps.20 The one country from the five major powers which had not gathered any experience in the use of armour in the First World War was the Red Army. It first encountered British and French tanks during the Civil War in fighting against the White forces. This led to the first manual on the use of tanks, published in September 1920, which emphasized tanks as infantry support weapons. The second manual was published in 1925, entitled Provisional Combat Manual for the Armoured Forces of the Red Army, although this was more of a technical guide on how to operate tanks. Of greater note was the 1928 manual, Provisional Instructions for the Combat Use of Tanks, even if here the contents still derived very much from the French Army, with a few adjustments provided by British doctrine.21 At this point, an operational role for the tank was not yet envisaged; the 1929 field service regulations, known as PU-​29, still viewed tanks as an infantry weapon. This was to be expected, since at the end of 1928 the Red Army was in possession of only 92 tanks, 100 armoured cars and 32 armoured trains, essentially obsolete equipment from the days of the Civil War.22 The early 1930s, however, witnessed rapid progress in the role envisaged for tanks in Red Army doctrine. It saw the official recognition of deep operations theory, even if these ideas and their proponents fell victim to Stalin’s purges in 1936–​38. In 1933, the Chief of the Red Army Staff, A. I. Yegorov, compiled a manual entitled Provisional Instructions on the Organisation of Deep Battle, which adopted the ideas of Russian theorists who had argued for independent mechanised forces, but as part of a combined-​arms team. This change in attitude was, in part, linked to the development of the new BT tank series. It was confirmed by the new 1936 regulations, PU-​36, which recognised the power of independent tank groups: ‘The decisive role of the long-​range tanks in penetrating an enemy defence zone in its entire depth requires that the use of the long-​range tank group is actually consistent with the situation.’23 Finally, the US Army differed from the other four major armies because it did not go to war until two years after Britain, Germany, France and the USSR, so it was able to adjust its doctrine in the light of the first campaigns of the Second World War. This was fortunate because the interwar years were ones of stagnation, not just in funding but in doctrine as well. Beyond the continued use of British tank manuals in the 1920s, the infantry branch was responsible in 1931 for an infantry manual for tank units. This drew almost entirely from the experience of the First World War and viewed the two roles for tanks as exploitation and infantry support, although the latter was what was emphasized. 42

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In fact, there is little indication that the US infantry branch really understood the British doctrine which it purported to adhere to.24 Despite the problem that the General Staff was limited to a planning and coordination role by legislation, which led to the order to mechanise the cavalry only being issued in 1931, the cavalry did continue to follow developments abroad during the 1920s. Yet, the lack of proper machines meant that, by 1939, cavalry doctrine was simply a reiteration of its previous mounted role. According to one instructional manual, ‘Mechanized cavalry finds its principal role in employment on strategical missions.’ Its value lay in ‘its ability, if properly employed, to conduct a distant reconnaissance and to create an initial success in a critical zone of the theater of operations’.25 The continuation of its traditional outlook meant that a gulf had opened between it and the infantry. Due to the lack of coordination in approaches to combined arms, it was not until 1939 before the first publication on anti-​tank defence was issued. But during the course of 1940, the US Army began to catch up with developments which had been taking place on the battlefields of Europe. The 1941 edition of the key operations manual contained a section on the armoured division, describing it as a ‘highly mobile force’. It possessed battlefield mobility, protected firepower, shock power and an extended radius of action. Although possessing certain vulnerabilities, its primary role was ‘in offensive operations against hostile rear areas’.26

The evolution of organisation Despite the importance of doctrine, the most significant factor affecting mechanised formations were the organisational structures created in the early postwar period, or those which were introduced in the 1930s by the ‘late-​starter’ nations. The decision as to whether armoured troops were independent or whether they were subordinated to other branches exerted a crucial influence over their evolution. In the case of France, things got off to an extremely bad start when the French Tank Corps, the Artillerie d’Assaut, was abolished and replaced by a new tank section within the Infantry Department in 1920. Although Marshal Philippe Pétain appointed an artillery officer to the new post of Inspector-​General of Motorisation on 27 July 1927, this was only a half measure. As the organisational structure and regulation of the French Army only permitted experimentation within the individual branches of service, the infantry retarded tank development. When the cavalry began to experiment, they tended towards traditional cavalry solutions, not least of all as they had enjoyed considerable success with armoured cars during the First World War. When the 1932 Mailly manoeuvres exposed the impossibility of using infantry tanks as the core of independent mobile units, the infantry became even more entrenched in their attitude. Although budget reductions in 1934–​35 caused problems for the development of the French armoured forces, policy largely reflected existing ideas. While the possibility of an armoured division had first been examined in 1932, it was only in 1939 that a memorandum was issued on the subject: it concluded that tanks were a tool of the infantry, to be used in the methodical 43

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battle, under rigid control, and to be employed in successive waves, providing there was adequate artillery support. To justify the hypothesis that the next war would be essentially a repeat performance of the Western Front in 1918, the threat of anti-​tank weapons to armour was exaggerated in what was an unbalanced doctrine.27 In Britain, due largely to the efforts of Fuller, the Tank Corps was saved from extinction after the First World War and its existence finally secured when, on 18 October 1923, the Royal Tank Corps (RTC) was created. Although the RTC was able to carry out experimentation, the fact that tank officers were united in their own corps meant that inter-​arm rivalry could not be avoided. The infantry and cavalry both felt threatened by the existence of the tank, although interestingly the artillery as a technical service was much less hostile. This was perhaps one of the reasons why the proposal to the Chief of the Imperial General Staff made by George Lindsay in early 1934 for the creation of a mobile division, with a motorised cavalry brigade, tank brigade, three infantry battalions and mechanised artillery, engineer, signal and air defence units, came to nothing. Perhaps the worst effect of inter-​arm rivalry was that, even though a decision had been reached in 1935 to mechanise the cavalry with light tanks, it took until 4 April 1939 before the order was given to amalgamate the RTC with the 18 cavalry regiments which still existed at that time. This meant that Britain entered the Second World War with a mechanised force which had not had time to develop as a unified, cohesive organisation.28 Part of the problem may have been, as Lindsay argued in 1929, that serious experimentation needed to take place in Egypt (an option unlikely to have been embraced by the War Office) because the main manoeuvre area on Salisbury Plain was too small.29 In the Red Army, the organisational development of armoured forces had a considerable impact on the preparedness of the USSR for war. In 1922, the Tank and Motor Transport Detachment of the Red Army, which had been founded in 1920, came under the jurisdiction of an artillery commander; armoured troops began to wear the black badges of the artillery on their uniform collars. In 1930 the armoured forces became the Motorised and Mechanised Troops of the Red Army; in March 1932 a directive recommended the creation of mechanised brigades within mechanised corps; from 1934 until 1942 they operated under the title of Armoured Car and Tank Troops. While inter-​arm rivalry was kept to a minimum, this was achieved by means of a doctrine which remained centralised and traditional, with not enough emphasis on combined-​arms cooperation. In short, theory had abandoned the traditional belief in mass and raced ahead of actual practical training in all-​arms formations.30 In the case of Germany, their experience reveals not only what they got right, but also what the other armies got wrong. Partly by accident, the restrictions of the Versailles Treaty forced Germany to avoid founding a separate branch for armoured forces. Instead, cooperative work with the Red Army was undertaken at Kazan in the Soviet Union, while a group of technical specialists under Guderian carried out experiments within the Motor Transport Service. This had the effect of quelling inter-​arm rivalry and allowing the embryonic tank forces to experiment without interference. Moreover, once rearmament started in earnest in 1933, the perfect organisation was already in existence. In the summer of 1934 a Panzer Troops Command was established within the Motor Transport 44

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Service and, in late 1935, the motorised combat troops, or Kraftfahrkampftruppen, were established. This took place close to the date of the founding of the Luftwaffe, and so the tank troops emerged at a time in Germany when new weapons were receiving official approval. So, although there was some resistance towards the tank from the infantry and cavalry, this was largely blocked due to the fact that the major experimentation took place between 1935 and 1940, a time when all branches were struggling to keep up with the demands of rapid military expansion, in particular the integration of new personnel and equipment.31 The United States Army suffered from the control of tanks by the infantry due to an amendment by Congress to the National Defense Act on 4 June 1920. Like the French, the suffocation of the tank by the infantry meant it was the cavalry which sought to innovate with armoured vehicles. The slow progress of armoured formations was partly caused by the types of tanks available:  in 1930, the army still held 900 Renault FT light tanks and 100 British Mark IVs and Vs. Even the performance of mechanised forces at the Fort Riley manoeuvres in 1934 could not persuade the army leadership to abandon the horse. At the Second Army manoeuvres in 1936, the 1st Cavalry Regiment (Mechanized) performed well; and, by 1938, the 7th Cavalry Brigade (Mechanized) had been formed, which stood out at the First Army manoeuvres in 1939. The same brigade cooperated the following year with an infantry tank brigade at the Louisiana manoeuvres, forming the first provisional armoured division. In May 1940, a group of senior officers agreed that the US Army needed to create a mechanised force beyond the control of the infantry and cavalry. On 10 July 1940, an order was issued by the Army Chief of Staff, George C. Marshall, which created the first armoured force, with Brigadier-​General Adna R. Chaffee, Jr., as its commander and de facto a new branch chief.32 There were, of course, other factors affecting the development of armoured forces during the interwar period, not least of all the strategic plans and general political atmosphere of the time. In the case of France, quite obviously the political desire to invest in a defensive project of the proportions of the Maginot Line meant that armoured forces, offensive in nature, would arouse political worries and scepticism. The requirements for armoured troops, an aggressive spirit, a high level of training and technical expertise, did not fit with the Republican ideal of the nation-​in-​arms. In Britain, although the army still held a privileged position in society, it was in specific regiments, above all cavalry regiments, where social status was concentrated. The tank threatened the military and political social order. Only in the two major totalitarian states, Germany and the Soviet Union, did the political culture seem to favour armoured forces. In the case of Germany, a new fascination with machines, which was a function of the Nazi ideology of the time, helped promote the popularity of new weapons among soldiers. In the Soviet Union, the purges decimated the leading tank officers, perhaps because these officers represented the intellectual elite of the country: intelligent, independent thinkers in the Red Army were not generally desired by Stalin. His group of cronies tended to be soldiers who were incapable of either understanding or embracing new ideas; and, of course, such officers existed in other armies, too. 45

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Technology The development of armoured vehicles during the interwar period was often slow, but its history was marked by differences in thinking over how mechanised forces would fight on the battlefield. The progress of technological development was conditioned by a complex array of factors, including budgetary restrictions, bureaucratic machinations, inter-​arm rivalries and personal jealousies, and the official military doctrines of the time. Some armies committed the error of designing tanks for a specific role –​usually infantry support or cavalry missions –​while others, such as Poland, Japan and Italy, did not possess the industrial base to be able to produce good medium tanks. The country which might have been expected to lead the way in vehicle design, Great Britain, struggled to produce a sound tank prototype. By the outbreak of war in 1939, there were two types of light tanks in existence, five cruiser tanks and three models of infantry tank under development or in production; this number does not take into account other designs which were abandoned. There were six separate types of suspension, four different transmission systems and various track systems, with the two-​pounder gun the only common denominator. While the Medium Marks II and III, used on manoeuvres in 1934, had been reasonably good machines for the time, tank design lost its way in the latter half of the decade. Amid all the confusion, mismanagement, lack of funds and proper coordination, the Vickers A12 Infantry Tank proved to be the best design, in fact the design which evolved into the Matilda infantry tank Mark II. While the first orders for the Matilda Mark I had been placed in April 1937, the Mark II was slow to come into production, with only two available on the outbreak of war.33 In the case of France, there seems little doubt that the problems in tank design were caused less by the budgetary constraints of the period 1932–​35 and more by the view of the General Staff that they required an infantry-​support tank and a heavy breakthrough tank. These requirements led to the Renault R35 light tank, introduced in 1935, which had a two-man crew and a speed of 12 mph, and the Hotchkiss H35 which entered production in 1936. Introduced in 1935, the Char B1 was intended as a heavy tank, with a 75mm howitzer mounted in the hull. The turret mounting a 47mm gun was added at a later stage in the design process, but its anti-​tank capability proved poor. While it had a crew of four, its major disadvantage was its relatively slow speed of 13 mph off-​road. The Somua S35, on the other hand, was originally conceived as a cavalry tank, but due to the need to increase the armour, its road speed was only 25 mph; the 47mm gun was adequate for the late 1930s, but the one-​man turret and three-​man crew were obvious design flaws. It only became available in significant numbers in 1938, yet the main problem was that only 430 had been delivered by May 1940.34 The Germans were able to introduce the Panzer II in 1935, a light tank with a speed of 25–​30 mph, with a crew of three. It was quickly realised, as well, that slow-​moving, infantry support tanks were not the best way to exploit the full potential of armour. This led to the production of medium tanks, with the Panzer III first entering production in 1936. It had

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a crew of five, a speed of 20 mph, and was initially armed with a 37mm gun. But the sound design of the tank made it possible to upgrade it with more powerful guns later. The Panzer IV, introduced in the same year, also had a crew of five, and could travel at approximately 26 mph. In addition to their strong engineering traditions, German tank development had benefited from the secret military cooperation with the USSR at Kazan. Here the Germans were able to test vehicles, guns and optical sights well away from the attentions of Allied control officers.35 US tank technology is connected to the history of two countries because a revolutionary design, the famous Christie tank, named after the eccentric American inventor, J. Walter Christie, was sold to the Red Army. Christie had produced a number of designs during the 1920s, all of which had experienced problems. In 1928, however, Christie’s ‘National Defense Machine’ made use of a long independent helical spring suspension system, and large road wheels, hence offering increased speed and cross-​ country mobility. By 1930, US army officers had come to recognise the significance of the Christie design and began calling for a 47mm gun to be mounted on the machine as a basis for the creation of armoured divisions. But opinion was divided within the army over both the future of the tank and Christie’s design. The personality of the designer made negotiations difficult, so that only one machine was ordered. Christie had also initiated talks with the Soviet Amtorg Corporation, so that his design eventually became the basis for the BT fast tank series, with the first version, the BT-​2, introduced in 1932.36 The development of tanks and other fully tracked vehicles was not, of course, the only aspect of the technological developments which occurred between the wars. Mobile warfare was also dependent upon lighter combat vehicles and the use of radios. The German Army, among others, developed a series of four-​, six-​and eight-​wheeled armoured cars. The six-​wheeled SdKfz 231 armoured car was first introduced in 1932: some mounted a 7.92mm machine-​gun in the turret, with the later version, the SdKfz 232, up-​gunned to carry a 20mm cannon. By 1936, they had been superseded by the eight-​wheeled SdKfz 231, which was an important part of armoured reconnaissance battalions:  gradually introduced in 1937–​38, it mounted a 20mm gun in a turret, had a speed of 53 mph, and a range of 165 miles; a command version of the vehicle, the SdKfz 232, was equipped with a large frame aerial over the turret. In the late 1930s, the German Army also came up with the idea of adapting a half-​track designed for pulling artillery pieces into a vehicle to carry infantry. This project was commenced in 1937, with vehicles going into production after successful trials in 1938. The first production vehicles of the SdKfz 251 were ready in the spring of 1939.37 Given that the most significant vehicle designs only began to appear in the late 1930s, quite clearly theory and doctrine had pushed ahead of the actual technology available. But Fuller’s first theories had predicted that tanks would move faster in the future and possess longer operational ranges. Yet, for some armies, the few instances where tanks were employed under combat conditions in the interwar period seemed to suggest that their actual potential was limited.

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Tanks in combat The first post-​1918 war in which tanks participated in combat operations on a significant scale was the Russian Civil War (approx. 1918–21). The opening action occurred on 7 February 1919 in the Odessa region when five Renault FT-​17s were used in the capture of Tiraspol in a joint Polish-​French attack. But as the French later abandoned these machines, the main activities around the employment of tanks centred on the battles between the ‘White forces’ and the Red Army. Britain supplied six Mark Vs and six Whippets to General Anton Denikin in March 1919. In July 1919, a further 51 Mark Vs and 11 Whippets were sent. A  second tank detachment (which never had more than six machines) disembarked at Reval on 5 August 1919 to aid General Nikolai Yudenich’s force in north-​west Russia; and a third detachment of only four tanks was sent to assist in the withdrawal of British forces from Archangel in northern Russia in the same month. The first combat action of tanks supplied to Denikin’s Volunteer Army took place on 8 May 1919 in the Voskreseensky Shiroky area, with two Whippets and three Mark Vs participating in the action. It was found that Whippets were useful in pursing the fleeing Red forces but that the Mark Vs were not fast enough to keep up. Due to the distances involved, mechanical trouble was a constant characteristic of operations, although the central workshop at Taganrog was staffed by over 150 British personnel, including mechanics. There was a tank school at the same location, which enabled British instructors to teach the Russians maintenance, driving and gunnery skills. Typical actions involved four or five tanks employed against Red Army positions, often leading to the defenders being driven away. The inexperience of the Russian crews, however, and the general lack of coordination of the anti-​B olshevik forces, meant that the British tanks could not make a decisive impact on the outcome of the civil war. The end of British involvement in southern Russia came in December 1919 as the Don Front began to retreat. The final evacuation of the Taganrog central workshops took place on 1 January 1920. Thereafter, only 49 British machines remained in Denikin’s army. There were, though, other notable developments in the Russian Civil War. First of all, 83 tanks sent by the Western Allies were captured and sent into action by the Red Army. As the number of captured Allied tanks mounted, the first ‘motor-​tank units’ were created in the Red Army in January 1920. The Battle of Ziyabki (July 1920) saw the first planned use of tanks, in combination with an armoured train, armoured cars, cavalry and infantry, as part of a combined-​arms operation to dislodge the enemy from a well-​defended position. The attack was a major success because within two hours of the opening of the attack, the tanks had broken through the enemy’s defences, leading to the capture of many prisoners, eight guns and 20 machine-​guns. Red Army tanks were also used in the liberation of Tbilisi, the Georgian capital, on 25 February 1921. In fact, as the Civil War progressed, Red Army soldiers overcame their initial fear of tanks and learned to use artillery in an anti-​tank role. Nonetheless, the initial shock of encountering tanks on the battlefield galvanised the Bolsheviks into manufacturing their own tanks. On 31 48

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August 1920, the very first domestically manufactured Soviet tank drove out of the factory gates, carrying the name ‘Freedom Fighter V. I. Lenin’. Although it was essentially a copy of the Renault FT-​17, the first series saw 15 produced, providing the embryonic basis for later Soviet tank production.38 During the Rif Rebellion (1921–27), the Spanish Army purchased 12 Renault FT-​ 17s from the French. The Renaults were all equipped with a 7mm Hotchkiss machine-​ gun, while, additionally, six Schneider CA1 tanks were bought, which were assigned to the artillery branch. Two platoons of five tanks each arrived in Morocco in March 1922, where they were to be used against Rif tribesmen who had rebelled against Spanish expansion into their territory. But the first tank action on 18 March 1922, which aimed at the capture of Tuguntz, ended in failure. The tanks advanced 800 yards beyond the infantry; the Riffians surrounded the unprotected tanks, first throwing stones at them. Then they identified the blind spots of the machine-​guns, so that they were able to push daggers through the vision slits, injuring a machine-​gunner. To make matters worse for the Spanish, some machine-​guns jammed due to faulty ammunition. The tanks were forced to withdraw, but two broke down and could not be recovered; they were blown up four days later by the Riffians using dynamite. The investigation by the Army General Staff concluded that lack of tank-​infantry cooperation, and the lack of adequate training, had been the main causes of the failure. Although tanks participated in an amphibious operation at Alhucemas Bay in September 1925, for the rest of the campaign they were assigned to reconnaissance operations, wheeled vehicle recovery, support during retreats and in ‘punitive missions’.39 In the mid-​1930s, there were other examples of the employment of AFVs in conflicts in which they made no major contribution, other than of course to underscore the same lessons which had been learned elsewhere. In the Chaco War (1932–​35), the Bolivian armed forces significantly outnumbered those of Paraguay. But the nature of the terrain and the climatic conditions meant that the majority of Bolivian deaths were caused by dehydration. A  handful of Carden-​Lloyd tankettes and British Vickers Type A  and B tanks –​the former tank equipped with two turrets and two Vickers 7.65mm machine-​ guns, the latter with a single turret, mounting a 47mm gun and a machine-​gun –​were commissioned into the Bolivian Army in December 1932. In July 1933, a Type B broke into the Paraguayan defences at the Second Battle of Nanawa after it had destroyed wooden defensive positions; on 15 November 1933, Type A tanks broke up an attack by Paraguayan infantry near Alihuatá; but, on 10 December 1933, some Vickers tanks were captured by a Paraguayan cavalry squadron. The tankettes proved to be unsuitable for the conditions. There were few lessons which could be drawn from the conflict, although Major ‘Wim’ Brandt, one of several German officers who manned the Bolivian tanks, recommended in a study that tanks should only fire when stationary and that all crew members be trained as drivers.40 Soon after the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War in July 1936, Italian CV (Carro Veloce, or fast tank) 35 tanks and Russian T-​26B tanks were involved in battles, on occasions against each other; the first tank-​versus-​tank clash took place on 24 October 1936. By the end of the war, a total of 149 CV-​35 tanks had been delivered to the Italian Volunteer Corps. In 49

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Photo 2  Nationalist Panzer I tanks advancing on Bilbao, June 1937 addition, the Germans supplied a total of 150 Panzer IA and IB light tanks to the Nationalists, who also used some Renault FT-​17 tanks of First World War vintage. The Soviet Union delivered a total of 407 tanks and armoured cars, with the Republicans employing Russian T-​26B and BT-​5 tanks. They possessed a few French Schneider CA1 M16 tanks as well, and some Renault FT-​17s; in fact, they tried to manufacture their own tank, the Barbastro, probably in an effort to boost morale, but only a few were actually produced.41 One of the problems for tanks in the war was that, due to the difficult terrain on which they were employed, with small rocks often breaking tank tracks, their fuel consumption was remarkably heavy and resupply was extremely difficult. Italian tanks had inferior armament and were no match for the BT-​5s armed with a 45mm gun. A further problem was the composition of the crews. The Italian tanks were manned by mixed Spanish and Italian crews, the Republican tanks were initially manned by all Russian crews, then, for political reasons, mixed Russian-​Spanish crews. The friction which ensued retarded the effective employment of tanks in the war. The Republicans had the habit of moving forward without infantry or artillery support, their vehicles presenting an easy target for artillery and anti-​tank guns. Surprisingly, although their machines were poorer, the Nationalists’ tactics were generally superior; a frequent ruse was to try and draw enemy armour forward by retreating so that their tanks could then be knocked out by Italian Breda anti-​tank guns. Given the challenges of the terrain, the weakness of Republican tactics, and the poor quality of Nationalist machines, it is not difficult to understand why the Spanish Civil War led to some confusion over the possible lessons of the war. Ironic is that the foreign nation most heavily involved, the Soviet Union, drew all the wrong lessons. Ignoring the very peculiar and specific features of the terrain, the conflict and the participants, 50

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the chief lesson drawn was that ‘deep operations’ had failed in Spain and was, therefore, an unsound theory. However, these incorrect conclusions can themselves only truly be understood within the context of the Great Purges. Many advisers returning from Spain were killed, among them leading intelligence officers. The fact that some of the most convincing and authoritative advocates of the tank and deep operations theory had already been killed increased the pressure to claim that the fighting in Spain had shown the theory was unsound.42 The employment of tanks by both the Red Army and the Japanese Imperial Army during border battles in 1939 provides a final example of the use of armour during the interwar period. At the Battle of Nomonhan/​Khalkhin Gol, which raged between 11 May and 16 September 1939, thereby continuing into the Second World War, tank forces were employed by both sides. The Imperial Japanese Army possessed more infantry, but only around 135 light tanks to the far greater numbers of BT-​5s and BT-​7s, as well as some BA-​ 10 armoured cars, which the Red Army was able to deploy. The Russians also had over 800 aircraft available to the 250 which the Japanese could bring to bear. As the Japanese advanced in early July, they destroyed around 120 Soviet tanks and armoured cars with Molotov cocktails, 37mm anti-​tank guns and anti-​tank mines. Japanese light tanks failed to breakthrough Red Army defensive positions, however, losing about half their strength in an ill-​coordinated night attack on 2/​3 July, although a more successful night attack took place on 6 July. Soviet tanks kept a distance of around 1,400 yards from the Japanese forces and, firing from hull-​down positions, they exacted a heavy toll on Japanese infantry. The essential problem for the Imperial Japanese Army was that it was an infantry force which had gathered experience fighting against the Chinese, who had minimal tank forces; so, the military leaders had assumed that light tanks would be adequate. Due to their previous combat experience, Japanese crews sought to advance rapidly without infantry support. Tank-​infantry cooperation had been seriously neglected, whereas the Red Army had emphasized it. After Japanese forces had been worn down in the first half of August by withering Russian artillery fire, the Red Army launched an offensive on 20 August, including 498 BT tanks cooperating with infantry. Soviet armour proved more effective than in July because they started to use a lower grade fuel which was less flammable, while wire netting had been used to cover the engines to defeat Molotov cocktails. By 21 August, Red Army tanks were already cutting off the Japanese supply lines. Japanese infantrymen were reported as depressed because they could only see Soviet armour and had not seen any of their own tanks. By the end of the fighting, the Red Army commander, Georgii Zhukov, had won his victory with tanks. The Japanese had been defeated, at least in part, because they had too few tanks and could not hold off Soviet armour merely with courageous attacks by infantry.43

Conclusion What emerges from events and trends in the interwar period (apart from the varying effects of financial austerity for each army) is that three factors significantly influenced 51

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the development of armour: first, inter-​arm rivalry over the control of tanks and mechanised vehicles; second, the rate of progress in each of the major countries was determined by the achievements made in the construction of balanced, combined-​arms formations; and third, the success of reform efforts was often dependent upon the outcome of attempts to integrate new ideas into the existing official doctrines, which often involved a willingness to consider foreign ideas dispassionately. The end result by early 1940 was either an army which understood that operational mobility of large armoured formations was the key to future success on the battlefield, or an army which still maintained the tank was a slow-​moving support weapon which needed to regulate its pace to the progress of the infantry. One of the most intense historical controversies surrounding the development of armoured forces in the interwar period has been over whether Britain influenced the development of Germany’s armoured forces. There seems little doubt that this was the case, even if the actual influence of the journalist Basil Liddell Hart has been exaggerated. What should be borne in mind in relation to this, however, is that the Germans took what they could from British field manuals –​and to a significant degree –​to develop their own ideas on the use of panzer divisions and corps. The German understanding of combined-​arms warfare was their great strength and it was largely developed through field exercises and manoeuvres. As a result, they were able to recognise that the chief lesson of the Spanish Civil War was that no serious conclusions could be drawn on account of the nature of terrain, the quality of the equipment used and the poor standards of tank training and maintenance among the crews. What is especially noteworthy is that the two armies most willing to innovate, the German and Russian, showed considerable interest in foreign military ideas. This was not simply directed towards the translation of theoretical books and articles, but also field manuals and the study of other armies’ military exercises. The Germans translated the 1927 and 1929 British manuals on tank warfare; they also closely watched developments in the Soviet Union. The Red Army was likewise interested in developments abroad. British officers, however, were sceptical of what they observed during the 1936 Red Army manoeuvres. The French were largely disinterested in innovations in foreign armies, partly because they had invested in a strategy based around their Maginot Line defensive system. The causes of the failure to understand the significance of the tank, and how best to employ it in war, were varied and complex. But the interwar period does seem to demonstrate that the military organisations which succeed are those which encourage debate and disagreement.44

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CHAPTER 3 BLITZKRIEG:  THE INITIAL GERMAN ARMOURED SUCCESSES, 1939–​4 1

Any examination of the early German success with armoured forces, even if it is argued that there is no evidence for the existence of a Blitzkrieg concept, would still have difficulty providing an account of events without mentioning the word. This is not only because the German methods of armour attack were so successful, but also because even during the war there was an assumption that a new form of offensive operation had been created. Indeed, there does seem to be something highly innovative about the German technique of warfare, which requires us to consider the significance of mobile forces for German campaigns in the period 1939–​41. However, before we turn to the historical and terminological issues surrounding Blitzkrieg, it is important to examine the employment of armour in the Polish Campaign in 1939, the French Campaign in 1940, the Balkan Campaign in 1941 and the planning and execution of the attack on the Soviet Union which began on 22 June 1941.

The Polish Campaign (1939) and its lessons The campaign which opened on 1 September 1939 saw the Polish Army defeated completely in a six-​week campaign. By 10 September, the Polish Commander-​in-​Chief, Marshal Edward Rydz-​Śmigły, had ordered a general retreat towards the southeast. On 17 September, an already desperate situation was made worse when the Red Army invaded the country from the east. The Warsaw garrison resisted under bombing from the air until 28 September, and the last major Polish formation surrendered on 6 October. Poland was then divided between Germany and the Soviet Union. Although Polish forces amounted to 1,000,000 when the conflict started, they were outnumbered and suffered from obsolete equipment, particularly in terms of their light tanks and tankettes which were little match for the technically superior German forces. The Germans claimed to have captured 694,000 prisoners out of an estimated 800,000 men who had actually participated in Poland’s defence. The Germans also captured 3,214 field guns, 16,500 machine guns and 1,700 mortars, as well as huge quantities of small arms and ammunition.1 The speed of the German victory has often been explained by the modern nature of the German tank force. One of the legends surrounding the campaign has been the claim that Polish cavalry attempted to charge German tanks with their lances. On the opening day of the invasion, the German 4th Panzer Division had indeed been involved in a battle with the

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Polish Wolynian Cavalry Brigade near Mokra, but the latter fought largely dismounted throughout the course of the battle. The actual origin of this myth was a small skirmish on the evening of 1 September 1939 near the village of Krojanty. Two squadrons of the Polish 18th Lancers had successfully charged a German infantry battalion in a wood, but were then surprised by two German armoured cars, losing 40–​50 men before they could withdraw. The following day, an Italian war correspondent who visited the scene was told by the Germans that the cavalrymen had died as they charged German tanks. The creation of the legend was intended by the Germans to highlight their technological superiority; for the Poles it helped advertise their heroism against overwhelming odds. Yet, the background to this incident reveals much about the nature of the campaign, why the myth of the lance charge against German tanks took root and the reasons why the Polish Army was defeated so rapidly. Polish cavalry had, in fact, made up 10 per cent of the Polish armed forces in the wake of the Soviet-​Polish War of 1920. In the early 1930s, the rise of Red Army mechanised formations led the Poles to develop an anti-​tank doctrine which required cavalry, armoured cars and tankettes to make use of an armour-​piercing bullet fired from machines-​guns. Polish approaches had been influenced, however, not only by the reactionary attitude of their cavalrymen but likewise by the capabilities of their own light armoured cars and mechanically unreliable tankettes. Against this background, the use of armour-​piercing bullets by a range of anti-​tank units made perfect sense. The emergence of a German tank threat led, though, to a modernisation programme in 1936, which saw two cavalry brigades successfully mechanised before the outbreak of war. From 1937, Polish cavalry regiments started to receive 37mm Model 36 anti-​tank guns; in the same year, a 7.92mm anti-​tank rifle was introduced. The modernisation effort saw each 3-​regiment cavalry brigade receive up to 66 anti-​tank rifles and 18 anti-​tank guns, while each 4-​regiment cavalry brigade received 78 anti-​tank rifles and 22 anti-​tank guns. In other words, while the Polish Army was not as modern as the German force it fought in 1939, it still had equipment which made it capable of mounting a defence against German tanks. Indeed, in the battle at Mokra, the 4th Panzer Division is reputed to have lost around 40 tanks, half its total tank casualties for the whole of the campaign.2 The German victory was made possible by several different factors. First, Poland’s geography meant that her territory was extremely difficult to defend, especially as the Wehrmacht’s plan was based on a pincer movement, with strong thrusts from East Prussia on the Polish northern border and from Silesia in the south, which aimed to meet in front of Warsaw. The German mobilisation was partly concealed by ‘manoeuvres’, the annual Tannenberg celebrations and troops allegedly returning to their peacetime bases. The Polish defensive plan was based on a deployment of divisions west of the Vistula because they did not want to give up territory; in fact, they hoped to hold long enough until the Western Allies came to their aid. What took the Poles by surprise was the speed of the German advance. Tank and motorised units drove forward leaving the infantry behind, without considering their flanks, but supported by aircraft. Although Hitler overestimated the contribution of armoured forces to the swift victory, there was

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no doubt that they had played a significant part: of the total of 53 German divisions and one cavalry brigade committed, 37 were infantry divisions while 15 were armoured and motorised divisions. The total number of Poles killed in fighting both the Wehrmacht and the Red Army has been estimated at 120,000, with 163,000 wounded, and 700 AFVs destroyed.3 The key to victory had, however, been the employment of air power rather than armour. As the head of the British Military Mission to Poland, Major-​General Adrian Carton de Wiart, reported, the immediate goal of the Luftwaffe had been to neutralise the Polish Air Force. This was achieved by systematic attacks on aircraft in the open and the destruction of aerodromes, hangers and airfields. After the opening two days, German aircraft concentrated on shooting down what Polish aircraft remained in the skies, thus securing air superiority. The second phase of the air campaign was directed towards disrupting the mobilisation and concentration of the ten remaining Polish divisions, with attacks also directed towards bridges, roads and railways. On some occasions tank unit commanders flew in aircraft and sent orders by wireless; panzer divisions could often advance under the cover of air support from the Luftwaffe. In other words, the success of the panzer divisions was heavily dependent upon the German air campaign.4 Total German Army losses show that the fighting cannot be described as light. Of the 1.5  million men available, 8,082 officers and men were killed (some figures place the number at 11,000), and 27,278 wounded (some figures give 30,000), and 5,029 were classed as missing. For our purposes, the key statistics concern tanks. German losses amounted to 217 tanks destroyed (300 AFVs in total), specifically, 89 Mark Is, 83 Mark IIs, 26 Mark IIIs and 19 Mark IVs. It is, of course, worth bearing in mind that before the Polish Campaign, the ideal strength of the Panzer Division had been set at 324 tanks, with a total strength of 11,792 men, although a sizeable proportion of these tanks still consisted of the Panzer I and II tanks.5 Still, it could be argued that the Polish Campaign was not really a Blitzkrieg campaign at all, especially given the faulty Polish troop deployments at the start of the hostilities, which contributed to the success of the German pincer movement. Nonetheless, the speed of the campaign astonished Europe, with tanks used in deep thrusts without regard to their flanks and a sophisticated air campaign. So, was this Blitzkrieg or not? Given the role of paralysis, in the sense that the opponent is paralysed by speed, rapidity of advance and destruction from unexpected quarters, it seems the case that certain elements of Blitzkrieg are recognisable in the Polish Campaign. The use of the Ju-​ 87 Stuka aircraft for terror bombing was certainly a key element, not least of all because they were employed in combination with the ground offensive. The significance of the Polish campaign for armour would seem to be as a testing ground for the German concept of ground warfare which can be referred to very loosely as Blitzkrieg. In many ways the Polish campaign can be seen as part of an armour learning process, during which the occupation of Austria in March 1938, the occupation of Prague in March 1939 and divisional manoeuvres in May 1939 represented earlier steps. That Hitler did not interfere in the military conduct of the campaign was important, as was the willingness of

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Colonel-​General Feodor von Bock to allow the commander of the XIX Army Corps, General der Panzertruppe Heinz Guderian, to leave the infantry divisions behind and maintain a high rate of advance.6 The attack on Poland was, in fact, not only limited to German forces as the Red Army invaded the east of the country on 17 September, an operation which exposed the gulf between Russian military theory and actual capability. While the mobilisation was conducted just two weeks before formations crossed the border, considerable problems were encountered among the mechanised units. Logistic preparation was poor, with some tanks unable to move forward by rail, causing a high instance of mechanical breakdown during the forward march. While Polish resistance was only sporadic, in some cases Soviet armour suffered casualties when it advanced without infantry support. During the fighting in Grodno between 20 and 22 September, 19 tanks and four armoured cars were knocked out by only a few guns and infantry using Molotov cocktails; and, in the fighting for Shat’sk on 28/​29 September, the Poles knocked out five T-​26 and two T-​38 tanks. Inadequate reconnaissance was the major cause of the losses in both cases, partly because the BT-​7 had poor visibility when its hatches were closed. In fact, while a reconnaissance battalion was leaving L’vov it accidently engaged a German mountain division, losing five BA-​10 armoured cars, one BT-​7 tank and suffering 19 casualties. Red Army casualties overall were around 2,600.7 The reaction to the Polish Campaign is in many ways as important as the actual fighting itself, in part because the German Army sought to learn lessons as they prepared for their attack on France. In particular, the army launched an intensive training programme between October 1939 and April 1940, which brought the army reserve and Landwehr units up to the level of regular formations. Just as in the case of other arms, close attention was paid to learning the lessons of the conflict for armoured units. While the many after-​action reports considered that the successes of troops in Poland had reaffirmed the soundness of German tactical principles, various weaknesses in performance were identified. Cooperation between tanks and infantry had often been inadequate; in some instances, tank unit commanders had divided their forces instead of concentrating them. Several reports noted that march discipline and road traffic control had been poor for both infantry and motorised forces. Most important of all, the light divisions, which had been created in 1935 to persuade the cavalry to mechanise, were shown as unlikely to withstand the future challenges of combat. Heinz Guderian considered that the air force would be better suited to conducting long-​range reconnaissance. As a result of the after-​action reports, the army high command decreed that light divisions would be converted into panzer divisions.8 There were other crucial aspects of the German Army’s preparations for the French Campaign, which sprang from the recognition of problems even before the end of the fighting in Poland. One area was the repair arrangements for motorised units:  on 18 September 1939, the Chief of the Army General Staff, Colonel-​General Franz Halder, had requested a date by which the panzer and motorised divisions would be ready for re-​employment. The subsequent German effort after the Polish Campaign was a triumph of improvisation through the use of civilian facilities and mechanics. By early April 1940 56

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many of the earlier problems in relation to spare parts and repair for motorised units had been solved. But drastic measures had to be undertaken –​4,000 lorries were requisitioned from the Luftwaffe and 16,000 from private industry, while 10,000–​12,000 new vehicles were delivered from production facilities in Bohemia and Moravia.9 As part of the extensive effort to draw lessons from Poland, particular emphasis was placed on overcoming the sluggish performance of the infantry. Junior leaders had lacked initiative. The training campaign sought, quite deliberately, to root out weaker elements, which was achieved by training troops to the limits of their endurance. The need to seize favourable moments was emphasized again and again. It was not just the ground troops which needed to learn lessons. During the Polish Campaign, the German Air Force had applied the lessons of the Spanish Civil War during which they had learned to break static defences, but the challenge of ground-​air cooperation in a war of movement had not been prepared for, so that existing procedures had proved weak, with no proper radio communication and the need to rely on visual signals. After-​action reports produced by the 10th Panzer Division cited cases of attacks on them by their own aircraft and a failure to adhere to agreed procedures. Nonetheless, although rather late in the day, army and air force officers attempted to find some solutions to the problems of close air support in April 1940.10 As a result, and despite the considerable degree of improvisation, the German Army and Air Force were much better prepared for the beginning of the war in the West than their opponents were.

Armour in the French Campaign (1940) The role of the German panzer divisions in the French Campaign, collaborating closely with other arms, but especially aircraft operating as ‘flying artillery’ in a close-​air-​support role, carved out a new chapter in military history. It cemented very quickly the acceptance of the word Blitzkrieg because the speed of the German victory surprised even many of their own generals. After the Second World War, the causes of the Allied defeat were sought in all sorts of quarters and for many different reasons. The success of the German forces was not, however, a result of superior numbers, overwhelming firepower or a general lack of the will to fight on the part of the Allied armies. The Germans had considered a number of separate offensive plans in the months before the actual attack which began on 10 May 1940. The plan with which the campaign has become associated, and which enabled the armoured forces to contribute heavily to such a dramatic success, was later dubbed the ‘sickle cut’ plan. As early as October 1939, Lieutenant-​General Erich von Manstein, Chief of the General Staff of Army Group A, provided a critique of the original concept which envisaged a strong thrust of the right-​wing of the German armies along the channel coast. He argued that the existing plan would lead to a collision of the two opposing forces; instead of pushing the enemy behind the Somme River, the aim ought to be cutting off their escape route. Rather than placing the main effort with Army Group B in the north, strong armoured forces were to attack through the wooded Ardennes area where they would be least expected; Heinz 57

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Guderian advised Manstein that an attack there was possible. The German directive which turned the idea into an operational plan was issued in late February 1940, after Manstein had explained his thinking to Hitler and Franz Halder had been won over. The key to success was that the Allied armies needed to be deceived into advancing into Belgium so that the drive through the Ardennes could catch them in the flank and lead to their encirclement. The decisive battle took place at the start of the campaign at Sedan, but not before the plan was almost undone at the outset. The complications of overcoming obstacles and guiding both tank and infantry divisions along the narrow routes through the Ardennes led to huge traffic jams. But the lack of Allied aerial reconnaissance gave German units enough time to cross the River Meuse on 13 May. The breakthrough at Sedan was not, in fact, created by any of the panzer divisions: determined assaults by German infantry, the employment of artillery and heavy air attacks, and the disintegration of the French 55th Infantry Division due to an outbreak of panic, all contributed to the way being opened for the panzer divisions. Essential was the determined leadership and high levels of initiative on the part of relatively junior officers on the ground, who were quick to understand the importance of individual infantry assaults on key positions.11 On 14 and 15 May, German divisions started to expand their bridgehead over the Meuse. Formations belonging to the German Twelfth Army, the 6th, 8th, 2nd, 1st and 10th Panzer Divisions, began to push south and southwest, while to their north, the 5th and 7th Panzer Divisions, which belonged to the Fourth Army, advanced beyond Dinant towards Flavion, Florennes and Froid-​Chapelle. The French 1st Armoured Division was unable to coordinate a planned counter-​attack at Flavion due to communications and refuelling problems, even though the French outnumbered the German 31st Panzer Regiment by just under 170 combat tanks to a force of 30 Mark III and IV tanks. By the evening of 15 May, however, the French force had been reduced to only 36 tanks due to the superior German tactics, better radio communication and the use of ‘all combat arms’, whereas the French had simply attacked with their tanks in a linear formation (part of the problem was that where French tanks had radios, they failed to function because of their weak batteries). On the day of this battle, the French front on the Meuse collapsed. Further north, in the area of Walter von Reichenau’s Sixth Army, another large and unequal tank battle had already occurred at Hannut on 12/​13 May. The French 2nd and 3rd Light Mechanised Divisions, which could call on 239 Hotchkiss and 176 Somua tanks, clashed with the 3rd and 4th Panzer Divisions, which consisted of 623 tanks, but of these 498 were Mark I and II machines. In essence, the battle-​worthy medium tanks possessed by the Germans were 73 Panzer IIIs and 52 Panzer IVs. The final outcome saw the 2nd Light Division lose almost no tanks, whereas the 3rd Light Division suffered losses of 75 Hotchkiss and 30 Somua tanks to the 160 German tanks which were knocked out. The German divisions had offset the superiority of the French tanks over their light tanks through better tactics, intelligent use of radio communication and faster rates of fire; they were helped by the limited accuracy of French firing and poor driving skills. 58

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Map 2  Battle of France, May/​June 1940

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Over the next five days, German panzer divisions surged through Belgium and northern France. Both Heinz Guderian (who was temporarily relieved of his command on 17 May) and Major-​General Erwin Rommel, commander of the 7th Panzer Division, ignored orders in an effort to keep the momentum of the attack going. There had been a brief crisis on the morning of 17 May when the French 4th Armoured Division, very much a makeshift unit led by Colonel Charles de Gaulle, had attacked the rear service units of the 1st Panzer Division with three-​and-​a-​half essentially unsupported tank battalions. Although the surprise had been perfect, the Germans quickly created an improvised defence and threw the attackers back in the afternoon with dive bomber attacks. By the evening of 20 May, elements of the 2nd Panzer Division had reached Abeville and units of the 1st Panzer Division had reached Amiens. Nonetheless, as a result of the famous halt order to the panzers issued by Colonel-​General Gerd von Rundstedt on 24 May, Allied forces were able to establish a solid defensive perimeter and begin a mass evacuation of troops by sea. The Germans were only able to break through and capture the harbour at Dunkirk on 4 June. Fighting continued in other parts of France until the armistice was signed on 22 June.12 Of interest during the final phase of the German race towards the Channel coast is the British ‘counter-​attack’ at Arras which occurred on 21 May 1940. According to the British official history, the attack was more accidental as it had initially been intended to create a more stable front by blocking the roads south of Arras in order to cut through German communications. Thus, the counter-​attack was actually conceived as a mopping up operation, although it was based on an underestimation of the strength of the German forces. At the time of the attack, the two British divisions involved, the 5th and 50th, were under-​strength, supported by the 1st Army Tank Brigade, which had a force of 58 Mark I  (equipped with only a Vickers .303 calibre machine-​gun) and 16 Mark II tanks. The unintended British counter-​attack caused an initial shock to elements of Erwin Rommel’s 7th Panzer Division and the SS Totenkopf Division when it ploughed into unprotected infantry columns; apparently nine medium and a number of German light tanks were destroyed, with losses of 378 killed, wounded and missing, although total losses may have been higher. The British action also succeeded in destroying a number of anti-​tank guns, although 88mm guns were used in fighting off the British attack. The lack of supporting artillery prevented the attack from being anything more than a local success. British casualties were ‘heavy’, there had often been a breakdown in tank-​infantry cooperation and air support was poor. This brief battle reveals much about the campaign as regards German strengths and Allied weaknesses. The British action achieved initial success for two reasons. The first was largely luck, as they had blundered into overextended German units which had been seeking to exploit the lack of cooperation between British and French forces; the second was that the Mark II Matilda tanks had 78mm frontal armour, which the standard German anti-​tank guns could not penetrate, so they were able to drive over antitank gun positions, crushing them. However, Rommel was able to prevent more damage to his division by taking charge of the defensive counter-​measures on the spot. The Allied action quickly unravelled due to communications failures which occurred from the 60

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Photo 3  French Char B-1 tank captured by the Germans, May 1940 radio sets in some tanks to the highest command level, so the Allies were unable to exploit the opportunities which German risk-​taking during their advance had offered. The lack of coordination between the Allied armies had prevented an organised counter-​ attack in mass.13 Central to understanding the role of armour in the French campaign is the use and misuse of armoured forces by the French and the Germans. While the Germans concentrated their numerically weaker armoured forces in highly mobile armoured divisions, the French had, out of a total of 3,254 tanks available on the north-​east front (which included 315 obsolete Renault FT-​17s), only 468 which were integrated into armoured divisions. Of the total number of French tanks available, a further 582 were to be found in light mechanised divisions, 110 were in light cavalry divisions and 1,125 were deployed in non-​divisional tank battalions. The Germans were able to muster 2,439 tanks, among which were 106 Czech 35(t) and 228 Czech 38(t) tanks, but only 349 Panzer IIIs and 278 Panzer IVs. The British could only deploy 310 tanks at the start of hostilities, although the 1st Armoured Division arrived at the end of May with 330 combat vehicles. The Belgians went to war with 270 combat vehicles, the Dutch with 40. But it should be remembered that the British and French outnumbered the Germans in artillery by about two-​to-​one, while the German operational aircraft strength was 2,589 to the Allied force (including Belgium and Holland) of 1,453.14 The Allied superiority in artillery would only have played a significant part, however, if the front line had held. But the German advantage of a combat-​tested air force was decisive, not least of all as the French armoured force had been dispersed across 61

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the front. According to French doctrine, the chief missions for armoured units were assisting the infantry in overrunning the enemy, fighting in short-​range engagements against enemy tanks, and participating in exploitation. However, these missions were to take place once the initial resistance of the enemy had ended. French doctrine lacked two crucial elements in the conduct of armoured warfare  –​mobility and speed. The badly thought-​out doctrine was compounded by technical problems. The three French armoured divisions were initially employed by rail because their fuel consumption was so high. The French Char B-​1 tank took 40–​60 minutes to refuel, indicating just how limited the mobility of French armoured units was.15 The performance of the 1st, 2nd and 3rd Armoured Divisions in May 1940 provides evidence of why French armour failed so disastrously. The 1st Armoured Division was overwhelmed due to inadequate logistical planning and poor traffic control, lack of reconnaissance and civilians blocking the roads. The 2nd Armoured Division was split up, the wheeled vehicles moving on their own to the front line, while the tanks were sent by rail. However, the trains were cut off from the rest of the division by German tanks. In the case of the 3rd Armoured Division an attack order was given on 14 May, first rescinded, the order then given again, only to be cancelled one more time. In addition to common problems of refuelling and inadequate logistical and administrative preparation, the fact that the division had only been in existence for two months highlights the lack of training which plagued the French armoured divisions. A variety of shortcomings led to them possessing very limited mobility and combat value. Contemporary photographs provide evidence that some of the French tanks had been abandoned after running out of fuel.16 A German panzer division was, of course, very different: it was designed for maximum independence and mobility. Although there were variations between individual divisions, every panzer division had its own signals units, so it could call on close air support which assisted in its ability to achieve breakthroughs and exploit them. This superior mobility suggests that the French Campaign was effectively decided before it had begun. Moreover, the Germans were prepared to use armour decisively and take risks, even with columns of light tanks and wheeled vehicles. During the preparations for the campaign, according to Heinz Guderian after the war, he had even advocated attacking across the Meuse with a panzer corps, unsupported by infantry.17 This indicates that German staff officers were aware of the French weaknesses and had already understood that surprise and relentless advances were the best way to disrupt any Allied defensive measures. It is worth pointing out that the speed of advance by Heinz Guderian’s XIX Army Corps, over a 25-​day period involved a distance of 300 miles. This meant an average daily advance of 12 miles; this reflects, though, the march rate of the slowest elements, as the whole corps needed to be moved, including motorised and horse-​drawn logistic units. The tanks advanced much faster. The 1st, 2nd and 10th Panzer Divisions managed to cover 100 miles in the first three days of the invasion. For the time, these were extremely rapid advances which took the Allies completely by surprise. The fact that in the space of six weeks the 7th Panzer Division, part of General der Infanterie Hermann Hoth’s XV Panzer Corps, captured 97,648 prisoners, 277 guns, 64 anti-​tank guns, 458 62

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AFVs and over 4,000 lorries, at a cost of 682 killed, 1,646 wounded and 296 missing, demonstrated unequivocally the power of a panzer division.18 These figures suggest that speed and mobility were among the most crucial elements in the German use of armour, if supported and employed properly. One of the major innovations in the panzer divisions, which proved crucial in the few large tank battles, lay in command and control. Heinz Guderian has been credited with adding a fifth man, the radio operator, to every German medium tank. He also devised a signal organisation which permitted the divisional commander to command from any point within the division.19 The structure of the panzer division itself offered considerable possibilities on the battlefield. It possessed its own reconnaissance, engineer (including bridging equipment), signal, flak, artillery and anti-​tank assets, as well as its own organic supply and administration.20 It was this flexibility of organisation which led to the first ad hoc battle group being formed directly on the battlefield after the capture of Sedan.21 The effectiveness of the panzer divisions was not, of course, simply due to their internal structure, it was also because effort had been invested in developing the correct tank and all-​arms tactics.22 The employment of airpower in support of armoured attacks also signalled a change in the methods of offensive operations. Close air support could be called up very rapidly by the ground forces and defences were softened up from the air in advance of the main ground assault. Flanks of advancing columns were often protected by the Luftwaffe and, occasionally, enemy tank attacks were beaten off by combat aircraft.23 Air units were used as flying artillery; in fact, they possessed the advantage of being able to attack the full depth of the enemy’s positions in a short space of time. The flexibility of aerial formations meant that the momentum of the offensive could be maintained where in the past a halt would have been made to allow the artillery to catch up.24 Moreover, air bombardment neutralised formerly impregnable bunkers –​even those of the Maginot Line  –​due to the improved penetrative powers of munitions delivered from the air.25 What had gone wrong from the Allies’ perspective? A paper produced by the General Staff of the British Expeditionary Force after the defeat sought to answer this question. One of the main conclusions was that because the German method of attack was infiltration by fighting vehicles and infantry, defence in depth was essential, a measure which the British forces had not been in a position to conduct. Likewise, the Maginot Line was considered to have distracted the French from the need to create defence in depth. It was asserted that the tactical value of anti-​tank obstacles had been overestimated, as this could only be obtained in conjunction with an active defence. In future, such obstacles needed to be sited much further back from the forward defence line. The purpose of infantry located further forward was to disorganise the attacking armoured forces and canalise their advance into the anti-​tank defences in the rear. The recommendations for future campaigns pointed towards the strengths of German methods: in particular, commanders needed to reduce to a minimum the time taken to reach a decision and issue orders. The outstanding features of the German employment of armour were adjudged to be the speed of attack, the fact that German mechanised columns were composed of 63

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combined arms units and that there was close tank-​infantry cooperation. In terms of the bigger picture, the lack of unity of purpose in Allied strategy had not helped: the main goal for France had been the defence of French territory, whereas for the British it had been the defence of French and British territory.26 The German victory had not, of course, come without a price. German tank losses during May and June 1940 totalled 753, much higher than in the Polish Campaign. Between 10 May and 30 June, 182 Panzer I, 241 Panzer II, 135 Panzer III, 97 Panzer IV and 98 Czech 35(t)/38(t) tanks were destroyed. But during the course of the evacuation of Allied troops from Dunkirk, only 13 light tanks and nine cruiser tanks could be transported back to England. In the case of the French armoured force, captured tanks such as the Hotchkiss and Somua S35 were subsequently used by the Germans on the Eastern Front, transferred to their alliance partners, or employed in security duties in occupied Europe.27 That the Battle of France had demonstrated the attack in depth with armour and aircraft was the new decisive means of waging war was confirmed by the German attack on the Soviet Union on 22 June 1941.

Operation Barbarossa (1940–​41): Planning and execution Following the French Campaign, German war planning moved very rapidly towards the fulfilment of Hitler’s dream –​the conquest and subjugation of Russia. For any discussion of whether Blitzkrieg can be viewed as a specific method of armoured warfare, it is important to reflect for a moment on the intentions and calculations which surrounded Operation Barbarossa. And it is important to assess whether the invasion of the Soviet Union marked the final and unsuccessful attempt at an attack with the methods of a style of warfare which has often been described as Blitzkrieg. In the field of armoured warfare, German observations of the development of the Red Army had recognised in early 1940 that their ultimate victory over Finland in the Winter War (1939–​40) had only been possible through artillery and weight of numbers. The opening of the war had seen stereotypical tactics which had resulted in heavy losses, despite the fact that the Finns possessed no combat-​capable tanks. The Red Army leadership had placed excessive faith in its armoured forces, failing to take account of the winter conditions in Finland or the country’s terrain. While, initially, German intelligence had identified a serious weakness in the Red Army, namely, its lack of trained middle-​ ranking and senior officers due to the impact of Stalin’s purges in 1937–​38, by early 1940 it had become clear that the Red Army had identified some of the major problems and was in the process of reasserting the command authority of senior officers. Further evidence of a major reorganisation was provided when Marshal S. K. Timoshenko held military exercises in August 1940 in order to consider the lessons of the Winter War. But despite the preoccupation with a possible invasion of Britain in July 1940, Hitler reached the decision on 31 July to launch the invasion of the USSR in May 1941. The Führer intended to eliminate the entire Soviet state through a ‘single blow’ executed by 120 divisions. Both he and the Chief of the Army General Staff, Franz 64

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Halder, believed that two large groups would need to strike north and south of the Pripet marshes. German estimates were that the Red Army would be in a position to deploy mainly infantry divisions, with only 28 motor-​mechanised brigades available. The main assumption of the early planning phase was that superior German armoured divisions would cut through the Russian defences rapidly in a thrust towards Moscow. By January 1941 the decision had become ‘non-​negotiable’ and planning for the deployment of forces began in earnest. There seems little doubt that belief in the power of their armoured formations underpinned German planning.28 But the original timetable, if it had ever been realistic, was now disrupted by the Balkan Campaign, which led to considerable alterations in the deployments. The German attacks on Greece and Yugoslavia belong to the Blitzkrieg era, so any discussion of the connection between armoured forces and the concept of ‘lightning war’ must make some mention of them. Although Hitler had not planned to invade Yugoslavia, a coup on 27 March 1941 caused him to order a quick campaign against the disobedient vassal, in part to protect the Romanian oilfields. Thus, the campaign was prepared at the shortest possible notice, with an attack on Greece launched on the same day as the strike on Yugoslavia –​6 April 1941. In the north, divisions of the Second Army attacked into Yugoslavia from Austrian and Hungarian territory, meeting first at Zagreb, before sweeping down to Sarajevo. To the east, the Twelfth Army attacked from Bulgaria in three directions, towards Belgrade to link up with forces from the Second Army, towards Albania to assist Italian forces, and southwards, first capturing Salonika, then occupying Athens on 27 April. The entire campaign lasted only 23 days. The rapid victory could certainly be ascribed to the poor equipment of the two opposing armies, German air superiority, but also the surprise achieved by seven panzer divisions, one mountain division and three motorised infantry divisions, two infantry brigades and an infantry regiment, employing a total of around 1,200 tanks. Essential to the success had been maintenance of the tempo of operations, together with the quality of the divisions and their combat experience. Moreover, there were no serious threats to the panzer divisions, as the Yugoslav Army only held some Renault FT-​17 light tanks, while neither the Greek nor the Yugoslav armies possessed anti-​tank guns. But the victory was to exert a baneful influence on Hitler’s perceptions of armoured warfare and its possibilities. The success of this campaign reinforced his already unrealistic view of the capabilities of German panzer divisions, not least of all his imagined contribution to their triumphs.29 After the war, one former German general, Walter Nehring, described the campaign against Yugoslavia as ‘virtually a military parade’. The campaign against Greece was, however, a more difficult proposition because, on the one hand, the British Expeditionary Force possessed an armoured brigade and anti-​tank weapons, while on the other hand the mountainous and broken terrain was unsuitable for armour. The ten German divisions deployed included two panzer divisions, both of which performed remarkably well in dealing with the challenges of the rugged landscape. Still, the skilful use of terrain by British, Australian and New Zealand troops enabled them to conduct a fighting withdrawal, which prevented the Germans from stopping the evacuation of 43,000 troops. 65

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Moreover, the attack on the two countries contributed to a delay of four to five weeks in the launching of Operation Barbarossa. Finally, since the Yugoslav Army had retreated into mountainous areas, the rapid transfer of forces for Barbarossa meant that the campaign had been concluded prematurely with the enemy defeated but not subjugated.30 With the conclusion of the Balkan Campaign, the preparations for Operation Barbarossa entered their final stage. The lack of motor vehicles and other essential supplies, the failure to shift German industry to a total war footing, together with many other necessary measures, meant that the German High Command was essentially forced to plan for a swift victory. Immediately prior to the launching of the invasion, the high command assessed their combat forces as falling into three categories. Of those units capable of any type of offensive action, 21 were armoured divisions, although two were still undergoing reconstitution, while there were 13 motorised infantry divisions and three motorised brigades. On 20 June 1941, the army possessed 3,350 AFVs, in addition to 600,000 motor vehicles and armoured cars. While this was an impressive force, based around units with considerable combat experience, the entire undertaking could only succeed if a rapid victory was achieved before the onset of winter.31 While Operation Barbarossa will only be dealt with here briefly, it is important to consider the invasion of the USSR on 22 June 1941 in order to better frame the discussion of armoured warfare and Blitzkrieg. If risk-​taking had been an essential component of German tactics in the three previous campaigns, Operation Barbarossa took the capacity of the German High Command to gamble to a new ‘strategic’ level. The opening three months of the campaign did suggest, though, that German optimism had been based on an accurate series of assessments of Red Army defensive capabilities. On the eve of Operation Barbarossa, the figures for the number of AFVs possessed by the Red Army differ in the available literature, although there is broad agreement that they were in possession of probably around 18,000 tanks. Still, a large proportion of these machines were obsolete BT-​7s and T-​26s. It has been estimated that around 1,000 T34/​76 tanks and 500 KV1 and KV2 tanks were available. It is easy to write off the BT-​7 as obsolescent, but its 47mm gun could knock out Panzer I and Panzer II tanks. It seems, then, that the Germans pulled off some remarkable victories. As was the case in France, a closer look at the opposition to the German forces reveals much about the price of unpreparedness. Of the 18,000 tanks available, it has been estimated that 30 per cent were in second-​line workshops awaiting repair and 43 per cent were in unit workshops awaiting spare parts. Thus, the number of Russian tanks actually available for combat was far lower than 18,000, probably in total a maximum of no more than 5,000 tanks. There were administrative and logistical weaknesses, not to mention the shortage of spare parts, which further reduced the effectiveness of Russian armour units. Furthermore, there was a shortage of fuel in the opening days and weeks of the campaign. Russian tank tactics were cumbersome, and crews had not been trained in the necessary drills so that they could react in the right way when the first combat situations occurred. Nonetheless, the initial successes of the German panzer divisions distracted attention away from a fatal weakness. In order to carry out the invasion of Russia, the Germans had been forced to weaken the panzer divisions. From the original strength of 66

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324 tanks in a panzer division, that number was halved in order to double the number of panzer divisions available for the invasion force. In the opening weeks of the campaign, this weakness did not manifest itself. But, as the fighting wore on, the attrition of panzer units became a major problem for the Wehrmacht.32 Nonetheless, the opening three-​and-​a-​half months saw some remarkable successes in the use of armoured, mobile formations, which led to five major encirclements:  at Bialystosk, 160,000 prisoners were taken after an encirclement effected between 22 June and 27 June; at Minsk, 164,000 prisoners were made during the same time period; at Smolensk, there were 315,000 prisoners after an operation between 3 July and 16 July; at Kiev, 665,000 prisoners were netted after combat action between 25 August and 14 September; and, at Vyasma-​Bryansk, 660,000 prisoners were taken after an operation between 30 September and 6 October. In total, 1,964,000 prisoners were taken, over and above those killed and wounded. In terms of the advance, three panzer and three motorised divisions belonging to Army Group North had advanced 800 km to Leningrad by September; seven panzer and seven motorised divisions of Army Group Centre had travelled 1,500 km by early October; and five panzer and three motorised divisions of Army Group South had advanced 1,600 km by early October. The success was based on the extensive use of battle groups, rapid orders and commanders leading from the front.33 The tank units surged ahead of the foot infantry, but there were only two good roads in Russia available for the transport of supplies, and there was a lack of motorised logistic support. As the Red Army continued to offer bitter resistance, the main thrust of the tank forces was split between a thrust to the south and the drive for Moscow. The Russian winter proved to be one of the deciding factors in the Battle for Moscow and the ensuing Red Army counter-​offensive. Not only did the T-​34s possess wide tracks, which enabled them to cross snow, the German tanks were suffering from the effects of Russia’s topography. Tracks were worn out, engines in need of spare parts, while the severe cold of the Russian winter meant that tank engines needed to be started every four hours to prevent them from freezing up completely. Sometimes fires were lit inside tanks as the crews tried to keep warm, on occasions leading to explosions. Moreover, and crucial for the German war in the East, mud and snow often meant that broken-​down tanks could not be recovered.34 According to some German generals, the Battle for Moscow and the failure of the German offensive in late 1941 broke the self-​confidence and morale of the German Army. Thus, it can be argued that the Blitzkrieg era of German armour-​led successes on European battlefields ground to a halt in freezing winter conditions before the gates of Moscow in December 1941.

Armoured warfare and Blitzkrieg It is obvious from the literature on armoured warfare that the word Blitzkrieg has been closely associated with the German approach to using the combined power of armoured forces and 67

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aircraft to achieve swift victories. According to one definition by Charles MacDonald, it can be seen as ‘a method of mobile warfare introduced in World War II by the Germans’, in other words, a specifically German approach to the conduct of war. Other definitions suggest a more general interpretation, which is not specifically German and transcends the Second World War, although it is seen as involving ‘combined air and ground attacks’. Further explanations contain an ideological element, such as those which can be found in Soviet-​era reference works. One typical example reads, ‘a theory of war, developed by German militarists, to win complete victory over the enemy in as short a time as possible, measurable in days or months’.35 Due to these variations in the definitions, German historians in particular have been quick to dismiss the word out of hand. It has been noted that the word was not in common usage in the German Army before the Polish Campaign; in fact, it seems to have been popularised by an article in the weekly news magazine Time in September 1939. It is unlikely that it will ever be determined exactly when and where the word originated, but it did reflect military and journalistic considerations of future war which were in circulation during the interwar period. Its origin appears to lie in discussions over the possibility of a swift, knockout blow being launched from the air.36 The difficulties associated with the use of an ostensibly German word, but one which was popularised in the press, are significant. Still, the reason why a word takes hold is usually because it seems to encapsulate many different elements of a new phenomenon which would otherwise be very difficult to define. An Australian historian, George Raudzens, has identified no less than seven different meanings: (1) a tactical-​operational method; (2) a type of strategy; (3) specific military skills; (4) a build-​up of military resources; (5) a specific military outlook; (6) a method employed by specific individuals; and (7) specific historical events.37 In actual fact, all these elements are relevant to any assessment of what may be termed Blitzkrieg. The issue of whether ‘Blitzkrieg methods’ can be identified throughout the twentieth century is beyond the scope of this chapter. However, despite question marks surrounding the Polish Campaign as a clear-​cut example of Blitzkrieg, all seven interpretations do coincide with the campaigns fought by the German armed forces from 1939–​41 where they employed strong mechanised and air forces in combination. In a sense, then, dismissing the word Blitzkrieg out of hand as a myth is a rather easy way out of more difficult historical questions associated with armoured warfare. It is often argued by historians that there was no identifiable Blitzkrieg doctrine which was put into writing by German officers before the outbreak of the Second World War. But this does not mean that a series of ideas came together in a short period of time, which could be identified as both coherent and innovative, regardless of how much they made use of earlier German teachings on combined-​arms warfare: the December 1940 manual for the panzer division is evidence enough of this. The tactical-​operational methods developed by the German armed forces were based on a clear set of methods, military skills and outlook, and were championed by identifiable individuals in the army and air force, thus fulfilling four of the seven different meanings for Blitzkrieg –​(1), (3), (5) and (6) –​identified by Raudzens. It is worth, therefore, considering each of the seven elements in relation to Blitzkrieg. 68

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The methods, military skills, outlook and the role of specific individuals have often been downplayed by historians, who argue that German success was not based on anything particularly new because the military skills and outlook were all part of the traditional German approach. The traditions of German officer education were, though, vital to the successful execution of mobile warfare, especially those for General Staff officers who were required to combine diligence, precision, broad thinking and creativity. Dynamic commanders often needed good General Staff officers to advise them against what was impractical but also on what could be improvised in any given situation. Officer candidates were subject to rigorous selection processes; after 1927 these included psychological tests. The principles of leadership included leading by example, as well as the capacity to exercise leadership according to the concept of Auftragstaktik, best translated as mission-​oriented command; in other words, the goal of the mission had to be accomplished, with the commander granted the freedom to decide which methods and plan he would use.38 These traditional strengths of German military leadership proved essential in the successful conduct of armour operations, which demanded high levels of initiative and command skills. Furthermore, the development of the methods associated with Blitzkrieg was dependent upon a specific generation of soldiers who had fought as young officers in the First World War. They had been accepted into the Reichswehr during the early Weimar period, where they had gained command experience; due to this background, they usually came from military families and possessed a strong conservative outlook. They were politically naïve, had in many cases fought with Freikorps units in the immediate postwar period, were anti-​Bolshevik in attitude, and were enthusiastic about the emergence of a strong government under the leadership of Adolf Hitler. The expansion of the armed forces after 1935 created new career opportunities, which probably dampened any suspicions they might have held towards the National Socialists. These were the officers who rose to the rank of General of Panzer Troops (a three-​star general) as the war progressed –​men such as Count Gerhard von Schwerin, Hasso von Manteuffel, Hermann Balck and Baron Leo Geyr von Schweppenburg, but also those who rose to higher rank, such as Heinz Guderian (Colonel-​General), Hermann Hoth (Colonel-​General) and Erwin Rommel (Field-Marshal). The role of the German air force was identified in 1941 by F. O. Miksche, a military theorist who had fought in the Spanish Civil War, as one of the factors which made modern war ‘entirely different from that of 1914–​18’. Air forces could provide air and fire superiority at specific points on the battlefield; air superiority enabled an air force to attack the enemy in the rear zones of the battlefield. The tasks fulfilled by air forces included reconnaissance, protection, liaison, supply and support. One of the strengths of the German air force was that, due to Versailles, it was only founded in 1935. Many of its personnel had served during the Weimar years in the army, which meant that they understood how ground forces functioned and were attuned to providing air support in all its various forms. The approach to air war was interwoven with the awareness of the psychological impact of mobile forces on the battlefield: Stuka Ju-​87 dive bombers were fitted with devices which unleashed a screeching sound as they attacked, terrifying for 69

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those on the ground, and were designed to increase the psychological impact of an attack from the air.39 If we consider points (2) and (4) in Raudzens’ list of seven definitions, Blitzkrieg as a type of strategy and as a build-​up of military resources, we find that again the role of armour in the German victories between 1939 and 1941 was central to the concept. Hitler’s rearmament programme meant war, not in the sense that he had a blueprint for the moment he would unleash his attacks, but rather because he was on a course to financial ruin if Germany continued to maintain weapons production as its main priority. The only way out of the dilemma was to conquer other countries and seize their raw materials and production facilities, and use foreign labour, so that she could prepare to wage war on the USSR. If there was a ‘strategy’, then it was Hitler’s and not one devised by military officers.40 The fact that Germany had not produced enough tanks by mid-​1940 meant that the army needed to use the Czech 35(t) and 38(t) tanks and their production facilities. The ‘grand strategy’ pursued by Hitler was based, on the one hand, on the need to remove the threat of certain counties in order to pursue his racial war against Russia, while on the other his approach of attempting to knock countries out of the war in quick campaigns was based on his faith in the capacities of the German armour and air forces to overwhelm opponents in a matter of weeks. The fifth point in Raudzens’ list of seven definitions, a specific military outlook, requires some further comment. While energetic military leadership can be explained by training, in the case of the German Army in the Blitzkrieg era it was much more. Nazi ideology influenced military outlook, with its emphasis on machines, speed and rapid decision-​making. Hitler’s belief in the need to ‘conquer living space in the East’ necessitated covert troop deployments, which were followed by surprise attacks without a declaration of war. Hitler’s propaganda methods and diplomatic manoeuvring assisted in weakening the opponent psychologically at the political level. In each of the campaigns in which armour and aircraft played a decisive part, the opponents were not only unprepared for the style of attack but often poorly equipped (like the Dutch in 1940), while their defensive plans did not take account of German capabilities. While the seventh point identified by Raudzens  –​Blitzkrieg as a concept relating to a specific historical era  –​is accepted for the purposes of this chapter, three areas can be identified that characterise the use of Blitzkrieg as a military concept which employs mobile forces as one of its central components: the prerequisites for a successful Blitzkrieg; the basic principles for the employment of tanks and aircraft; and the doctrinal concepts underlying the German conduct of operations in the period 1939–​41. The prerequisites which provide the necessary environment in which a Blitzkrieg can succeed can be seen as:  significant weaknesses on the part of the opponent, in terms of doctrine, deployments and intelligence; the initiative has to be seized in the opening days, if not hours of the campaign; air superiority should be gained at the outset, especially through attacks on enemy airfields; surprise should be achieved as regards the locations and direction of the main blow; intelligence can be gained on the enemy’s deployments through air reconnaissance; mobilisation and deployment is part of the 70

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battle plan, as are supply and traffic control procedures. In addition, the basic principles for the employment of combined air and mechanised forces are that:  the attack will begin with concentrated air and artillery strikes at the points where a breakthrough is intended; the weight of the main attack will come through armoured forces; mobile forces will attack on a narrow front and in strong columns; the flanks will be protected by speed and aircraft; the enemy’s front should be split and bypassed; psychological shock is a key weapon; the armoured forces should be flexible and able to change direction at short notice; and, in tactical engagements, tanks and infantry must cooperate closely. These prerequisites and basic principles could, most probably, be applied to other historical examples beyond the German Blitzkrieg victories.41 However, the victories achieved by the German armed forces during the period from September 1939 to September 1941 were underpinned by a number of specific German doctrinal concepts, which had been in a process of continual evolution since the early nineteenth century. The idea of Kesselschlachten, or battles of encirclement and annihilation, can be seen as essential to the Polish, French and Russian campaigns. The principle of identifying a Schwerpunkt, that is a centre of gravity on the battlefield which was decisive for success, was a key part of German officers’ military training and command methods. The notion of Einheitsprinzip was another important idea which underpinned the German approach: it called for a combined-​arms approach, underpinned by a decentralisation of command. Auftragstaktik, mission-​oriented command and control, was not only a German tradition it was one which was perfectly suited to exploit the opportunities which arose in fast-​moving armoured battles. Finally, Beweglichkeit was an approach which encompassed improvisation, mental agility and the capacity to conduct flexible operations.42 In other words, it was a combination of traditional strengths, new tactics and specific circumstances which enabled Blitzkrieg campaigns to succeed.

Conclusion What any examination of the Blitzkrieg era indicates is that the German military were successful not simply in turning doctrine into superb tactical performance, but they understood the psychological impact of speed and mobility in sudden attacks. The cause of their success was, however, based on maximising the impact of their technological and numerical advantages in combat aircraft, communications equipment and the benefits of tanks with five-​man crews, which were able consistently to outmanoeuvre their opponents on the battlefield. Whether Blitzkrieg can be viewed as a specifically German military concept is a question which will continue to be debated by military historians. The Red Army’s failure to use armour successfully in the Winter War was due to a variety of fairly obvious factors, such as the intense winter conditions, poor training, an extremely talented opponent and a lack of air support. But this does not mean that the Russians had failed to recognise the potential of armoured forces for swift blows to stun an opponent in a short space of time. 71

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However, further problems remain in the definition of Blitzkrieg as a military concept. Among the most important of these is the issue of the German Army’s lack of a defensive doctrine during the invasion of the Soviet Union, which begs the question, was Blitzkrieg a purely offensive concept which paid little attention to defensive planning? Of course, this is not to say that the Germans did not understand defensive warfare, or had not dealt with it in their major interwar field service regulations. But the panzer divisions in 1941 proved very vulnerable when they were stationary, while problems were experienced in the reduction of pockets. Kiel und Kessel tactics demanded that panzer forces create enemy pockets by the speed and power of their advance, to then leave the reduction of them to the infantry while the panzers formed an outer ring to the pockets to defend them against relief attempts by the Red Army. In late 1941, lack of a coherent defensive doctrine led to the incorrect deployment of tanks to frontline positions to protect infantry during the Russian winter counter-​offensive. A final question remains, namely, did the Germans depart from a Blitzkrieg concept on the eve of the invasion of Russia? In some ways they did, given the reduction in the strength of the panzer divisions. The ad hoc planning and improvisation which had been a factor in the victory in the French Campaign was not enough, however, to defeat the Red Army by the end of 1941. A war in the vast spaces of Russia required much more rigorous preparation and an accumulation of military resources than the Germans felt they had time to undertake. Not enough thought had been invested in the maintenance of tanks under the severe conditions of Russia’s climatic extremes and primitive road system. Moreover, the Germans underestimated their opponent, not only in terms of technological capability, but also in terms of his ability to learn from mistakes, generate reserves and launch successful counter-​offensives.

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CHAPTER 4 QUALITY VERSUS MASS: THE SOVIET-​G ERMAN WAR, 1941–​4 5

The war in the East –​from the German perspective, the Eastern Front, from the Russian, the Great Patriotic War  –​provides probably the single best historical laboratory for the study of armoured warfare. There are numerous examples to be found of what can be achieved with mechanised forces, but also of the mistakes which can be made. Examining this war allows at the same time the study of two contrasting approaches to the conduct of mobile war. This chapter will combine an account of some of the major battles involving mechanised forces with a consideration of the different vehicles, tactics and approaches of two gigantic armies; naturally, this also requires some reference to be made to the use of armoured fighting vehicles sent to the Red Army by the Western Allies. Needless to say, the Soviet-​German War is still overshadowed by a number of myths –​myths which it is important to dispel.

From Barbarossa to Stalingrad (1941–​43) During the months of July, August, September and October of 1941, the panzer divisions of the German Army surged deep into the Soviet Union, creating huge pockets of men, destroying several thousand tanks and armoured cars, and taking prisoners numbering nearly two million men. However, the failure to achieve success was to prove fatal to the entire German undertaking in Russia. If we put aside many of the more general factors, such as the early onset of winter, the question which arises is why the panzer divisions failed to deliver victory, or at the very least the capture of Moscow in late 1941. The numbers of Red Army soldiers ensnared in large pockets should not divert attention from the considerable problems which the Germans encountered in Russia in the second half of 1941. As the panzer divisions moved forward, any infantry division left defending territory discovered very quickly that the standard 37mm anti-​tank gun was useless against Russian T-​34 and KV tanks. There were not enough Sturmgeschütz assault guns to prevent Russian counter-​attacks, while the 88mm anti-​aircraft gun had not yet been distributed to infantry divisions. The salient at Yelnia, created in the zone of operations of Panzer Group 2 (part of Army Group Centre), proved especially costly in casualties for stretched German infantry divisions which were not adequately supported by armoured units in July, August and early September. Casualties were between 45,000 and​ 47,000 men. The experienced Red Army commander, Georgii Zhukov, discovered not only that Russian artillery could devastate even dug-​in German infantry, but that tanks

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were most effective if they remained in the front-​line areas during an attack on German positions, destroying machine-​gun emplacements; if they ventured too far into the rear of the German positions they could be destroyed by German artillery. Yet, the failure of the German panzer divisions to reach Moscow in 1941, far less assault and capture it, was as much a function of the chaotic German command structure as it was a result of the dwindling combat capability of these formations. In August, Hitler had decided to direct Colonel-​General Heinz Guderian, commander of Panzer Group  2, to capture Kiev and move south towards the Caucasus, rather than give up some of his panzer units for a concerted drive on Moscow. Guderian’s insistence that his Panzer Group not be broken up was pigheaded and irresponsible from the point of view of German strategy. The German forces in September 1941 had the capability to capture the whole of the Ukraine or Moscow, but not both objectives. The failure to recognise the limits of panzer divisions in a country as large as the USSR was one of the causes of the failure of Operation Barbarossa. But probably the chief difficulty was the lack of a coherent German strategy, with intrigue rife, and the Wehrmacht High Command (OKW), increasingly under Hitler’s influence, not in agreement with the Army High Command (OKH) under Colonel-​General Franz Halder.1 The weaknesses of Germany’s alliance partners cannot be forgotten either, exemplified by the Romanian ‘armoured division’. In June 1941, although it was the only fully motorised Romanian unit, the ‘division’ possessed only 109 tanks which were combat ready; it was a division in name only, possessing no more than the strength of a brigade. There were two types of light tank, the French R-​35, armed with a 37mm gun and one machine-​gun, and the Škoda LT-​35, armed with a 37mm gun and two machine-​guns. Training was poor, while many of the senior commanders were wedded to an antiquated view of tactics, which saw tanks as mere infantry support weapons. This formation’s failure in an attack on Odessa on 18 August 1941 stands as a testament to the lack of adequate armour among Germany’s allies. The tanks were divided among infantry and other units; the infantry failed to accompany the mechanised attack, so that all but 32 of the tanks were destroyed by artillery and anti-​tank weapons. Not surprisingly, non-​ German Axis units usually proved only useful in securing sectors behind the front.2 On 11 September 1941, Panzer Groups 2 and 3 were given their objectives for a thrust towards Moscow, with Army Group Centre receiving Panzer Group 4 from Army Group North. What was known as Operation Typhoon was launched by Heinz Guderian on 30 September; the remainder of Army Group Centre attacked on 2 October, at which point it could muster 1,929,406 men and 1,217 tanks. The aim of the Red Army –​at least this was what was claimed after the war –​was to delay the Germans by allowing them to create pockets, which then had to be reduced, to generate enough breathing space for counter-​attacks to be launched north and south of the capital. When the Red Army counter-​offensive commenced on 5 December, 1.1 million men, 7,652 guns and mortars, as well as 774 tanks (of these, 222 were T-​34s and KV machines) and 1,000 aircraft were deployed. The main blow fell north of Moscow.3 The Russian attack caught the German forces at a moment of great vulnerability. The final push towards Moscow had been made just as the autumn mud set in. As units 74

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Map 3  The German invasion of Russia, 1941

advanced along the dirt tracks in Russia, lorries, motorbikes, tanks and other vehicles became mired in the mud, with elements of divisions spread out to such an extent that commanders no longer knew where they were. Attempts to remove vehicles from the mud caused immense damage to their engines; trapped AFVs even suffered from mice gnawing through cables, damage which could not always be located. Further attrition 75

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was inflicted by the lack of time for adequate repairs during the advance through Soviet territory and the shortage of spare parts. The crews of the vehicles which had become immobilised often decided to abandon them so they could relocate their units. From the perspective of the panzer divisions, the attempt to drive them forward was pointless because it led to the sacrifice of many vehicles which could otherwise have been repaired.4 When the Red Army counter-​offensive came, however, it took the Germans by surprise, in part through the use of Siberian troops withdrawn from the Far East. In total, 88 divisions, 15 cavalry divisions and 24 tank brigades attacked along a broad front. The German High Command had refused to accept that their armoured and motorised divisions had virtually lost all their mobility. Already by 1 November 1941, the Germans had lost 65 per cent of their tanks and two-​thirds of their 1.5 million motor vehicles. The Red Army offensive developed under three front commanders:  the Kalinin Front under I.  S. Koniev, the Western Front under G.  K. Zhukov and the Southwest Front under S. K. Timoshenko. The counter-​offensive forced the weakened German units back, with the forces of Zhukov and Timoshenko almost encircling elements of the German Fourth Army, which was part of Army Group Centre. The retreat was slow: the 4th Panzer Division, for example, could not manage more than 6.5 km a day. The disaster which threatened the German forces provoked Hitler’s order of 16 December that no units could retreat without his permission. While it made sense under these exceptional circumstances, it also led to the dismissal of Guderian on 26 December when he ignored the order. By 7 January 1942, the Moscow counter-​ offensive had run its course.5 Nonetheless, the Red Army winter campaign was in many ways just beginning. On 8 January 1942, what is known as the Moscow offensive began, which finally halted on 20 April; the previous day, the Demiansk offensive began, which was fought to 25 February; the Toropets-​Kholm offensive ran between 9 January and 25 February; and the Rzhev-​ Viaz’ma offensive took place between 15 February and 1 March. There were various other offensive actions undertaken by the Red Army, which failed to achieve their objectives, even if the Russian Tenth Army had created the opportunity to severe communications between the German Fourth and Second Panzer Armies. The mistake which was made during these operations was that Red Army formations were distributed evenly along the designated zone of the attack front. Although a new type of mechanised corps had been introduced, which consisted of two tank brigades, there were still relatively few T-​34 tanks available for the brigades. The two combined brigades of each corps totalled 20 KV-​1 tanks, 40 T-​34s and 40 T-​60s/​70s. The failure of the spring offensive was also due to the lack of forces available to conduct exploitation –​essentially, it amounted to the cavalry corps and a few tank brigades.6 During May 1942, Red Army offensive operations were disrupted by German attacks, with a series of disasters overcoming the Russian forces. Stalin had believed that the Germans wanted to renew their offensive towards Moscow, whereas Hitler had decided to launch offensives in the north and south. On 28 June, Operation Blau was launched by Army Group South, which made rapid progress since the Red Army’s own offensive 76

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plans meant they were not in proper defensive positions. The efforts to halt the advance of Colonel-​General Hermann Hoth’s Fourth Panzer Army failed, despite Soviet superiority in tanks, which included 800 T-​34s and KV machines, a pattern repeated on other sectors of the front. As the Germans advanced, the Red Army began for the first time in the war to try and evade encirclement. But a series of defeats were inflicted on them, in particular the destruction of the 4th Tank Army in a bend of the River Don in mid-​ August. Late in the evening of 23 August, the first German unit reached the outskirts of Stalingrad as the Luftwaffe pounded the city. Stalin now vowed to fight it out at Stalingrad and forbade any evacuation. He was clearly incensed by the fall of Rostov on 23–​24 July. But the situation worsened, as a desperate counter-​attack to draw German forces away from Stalingrad, launched by Zhukov on 5 September, failed. The defending Russian forces were in bad shape, with the 62nd Army reduced to a force of 60 tanks. There were three sectors of the Stalingrad front, with the central sector possessing 40,000 men and 100 tanks. By mid-​September anti-​ tank defences in the city remained incomplete, tank brigades were reduced to a dozen tanks, while Major-​General M. M. Popov’s ‘tank corps’ was down to 50 tanks, many of these only fit for static defence. On 14 September the Germans launched a full-​scale attack on the city, which included the 24th and 14th Panzer Divisions. On the eve of the German attack, there were only 120 Red Army tanks left in Stalingrad and the majority were only lightly armoured T-​60s and T-​70s. The German employment of armour aimed at supporting advancing infantry as well as destroying buildings. But city fighting was not the best way to make use of their panzer divisions. Worse still for the Germans, they were unable to capture all of the west bank of the Volga River, so that the Red Army was still able to feed fresh troops and tanks into the battle. On 14 October, the Germans launched a massive attack, including 300 tanks. Despite significant advances, Red Army units hung on to a small piece of territory on the Volga’s west bank. German tanks were dealt with largely through mines and anti-​ tank weapons. As the Soviet units clung on, the Germans launched a final assault on 17 November. But on the morning of 19 November a well-​planned Soviet counter-​offensive attacked the weak flanks on both sides of the German line. The 1st Romanian Armoured Division, equipped now with 100 Czech 38(t) tanks, could not stand up to the intensity of the attack. Red Army forces on the ‘Stalingrad axis’ numbered over a million men, equipped with 894 tanks. In the space of a hundred hours, around 90,000 Axis troops had been surrounded in Stalingrad itself, including three panzer divisions, together with 100 tanks and 2,000 artillery pieces.7 Given the nature of the fighting in the city, the Germans had committed two grievous errors in the conduct of their offensive. By allowing themselves to be drawn into a ferocious battle of attrition, they were unable to exploit the superiority of their mobile divisions. The overextended German front, secured on two sides by the Romanian Third and Fourth Armies, broke under the assault and rapid advance of Soviet armoured units. There was, in fact, little pressing need for the Germans to capture Stalingrad as it had ceased to function as an industrial city by the time the Russians attacked. The best option would have been for the Germans to retreat and form a defensive line for the winter. 77

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The fact that the high command refused to consider anything other than attempting to capture the city suggested that their conduct of the war was not going to provide the basis for success. A relief attempt by Erich von Manstein in mid-​December, which saw two thrusts by the LVII Panzer Corps and the XXXXVII Panzer Corps, was frustrated by Red Army counter-​attacks. In the wake of the encirclement of the Sixth Army in Stalingrad, then its final surrender on 2 February 1943, the Soviet High Command sought to exploit their success. A series of offensives were launched in December and January. These led to the recapture of Kursk and Belgorod on 8 and 9 February, and Karkhov on 16 February. These offensives were based around the improved use of mechanised forces.

Manstein’s backhand blow to Jassy-​Kishinev (1943–​44) If Stalingrad had demonstrated that the Wehrmacht could not win against the Red Army, this was due in 1942/​43 to the incapacity of Hitler to adjust to the realities of war and the inability of the German High Command to prise him away from military planning. Yet, there was still plenty of fight left in the ground forces and its mobile units, in particular. As the Soviet Stalingrad counter-​offensive developed, Colonel-​General Erich von Manstein was appointed commander of Army Group South. He sought to withdraw from the southern-​most sector of the front westwards beyond Rostov, while the Fourth Panzer Army was to be used on the left-​wing of his army group in a bold counter-​attack against advancing Russian armoured forces which were losing momentum. When the German counter-​stroke was launched on 20 February 1943, it took the Russians completely by surprise. The basis of the success was better intelligence, air superiority and a willingness to take risks. But the main basis was the combat capability of the panzer divisions led by experienced commanders.8 The 17th Panzer Division, command of which had been taken over on 10 October 1942 by Major-​General Frido von Senger und Etterlin, which had taken part in the attempt to break through to the encircled Sixth Army, was an example of the type of unit which contributed to the ‘backhand blow’. Having retreated westwards between 19 and 23 February, this panzer division was able to launch a thrust at the flank of Russian forces which had been advancing towards Dneprpetrovsk. The division had been reduced to the strength of a reinforced regiment, with only eight tanks and 11 assault guns, two light field batteries and one medium howitzer battery remaining. Despite the losses as a result of continual combat since December 1942, morale was high, while the staff remained that of a division. As its commander had identified that the Russian forces had lost their combat power and seemed to have no real plan of operations, the 17th Panzer Division went on the offensive on 24 February. The Russian units were caught unprepared. Von Senger und Etterlin ignored the danger to his flanks and sought continually to maintain the momentum of his advance. By the close of combat operations on 27 February, the main objective of Petrovskoye had been captured, as had much Red Army equipment. The strength of the division had sunk to 1,840 men, six tanks and ten assault guns; losses stood at seven dead and 14 wounded.9 78

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The backhand blow consisted, in fact, of two separate counter-​attacks. Following the attack in the Donbas region, Manstein conducted his Kharkov offensive between 5 and 23 March. Having already successfully struck at the flanks of the Southwestern Front’s pursuit forces in February, causing the collapse of their offensive, in March he disrupted the overextended Voronezh Front, recapturing Kharkov and Belgorod on 16 and 18 March. The deterioration in the weather finally halted his advance. In the same period, the Germans abandoned the salients in the Demiansk and Rzhev regions in order to create a more defensible front. As the fighting ground to a halt, the front line contained a huge bulge, the Kursk-​Orel salient. The plan to remove this salient was to lead to one of the largest and most violent armoured offensives of the entire war –​the Battle of Kursk.10 The German attack opened on the 5 July 1943. When one reads Manstein’s memoirs, what is remarkable is that the chapter on Kursk is so short. He makes the point that the Germans delayed too long before launching their attack; and he claims that the battle should not have been broken off before all their reserves had been committed. In fact, given the total number of 1,336 tanks available (far fewer were operational) for all German forces in the east on 1 April 1943, it is easy to see why the delays occurred, over and above Hitler’s desire to wait for the arrival of the new Panther Mark V tanks. Nonetheless, German Army intelligence had failed to identify many of the Red Army divisions. The counter-​stroke which the Russians launched after the German attack had been blunted showed that their planning for a rapid switch to offensive operations had been essentially correct. By allowing the Germans to blunt their combat power on a well-​ echeloned defence in depth, with three main defensive lines, they were able to make use of their superior resources, laying numerous minefields and building strong points; and the effect of their armoured forces was greatest when the German divisions had been weakened by intense fighting. For the second time in a major operation, the Germans had wasted their advantage in panzer divisions by allowing themselves to be drawn into a set-​piece battle.11 Nonetheless, the Battle of Kursk is paradoxical because the losses in tanks and self-​ propelled guns were far higher for the Red Army than for the Germans; nonetheless, German offensive plans collapsed as they were driven back. The German attack on the northern shoulder of the ‘Kursk bulge’ had made slow progress, but in the south their forces had penetrated to the third and final major defensive line. At the centre of the fighting was a particularly fierce engagement near Prokhorovka on 12 July. Erroneously referred to as a huge ‘meeting engagement’ in much of the historiography, it involved much less armour than historians had for a long time assumed. The most recent research estimates that elements of the 5th Guards Tank Army engaged the Germans with 642 tanks and 30 self-​propelled guns, whereas the Germans had only 420 tanks and assault guns. It was anything but a meeting engagement as the fighting in Prokhorovka region lasted until 17 July as the Red Army fought to defend their final major defensive position. On 12 July, however, the northern Orel salient held by the Germans was attacked by the Red Army (Operation Kutuzov); by 18 August they had successfully eliminated it. In the southern sector, the Belgorod-​Kharkov Operation began on 3 August and by 23 August had led to the recapture of Kharkov. Still, the cost for the Red Army was high: for 79

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the defensive battle and the two counter-​offensives, 7,360 tanks and self-​propelled guns were committed, of which 6,064 were lost. During the original offensive, the Germans committed 2,928 tanks and assault guns; during the entire Kursk operation armour losses appear to have amounted to 323 tanks and assault guns destroyed, with up to 1,612 damaged. There are many reasons for the disparity in German and Russian losses: German tank guns enjoyed a superior range; some of the Russian armoured units still included T-​60 light tanks, armed with no more than a 20mm gun; the first SU-​122, SU-​152 and SU-​76 self-​propelled guns were lightly armoured and only became available in January 1943, while the crews’ training was poor; the Stuart and Grant tanks received through Lend-​Lease were too thinly armoured to be effective on the battlefield; communications equipment was inferior; and the Red Army anti-​tank rifles were largely ineffective.12 The Soviet victory at Kursk should be seen as largely down to the territory gained rather than the damage inflicted upon the opponent’s armoured forces. Despite the flaws in the Kursk victory, there were two major operations conducted in 1944 which show the extent to which the Red Army had successfully passed through a learning process in the employment of armoured forces during 1943. The destruction of Army Group Centre (Operation Bagration), 22 June to 23 July 1944, was one of the most decisive operations of the entire war, and broke the defensive power of the German Army once and for all. Remarkable was that the Germans possessed a number of advantages; at the same time, Army Group Centre had been weakened by troops being sent to reinforce Army Group North. Among the reasons for the Russian success was the amount of material which they were able to amass prior to the commencement of the offensive:  1,200,000 men, 2,500,000 if one includes reserves and support troops, and between 4,000 and 5,200 tanks. The air support was provided by around 6,000 aircraft. Logistical preparations were extensive. Finally, the Russians succeeded in achieving virtual strategic surprise. Another factor of major significance was that the commander of Army Group Centre, Field-​Marshal Ernst Busch, was explicitly forbidden from making any withdrawals. Since he had owed his rapid promotion to his ideological reliability, he was never going to contradict Hitler’s orders. By failing to retreat and not making use of the Germans traditional skill at elastic defence, the fate of Army Group Centre was sealed. The results of the destruction were crippling for the German war effort. During the course of the operation, the Germans suffered 400,000 dead and lost some 150,000 prisoners, with nearly 30 divisions destroyed. They lost 630 aircraft and, significantly, 2,500 tanks and assault guns, 16,000 artillery pieces, 20,000 machine guns and over 60,000 vehicles.13 It was a victory more decisive than Kursk. There was a further consequence of Operation Bagration: it paved the way for the Battle of Jassy-​Kishinev, which opened on 2 August 1944, and was launched against Army Group South in the Ukraine. This operation enabled the Red Army to maintain the pressure on the Germans following the destruction of Army Group Centre: it virtually destroyed an entire Axis army group; it encouraged partisan activity in Hungary and Yugoslavia; and it led to the defection of Romania and Bulgaria from the Axis. Moreover, it was achieved at very low cost and was a success largely because of the skilful 80

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handling of two tank corps and one tank army. The choice of the main axes for the attack ensured a flexible advance. Surprise was yet again achieved. The decision not to employ strategic reserves fooled the Germans into thinking that an attack was not imminent. Mobile groups were inserted into the penetrations in the front line at exactly the right moment. The Red Army also made sure that the momentum of the offensive was kept going, a problem unsolved during the operations of 1942 and early 1943. By keeping the momentum of the offensive going, the Red Army made sure that the Germans had no time to recover. Continuous pressure was maintained over 11 days by operating extensively at night, crossing water obstacles on the march and maintaining air support throughout the operation. Given that the breadth of the advance was 500 km and the depth 300–​400 km, it is not surprising that it was one of the most studied and celebrated operations in Soviet military academies after the Second World War.14 Still, as there were so many armoured battles in the East, it is necessary to summarise the key characteristics of both the German and Russian approaches to mobile warfare.

The German approach to mobile war The German approach to armoured warfare in the East can be best understood by dividing it into two phases:  in the first phase, running from Barbarossa until immediately after Kursk, they were superior to the Red Army in the conduct of mobile operations; in the second phase, running from late 1943 until the end of the war, the inherent problems of an improvised war effort became increasingly manifest. In both phases, however, the German approach was characterised by flexibility and a willingness to push forward with armoured units without waiting for infantry marching on foot. During defensive operations it was emphasized that armoured forces were to be held back from the main combat zone, until the main direction of enemy attack was identified. But in some situations it became necessary to use them in the forward line if not enough infantry was available. The commanders at division, corps and panzer group levels were always kept informed of the immediate situation by the forward units. Observation planes often warned advancing units of the presence of enemy tank formations in the vicinity. German units exploited unexpected success well. The fact that in the early phase of the war Russian armoured units never deviated from their original orders and plans made it easy for the German units to encircle, envelop or outmanoeuvre them in some other way. Furthermore, it was discovered that even severely mauled units, such as divisions reduced to regimental strength, were remarkably effective because a smaller number of armoured vehicles were much easier to control on the battlefield.15 A further characteristic of the German approach was their understanding of the importance of road traffic control for armoured forces. The responsibility was placed in the hands of the divisional commander, although a field manual had been issued on the subject. Experience taught, though, that traffic and march procedures had to be carried out flexibly. Military police units were usually tasked with ensuring that traffic control did not break down; soon after the invasion of Russia it was discovered that motorcycles 81

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Photo 4  The formidable Tiger I tank and light personnel carriers were no longer adequate, so they were equipped with half-​ tracked motorcycles and sturdier personnel carriers. Procedures improved during the war, not least of all after it was discovered how important they were in mobile operations. The poor nature of the road system in Russia, the impact of the seasons on the roads and the significance of river crossings further increased the importance of traffic and route control.16 One of the most important considerations when analysing the German performance in armoured warfare is the quality of tanks and other AFVs they employed. After 1941, the mainstay of the panzer divisions was the Panzer IV tank. It proved well suited to upgrading, both in terms of armour plating and the calibre of the gun. Both the Tiger and the Panther tanks were introduced in early 1943. The Tiger proved to be a very powerful, if cumbersome, heavy tank. The Panther attempted to make use of sloping frontal armour, but it was plagued by mechanical problems during its first year. The production statistics for these tanks do reveal, however, where the problem in the German war effort lay. The highest number of Panther tanks produced in any one month during the course of the war was 380 in July 1944, and the highest number of Tiger I tanks produced in one month was 104 in April 1944. The Tiger II tank reached its production peak in August 1944 when 94 machines were turned out; in January 1944 only 5 machines 82

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were produced. This problem was not simply restricted to the new, heavier machines. The upgraded Panzer IV, armed with the 7.5cm cannon, reached its production peak in December 1943 with a total number of 354 machines.17 The Germans attempted to compensate for the low production rates of tanks by building in the first instance the Sturmgeschütz assault guns based on the Panzer III chassis. This was a rational response to the fact that the Panzer III and Czech 38(t) tanks had become obsolete by 1942. The 38(t) chassis was used as the basis for the diminutive Hetzer and the Marder III tank destroyers. Tank destroyers began to be produced in earnest in 1943 and were usually assigned to infantry divisions as a means of countering the lack of a proper mobile anti-​tank defence. The Germans made a distinction between three different types of mobile anti-​tank weapon: assault guns, tank destroyers and Pak vehicles. Tank destroyers were, like the Sturmgeschütz, not equipped with turrets, but had strong frontal armour and long guns with high muzzle velocity. Mobile Pak weapons possessed limited armour, only sufficient to protect the crews from splinters and infantry weapons (essentially they were guns mounted on the chassis of a tracked vehicle). German practice rejected the use of mobile anti-​tank AFVs as static weapons under any circumstances because their purpose was to be held in reserve, to then be employed quickly at key points; they were not to be used on their own and the aim was to open fire before the enemy did.18 In 1942 the tank destroyer units faced a crisis due to lack of adequate weapons. But the intervention of Colonel-​General Heinz Guderian contributed towards the production of better weaponry, so that tank destroyers could become the mobile anti-​tank defence of the infantry divisions. Russian tanks were seen as the principal enemy of the infantry divisions, so the task of the Panzerjäger was to protect the infantry by destroying enemy tanks, although it could also be employed as a forward weapon. Heavy tank destroyers could be employed as an army reserve to be used in breakthrough operations against enemy positional defences. In these tasks, their flanks would be protected by tanks belonging to panzer divisions. The revival of the fortunes of the Panzerjäger in 1943 meant that their commanders carried the offensive spirit of the tank force into the infantry divisions.19 The assault gun units, which had been developed under the auspices of the artillery, where they were seen as representing the elite of that arm, proved to be extremely important for the German conduct of armoured warfare. The crews were trained at the Sturmgeschütz School at Burg, where training in shooting was emphasized. By the close of 1943, the Army General Staff had analysed statistics which indicated that the assault guns had destroyed more enemy tanks than any other form of mechanised vehicle (over 12,000) and with the lowest losses. The significance of the assault guns could be seen in an order of the Red Army Marshal of Artillery N. N. Voronov of 2 July 1943, which considered that the destruction of German assault guns was of the highest importance: officers and troops had to be instructed to recognise the difference between tanks and assault guns; artillery had to direct its fire against the assault guns first; and, according to an order of 24 June 1943, any soldier who destroyed an assault gun was to receive a military decoration.20 83

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German armour tactics, including those for assault guns, were developed within the context of an approach which relied heavily upon improvisation. But the lack of any centralisation created its own problems. At the end of March 1943, for instance, an army group complained that the Inspector-​General of Tank Troops had ordered that reports on combat experience of a tactical and technical nature were only to be sent to him. The implication made was that recipients beyond the tank troops were laymen in matters of armoured warfare. This led the Army General Staff to countermand the order, making it clear that copies of all reports on combat experience were also to be sent to higher headquarters. A further communication from the Army General Staff highlighted that complaints over mechanised vehicles from within the ranks of the tank troops had been made to other military departments, which had damaged the reputation of the armoured forces.21 These two examples suggest that the German system of ad hoc reports on combat experience was inefficient. In fact, the failure to publish any new field service regulations during the course of the war, identified later by Soviet historians as a major weakness,22 hindered the German conduct of armoured warfare. Before the launch of Barbarossa, there had been an attempt to update tactical manuals, such as the Regulations for Leadership and Battle of the Panzer-​Regiment and Panzer-​Abteilung, completed in January 1941, which covered attack, pursuit, defence and combat in fog, forests and mountains. The philosophy had remained unchanged from the French Campaign, with leadership and command based on boldness and agility, surprise and concentration in mass, while the offensive power of tanks was employed to best effect through the combined employment of the panzer regiment.23 After Barbarossa, however, various informational sheets were issued, which provided new information on tactical methods. One example was a series of instructional notes on the employment of anti-​tank weapons in defensive actions, in which it was noted that the most important lessons had been drawn together from experiences gained in the East.24 Experience gained at the front was often fed into tactical notes, such as commanders’ methods for breaking out of encirclements, which usually involved surprise and concentrated firepower.25 In the evolution of German armoured formations in the East, an important development was the appointment by Hitler of Heinz Guderian as the new Inspector-​ General of Armoured Forces, equipped with increased powers, on 1 March 1943. He quickly renamed the ‘Fast Troops’ the ‘Armoured Troops’ (Panzertruppe) on 1 April 1943. Under his influence, the production of field manuals became more consistent and the quality of training began to improve, with more emphasis on gunnery practice. Before his appointment, all regulations had required the approval of the training section of the General Staff, which had hindered the timely publication of new regulations. If the writing of new regulations was improved, he could do little to prevent the progressive weakening in the strength of the panzer divisions in 1944/​ 45. And, while he was able to develop a clear esprit de corps within the Panzertruppe, this sense of identity caused a gulf between panzer divisions and infantry formations. While a well-​led panzer division could perform wonders, a poorly armed and overstretched infantry division could collapse quickly if left unsupported. Mobility 84

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was of course much higher in the panzer divisions since infantry divisions were forced to rely on horse-​drawn supply wagons.26

The Russian approach to mobile war The most logical place to start any analysis of the Russian approach to mechanised war is with the tanks and vehicles employed by the Red Army. When the Germans invaded the USSR, much of its armour consisted of BT-​7 and T-​26 tanks, although many histories talk of the shock experienced by the Germans when confronted for the first time by the T-​34 tank. First armed with a 76mm gun, featuring sloping frontal armour to deflect shells, with a new version mounting an 85mm gun introduced in the summer of 1943, historians have praised the T-​34 as the decisive weapon in the war. There is no doubt that it was relatively simple to operate and ideally suited to mass production. The advantage of the mass production of one major type of machine was that the supply of ammunition and spare parts was simplified, while the cannibalisation of broken-​down or destroyed tanks for spare parts was easier for the Russians than the Germans. The T-​34 possessed, however, a number of weaknesses which help explain the scale of some of the German Army’s successes. When the Germans invaded in 1941, only 967 T-​34s were in units in the Western Military District; furthermore, about half the crews had had only one or two months’ training with the new tank. There was a grave shortage of armour-​piercing ammunition and there were technical problems with clutches and gearboxes. Yet organisational difficulties and lack of training alone do not explain the poor performance of the T-​34 in 1941/​42. The tank turret layout was in fact problematic: the turret accommodated the commander/​loader; hence, the commander was mainly occupied with firing the gun rather than commanding the tank. He had poor sight of the battlefield due to the lack of adequate vision devices. The turret hatch was also badly designed because it required the commander to expose most of his upper body if he wished to scan the battlefield. There were mechanical problems too:  dirt built up in the engine which led to breakdowns; the average distance it could travel before maintenance was required was 200 km; oil changes were required every 145 km, whereas the Panzer IV could last 2,000 km. On the other hand, the diesel engine was less flammable than petrol engines, while the T-​34 also enjoyed high mobility on muddy ground due to its wide tracks.27 Over 52,000 T-​34s were manufactured, with a further 6,000 self-​propelled artillery pieces mounted on the same chassis produced. Given that overall tank production in the USSR between 1 June 1941 and 1 May 1945 reached 72,231, as well as 20,293 self-​ propelled guns, the technical flaws in the T-​34 were of major significance for the overall conduct of armoured operations. At the same time, the KV-​1 heavy tank also suffered from mechanical problems. In fact, despite the numbers of the T-​34 tank produced, the USSR also received shipments of tanks from the United States, Canada and Britain, which included Shermans, Grants, Stuarts, Valentines and Churchills, with the overall number according to Soviet statistics totalling 12,439 AFVs. The United States sent 1,676 85

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M3 Stuart light tanks, and 1,386 M3 Grant medium tanks, although some were lost in transit. Britain sent a total of 4,542 Valentine, Matilda and Churchill tanks. Of major importance were the M2 and M3 American half-​tracks and British Bren-​Gun Carriers, as well as over 3,000 M3A1 scout cars, together with 362,825 trucks of over a quarter of a ton in size. These wheeled vehicles made a vital contribution to the overall mobility of Red Army offensive operations.28 Despite the availability of some wheeled vehicles and armoured personnel carriers, Russian infantry frequently travelled on tanks. While this allowed infantry to maintain the same pace as tank formations, riding on tanks was extremely dangerous. Not only could infantry be killed if enemy artillery or armour opened fire on a tank, but German air attacks could also wreak havoc among tank riders, who had to leap from the machines and seek cover as best they could. If a tank broke down, some of the infantry would assist with the repairs; if these were unsuccessful they would become separated from their unit. During the last year of the war, T-​34 tank crews became increasingly afraid of the German Panzerfaust, so the tank riders were required to combat the threat of German infantry armed with these devastating anti-​tank weapons.29 When one examines the Red Army style of armoured warfare, the gradual increase in scope and size of operations as the war progressed should be highlighted. Whereas the Soviet offensive in the winter of 1941–​42 was initiated on a front of no more than 1,000 km, and troops advanced from 200–​400 km, offensive operations during the winter of 1942–​43 were waged on a front of over 3,000 km with advances of up to 700 km. In the summer and autumn of 1943, operations extended over 3,700 km of front, with gains of 600 to 1,100 km. During the offensives, army groups steadily improved their performance, so that further improvements could be seen in 1944 and 1945. This gradual expansion in the scope of operations and the weight of armoured forces which could be thrown into battle was a result of improvements in staff work and command, not to mention the growing capacity of Soviet industry to mass produce tanks at an increasing rate as the war progressed.30 One reason for this improvement in performance was the gradual transformation of the structure of armoured units. In mid-​1941, the unwieldy mechanised corps had proved difficult to manoeuvre. They were too large as formations, containing 1,031 tanks, around 200 armoured cars and 300 artillery pieces; manpower stood at 36,000. Each corps had one motorised infantry division and two tank divisions; the latter consisted of 375 tanks (63 KVs, 310 T-​34s, 102 T-​26s and BTs). But this was the strength on paper; the actual number of tanks was about 68 per cent of what had been planned. By the end of August 1941, the majority of these formations had been decimated.31 One of the lessons drawn from the first failures was that it was necessary to create two different types of armoured unit: one was designed for the direct support of infantry and the other for exploitation and pursuit. The evolution of these formations was initially governed by the losses in the first six months of the war and lack of equipment, but later by the improved understanding of armoured warfare within the Soviet Supreme Command, the Stavka. In late 1941, a Red Army tank brigade was composed of 46 tanks. During the winter of 1942/​43, a Tank 86

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Corps possessed 141 tanks, 25 armoured cars, 940 trucks and 46 armoured personnel carriers. By the spring of 1944, a Tank Corps had grown to 10,500 men, with 198 tanks, 31 armoured personnel carriers, 25 armoured cars, 1,050 trucks, 28 rocket launchers, 68 artillery pieces, 28 anti-​aircraft guns and 16 assault guns. In other words, it probably possessed more combat power than a panzer division at full strength. Around 40 per cent of tanks and self-​propelled artillery pieces were assigned to infantry support roles; the other units were grouped together in independent tank and mechanised corps.32 The early attempts in 1942 to exploit armoured formations, such as the disastrous Kharkov operation in 1942, ended in failure due to poor staff work, as well as inadequate administration and planning. The summer of 1942 saw further catastrophes. However, the strength of the Russian war effort was its centralisation and the ability of the Stavka to assess what had gone wrong. The lessons were embodied in the field service regulations of 1942; a new version of the field service regulations was issued in 1943, to be reissued virtually unaltered in 1944. This saw the full development of Red Army doctrine for the use of tank and mechanised units to deliver concerted attacks to isolate and encircle the main enemy groupings and attack his flanks and rear, although a warning was sounded not be drawn into combat with enemy tanks where there was no technical superiority. In terms of tactics, the opening months of the war saw the untried Red Army formations blundering into battle, with poor coordination, with tanks tending to bunch together or advancing into towns and villages without having undertaken proper reconnaissance. Although basic tank tactics improved, the Russians still struggled in combined-​arms cooperation in 1942, tanks often advancing too far beyond their infantry support. However, by 1944, tactics, communications and basic procedures had improved dramatically and were codified in a manual, the Combat Regulations for Armoured and Mechanised Forces. Effective tactics, which were not too complex, had to be devised to overcome German anti-​tank defences echeloned in depth. The most important part of the solution was the support of the medium tanks with heavy AFVs, mainly the SU-​85 assault gun and the Josef Stalin II heavy tank. The more powerful the defence, the more precise the coordination had to be between the medium and heavy mobile weapons.33 The mistake in the winter of 1941–​42 had been, essentially, that formations were evenly distributed along the zone of the front designated for attack. This meant that the necessary concentration of forces at the main point of attack where superiority was necessary could not be achieved. But the Stavka officers did learn from their mistakes. Divisions, corps, armies and army groups began to be assigned narrower breakthrough sectors and much narrower zones of advance. In the Kursk counter-​offensive in the summer of 1943, there were already 2.8 to 6 or more rifle battalions, 128 to 160 guns and mortars, and 11 to 25 direct infantry support tanks per kilometre of the designated breakthrough sector. In 1944 and 1945, the tactical densities per kilometre were even higher. In the most important operations in 1944–​45, a division was supported by 130 to 250 guns and mortars and up to 123 tanks and self-​propelled guns, of which about 30–​40 were used for direct infantry support. In the major Red Army operations from 1943 to 1945, army groups included one or two, and in some cases even three, tank armies, each numbering 600 to 800 tanks and 87

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self-​propelled guns, and two or three tank and mechanised corps, each consisting of 200 to 300 tanks and self-​propelled assault guns. The swift advance of the tank armies and tank corps was instrumental in assuring rapid exploitation of breakthroughs and making possible the encirclement of Axis formations. From their experience in the war, the Red Army learned that their tank losses were at their heaviest when the tank armies took part in the breakthrough: in these cases they lost around 30–​40 per cent of their strength. On average, about 90 per cent of the tanks and self-​propelled guns committed to combat at the start of an operation were lost during it.34 So, while Red Army performance improved, major operations were still expensive in terms of the casualties in men and machines.

The final phase and the fall of Berlin (1944–​45) With the summer offensives of 1944 decided decisively in favour of the Red Army, the outcome of the Soviet-​German War was no longer in any doubt. But it did not mean that there would be no further significant battles involving armoured forces. On 14 September, the Stavka launched a major attack into the Baltic States, followed by a further attack three days later on the Leningrad Front. The aim was to cut off German formations in the territory of the Baltic, for which no less than 900,000 men were deployed, along with 3,081 tanks and 2,643 aircraft, 125 rifle divisions, and 17,483 guns and mortars. For the offensive itself, the Red Army was able to throw in 1,328 tanks and self-​propelled guns. Yet, the Soviet High Command had underestimated the scale of sophisticated German defensive positions and their powers of resistance, so on 15 September a German mechanised force from the 14th Panzer Division was able to launch a savage counter-​attack using 200 tanks. Nonetheless, Riga was captured on 13 October, effectively ending German resistance in the region, despite the existence of a number of pockets into which a total of 30 German divisions had been pushed. Army Group North had been successfully separated from the other German forces. By the end of the year, the Red Army had restored all of the territory of the USSR, had reached the edges of East Prussia in the north, advanced to the gates of Warsaw, captured much of Hungary, knocked Romania out of the war and reached the outskirts of Belgrade. During the course of 1944, the Germans had lost a million-​and-​a-​half men and 6,700 tanks. Of all the German units eliminated in the war between mid-​1941 and the end of 1944, 65 per cent were destroyed in 1944. Even more catastrophic for the German position in the East was that the Ardennes Offensive launched in December led to the withdrawal of some of the most powerful German armoured units to bolster the assault forces to be committed against the Western Allies. If the surprise attack upset the Western Allies’ plans for around two weeks, it further weakened the defensive power of Hitler’s panzer units which were facing the Red Army.35 The final mechanised battles were strongly influenced by the stranglehold which Adolf Hitler held over the conduct of military operations and the power of Nationalist Socialist ideology. This led to an obsession with holding ground at the expense of 88

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using the mobility of the armoured units. On 31 December 1944, the German Army was in possession of 1,079 combat-​capable tanks, together with 1,853 assault guns; in total, there were four panzer armies. Although the forces in the East still appeared to be strong on paper, they had fewer than 26,000 officers, while there were severe equipment shortages, especially lorries. Thus, the pause in military activity led the Germans to concentrate on building defensive works, although the Führer rejected Heinz Guderian’s request to create an operational reserve. The problem was that north of the Carpathian mountains the Germans were lacking panzer divisions:  out of 18 divisions, seven were committed in Hungary, four were based in East Prussia, two in Courland and only five on the main axis of the Red Army’s planned attack.36 Meanwhile, from 16 to ​31 December 1944, Soviet forces had made heavy weather of breaking into Budapest; quite simply, Hitler did not want to give up the city. The IV SS Panzer Corps was sent to relieve pressure on the defenders, counter-​attacking on 1 January. Another Red Army attack aimed at the rear of IV Panzer Corps was launched on 6 January, which saw an intensification of the fighting in and around Budapest. III Panzer Corps, commanded by General der Panzertruppe Hermann Breith was then thrown into the battle, although it suffered many tank losses. On 18 January, however, the IV SS Panzer Corps all but destroyed the Red Army’s 135th Rifle Corps. It continued its advance towards Budapest, reaching a point 25 km from the suburbs of the city, although Hitler did not want the surrounded German units to break out. On the same day, German units fighting in Pest surrendered with tank losses estimated at around 300; resistance in Buda ended on 13 February.37 If the panzer divisions fighting in Hungary had demonstrated that they were still a force to be reckoned with, it proved a different story when the huge Red Army offensive, usually referred to as the Oder-​Vistula operation, began on 12 January 1945. At the centre of the Soviet armies facing Warsaw was Marshal Zhukov’s 1st Belorussian Front; to its south lay Marshal Koniev’s 1st Ukranian Front; together they possessed two-​and-​a-​quarter million men, 6,500 tanks and 4,772 aircraft. To the north of Zhukov lay the 2nd and 3rd Belorussian Fronts: these two fronts had 1,670,000 men, 3,300 tanks and assault guns, and around 3,000 aircraft. Zhukov knew well the German tactic of removing their powerful armoured units from the front line and adjusted his offensive plans accordingly. Even though the main weight of the offensive lay with Koniev and Zhukov, they were surprised at the speed with which they were able to advance. By 2 February the Red Army had captured Warsaw and reached the Oder River, coming close to Breslau, Frankfurt an der Oder and Küstrin; in the north progress was slower; and, while German forces were encircled in a large pocket stretching from Köningsberg to Braunsberg, they still held a large area of territory along the coast of the Baltic Sea between Stettin and to the east of Danzig. By the end of March this territory had been in large measure conquered.38 In the final few months of the war, German mechanised forces laboured under a variety of severe problems, such as lack of fuel supplies, to lack of ammunition, to the constant danger of encirclement and destruction. Yet even in this dire set of circumstances, if not faced with overwhelming odds they could still achieve local successes, 89

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even as the front crumbled around them. On 22 March 1945, as the Red Army attempted to break out of the Küstrin bridgehead, and as it was moving in the direction of Berlin, a scratch German battle group consisting of 37 Panther and 14 Tiger tanks was able to halt two Russian tank brigades of around 120 machines, destroying 60 T-​34/​85s in the process. Then, as late as 6–​7 May 1945, a clash of armour took place 10 km south-​east of Prostejov, east of Brno, between various German units, including four panzer divisions, attempting to reach the remnants of Army Group Centre, and the Russian 5th and 42nd Tank Brigades of the Eighth Army and the 31st Tank Corps of the Sixtieth Army. Some 150 German AFVs destroyed between 200 and 300 Russian tanks. Nonetheless, the advance to the Oder had been a dramatic success, particularly for Red Army armour formations: the 3rd Guards Tank Army had started the operation with 921 tanks, with 750 still operational 17  days later. The wear and tear on machines did, though, mean that a pause was required to prepare for the final assault on Berlin. An essential precursor to this was the battle for the Seelow Heights, successfully carried out over 16–​19 April. Infantry armed with the hand-​held Panzerfausts presented an increasing danger to Red Army tanks, but crews started to use mattresses from German houses to deflect the rounds. On the morning of 20 April, the guns of Zhukov’s 1st Belorussian Front opened fire on Berlin; armoured units entered the city the following day. Artillery and tanks were used to destroy buildings in three weeks of heavy fighting. Greater Berlin proved difficult to defend in any organised fashion because the loss of the circular Autobahn around the outskirts of the city gave the Red Army the opportunity to move their forces where they wanted them. At the same time, it deprived the Germans of any chance of moving their forces to threatened parts of the front. It was impossible for the Germans to destroy the Autobahn at short notice. As a result, the fighting in Berlin degenerated into ferocious house-​to-​house fighting. Some indication of its intensity is provided by the combat record of the 2nd Guards Tank Army, which lost 1,284 tanks in the fighting in the city. Soviet mechanised forces were used not just to capture Berlin, which fell on 8 May 1945, but to encircle it completely. This task was accomplished by Koniev’s 1st Ukrainian Front advancing from the south, with Zhukov sweeping around it from the north. To the north of Berlin, the 2nd Belorussian Front brushed aside Army Group Vistula to occupy the rest of eastern Germany.39 The Vistula-​Oder operation was one of the most successful of the war in terms of the depth of the advance; at 500 km it was only bettered by the advance rate during Operation Bagration. At one point the advance of 2nd Guards Tank Army, part of Zhukov’s 2nd Belorussian Front, achieved 90 km per day. In fact, it advanced so rapidly that when it had reached the Oder, its logistical support had fallen 300–​470 km behind the forward elements. Nonetheless, the final four months and eight days of the war in the East cost the Red Army 8,700 tanks and around 5,000 assault guns.40 If the final phase of the war had been costly for the Russians, it did at the same time demonstrate that their tactics and handling of large armoured formations had improved dramatically in the course of four years of war. 90

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Conclusion If we consider the armour loss rates in the Great Patriotic War, Red Army tank and self-​propelled gun losses have been given in an official Soviet report of 1988/​89 as follows: for 1941 (beginning on 22 June) 20,500; in 1942, 15,100; in 1943, 23,500; in 1944, 23,700; and up to May 1945, 13,700. There are some discrepancies in the figures, so that overall losses have been estimated between 87,300 and 95,924. One Russian authority (G. F. Krivosheev) gives the total number of irreplaceable tank losses at 63,229, whereas Steven Zaloga gives the figure of 83,500 as the total number. But it has never been clear whether figures for irreplaceable losses include the numbers for lend-​lease tanks.41 What is important to bear in mind, however, is that many of the Soviet statistics on German tank losses are unreliable. This was not an attempt at deliberate distortion, but rather a reflection of the Germans’ ability to recover and repair tanks which the Red Army had recorded as knocked out. One estimate suggests that in 1943/​44 only one-​ quarter of German tanks put out of action could not be repaired, whereas another estimate asserts that two out of three Soviet tanks disabled in battle could not be returned to the front. The differences in statistics for loss rates were due to several factors. For one, German tanks tended to keep firing until Soviet tanks caught fire, even if already immobilised. There was also the tendency of Soviet commanders to exaggerate their successes, as well as the fact that if several Red Army tanks concentrated their fire on one machine, then several commanders might claim the same kill. Another important factor was that the Panzer IV, Tiger and Panther tanks were difficult for both versions of the T-​34 to knock out. For this reason, German tank ‘casualties’ were often caused by mines, damage which was rarely ‘catastrophic’, thus allowing workshops to return them to working order within a few days.42 These considerations have seduced some historians into considering the final Soviet victory as being based on the simple achievement of out-​producing the German factories with two basic tank designs, the T-​34 and the KV-​1. According to this thesis, the Red Army was able to replace their huge tank losses quicker than the Germans could destroy them. While high Soviet production rates were one major element in the war, they should not be used to obscure the achievement of the Red Army in superior planning and an increasing ability to use their armour more effectively than the Germans from late 1943 up to their final victory in the ruins of Berlin in May 1945. Moreover, three months after the fall of Berlin, they achieved their spectacular success against the Japanese Kwantung Army in Manchuria in August 1945 in a dramatic two-​week campaign in terrain not deemed suitable for the mass employment of armour.

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CHAPTER 5 DIFFICULT TERRAIN:  DESERTS, MOUNTAINS, HEDGEROWS, JUNGLES, 1940–​4 5

Considering the scale of the battles led by mechanised forces on the Eastern Front, it may seem that the employment of armour in the Western Desert, the Italian Campaign, northwest Europe and the Far East was severely restricted by the nature of the terrain. Certainly, prewar doctrine had warned about the limitations imposed by desert conditions, mountains, forests and jungles. But while stifling heat, flies, dust, rain and mud made combat difficult for the crews of machines, infantry and artillery had to cope with these conditions, too. The real challenge was to develop tactics to accommodate the limitations of the topography and to make adjustments to tanks, in particular, to take account of the terrain and the increasing intensity of the battlefield. In fact, in the Western Desert and northwest Europe, the basic principles for the mass employment of armour remained more or less intact; in Italy and the jungles of the Far East, however, tanks and other AFVs were often required to break some of the rules of armoured war in order to make a significant contribution to the fighting.

The Western Desert, 1940–​43 The war in the desert in which the British, their allies, and the Italians and Germans participated was characterised by a number of factors. First, many battles took place that involved AFVs which were nearing the point of obsolescence. Second, logistics at every level –​tactical, operational and theatre-​strategic –​played a major part in the course and outcome of the conflict. And third, speed, manoeuvre and tempo produced on occasions some dramatic results, illustrating once again that when an army is unprepared, poorly equipped, uncertain or indecisive, the results which can be achieved by a decisive, quick-​ thinking and fast-​moving opponent can be quite dramatic where armoured vehicles are employed. The terrain in the Western Desert has been described as ‘really a flat rocky plateau stretching for hundreds of miles west from Alexandria in Egypt, through into Cyrenaica, to Tripolitania’. While there were green and fertile areas in northern Libya, the majority of the desert was covered with loose sand, stones and small rocks. At Bardia and Tobruk there were wadis and rocky ravines, while the Jebel mountains could be found around Cirene and Barce, but most of the terrain was flat, providing no cover for tanks, other armoured vehicles or lorries. There were some undulations in the ground, some of which contained sand, which could lead to vehicles becoming stuck, while some of the desert

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contained thorny scrub. Sandstorms were common and could last for up to two days; needless to say, sand got into equipment very easily, necessitating frequent cleaning. Even though the desert could be unbearably hot during the day, nights could be bitterly cold. British tank crews were often without fresh fruit and vegetables for months at a time which led to ‘desert sores’ on noses, hands and legs. Washing was often impossible for days on end as water was scarce; hair became matted with sand; British crews frequently survived on bully beef and biscuits. All these factors presented huge challenges for the conduct of armoured warfare.1 The opening phase of the war in the desert saw British forces pitted against the Italian Army, who in the wake of the Battle of France had started to pose a military threat to Britain in Egypt and the Mediterranean. The three tank regiments which were sent, originally designated for Britain’s anti-​invasion force, were equipped with Mark II Matilda infantry tanks, A13 Cruiser tanks, as well as some A9s, A10s and Mark VI light tanks. During the course of the fighting, even a few Rolls Royce armoured cars of First World War vintage took part, armed with only one machine-​gun, but with a speed of 45 mph. Their Italian opponents fielded the M11/​39 tank, armed with a 37mm gun, two machine-​guns and manned by a crew of two. The best Italian tank, the M13/​40, armed with a 47mm gun, and reasonably well armoured, was only able to manage 7 mph cross-​ country, allowing it to be constantly outmanoeuvred by Allied forces; furthermore, this tank was only able to participate in the final battle at Beda Fomm (5–​7 February 1941). Apart from that, the Italians possessed the CV-35 light tank which was only armed with two machine-​guns. After the arrival of the three British tank regiments, the Italians started to move towards Egypt. The British force, which included the 4th Indian Division, had 30,000 men, 275 tanks, while the Italian force which had moved forward had 80,000 men and 120 tanks. What was initially planned as an assault on the Italians at Sidi Barrani to throw them off-​balance exceeded all expectations in December 1940. The Italians collapsed in this and subsequent battles, and some British commanders came to see every Matilda tank as worth a battalion of infantry. At the decisive battle of Beda Fomm, the Italians squandered their advantage in tanks by feeding them into the battle in small numbers, in keeping with their infantry support role, and this allowed the British to destroy them one by one from hull-​down firing positions. Major-​General Richard O’Connor’s successes came at the price of many tanks lost, even though most of these losses were due to mechanical failure rather than enemy action. However, in two months he succeeded in advancing 500 miles, at a cost of less than 2,000 casualties, and he had destroyed an army of ten Italian divisions, capturing 130,000 prisoners, 400 tanks and 850 guns. The key to success had been the British method of outflanking the Italian defences by wide sweeps through the desert, breaking into the rear areas, cutting their communications and spreading panic and confusion. The Libyan Campaign was effectively ended by a decision in London to halt any further advance into North Africa; yet this was a decision which allowed Rommel’s Afrikakorps to land at Tripoli. The skeleton corps consisted of the 5th Light Division

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and the 15th Panzer Division. They were both under-​strength, but the Allied forces had been reduced drastically; some had been sent to Greece, the 7th Armoured Division to Egypt for rest and refitting. The forces left were the under-​strength 2nd Armoured Division and the 9th Australian Division. Without waiting for the 15th Panzer Division, Rommel began launching a series of dynamic attacks driving the British forces back. Lack of proper communications and the centralised British command structure led to further disasters as the British found themselves receiving orders which did not relate to the situation on the ground. The ensuing chaos led to fuel dumps being destroyed needlessly. This was another example of the psychological shock caused by rapid armour thrusts deep into enemy territory. Within two weeks in April 1941, Rommel had cleared the Allied forces out of Cyrenaica, with the exception of those forces surrounded in Tobruk. Poor communications and hesitant command had been the main faults on the British side; to make matters worse, O’Connor was captured together with Lieutenant-​ General Philip Neame on 6 April. Until the Second Battle of El Alamein opened in October 1942, the war in the desert see-​sawed back and forth. Although the British could generally call on more resources, they often made the mistake of trying to overcome German anti-​tank defences with frontal attacks; they also tended to dissipate their armour instead of concentrating it. The German use of anti-​tank screens, behind which their armour waited for the chance to launch counter-​attacks, proved particularly formidable whenever the 88mm flak gun was employed as an anti-​tank gun. However, Rommel’s love for offensive, outflanking actions was often his undoing, and he tended to overplay his hand. The third British attack on the Afrikakorps in 1941, Operation Crusader, succeeded in forcing the Axis forces out of Cyrenaica.2 In mid-​1941, the British forces had started to receive new Valentine tanks. But faced with the German Panzer III, armed with a 50mm gun, and the Panzer IV with its 75mm gun, it found itself outgunned and outranged. Its 2-​pounder gun was not powerful enough; moreover, it needed to close to 400–​500 yards to have a chance of knocking out a German tank, whereas the German tanks could achieve a kill at 900–​1,000 yards. Although it had 3.5-​inch armour and was small with a low silhouette, it only had a three-​man crew (the Mark III and IV versions were modified to allow space for a loader). This meant that the tank commander had not only to command his tank, troop or even squadron, but also load the 2-​pounder and the Besa machine-​gun, and work the wireless set; this was a distinct disadvantage given that the German tanks had five-​man crews. It was also slower than the Panzer III and Panzer IV, which could move at 20–​25 mph, whereas the Valentine could only travel at 15–​20 mph. Still, there was one advantage it possessed: the turret flaps opened out flat, so from a distance it looked as if the crew was ‘buttoned up’; this enabled the commander to look outside more frequently, which proved critical in battle.3 Rommel launched a fresh offensive in May 1942. His victory at Gazala in June was caused by the lack of speed in the Allied counter-​attack. Nonetheless, the Afrikakorps had been taken aback by the appearance for the first time of the Grant medium tank,

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which was equipped with both a 75mm gun mounted in the hull (which could only traverse 15 degrees left and right) and a 37mm gun in the turret. Although the design of the Grant was flawed and it required a six-​man crew, German tactics at this stage were designed to defeat an opponent with 2-​pounder guns. On 26 May 1942, 12 German tanks were knocked out in quick succession by the 75mm guns of a number of Grants. The appearance of the Grant medium tank and the 6-​pounder anti-​ tank gun had swung the technological pendulum back in the direction of the Allies. After Gazala and the fall of Tobruk, Lieutenant-​General Claude Auchinleck rallied his forces and succeeded in anticipating Rommel’s moves; by the end of July, he had been able to halt Rommel’s advance at the First Battle of El Alamein (1–​27 July 1942). Nonetheless, despite his recovery, Auchinleck was dismissed on 8 August by an impatient Churchill whose constant demands for action demonstrated his lack of understanding of armoured warfare.4 After the British victory at the Battle of Alam Halfa (30 August–​6 September 1942), the decisive turning point of the Desert War was reached at the Second Battle of El Alamein in October 1942. With Bernard Montgomery now in command of the Eighth Army, a commander had arrived who was determined to win. But ‘Monty’ was not in any way a master of mobile warfare. El Alamein has been described as an ‘unnecessary battle’, as Rommel would have had to retreat had it not been fought, which would have made his forces vulnerable. His tanks were low on fuel and the Axis defences were only five miles deep. Yet, this largely attritional battle cost the Allies 13,500 dead and 500 tanks. However, German tank strength was reduced from 273 on 19 October to only 24 combat-​ready tanks on 3 November, so the battle paved the way for the capitulation of all Axis forces in Tunisia in early 1943.5 Explaining the causes of success and failure in the war in the Western Desert, the course of the campaign shows that at the beginning of the conflict Rommel was often able to offset his lack of strength in tanks by bluff. He was practical and creative in armoured warfare, making clever use of captured British tanks. His leadership style and command from the front suited war in the desert –​and he was willing to take risks. As the campaign progressed, however, Allied strength began to reduce the options available to the Afrikakorps even if British commanders did not always perform as well as the Germans. German tactical superiority could be offset by numbers, even if the British Army mastered neither combined-​arms warfare very well during the campaign nor the use of anti-​tank defences in combination with armour. While the quality of British generals was certainly a factor, faulty prewar doctrine played a part, too, in what was at best an indifferent performance.6 Still, by mid-​1943, doctrine had integrated some of the lessons learned. It was acknowledged that anti-​tank defence needed to be constructed in depth, a modification of the defensive boxes which had been used by the Eighth Army; at the same time, the idea persisted that armour would attract enemy armour, so that anti-​tank defences were a means of protecting areas occupied by the infantry. The weapons of anti-​tank warfare were primarily the 6-​pounder and the 17-​pounder.7 At the time the troops were mystified as to why the 3.7-inch anti-​aircraft gun was not used in the same way the Germans 96

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employed their 88mm flak gun: the official reason given was that the profile of the gun was too high, but the lack of an adequate optical sight and the need for anti-​aircraft protection were probably the real reasons. British attacks were often based on the false premise that they were conducting tank battles; indeed, some estimates suggest that over 90 per cent of tank kills were caused by anti-​tank guns.8 The German commanders, on the other hand, had shown themselves to be highly flexible, drawing on their tradition of Auftragstaktik (mission-​oriented command), which most of them had learned as junior infantry officers in the war of 1914–​18. Rommel over-​estimated his capabilities on more than one occasion, though, hastening the defeat of the Afrikakorps which surrendered in Tunisia on 13 May 1943. But this was not before the Germans inflicted some hard lessons on the inexperienced US 1st Armored Division, which had arrived in November 1942. On 14 February 1943, at the village of Sidi Bou Zid, American units were attacked by two German panzer divisions, which included some new Tiger tanks; shortly afterwards a poorly organised counter-​ attack ended disastrously. By the end of the day, 98 medium tanks, 57 half-​tracks and 29 artillery pieces had been lost.9 This was a clear warning that future battles in Europe against German armoured forces would be extremely bloody.

The Italian Campaign, 1943–​45 The invasion of the Italian Peninsula in 1943 was prepared through a campaign which was as much conditioned by logistics as it was by combat: the conquest of Sicily, 10 July to 17 August 1943. The Italian forces on the island were composed of four weak divisions and five coastal divisions, few of them with either adequate equipment or morale. The Germans had formed a makeshift division, optimistically christened the 15th Panzer Division, with only one tank unit, while the reconstituted Herman Goering Panzer Division was despatched to the island; the 29th Panzer Grenadier Division arrived later. The Allied forces which landed were the US Seventh Army and the British XIII Corps and XXX Corps, containing the 23rd and 4th Independent Armoured Brigades, as well as the 44th, 46th and 50th Royal Tank Regiments. In effect, the only resistance to the advancing Western Allies was offered by five German battlegroups, which conducted a successful fighting withdrawal, escaping with much of their equipment intact. In terms of armoured warfare, the topography of Sicily afforded little opportunity for large-​scale tank actions. Tanks were often confined to roads, although they proved useful in destroying enemy bunker positions. In tank versus tank combat, Shermans were pitted against Tigers in usually an unequal battle. The contribution of the Tigers was to lie and wait and delay the advance of Allies, clearly making a major contribution to the successful withdrawal by the German forces. The narrow roads of Sicily meant that the harassing tactics employed by the Germans were highly effective. German parachute troops employed snipers against Allied tank commanders, with some success, but they also attacked tanks directly with various anti-​armour weapons; 88mm flak guns were employed successfully in an anti-​armour role. The Allied AFVs suffered from the 97

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hairpin bends in the roads through mountainous terrain which led to many tanks shedding their tracks. The conditions for armour on Sicily were a warning of what was to come during the Italian Campaign.10 Various aspects of the conduct of the Italian Campaign by Allied commanders have been criticised by historians, whereas the German defensive actions have been viewed as skilful. From the perspective of armoured forces, Italy provided good conditions for anti-​tank forces on the defensive, but for the attackers there were many obstacles to the employment of armour in mass: the roads were poor, rain could turn tracks into mud, dust was everywhere, and rivers criss-​crossed the landscape, swelling to torrents when it rained. Due to the narrow roads and the mountain terrain, which canalised forces, larger flanking actions could only be conducted by coastal landings behind the enemy front. At the start of the campaign, the landing at Salerno in September 1943 proved particularly tricky for tanks because the beachhead zone was crossed only by narrow lanes; the sides of these often collapsed under the weight of the tanks, causing them to become stuck; in fact, a furious German counter-​attack came within two miles of the Allied landing area, and was only beaten back by a concentrated air attack. As the Allied armies advanced during late 1943, there were many small tank versus tank actions, often with roughly equal losses on both sides, but with no obvious pattern in tank-​killing ratios discernible. Due to the nature of the advance and the terrain involved Allied tanks often went into combat without infantry support to keep the advance moving and, on occasions, had to fight uphill, providing German machines with an immediate advantage. There were even cases of some members of tank crews ‘dismounting’ from their vehicles in order to go into villages to clear out remaining defenders with small arms and machine-​guns. The narrow roads, contributing to the need to ford streams and rivers or cross water-​logged ground, caused tanks to become ditched or bogged down, so that time was lost while specialist vehicles were engaged in complex recovery tasks.11 For some British units which had fought in North Africa, one change which the Italian Campaign brought was the introduction of the M4 Sherman tank, which replaced the under-​gunned Valentine and other essentially obsolete machines. Overall, the crews were happy with their new tank: it had a five-​man crew, which enabled the commander to concentrate on the battle; it could travel on roads at 25–​30 mph; it was equipped with two .30 Browning machine-​guns and a .50 on the commander’s cupola ring; and its main armament was the M3 L/​40 75mm gun, which was extremely accurate if fired when stationary due to its gyrostabiliser. But it possessed two drawbacks: it had an extremely high profile, so it was difficult to conceal in the Italian landscape, and its armour was fairly thin at two-​and-​a-​half inches, so that German anti-​tank guns could penetrate it easily, even at fairly long range. As the Sherman carried 100 rounds of mainly 75mm shells, 5,000 rounds of machine-​gun ammunition, and 90 gallons of petrol, a hit on the tank would often cause it to burn, then explode.12 The heaviest losses in tanks occurred during the ferocious fighting over the Gothic Line in September 1944, which saw Allied armour thrown into fierce fighting against determined defenders. For a change, the German supreme commander in Italy, 98

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Photo 5  M4 Sherman tanks advancing, northern Italy, 1944/​45 Field-​Marshal Albert Kesselring, had been allowed time to strengthen his defences. Moreover, the Allied forces, which had 1,089 Sherman and 187 Churchill tanks, still had to attack uphill against 92 German tanks and 235 anti-​armour AFVs. Although the Germans suffered final losses of just under 100 tanks and 124 assault guns, they claimed to have destroyed 600 British tanks. The main tank killer of British armour was considered by the Germans to be tank guns, followed by hand-​held weapons, anti-​tank guns, followed by artillery; according to some evidence, over half the German losses were caused by artillery, terrain and breakdowns.13 Allied tank crews had found the fighting extremely tough due to dug-​in assault guns, anti-​tank guns, mines and fortified villages, which taken together represented the virtual negation of good tank country.14 The tactics employed in Italy had, by necessity, become very different from what had been practised in the Western Desert. Not only had the veterans of that campaign little or no time to train in new tactics, there had been no opportunity to practise amphibious landings or the use of specialised vehicles. The severe winters in the mountains often meant that tank units had to be supplied by mule trains. Given these difficulties, it is not surprising that tactics were reduced to fire support for infantry or efforts at breaking down entrenched German infantry and anti-​tank gun positions, which could be concealed in a range of topographical features and buildings. Not only did the Germans employ Panzer IV, Panther and Tiger tanks, they were also adroit in the skilful positioning of assault guns, such as the Sturmgeschütz III and IV, box-​ like vehicles, mounting a 75mm or 105mm gun on a Panzer III or IV chassis. These 99

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vehicles were easy to conceal due to their low profile and acted as an effective form of mobile anti-​tank gun.15 These various factors taken together meant that certain battles demanded Allied tanks be used, on occasions, without proper infantry support against well-​constructed German defensive lines. Moreover, in the first phase of the campaign, Allied armour suffered from units being withdrawn as part of the preparations for D-​Day. The result was a campaign in which initially no Allied tank was available which could hope to take on German machines on an equal footing. The advantage presented to the defender by the terrain meant that the tactical advantage was held by the Germans during much of the fighting in Italy.

Northwest Europe, 1944–​45 Prior to the Normandy landings, the German Army High Command faced a dilemma concerning their employment of armour in northern France. There were two schools of thought:  the first approach, consistent with German experience in Russia, was to hold strong armoured formations well back from the beaches, which would then be thrown against the Allied landing areas once it had become clear where the main effort was located; the alternative strategy would be to place the armoured forces close to the beaches so that they could react immediately. The argument which took place over these two variants is often referred to the as the ‘Rommel-​Rundstedt Controversy’. Field-​ Marshal Erwin Rommel, in charge of the invasion defences, backed by his Chief of Staff, Lieutenant-​General Hans Speidel, argued that the landings in France would have to be defeated on the beaches, whereas the Commander-​in-​Chief West, Field-​Marshal Gerd von Rundstedt, believed that the armoured forces needed to be committed in strength, a view supported by the Inspector of Armoured Troops, General der Panzertruppe Leo Geyr von Schweppenburg. Rommel had begun inspecting the defences in northern France in December 1943; very quickly, he ordered a massive programme of fortification building, so that by June 1944 16,000 bunkers had been built and four million mines had been laid. This, ironically, was the same linear defence against armoured forces which the French had relied on in May 1940 in the shape of the Maginot Line. Rundstedt, the supreme commander in the West, argued from a different perspective. He thought that the landings could not be prevented; instead, the armoured divisions would need to fight the decisive battle against the Western Allies beyond the range of the latter’s naval guns. Immediately prior to D-​ Day, the German armed forces had 58 divisions in northern Europe, of which ten were panzer divisions, fielding around 1,400 tanks (1,860 AFVs of all types in total). Rommel proceeded from the assumption that Allied airpower would make the movement of his divisions extremely difficult; Geyr, however, thought he could overcome the problem by moving his armoured units forward at night –​and he had Heinz Guderian as an ally. On 26 April 1944, Hitler reached a compromise: three of the ten panzer divisions were to be placed under Rommel’s Army Group B, three in southern France under Army Group 100

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G, while the other four were assigned to Geyr’s Panzer Group West, including the I SS Panzer Corps.16 This was a gross strategic error as the high command should have come down on one side or the other. For the Western Allies, the challenge was how to achieve surprise, to gain a foothold on the beaches and to bring troops, supplies and armoured vehicles ashore before the Germans launched a counter-​attack. From the perspective of the armoured forces, the key lay in the considerable preparations and inventiveness which accompanied the invasion planning. And there can be no doubt that several modified AFVs known as the ‘funnies’ contributed to the successful landing. The Sherman crab tank had a revolving drum with 43 chains attached which detonated mines, thus clearing a path through minefields. The Sherman Duplex-​Drive (DD) could ‘swim’ ashore on account of the twin propellers mounted on the rear of its hull and the canvas flotation screen which assisted it in the water, although those tanks released too far away from the beaches sometimes sank before they made it ashore.17 On Sword Beach on 6 June 1944, of the forty DD tanks belonging to the 13/​18 Hussars and the Staffordshire Yeomanry, six in total sank, although two of these because they were inadvertently rammed by landing craft.18 Once the Normandy beachhead had been established, a series of Allied offensives were launched in July and August:  Operations Goodwood and Atlantic (July 1944); Operations Cobra and Spring (July 1944); Operation Totalize (August 1944)  and Operation Tractable (August 1944). Goodwood was the first major operation involving Allied armoured forces, which saw British and Canadian units attempting to capture the city of Caen: it proved a costly failure, although the damage done to German forces contributed to the general attrition of their defensive capability during July and August. When Goodwood was launched on 18 July 1944, British armour was facing three German panzer divisions consisting of 200 tanks, 35 assault guns and two separate Tiger battalions. If the aim had been to wear down German armoured strength, the cost was high: 500 British tanks had been destroyed by the end of the first day. Although the defenders had been battered from the air, which also restricted their movement to the hours of darkness, the German defensive positions had been well organised, with fortified villages providing the basis for interlocking fields of fire.19 A German counter-​attack south of Caen on 20–​21 July restored the equilibrium of their position, illustrating that when faced with enemy tank forces, unsupported infantry will suffer heavily. The problem had not been a lack of adequate Allied armour, as Sherman Firefly tanks had been available. The setback had been caused because the infantry had been sent forward, with the tanks afraid to venture too far due to the known superiority of the German 75mm and 88mm guns. However, west of Caen, Operation Cobra led to the American breakthrough at St. Lȏ which had been achieved by 26 July. The threat to the German position was immediately recognised, so that Field-​Marshal Günther von Kluge decided to launch a counter-attack at Mortain. For Operation Lüttich on 7 August, he assembled three elite divisions, equipped with 70 Panthers, 75 Panzer IVs and 32 assault guns and Mark IV tank hunters. The attack was, however, decisively blunted by Allied airpower in the shape of P-​51 Mustangs, P-​47 Thunderbolts and RAF Typhoons. This opened the door for Operation Totalize on 8 August, which finally saw 101

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the Allies achieve the breakthrough they had sought, despite the fact that tanks continued to be used as a form of infantry support weapon.20 As the Allied ground operations developed, it was decided to deviate from the original plan to wait until the German forces reached the Seine: now they were to be halted along the Falaise-​Argentan line. While units from the US Third Army, which was commanded energetically by General George S. Patton, together with the French 2nd Armoured Division, reached Argentan on 13 August, progress was slower in the north. By 19 August there was a real possibility that the Allied forces might be able to encircle and destroy the II SS Panzer Corps and the German Seventh Army. Over the following two days, however, the German forces managed to keep a corridor open, which allowed 35,000–​40,000 troops to escape. Still, once the Falaise pocket was closed, 50,000 German soldiers surrendered, 10,000 had been killed, while 344 armoured vehicles and 2,447 other vehicles had been left behind, along with 255 artillery pieces. Moreover, as the German Seventh Army and the Fifth Panzer Army moved eastwards, they attempted to withdraw as many units as possible to the right bank of the Seine; yet, further losses in equipment were unavoidable, so that the Allies later counted 304 armoured and 3,178 other motorised vehicles, and 166 artillery pieces, which could not be evacuated.21 These were crippling losses in AFVs, especially as fresh Allied units continued to land in Normandy. It is frequently argued that the Allied attacks which preceded the final breaking of the deadlock were bludgeoning, unimaginative affairs when it came to the employment of armour. There were many causes behind this largely correct analysis: the abilities of senior Allied commanders; the lack of combat experience of many of the tank crews; the close nature of the terrain on which the armoured forces had to be employed; and the careful construction by the Germans of their strong points. In the case of the Brittany Campaign, the aim of which was to clear the Cotentin peninsula and capture the vital port of Brest, the fighting proved a significant formative experience for the US 4th and 6th Armored Divisions in improving coordination between air and ground forces. Another cause of the failure to break through quicker was undoubtedly faulty doctrine, especially on the British side. At the same time, many of the German armoured units were made up of men with considerable combat experience, while there was also no doubt that the Germans enjoyed technological superiority in the range and power of their tank guns. As a result, any discussion of German technical superiority was rigorously suppressed in Allied divisions. Allied crews discovered quickly that Tigers and Panthers could not be knocked out at longer ranges; it was necessary for Sherman and Churchill tanks to try and attack German tanks in the flanks, never straightforward in the Normandy countryside. The British Sherman Firefly, armed with a 17-​pounder gun could take on the German tanks, but it was not available in sufficient numbers to exert a major influence on the campaign. The Sherman tank was mechanically reliable, and had a track life five times greater than that of its German opponents. But even the Panzer IV came off better in comparison with the Sherman in gun power: it could penetrate 92mm of armour at 500 yards compared to the 68mm managed by the Sherman. Moreover, the infantry anti-​tank weapons 102

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(the American bazooka and the British PIAT) available to the Western Allies proved to be inadequate, while the Germans’ hand-​held Panzerfaust weapon was highly effective at close range and extremely simple to use. Allied artillery was good, but the German 88mm anti-​aircraft and tank guns proved their worth time and again against Allied armour.22 One British tank commander recorded on 25 June 1944 in his diary: ‘My stomach sinks to record low levels when I think of facing a barrage from Jerry 88s. Have seen their effect on a Sherman!’23 With German defences very much of a makeshift nature in early September, higher German commanders found themselves under pressure from Hitler to launch overly ambitious attacks. On 12 September, Colonel-​General Johannes Blaskowitz ordered the commander of the Fifth Panzer Army, Hasso von Manteuffel, to launch a limited counter-​attack against the US XV Corps. The commander of the XXXXVIII Panzer Corps, Lieutentant-​General Heinrich von Lüttwitz, was then ordered to attack towards Vittel. In fact, the backbone of Lüttwitz’s Corps was the 112th Panzer Brigade. With more time for reconnaissance, and under a different set of circumstances, it could have been a powerful unit: it had just received new tanks in the shape of a battalion of 48 Panzer IV and 48 Panther tanks. The two battalions, together with an infantry battlegroup, advanced in two columns. The following day, the French 2nd Armoured Division engaged the German tanks which had camped in a narrow valley overnight, catching them by surprise. The French employed fire from artillery, M4 Shermans and M10 tank destroyers, combined with four separate air strikes. As the Germans were in a valley, the flanking manoeuvres they attempted failed. Their losses on 12 and 13 September amounted to 34 Panthers and 26 Panzer IVs.24 However, one severe weakness for the German defenders was the way in which ill-​ conceived plans –​created largely for political purposes and due to Adolf Hitler’s belief that he understood modern ground warfare –​were forced upon experienced commanders. This can be seen quite clearly in the Arracourt tank battles, which took place between 19 and 22 September 1944. As the Allied breakout began to develop, the Fifth Panzer Army was scraped together from inexperienced personnel and ordered into a counter-​ attack against the American forces in Lorraine, against the advice of the commander of the LVIII Panzer Corps, F. W. von Mellenthin. The main striking force of the corps, the 111th and 113th Panzer Brigades, was under-​strength and missing important component units, but it was still hoped that the Panther tanks they possessed would prove to be decisive. The main objective of the LVIII Panzer Corps was blocked by elements of the US 4th Armored Division. The actions which followed over several days provide a classic example of what can go wrong if a mechanised unit is manned by inexperienced soldiers and is lacking other AFVs and support units.25 On 19 September, 113th Brigade attacked an outpost of the 4th Armored Division in thick fog. The fog clearly favoured the US Army units:  at close range a platoon of US tanks and tank destroyers knocked out ten Panthers at a cost of three tank destroyers. In further actions, hull-​down tanks and tank destroyers accounted for a further 16 Panthers. The Americans then launched a counter-​attack and destroyed nine Panthers and inflicted heavy losses on Panzer Grenadiers at the cost of three M​4 tanks. The 103

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following day, eight Panthers were knocked out trying to attack US units and, in a further battle, five or six tanks were lost on each side. On 22 September, the Germans renewed their attack, knocking out seven US light tanks, but also losing three of their own tanks. Then, following P-​47 air-​to-​ground attacks, a US assault led to the destruction of 14 German tanks. By the end of the fighting, Combat Command A of the 4th Armoured Division had destroyed the 111th and 113th Panzer Brigades as fighting units at a cost of 113 casualties and 14 medium and 7 light tanks. The extraordinary success of the US units can be seen to be a result of their recent combat experience, the right mix of vehicles in their units, superior leadership and the inexperience of the German brigades, which were ordered to undertake ill-​advised attacks against the advice of the commanders on the ground. American tactics seemed to have proved their worth when the US 4th Armored Division was the main spearhead of the breakout from the Normandy bridgehead. However, as the ground became muddier, the advance of the division bogged down in France once the Germans began to conduct a successful elastic defence. Since American doctrine had viewed tanks as essentially weapons of exploitation, which would move into a breach in the front line created by infantry, US Army armour formations were both poorly equipped and organised to take on German tanks and infantry in a tank battle. Both the Sherman and the M3 half-​track ran into difficulties when faced with muddy terrain; the Panther, on the other hand, which possessed wide tracks, was much better suited to cross-​country movement; rain and mud forced American tracked vehicles to remain on roads, which began to suffer heavy damage. The superior range of German tank guns and their thicker armour led them to seek extended fields of fire in order to try and engage American tanks at long range. American tactics were aimed at closing range, using the undulations in the terrain, or moving forward under cover of smoke or artillery fire, in an effort to tackle the German tanks at close range or from the flanks. However, they did possess the frequent advantage over the Germans of outnumbering them in tank engagements.26 What can probably be concluded is that, despite the rapid advances of the 4th and 6th Armored Divisions, the US Army had not fully absorbed the technique of armoured warfare. This is revealed by a furious row which developed between Patton and Major-​ General John S.  Wood, the commander of the 4th Armored Division in November 1944. Wood saw rapid attacks, flanking movements and speed on the battlefield as the key to success in armoured warfare. As the Allied advance began to bog down in November 1944, he tried to take the initiative, thereby straying into the combat zone of another corps. His attempts to ignore the orders given to him to stick to the concept of the methodical battle, including the use of armour against well-​defended towns, in order that he could exploit opportunities as they arose, led to his dismissal by Patton. This affair reflected the incapacity of some senior American generals to understand that armour commanders needed to seize opportunities as they presented themselves on the battlefield.27 There is another crucial element which needs to be considered in examining the Allied successes in northwest Europe –​that of airpower. It is often assumed that Allied 104

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air superiority accounted for large numbers of German armoured vehicles. Certainly, soft-​skinned vehicles were destroyed in great numbers by Allied aircraft. On the other hand, it seems to be the case that rather lower numbers of German tanks were actually accounted for by air attack. Only if a Typhoon scored a direct hit on, for example, a Panther, could it hope to knock it out; splinters and blast resulting from a near miss would not cause any catastrophic damage to a tank. In fact, in tests it was discovered that a Typhoon firing an eight-rocket salvo at an object the size of a Panther tank had around a 4 per cent chance of hitting it. The main effect of Allied air attacks was to demoralise German units, degrade their mobility and create psychological feelings of vulnerability, with the shock often causing the crews to abandon their tanks. The Panzer Lehr Division, for example, was attacked repeatedly from the air while moving up to the front line in Normandy. During the course of the attacks, although only five of some 140 tanks were destroyed, 130 trucks out of 1,000, and 84 half-​tracks, prime movers and self-​propelled guns were lost out of a total of 700 –​heavy losses for a unit which had not yet had a chance to go into action. But the most devastating effect of Allied air attacks was psychological. Inexperienced tank crew members were gripped by panic during air attack and sought to ‘bale out’ of their vehicles as quickly as they could. Men would often remain in cover 20–​30 minutes after the attack. The Allies knew this reaction from POW interrogations, and it was as much a goal of air attacks on armour to spread panic as it was to destroy tanks.28 The last major armoured offensive of the war in northwest Europe took place between 15 December 1944 and 5 January 1945 –​the German Ardennes Offensive. Its strategic intention was that strong panzer formations were to break through the Allied line, head for Antwerp, and thereby exacerbate alliance tensions between the Western Allies and the Soviet Union. The plan was completely unrealistic, but it did involve heavy armour, surprise, with the key battle taking place for the road intersection at Bastogne. While the German 2nd Panzer Division was able to advance 60 miles, by 25 December the advance had ground to a halt. The Germans had begun their counter-​offensive with just over 1,200 tanks and assault guns; by 16 January 1945 their strength had been reduced to 630 tanks and assault guns, including later reinforcements. The Allied First Army, which held 1,035 tanks, assault guns and tank destroyers on 16 December, had over 2,000 combat AFVs by 16 January. The result of the offensive was to hasten the end of the war because in launching the attack Hitler squandered his remaining battle-​worthy armoured units.29 The final months of the war for the German armoured troops were conditioned by the decreasing numbers of tanks which were delivered to them. On 1 February 1945, the German forces in the West were in possession of a total of 1,495 AFVs, including assault guns and flak-​panzers. In the course of January, they received 291 new tanks. In the final months of the war, the reality on the ground was sobering: for example, on 23 March 1945 the 9th Panzer Division held 17 combat-​ready tanks and two assault guns. In the case of personnel, the situation was equally bleak –​between July 1944 and mid-​February 1945, the armoured forces on all fronts had suffered losses of 72,065 men. In mid-​February 1945, there were 65,906 men serving in the panzer arm, although a further 64,505 were 105

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undergoing training. By the end of the war, 28,555 members remained.30 But this does not tell the whole story. Fuel shortages plagued any attempted armoured actions, while new crews lacked anything other than the most rudimentary of training. In the wake of the Ardennes offensive, German mechanised forces in the West were no longer capable of anything other than limited tactical tasks. Where the Allies possessed a major advantage was in numbers. Between 1940 and 1945, the Americans were able to turn out 88,410 tanks to the 24,843 produced by the British; between 1934 and 1945 the Germans produced 29,180 tanks. Compared to the German tanks available in Normandy, the Allies had far greater numbers and could replace their losses faster than the Germans. But there were many critical moments in the battle when Allied leadership, even at small unit level, proved decisive. A study of the fighting in northwest Europe does seem to indicate, once again, that success in armoured warfare is dependent on a wide variety of factors, so that no one factor –​whether it be superior tactical skill, airpower or organisation –​is decisive on its own.

Armoured warfare in the Far East, 1941–​45 It seems worth beginning any analysis of the employment of armour in the Far East with the Japanese, since their early victories appear to offer parallels with those of the Germans in terms of speed. Yet, in contrast, little evidence can be found of a significant contribution of armour to these early successes. The Japanese had introduced several tanks before 1939, two of which were their principal machines during the war: the Type 95 Ha-​Go, armed with a 37mm gun, of which around 2,000 were manufactured; and the Type 97 Chi-​Ha medium tank, armed after 1942 with a 47mm high-​velocity gun, but lightly armoured, of which 3,000 were manufactured. Due to steel shortages, other tank types were manufactured in much smaller numbers.31 For the most part, the Japanese Army did not appreciate the value of armour and employed their tanks in static or infantry support roles. However, there were several instances during the war when the Japanese employed tank forces successfully and in an aggressive fashion. For instance, the Japanese did use armour successfully in an exploitation role in the course of January 1942 when the British were retreating from northern Malaya. On 7 January 1942, at the Battle of Slim River, the Japanese succeeded in punching their way down a road with a force of 17 medium Type 94 and three light Type 95 tanks and successfully capturing a vital bridge. In the course of seven hours, a company of tanks, an infantry company, engineer company and an infantry regiment succeeded in destroying a British division. The Japanese success was achieved for a number of reasons. First, the tank company commander managed to persuade an initially sceptical Japanese colonel of the value of attacking straight down the road. Second, the British and Indian units were tired and dispirited from a long retreat, a fact which affected their defensive preparations. Third, the British and Indian units had lost many of their radios and, as a result, were not able to communicate with units further down the road to report on the rapid Japanese advance. This meant that several units were surprised by the approaching 106

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Japanese column and unable to unlimber the guns to engage the Japanese tanks. Fourth, the British had assumed that the terrain would not allow the employment of tanks; however, vital to the Japanese success was the availability of side trails in the jungle which were not defended. Fifth, and finally, the Japanese force kept up the pressure and did not wait for orders or try to regroup.32 Prior to the Second World War, the US Army had also assumed that tanks would have no major role to play in jungles. A 1941 War Department manual on jungle warfare stated: ‘[s]‌upport of infantry by other arms will frequently be impracticable or impossible’. Furthermore, it was asserted that mechanised cavalry, with the exception of roads, fairly dry trails and in sabanas, was ‘unsuited for employment in jungle terrain’, while ‘[m]echanized units will have little or no combat value in the jungle itself ’. This simply reflected the doctrine espoused in the May 1941 field manual 100–​5 (Operations), which took the view that jungle fighting would be largely undertaken by infantry as the movement of vehicles would often be impossible. The doctrine for the armoured division also noted that this force was ‘sensitive’ to obstacles, unfavourable terrain, darkness and weather.33 Hard experience during the war in the southwest Pacific proved these assumptions to be flawed. However, the first experience with armour in late 1941 and 1942 saw tanks being employed in the wrong fashion, so that lessons had to be learned the hard way. One example is the case of Company C, 194th Tank Battalion, equipped with M3 Stuart light tanks, which became caught up in fighting during the defence of Luzon in the Philippines on 8 December 1941, the day after Pearl Harbor, when the Japanese launched an air raid on a US Air Force base on the island. On 24 December, the Japanese landed 7,000 troops. On 26 December, 2nd Tank Platoon was ordered down a narrow mountain trail. Although the platoon leader suggested that reconnaissance should be conducted, the commander insisted it was unnecessary, and the tank column then ran into enemy forces and all five tanks were hit and immobilised. (Interesting is that one tank crew member was hit by a flying rivet, which later caused the War Department to change from riveted to welded construction in the production of tanks.) On 5 January 1942, two tanks and two half-​tracks assisted in delaying the Japanese advance and aided the American retreat into Bataan. Before the final defence perimeter at Bataan surrendered on 9 April 1942, the tanks available had conducted important work, but had made the discovery that in jungle conditions tank-​infantry cooperation was even more essential than in other types of difficult terrain.34 Much of the tank-​infantry cooperation later in the war was developed on the spot, with little thought having been given in advance to possible cooperation, although previous experience had alerted the army to its significance. In the battle for the Wakde Islands from 17–​19 May 1944, for example, two Sherman tanks from the 603rd Tank Company were employed on 18 May to destroy Japanese bunkers. Infantry cooperation was necessary to prevent them falling prey to enemy infantry. One platoon was assigned to each tank, and the tactic worked well even though tank-​infantry cooperation had only been practised for the first time the day before. The tanks proved so effective that more were requested, and they proved a decisive element in clearing the main island of 107

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Japanese defenders. The experience on the Wakde Islands was repeated elsewhere during the Pacific War. It was revealed time and again that the presence of tanks freed the infantry from the dangerous task of assaulting Japanese bunkers and defensive works with hand grenades and flamethrowers. Moreover, tanks added speed, momentum and firepower to attacks, even in dense jungle conditions. They were especially useful in reducing centres of resistance which prevented the infantry from advancing. Experience also showed that better results could be achieved if thorough reconnaissance was carried out by infantry, tank and artillery officers. In jungle conditions both armour and infantry units could lose their orientation, which could lead to them either becoming lost or firing on their own forces. One of the most important lessons was that tanks could easily be knocked out by Japanese infantry if they were not accompanied by their own infantry. Every Japanese infantry company had specially trained tank hunters armed with anti-​tank mines and smoke grenades. They were fully aware of a tank’s blind spots; they were fanatical in their attempts to knock out a tank or at least to try and damage the main cannon. Infantry were not only able to protect tanks from this threat as they could also assist them in pointing out important targets. Attempts were made to facilitate communication between infantry and tank crews through the use of a field phone which could be plugged into a wire hanging from the rear of the tank. At the same time, cooperation between tanks, artillery, engineers and air support proved important when particularly strong and determined anti-​tank defences were encountered.35 Experience gained in jungle warfare against the Japanese began to filter into US manuals. In field manual FM 17–​36, which dealt with tank-​infantry cooperation, it was noted that if certain conditions were met tanks could be employed in jungle operations. If the infantry were being held up and sufficient numbers of tanks were available, then infantry would benefit from tank support. Proper planning was to be undertaken, with all available weapons tasked to offer supporting fire, thereafter tanks would attack in two or more waves. Although manoeuvre was problematic in jungle conditions, flanking actions were to be considered. Infantry had to mingle with the tanks in order to prevent enemy attacks. Tanks were to use canister shot and machine-​guns to clear jungle foliage sufficiently that pill-​boxes would become visible, which could then be dealt with through flamethrowers or high-​explosive shells.36 By the time that the field manual FM 100–​5 (Operations) had been revised in 1944, the US Army had reversed its previous position, the manual stating that in jungles, ‘[t]‌anks may be used in close support of infantry.’37 The US Marine Corps developed its own particular approach to the employment of armour, largely through the need to bring tanks and other vehicles ashore during amphibious landing operations. The first important experience was gained at the Battle of Tarawa in November 1943. This saw not only the first combat use of the M4 Sherman in the Pacific War, but a series of bitter lessons also had to be learned. On the first day, not only were 12 out of 14 Shermans destroyed or lost, but also 90 of 125 tracked landing vehicles (LVTs) were knocked out during the three-​day operation. The disaster which had taken place required close study and led to continual improvements in bringing armoured vehicles ashore, usually in the face of heavy fire from the Japanese defenders. 108

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As auxiliary naval vessels began to be developed, such as the Landing Ship Dock and Landing Ship Mechanized, the speed with which tanks could be brought ashore gradually improved. Moreover, by mid-​1944 Marine Corps Shermans were starting to be equipped with ‘fording kits’ which enabled them to ‘wade ashore’ under their own steam, with their engine air intake and exhaust systems protected. One of the lessons of the Tarawa battle was that the M2 and M3 Stuart light tanks were no longer robust enough for amphibious landings. However, as the best Japanese anti-​tank gun was the 47mm, the M4 Sherman could usually survive reasonably well in the face of Japanese opposition. Experiments were also undertaken to create a flamethrower version of the M4, which proved its worth in successful battles for Japanese island strongholds. During the Marshall Islands Campaign, tank-​infantry cooperation improved steadily. During Operation Forager (June 1944), Saipan, Tinian and Guam were assaulted by US Marines, islands which were larger and defended by sizeable forces of the Japanese Army. In the attack on Saipan, 1st Battalion, 6th Marines, was attacked by 44 medium tanks of the Japanese 9th Tank Regiment. M4 Shermans destroyed 24 enemy tanks in three hours. During the battle for Iwo Jima eight Sherman flamethrower tanks played a decisive part in an operation which cost 24,000 American casualties. In the battle for Okinawa, US Marines faced Japanese forces which had received special anti-​ tank training, and who had constructed mutually supporting defensive strong points. In the course of the battle, 51 Marine Shermans were lost (out of a total of over 220 American tanks destroyed), with many more receiving several hits, but the M4 tanks had still proved essential in the final victory over the fanatical defenders.38 The use of tanks by the British in Burma in 1942 should not be forgotten, together with the Australian 2/​6th Armoured Regiment’s employment of M3 Stuart tanks in the Buna-​Goa battle (November 1942–​January 1943)  during the New Guinea campaign, and the New Zealand and Australian use of Matilda tanks during other battles in the Far East in 1944. During the Burma Campaign from February to May 1942, the 2nd Royal Tank Regiment (RTR), which had been transferred from the Western Desert, was equipped with American Stuart tanks and arrived in Rangoon on 21 February. In one of the first actions, Japanese infantry attempted to drop grenades into the turret openings using long poles. The British tanks assisted in helping units retreat and break through encirclements, while tanks of A Squadron, 7th Armoured Brigade, saved the Chinese 38th Division from being overrun in one action in April 1942. On 6 May 1942, three of the 2nd RTR’s Stuart tanks had to be abandoned due to mechanical breakdown, the first to be lost in the campaign –​they had covered 2,400 miles in 11 weeks with little opportunity for maintenance.39 By 1944, British doctrine had also started to reflect the lessons of employing tanks in jungle conditions. One manual on tank-​infantry cooperation noted that while there were many difficulties which tanks encountered, not least of all their vulnerability to attack by enemy infantry, surprise could be obtained where tanks had not previously been used, so that even ‘decisive results’ were possible. Mirroring US Army experience, tanks’ main value during an attack was in neutralising enemy machine-​gun posts and destroying bunkers. Due to the requirement for tanks to operate with hatches down, 109

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and the heat and humidity of the jungle, drinking water needed to be carried, while salt tablets could offset the effect of heavy perspiration. Finally, long periods of maintenance were required for the tanks due to the wear and tear caused by the conditions and the continual use of low gears.40 The most spectacular victory in the Far East was achieved by the Red Army in its lightning campaign in Manchuria, launched on 9 August 1945 against the Japanese Kwantung Army. Three army groups, equipped with 3,704 tanks and 1,852 self-​propelled guns, operating on a 4,400 km frontage and driving towards objectives between 400 km and 900 km deep, succeeded in smashing 24 Japanese divisions and 11 brigades in 11 days. At a cost of 8,000 killed and 24,000 wounded, the Red Army inflicted over 80,000 casualties on their opponents and captured 594,000 men. Tank and other AFV losses are unknown on both sides; at the same time, there were no recorded cases of tank versus tank combat. The Japanese had assumed the terrain was not suitable for mechanised vehicles, so their preparations for anti-​tank warfare were poor. Armed only with obsolete light tanks and inadequate 37mm anti-​tank guns, and with land mines in short supply, Japanese anti-​armour tactics were based around fanatical infantry attacks with explosive charges, attacks on tank columns by combat aircraft and artillery strikes, although no armour-​piercing rounds were available. What made the victory more remarkable was the diverse type of terrain which Soviet mechanised units were required to cross, including swamps, mountains, desert and marshes; in fact, the Japanese were completely unprepared for the appearance of tanks and self-​propelled guns in difficult terrain. The tactics and techniques used by the Red Army were based on the doctrine laid out in the 1944 field service regulations, which emphasized initiative at all levels and the use of mobile, forward elements. Anticipating Russian human wave attacks, the Japanese commanders were unable to respond to the armour-​heavy forces which continually disrupted their defences. Following the advice of PU-​44, the employment of armour in the hours of darkness, the use of speed and envelopment, the integration of engineer units into forward elements, risk-​taking by commanders and close air-​support were key factors in the dramatic, Blitzkrieg-​style success.41 During the campaigns in the Far East, both Allied and Japanese tanks continued to confound the prewar preconception that AFVs could not operate in jungle or mountainous terrain; even lightly armoured Japanese light tanks launched successful attacks when faced with disrupted or unprepared defenders. And, while the Japanese continued to improve their anti-​tank methods throughout the war, American armour in particular underwent continual technical improvements. By the invasion of Iwo Jima (19 February 1945), the M4 Sherman, for example, was equipped with vision rings around the commander’s cupola.42 Thus, on balance, when viewing the employment of armour, it seems reasonable to conclude that tanks, even though they were not always absolutely decisive, were massive combat multipliers in those battles in which they were employed: they not only helped reduce casualties but often led to decisive tactical results –​and in the case of the Manchurian Campaign decisive operational results –​against determined Japanese defenders. 110

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Conclusion Can any general conclusions be drawn, then, from the employment of armoured forces in the Western Desert, the hills of Italy, the undulating terrain of northwest Europe, the mountains of Manchuria and the jungles of Asia? Essentially, regardless of terrain, tanks and their supporting vehicles proved themselves to be decisive weapons –​at the very least in individual, tactical engagements –​in each of these regions. Failure to have AFVs available to protect infantry could often end in disaster, even if anti-​tank guns were available. Tactics had, of course, to be adapted to the enemy and the nature of the terrain, but in every case, tanks, infantry and artillery cooperation in the all-​arms battle achieved impressive results. At the same time, each theatre of war highlighted time and again just how important radio communications could be in mechanised war. The British in the Western Desert in 1941 and in Malaya in 1942 provide several examples of how lack of radio communication could lead to catastrophe. In the Western Desert and northwest Europe, armoured forces were able to create breakthroughs, pursue a disorganised opponent and conduct long marches, despite the effects of climate and terrain. In other words, armour remained the operationally decisive weapon in the war, even in difficult terrain. In both theatres, however, what emerged was a battle between the superior training, tactics and the power of the 75mm and 88mm tank guns on the German side and the greater numbers and increasingly superior nature of Allied artillery and airpower. Technical and tactical ability was pitted against weight of numbers and munitions. In this duel, it should be remembered that the numbers of knocked-​out vehicles in documents can be deceptive. The Germans had a far better recovery and repair system in operation in the Western desert, so that a knocked-​out tank, whose crew had been killed, might end up back on the battlefield only a few days later. Contrary to some of the assumptions of prewar doctrine, the cause of destruction for German tanks was not usually other tanks: mines, artillery, anti-​tank guns, handheld infantry weapons and breakdowns all played a part. In Italy and the jungles of Asia, on the other hand, armoured forces could not conduct long-​range thrusts due to nature of the terrain they were facing. What is perhaps most significant, however, was the way in which prewar doctrine, which had warned against the employment of AFVs in mountains and jungles, was overturned by experience. In the Allied attempt to break through the Gothic Line in Italy, tanks were forced on some occasions to expose themselves to fire on their flanks, without infantry support, and even attack up hills. But the tough nature of the German defences required this. The reverse side of the coin was the way in which heavily camouflaged German assault guns were used in an ambush role. In the jungles of Burma and in the fighting on the Pacific islands tanks and flamethrower tanks proved their worth in destroying Japanese bunkers. Providing they were supported by infantry, their main gun and machine-​guns probably decided many engagements in favour of the Allied troops. Although overcoming Japanese defences was a slow business, the role of armour was essential in limiting infantry casualties in many engagements. 111

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As was illustrated in each theatre, with its own particular challenges, success in armoured warfare against a demoralised, poorly supplied, or badly prepared or trained opponent could be achieved through decisive leadership, initiative, good communications and the exploitation of the situation and opportunities as they developed. If tactics were adapted to the terrain and climate, armoured vehicles proved just as much a combat multiplier as they did in what was generally understood to be ‘good tank country’. If the rates of advance were sometimes ponderous, they might well have been even slower if mechanised forces had not been available.

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CHAPTER 6 THE COLD WAR (I):  ARMOUR IN KOREA, INDO-​C HINA AND VIETNAM

Although the history of armour during the Cold War was largely conditioned by the competition between NATO and the Warsaw Pact in central Europe, three conflicts in southeast Asia played an important part in the development of thinking on mechanised forces: the Korean War (1950–​53), the French war against the Vietminh in Indo-​China (1945–​54) and, finally, the Vietnam War (1962–​75). Yet, this was not immediately obvious at the beginning of each of these three wars. The terrain in Korea and Vietnam, dominated by mountains, paddy fields and a lack of adequate road networks, offered little prospect for the type of large-​scale employment of heavy armoured forces which had been prevalent in northwest and eastern Europe during the Second World War. Despite the limitations of climate and terrain, however, mechanised units made significant contributions to all three wars. The analysis of the lessons contributed to subsequent vehicle design, but it also introduced a new element into the superpower competition –​ the importance of military advisers in training friendly armies in the use of tanks and combined-​arms tactics.

Armour in the Korean War (1950–​53) At the time, the use of AFVs in the Korean War possessed obvious relevance for potential conventional operations in Europe because the Soviet Union had trained the North Korean Army in the use of armour. But the conflict is also striking for what it illustrates about the misperceptions surrounding the mobility of tanks on the part of the US Army. In an article published in 1950 in the journal Armor, Lieutenant-​Colonel G. B. Pickett argued: One of the first lessons which can be learned from tank employment in Korea is . . . the lack of appreciation on the part of the average American officer of the cross-​ country mobility of tanks. On numerous occasions, even after the North Koreans had overrun the bulk of Korea with tanks, US officers insisted that our tanks could not maneuver through the rice paddies, couldn’t climb hills, and were restricted to roads in a country where there are only a few roads, most of which are very poor.1 He continued that another major lesson of the opening months of the war had been the necessity of teamwork between infantry and tanks, which demonstrated that basic

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lessons from the Second World War had been forgotten, or at least deemed no longer relevant, while he added that tanks needed to be measured in units and not numbers.2 At first, when the North Koreans attacked their southern neighbour on 25 June 1950, it seemed as if the offensive, propelled forward by T34/​85 tanks, with infantry riding on the hulls Red Army style, would sweep all before it. However, a successful last-​ditch defence by the UN forces in the Pusan perimeter, and the destruction by American airpower of 80 of more than 200 North Korean T34 tanks used in the invasion, laid the basis for a counter-​attack facilitated by a surprise landing at Inchon. The sweep north by General Douglas MacArthur led to Chinese intervention in late October 1950, so that the ensuing offensive drove the UN forces back once again. By the summer of 1951, however, the war had settled down into a stalemate along the 38th Parallel. The employment of armoured forces can, then, be divided into two phases: the first one mobile, the second fairly static.3 In the first phase, the North Koreans benefited from the training they had received from Soviet Army advisers. They were also supplied with a large number of tanks: in all, 225 T-​34s, 152 SU-​76s, whereas the South Koreans had no tanks. In early 1950, tank reserves were secretly shifted to North Korea from Manchuria, adding to the heavy weapons which the Russians had started stockpiling in the country in 1948. Training had been thorough and had covered maintenance, river crossings, reconnaissance and tank-​ infantry cooperation. The opening attack by the North Koreans surged forward, but as the advance continued they became overconfident and often advanced without infantry support. When they first encountered US M26 Pershing and M4 Sherman tanks, they thought they could treat them the same way they had the M24 Chaffee light tanks, in other words, to destroy them with ease. The result was heavy losses, not least of all as the North Korean tankers waited too long before opening fire on opposing tanks as they attempted to close for combat. Moreover, after three weeks of the initial advance, the T-​ 34s began to show signs of wear and tear. At the same time, the tank crews became more cautious and their morale suffered from the use against them of a 500lb bomb filled with thermite and napalm.4 But there were other reasons why the North Korean employment of armour failed to secure a victory during the period of the UN defensive –​27 June to 15 September 1950. The initial deployment of North Korean forces did not concentrate its armour in one thrust, which allowed the UN forces to slow the advance and buy enough time to organise their counter-​offensive. In terms of tactics, the North Koreans made little use of feints or diversions; in fact, they tended to place pressure on one sector of the front at a time, thereby presenting the defender with the opportunity of transferring forces to the threatened sector. They also lacked transport for their infantry and their supply lines were vulnerable to air attack. Furthermore, the North Koreans suffered from their Soviet training because they had only been drilled in offensive operations, so when their advance stalled they were unsure of how to fight on the defensive, not least of all as their gunnery skills were extremely poor. The arrival of American M4 and M26 medium tanks on the battlefield in August cancelled out the initial advantage which the North Korean

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T-​34/​85 tanks had possessed over the defenders who were largely bereft of anti-​tank weapons. In fact, by the end of the third week of August, more than 500 US medium tanks had arrived in Korea; by early September, US tanks outnumbered North Korean T-​34s by a ratio of 5:1. By the end of September, UN forces had discovered 239 North Korean tanks either destroyed or abandoned, indirect evidence that the USSR had continued to resupply their ally with T-​34s after the start of the invasion. One of the ironies of the initial defensive fighting conducted by UN forces and the subsequent drive north was that, despite the chronic lack of preparation for armoured warfare, American tanks managed to destroy around 25 per cent of the enemy tank force on account of their better first-​round hit ratios. Apart from early technical problems with the M26 Pershing tank –​such as an engine prone to overheating, a reflection of the lack of preparedness –​American medium tanks proved lethal in Korea in tank-versustank engagements. The M26 was later upgraded with new engines and designated the M46 Patton; still, the 90mm gun of the M26/​M46 proved highly effective against the T-​34. These successes came as a surprise to many officers since Korea had, not surprisingly, been viewed as poor tank country. Although there were valleys which afforded reasonably good trafficability to tanks, the western plain which provided the area for the North Korean advance in June, and the UN breakout in September and October, was certainly not good tank country. Mountainous and rugged terrain exacted a considerable strain on tank engines, while the fine dust which was encountered took a toll on equipment. However, the advantageous tactical and operational situation for both sides during their advances enabled tanks to perform better than they might otherwise have done against a better-​equipped and organised opponent.5 Interesting are some of the home truths identified in a study by the US Army Far Eastern Command in early 1951. The conclusion that the M24 and M4A3 tanks had a better maintenance record than the M26 and M46 may have seemed surprising, but the reason for this was straightforward: maintenance units were more familiar with the M24 and M4A3 tanks than the newer models. It was noted that some units had disputed the figure of 38 per cent armour losses to enemy mines, asserting that the figure was closer to 75 per cent. Although there was only ‘limited evidence’, it was concluded that airpower was responsible for 40 per cent of all enemy tank losses, while napalm was considered to be the most effective air-​delivered anti-​tank weapon. Finally, US Army officers had now realised that tanks could be employed in mountainous terrain.6 The original prejudices concerning the capabilities of tanks in difficult terrain had been quickly exposed by experience on the ground. The assumption that paddy fields were impassable to tanks, for instance, was proved to be incorrect. A study prepared in 1952 at the US Army Armor School at Fort Knox noted that ‘[i]‌t was found that under certain conditions rice paddies can and do support tanks.’ It was noted that when paddies were dry or frozen movement was possible; even when flooded, the M26 Pershing could cross, provided it moved smoothly and without change of direction or gears. Surprisingly, it was discovered that short halts could be made to fire, so long as the tank started to move again quickly. The same study concluded that the major cause of US tank

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losses had not been T-​34s but mines and anti-​tank guns. However, the peculiar tactical situation at the start of the war meant that the tank action in the early period was ‘not representative of armoured action as a whole’. UN forces essentially used tanks in support of infantry, so distorting the potential value of any lessons which could have been drawn from the conflict.7 Following the UN counter-​offensive, there were two periods of defensive fighting: the first was that of the Chinese intervention from 3 November 1950 to 24 January 1951, while the second was marked by the Chinese Spring Offensive from 22 April to 25 June 1951.8 The Chinese attacks were usually mounted against the troops of Republic of Korea, aiming to infiltrate their positions; however, the lack of motorised or mechanised transport meant they could not exploit initial successes. During this period tanks proved themselves extremely useful in combination with infantry in perimeter defence, especially at night. It was repeatedly shown that rapidly conducted, decisive operations were always more likely to succeed as opposed to overcautious actions. Particularly during the Chinese Spring Offensive, tank forces suffered numerous delays due to mines and the effects of heavy rain, which made some roads impassable. The main contribution of tanks was to employ their firepower against enemy infantry, sometimes firing virtually at point-​blank range. Not only were tanks used to shore up defensive positions which were subject to heavy enemy attacks, but they were also of great use in assisting the infantry to disengage, either acting as a rear-​guard or blasting a path through enemy roadblocks. One example of the crucial role played by armour in preventing a Chinese breakthrough was at the Battle of Kapyong (23–​25 April 1951), where the stand made by UN forces prevented the vital Chunchon-​Seoul road from being cut.9 The other period of mobile warfare was during the UN counter-​offensive from 25 January to 21 April 1951, by which time tank-​infantry cooperation had started to improve. Yet, the climate, geography and lack of mechanised infantry imposed limitations on what tanks could accomplish. Thus, although tank units could rapidly penetrate deep into enemy defensive positions, tank-​borne infantry could never keep up, so ground invariably had to be given up. The main threat to tanks was from enemy tank-​hunter teams using rocket launchers and pole and satchel charges, who proved to be fanatical in their attacks. Tanks could also be used for attacking the flanks or rear of enemy positions, or supporting advancing infantry with direct fire. Various actions in this period underscored another lesson from the Second World War:  tank-​borne infantry could sustain terrible casualties if contact with the enemy came unexpectedly, hence armoured personnel carriers would always improve the effectiveness of infantry in mobile operations.10 During UN operations in the first half of 1951, it was discovered again just how important tank-​infantry cooperation was. Chinese offensives were extremely vulnerable as soon as they outran their logistic support, hence counter-​attacks with tanks proved highly effective. During the rest of the war, once the fighting settled down to a stalemate roughly along the lines of the 38th Parallel, tanks in the UN forces were employed in two ways: as part of tank-​infantry patrols and in a direct, fire-​support role. When contributing to patrols, tanks and infantry would move towards the objective from different directions 116

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in order to keep the fire which tanks attracted away from the advancing infantry. The withdrawal to friendly lines required the infantry to move off first, or, in the case of longer patrols, infantry would ride back on the lead tanks. Such patrols could usually be conducted successfully, provided proper coordination and planning took place beforehand.11 Essentially the same lessons were learned by British and Commonwealth units fighting in Korea, which employed Churchill and Cromwell tanks of Second World War vintage, and the new 52-​ton Centurion tank.12 When the 8th King’s Royal Irish Hussars landed at Pusan on 14 November 1950 with three squadrons of Centurion tanks, once again the tank crews needed to improvise under the winter conditions. Straw was placed under the tracks to prevent them freezing to the ground, while engines had to be started frequently, and each gear engaged one after the other, in order to prevent parts freezing up completely. It was found that tanks were vulnerable to night attacks, while some Centurions struggled in the mud which the heavy rains in Korea brought with them. However, they provided vital support in destroying enemy bunkers through direct fire from their 20-​pounder gun, breaking up enemy infantry attacks, while the tank’s searchlight proved useful in night fighting. There were many individual battles in which British armour made a significant contribution:  during the Battle of the Imjin River (22–​25 April 1951), Centurions covered the withdrawal of the 29th Brigade, for the loss of five tanks; and the 1st Royal Tank Regiment played an important part in repulsing Chinese attacks during the Third Battle of the Hook (28–​29 May 1953).13 Although using the tank as a form of mobile pillbox contradicts its inherent qualities as a weapon of mobility, breakthrough and exploitation, in the stalemate conditions in the second half of the Korean War the use of tanks for offensive fire-​support missions demonstrated the inherent flexibility of the tank’s gun. Operating from specially prepared positions, dug-​in, protected by sandbags and other defensive features, tanks were able to fire several times before being located by enemy guns, thus allowing them to reverse out of the firing position and move to relative safety. One US Army study published in early 1953 made the point that ‘[h]‌aving maneuvered tanks into seemingly inaccessible positions we will be amply rewarded by targets ill prepared to withstand the effect of concentrated tank fire from a surprise direction.’ Through proper reconnaissance, pairs of tank were able to destroy enemy observation posts, bunkers and weapons emplacements. Experience showed that tanks needed to be positioned on high ground to exploit the full range of their gun, while they were to be deployed along the length of the front rather than clustered in platoon-​sized units, and supplementary and alternative firing positions needed to be prepared. In fact, what the US Army experience demonstrated was that in the mountainous terrain of Korea, tanks could play an important part in a war of stalemate. Providing they occupied high ground, the gun of the M26 Pershing was effective at a range of 5,000 yards. The high rate of fire, the variety of tank ammunition and the ability to shift accurate fire over an extended area could be considered to constitute ‘mobility of fire’. This success was dependent, though, upon the establishment of well-​protected observation posts within the vicinity of the tank position, equipped with the Battery Commander’s Telescope M65 or the Observation Telescope M49. If these prerequisites were met, 117

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including the ability to resupply these forward tank emplacements, then it was possible to ‘lay siege to the enemy line’. The high ground enabled tanks to destroy enemy forward observation posts which helped reduce the volume and accuracy of enemy artillery fire. Finally, it was important that the enemy could never predict where fire would come from, since this enabled the tanks to destroy the enemy’s will to resist as much as the direct destruction of their forward positions. Over and above the various preparations mentioned, the key to success in enabling the tank to dominate terrain was close cooperation with the artillery.14 Reviewing the experience of both the mobile and the static periods of the war, it can be concluded that there were two reasons why the American tank force was caught off guard: first, they had erroneously assumed that the terrain would not allow armour operations; and second, they had wound down their combined-​arms formations due to a general assumption that the nuclear battlefield was the scenario for which they should prepare. This almost certainly contributed to an atmosphere which, combined with budget cuts, made it easier to believe those who argued that anti-​tank weapons would hold Russian armour in Europe long enough until a nuclear defence could be organised. This provided the background to what turned out to be a classic case of unpreparedness for armoured warfare, the hallmarks of which were low maintenance on tanks, limited tactical skill, lack of awareness of the necessity of tank-​infantry cooperation and fallacious assumptions about terrain.15

French armour in Indo-​China (1945–​54) The French experience of the use of armour in Indo-​China predates the outbreak of the Second World War. Perhaps not surprisingly, given all the places where the French Renault FT-​17 tanks were employed, a platoon of five of these tanks was sent for trials to Tonkin in December 1919. Before September 1939, around 20 FT-​17s were stationed in Indo-​China, together with some armoured cars.16 Still, there had effectively been no previous experience of the employment of armour until, in October 1945, elements of a French Expeditionary Force had landed to reoccupy the country, commanded by Lieutenant-​General Philippe LeClerc. He sought to use his AFVs in the same way as he had done in northwest Europe where he had commanded the French 2nd Armoured Division. By 5 February 1946, the whole of southern Indo-​China had been reoccupied. On the basis of agreements reached with the Vietminh on 6 March 1946, French units landed in the north and seized the Tonkin Delta. However, this rapid success led the French into a false sense of security, shattered very quickly once hostilities with the Vietminh recommenced in December 1946.17 When the Vietminh recommenced their fight, the French were still using armour for road-​bound escort duties, and they suffered serious casualties in the first wave of attacks. Moreover, they were using not only American equipment in the shape of M8 armoured cars, M3 half-​tracks, M5 light tanks and M8 self-​propelled howitzers, but also British Coventry armoured cars, Humber scout cars and pre-​1939 French Panhard armoured 118

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cars. The limitations of the vehicles available were plain, so in 1948 the French attempted to organise its first amphibious units. They introduced the M29C Cargo Carrier and the LVT4 and LVT4A Alligator vehicles, neither of which were designed for use on soft or muddy ground. The first results were disappointing, but experimentation led to the development of suitable tactics, while the vehicles were adapted by fitting better weapons and armoured shields to protect the gunners. The LVTs were equipped with two .50 calibre and two .30 calibre machine guns; some of them mounted the 40mm Bofors gun. In 1950 and 1951 there was a further improvement in equipment when the M5 tanks were replaced by M24 tanks; the M24 Chaffee possessed the advantage that when disassembled it was possible to airlift it into the theatre of operations and then reassemble it. Moreover, the low ground pressure of the M24 meant that it could be driven everywhere during the dry season, including across flooded paddy fields. The Vietminh employed a variety of anti-​tank tactics against the French, but by far the most successful was simply laying mines. A variety of mines including Chinese conventional anti-​tank mines accounted for over 85 per cent of the French vehicles damaged or destroyed. Still, the tank hulls were generally able to resist the blast of mines and could usually be repaired and returned to combat very quickly. Since the Vietminh fought as a guerrilla force, they tried to avoid taking heavy equipment with them. The portable anti-​tank weapons which they carried were the 57mm and 75mm recoilless rifles, which were only in rare cases able to knock out armoured vehicles. In fact, if an AFV was immobilised, it usually took a team of Vietminh soldiers armed with explosives to destroy it completely. The Vietminh were actually most successful in their attempts to limit the mobility of French armour when they made use of anti-​tank obstacles, such as earth works. Since the French had no tank-​dozers or mobile, mechanised bridging equipment, they were often held up by such simple tactics.18 An improvement could be seen in French armour, first, after the arrival of Marshal Jean de Lattre de Tassingy in 1950, and then, in 1951, with the creation of armoured groups. The armoured and amphibious groups assisted in giving French armour some of its mobility back. Until that point it had largely been squandered in guarding supply routes and escorting convoys, although this task obviously laid it open to ambushes. In fact, it was in the final stages of the conflict that French mechanised units scored some of their greatest successes: in July 1953, one Vietminh battalion was annihilated; in October and November 1953, Vietminh Regiment 95 was so badly mauled that it did not conduct any combat operations for four months; and in June and July 1954, during a mobile defence operation conducted in the Tonkin delta, six Vietminh battalions were destroyed. By 1954 the French had, in fact, 452 tanks and tanks destroyers in Indo-​ China, supported by 1,985 armoured cars, half-​tracks and amphibious vehicles.19 The tragedy for the French armoured force was that these successes came too late to influence the course of the war. Had armour operations being conducted more effectively earlier on, tanks and other AFVs might have made more of a difference; worse still, the combat lessons of Indo-​China were open to misinterpretation. The tendency to draw incorrect lessons from the fighting was reinforced by the participation of Chaffee tanks at the Battle of Dien Bien Phu, which raged from 13 March 119

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to 7 May 1954. The battle ended in a catastrophic defeat for the French, one which signalled the death knell for their presence in the country. The defeat was caused by the faulty strategic conception which underpinned the thinking behind the French attempt to draw out the Vietminh into an assault on their fortified position. Due to the greater ease with which resupply could be carried out, the French defenders selected a position surrounded by mountains. They also underestimated the ability of the Vietminh to drag artillery and anti-​aircraft guns up the sides of the mountains and subject them to heavy fire. The fundamental miscalculations made by the French commanders meant that no positive lessons could be drawn from the employment of any particular weapon at the battle.20 Nonetheless, the combat role of the ten Chaffee tanks which fought at Dien Bien Phu is worthy of mention. The reason that the M24 Chaffee tank was chosen was that it was compact and light enough to be dismantled and flown in by air. During December 1953, an airlift was organised and five C47s and two British Bristol transport aircraft flew separate bundles of parts into the French base. The tanks were then reassembled in a field near the airstrip. Bearing in mind the disastrous positioning of the French forces, and their dependency on ever dwindling resupply from the air, the ten tanks proved their worth as a force multiplier for the defenders. As an anchor point for the defensive line, they were also used to lead counter-​attacks. In the course of one counter-​attack, one tank was hit six times by fire from recoilless rifles but continued to function. Five days later, an anti-​tank shell penetrated the hull, wounding two men; the crew members were replaced and the tank remained in action. Despite the fire to which the tanks were subjected, six remained in action until the surrender.21 If anything, Dien Bien Phu demonstrated unequivocally the high combat value of tanks in Indochina, in this case in a defensive battle. When one considers that by the time of the ceasefire on 24 July 1954, the French had four armoured groups, two amphibious groups, three reconnaissance groups and six separate armour battalions in Indo-​China, it becomes clear what a significant role they had played in the conflict. This case study demonstrates that, under combat conditions, soldiers will discover the correct tactics and unit composition through trial and error. The French proved that armour could be used effectively in the various types of terrain of what later became Vietnam. But armoured units were not exploited to their full advantage: first, due to the limitations of the vehicles initially delivered; and second, due to the failure of the French to understand the correct role for mobile units quickly enough.22 The traditional French tactical concept of tanks as infantry support weapons seems to have led them too quickly into a convoy security mission for AFVs, thus hindering effective exploitation of their armour at the start of the conflict.

The Vietnam War (1962–​72): The ARVN and US Army experience If we turn to the Vietnam War, one of its greatest ironies is undoubtedly that after having discovered in the Korean War that old lessons from the Second World War had 120

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had to be relearned, the US Army ignored the lessons of the French experience against the Vietminh. This is not to say, of course, that they made no effort to try and learn lessons. Apparently General William Westmoreland, the head of the US Military Assistance Command Vietnam from 1964 to 19​68, had read Bernard Fall’s Street without Joy (1961), an account of the French experience in Indo-​China. The book contained a description of the destruction of Mobile Group 100. Even though this mobile force had consisted of four truck-​mounted battalions, supported only by ten light tanks, the story took on a life of its own, discouraging the high command from committing large armoured forces to the American war effort.23 Yet, the French experience, particularly in their use of LVT4A Alligator amphibious vehicles to pursue the Vietminh through paddy fields and other difficult terrain, was to be repeated by the US Army as they discovered by trial and error lessons very similar to those drawn by the French. At the end of the 1950s, US Army doctrine was still largely focused on the employment of armour-​heavy forces under nuclear conditions. This was not to say that jungle warfare was ignored for mechanised forces, but thinking had not advanced much beyond what had been learned during the Second World War. One US Army armour manual, FM 17-​1. Armor Operations: Small Units (1957), stated that, in jungles the ‘movement of armor units is generally limited to roads, beaches, and grass-​or brushed-​covered fields’. Cross-​country movement of AFVs in dense jungle was ‘almost impossible unless routes have been previously prepared’. The manual even went as far to assert that jungle combat was ‘essentially a fight by small dismounted infantry units which operate extremely close to the enemy’. The only apparent function for armour was for a tank platoon to be attached to a rifle company to provide supporting fire.24

Photo 6  US Army M113 in South Vietnam (around 1966) 121

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But before American troops began to arrive in large numbers, the South Vietnamese were already making use of mechanised units, mainly M24 Chaffee light tanks left behind by the French, but not with any great success. There was at first little in the way of input from American advisers, who were not allowed to discuss what they had been doing in Vietnam when they returned home. However, once the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) received some M113 armoured personnel carriers (APCs) in April 1962, experience in the field exposed the erroneous nature of American doctrine. The M113 APC, known generally as a ‘battlefield taxi’, was intended to transport infantry to the combat zone, where they would dismount in order to perform their traditional role, with the M113 providing supporting fire. At the end of the engagement, the troops would climb back into the vehicles and depart. On 25 September 1962, nine ARVN M113s operating in the Mekong Delta discovered some Vietcong guerrillas and chased them through paddy fields, firing from the APCs. A US adviser demanded that they stick to the US doctrine and dismount, which then led to heavier casualties. But a captured document made clear that the Vietcong had had no immediate antidote to the APC when it was used as a mobile gun platform. Still, as is usually the case with irregular forces, the Vietcong learnt quickly. They began employing snipers to neutralise the M113’s machine-​gunners. They also learnt the importance of mines and hand-​held anti-​tank weapons. For many US Army advisers, the Vietcong response to the M113 confirmed their initial assumption that Vietnam would have to remain an infantry war. However, the US Marines who began to be deployed in early 1965 operated outside much of official army thinking and were soon making use of tracked, amphibious, landing vehicles, the M50A1 Ontos multi-​barrelled vehicles and M48 main battle tanks, achieving some early tactical successes.25 The official American military view was that tanks were inappropriate for counter-​ insurgency operations. In a way, there was some justification for this view, as demonstrated by the problems which a firepower-​based approach to US strategy created later.26 The key aim of US policy was to keep the state of South Vietnam intact, to achieve in effect the final result of the Korean War: ‘hearts and minds’ was an essential component of that policy. The problem for the US military, though, was that they were facing not one but several military challenges. Until the Tet Offensive in 1968, they were often fighting Vietcong guerrillas who sought to blend into the population during the day; then they were trying to protect the population from the fighting and the actions of the Vietcong; and, at the same time, the North Vietnamese Army (NVA) were also launching sizeable attacks. This made it extremely difficult to decide when an armoured force was the best response. But thinking on the use of armour was to develop rapidly. Even in October 1966 a modification to doctrine for jungle warfare could be seen:  while it was reiterated that movement of armoured forces was often restricted, it was accepted that AFVs could move through difficult terrain and ‘at times they will be able to pass through even primary jungle’.27 During the course of 1967 US Army thinking on the role of armour underwent some dramatic changes. At the most basic level, it was recognised that mechanised vehicles could operate in the Delta in Vietnam –​terrain which consisted of cultivated rice paddy 122

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fields, marshy bogs, mangrove swamps and the U-​Minh forest. It had been discovered that rice paddies offered excellent trafficability during the dry season and good going during the rainy season. The marshy bogland was passable during the dry season, although it varied considerably in the rainy season. The mangrove swamps were generally off limits for M113 APCs, but narrow stretches could be traversed using obstacle-​crossing techniques, while the U-​Minh forest was impassable. The learning process which took place also revealed that tow cables and a capstan and marine anchor kit were an essential part of armour equipment, since they enabled the M113 to winch itself out of canals. In the area around Long Bihn and Saigon, movement for wheeled vehicles and tanks was normally restricted to the road network during all seasons. This meant that control over the major road intersections and bridges was vital for political and economic stability. It was discovered, nonetheless, that basic armour tactics and techniques were as relevant in Vietnam as other theatres, one example being road marches. Due to the flat terrain and limited vegetation in the Mekong Delta, it was necessary to travel with 100–​200 m intervals between each vehicle on road marches. The command vehicle in the column was distinctive due to its additional radio aerials, so it was important that its position in the column was varied continually. Due to the threat of mines, troops often travelled on the roof of their APCs. Recovered mines were not to be taken back to base in APCs due to the unstable nature of the explosives. Finally, crossing canals was a fairly frequent occurrence, so that security procedures were developed for this type of manoeuvre.28 What likewise proved necessary to relearn were the challenges of maintenance in the field. One of the other three types of terrain in Vietnam, the Central Highlands –​the other two being the coastal plain and the central plateau –​produced clouds of dust in the dry season and mud during the monsoon rains. During the dry season, dust permeated everything, clogging equipment, making breathing difficult and often reducing visibility. Air cleaners and oil coolers in vehicles became easily clogged, necessitating frequent cleaning. Weapons had to be cleaned daily. When the six months of monsoon arrived, mud created new problems –​it caused thrown tracks on AFVs, contaminated lubricants and discouraged normal crew maintenance. It also resulted in a virtual halt to travel by wheeled vehicles, which in turn reduced the army’s capacity to supply spare parts; helicopters could only transport limited numbers of smaller parts. Yet, despite these climatic conditions, it became clear that repair as far forward as possible was a principle which needed to be adhered to. But the single biggest factor to influence maintenance was enemy mines. While mines only disabled tanks, they could damage the suspension of the M48A3 and were capable of knocking out the M113.29 By the end of 1967, it had become clear that the US Army had dramatically altered its attitude towards armour in Vietnam. The M48 tank had vindicated itself as ‘an infantry killer’, it had been able to clear paths through jungles, it had cleared landing zones and been used as a form of mine clearer. AFVs now carried primarily anti-​personnel rounds, with a scatter-​shot type of ammunition specially developed for tank guns. The M113 APC was soon re-​designated as the Armoured Cavalry Assault Vehicle (ACAV), mounting a forward .50 calibre machine-​gun and two M60 machine-​guns, protected by shields. Lieutenant-​Colonel Donn Starry argued that the M113 had traditionally been intended 123

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to transport the infantry to the battlefield, but it had now become an assault weapons system. Already, in 1967, he had concluded that armour and infantry had changed roles in Vietnam. In the Second World War, infantry had acted as the anvil and armour the hammer. But now infantry transported by helicopter had become the hammer and armour the anvil on to which the enemy was to be driven.30 By mid-​1968, a transformation in the role of armour had taken place within the US Army and Marine Corps units operating in South Vietnam. In late 1966, the arrival of the 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment had marked the beginning of a build-​up of US mechanised forces. Quite apart from the successful tactical experimentation of troops in the field, there were two main reasons for this development. First, the opponent had evolved from small guerrilla units into properly equipped and trained regiments and divisions of the NVA; the result on the ground of the appearance of a much stronger enemy was an increased use of anti-​personnel mines and small-​arms fire. The results which armoured units could obtain, providing protection against these new threats and often creating a tactical advantage for the infantry, led to a rising number of requests for AFVs. Second, the completion of a study in the spring of 1967 by Major-​General A.  L. West, ‘The Mechanized and Armor Combat Operations Vietnam’, had affirmed that basic doctrine, organisation and equipment was suitable for Vietnam; tactics and techniques were being modified to adapt to the requirements of the terrain and the conditions of an area war. Armour could be used effectively in most areas of the country and under the majority of weather conditions; in areas where armoured forces were restricted, helicopters could be employed.31 As the war became more complex and expanded, it came to be known as an ‘area war’ (essentially, an absence of clear front lines), for which by late 1968 there were several functions for armour which had come to be recognised. There were ‘search and destroy’ missions, which aimed to locate and destroy enemy forces, installations, supplies and equipment. There were security missions, which could be divided into convoy, route and base security tasks. The helicopter had solved one of the problems for armour in jungle warfare, as command and control from the air helped prevent AFV crews from losing their way. Another major development was that the US Army discovered that, even though they still saw the M113 as a means of carrying the infantry to the battlefield (which in some cases was clearly justified since the infantry needed to pursue the enemy into bunkers, tunnels and concealed hideouts), its new role as a mobile gun platform had been established. Almost in spite of doctrine, infantry on the ground had discovered that dismounting was not always the best option, so they started to adapt the M113 into a platform from which to fight. Sandbags and ammunition boxes were added to improve protection of the floor and sides of the vehicles. Extra machine-​guns were mounted, facing to the rear, and parapets were added to enable infantry to fire from the sides of the vehicle; some infantry rode on top of the vehicle for fear of mines. Although it was frowned upon, some drivers even built steering gear to allow themselves to steer while sitting on top of the vehicle. These improvisations were taken up by the military authorities, who started to produce add-​on armour, leading to an M113 which had an armoured

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roof as well; this process of evolution had turned the M113 into an armoured cavalry assault vehicle. In total, around 40,000 M113s saw service in Vietnam.32 The use of firepower from AFVs in Vietnam was different to previous wars. Most of the casualties from fire delivered from APCs and tanks were inflicted at close range. The conditions of Vietnam rarely gave tanks an opportunity to make use of the full range of their main gun. Of tank-​gun ammunition fired, 90 per cent was canister. This was used to clear paths by destroying booby traps, anti-​personnel mines and foliage. The ability to deliver rapid and concentrated fire was assisted by the lack of opposing enemy armour. On the whole, the crews in tanks and APCs went into battle with the hatches open, only ‘buttoning up’ after contact was made. In order to reduce the danger, flak-​jackets were worn. The need to respond rapidly to ambush situations led to the ‘herring-​bone formation’ for armoured columns, allowing 360-degree coverage by a tank formation’s cannons, with each vehicle pointing outwards at an angle, either right or left.33 After the 1968 Tet Offensive, North Vietnamese forces attempted to infiltrate into South Vietnam through Laos and Cambodia. During the course of 1969 and 1970, the aim of US forces was to try and cut the logistics lines, an operation for which armoured vehicles proved ideally suited. It was during this period that US armour units tested the new Sheridan M551 tank, or Armored Reconnaissance Airborne Assault Vehicle. It had been introduced in early 1969 as a replacement for the M48 in cavalry squadrons. However, although it was found to possess a greater range, superior mobility, better night-​fighting ability and firepower (it was equipped with a 155mm gun and could fire the Shillelagh missile), its ammunition detonated more easily than in the M48, its electrical fire-​control system broke down frequently and its aluminium armour could barely stop a 12.7mm round. Heavy machine-​guns with shields had to be added to the turret to provide additional firepower. Nonetheless, by the end of 1970, there were more than 200 Sheridan tanks in Vietnam.34 While the traditional image of armoured warfare in Vietnam is a group of M113s moving along a jungle path, it is often forgotten that there were cases of intense urban combat involving tanks and M113s. The most spectacular examples of these actions occurred during the Tet Offensive in early 1968. During the Battle of My Tho (31 January–​2 February 1968), one troop of ARVN tanks fought two enemy battalions and was able to survive for periods without infantry support. A major problem in the street fighting was found to be manoeuvring into a firing position, as on a few occasions the lead AFVs backed into the vehicles behind them. During this battle, the streets would only allow a maximum of three ACAVs to support the infantry effectively, while the crews had difficulty identifying the forward positions of their own infantry. But fighting was even more intense for US units engaged in other battles. In Pleiku, armoured units assisted in a five-​day battle against the Vietcong attackers; the story was the same in the coastal city of Phan Thiet where the battle raged for eight days. In the US Army III Corps Tactical Zone, armour participated in all the major battles and in 37 of 79 individual engagements. As a final example, on 1 February 1968, two companies of the 5/​60 Infantry were engaged in a battle at the Phu Tho racetrack near Saigon: three APCs of B

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Company were ambushed, two destroyed, but a third, although burning, continued to direct fire at the Viet Cong so that the dead and wounded could be evacuated.35 The most intense city battle during the Tet offensive, however, took place in Hue, the third largest city in South Vietnam, located just 60 miles south of the demilitarised zone. US cavalry units and Marine Corps armour participated in fighting which lasted 26 days. The initial combined Vietcong and NVA attack had aimed at taking control of the entire city and holding it for some time; it only just failed, allowing ARVN and US units to relieve the beleaguered defenders. During the course of the fighting, the M48 tank proved to be capable of withstanding the effects of Soviet B-​40 rockets which were used frequently by the NVA forces, but the ARVN M24 Chaffee tanks were not sufficiently armoured for the intensity of combat. At times, tank crews had to be changed once a day due to the effects of multiple hits on vehicles by rocket-​propelled grenades (as many as 15 on some tanks); armoured units were in constant demand, sometimes expending all their ammunition in just a few hours. But their fire support for the infantry and marines was decisive in swinging the battle against the Vietcong and NVA units. The M50 Ontos tracked vehicle, armed with six 106mm recoilless rifles, proved more popular with the US Marines than the M48 because it was easier to manoeuvre, although it had no protection for its crew and was thus highly vulnerable. In general, both the M48s and Ontos vehicles were used for fire support, but the M48s did occasionally lead attacks, providing protection for the marines following behind. What was important was that the M48 tank was robust and could often be repaired quickly; it was easy to operate, so replacement crews who had little training could be used.36 US Army mechanised forces were kept in Vietnam until the last possible moment as the American government sought to wind down its military involvement. In December 1971, armour units represented 54 per cent of American main force battalions still present in Vietnam, but by April 1972 the last remaining units were being shipped out of the country. In other words, when the North Vietnamese Army launched a major conventional attack on South Vietnam on 30 March 1972, only American airpower was left to support the ARVN.

Australian armour in Vietnam It is important to remember that the Australian Army sent a small force to support the American effort to defend South Vietnam, which included both APCs and tanks. At first, Australian ‘armour’ consisted only of M113 armoured personnel carriers, which served from June 1965 as part of the 1st Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment, under the command of the 173rd US Airborne Brigade in the Bien Hoa Province. One action in which M113 APCs distinguished themselves occurred in 1966 at Long Tan where they were able to rescue infantry from a difficult situation. M113s from 3rd Troop, 3rd Cavalry Regiment, broke up an enemy attack. In essence, the Australian experience replicated that of the US Army in the use of the M113, not simply due to its considerable value in firefights, but likewise in terms of its vulnerability to mines, recoilless rifles and 126

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rocket-​propelled grenades. The Australian 3rd Cavalry Regiment suffered total losses of 20 dead, 17 of whom were killed in action; another 110 members of the unit were wounded. No. 1 Troop was, in fact, one of the last Australian units to leave Vietnam, assisting in the closure of their base area before their final departure from the country on 12 March 1972. Australian Army units in Vietnam also employed Centurion tanks, which first arrived in the country in February 1968. Initially, opinion within the Armoured Corps had been divided as to whether the Centurions could be employed in the jungle conditions of southeast Asia. However, two short and bloody actions in 1967 demonstrated that mines and booby traps could inflict substantial casualties on infantry, which led to the conclusion that a third battalion was needed, as were tanks. The decision to send tanks was taken on 6 September 1967; C Squadron, 1st Armoured Regiment, eventually included four tank troops, as well as two tank-​dozers, two armoured recovery vehicles and two bridge-​layers. The Centurion proved its value because of the quality of its 105mm L7 gun and its ability to withstand punishment, either from rocket-​propelled grenades or mines. Its most common mission was to participate in the destruction of bunker complexes. The first major battle in which the Australian Centurions were involved was in May 1968 around the Fire Support Bases Coral and Balmoral. Inside the bases, tanks were able to support artillery fire, but in addition they operated beyond the perimeter against enemy bunkers, employing canister fire to clear areas of the jungle. What is interesting about the Australian experience with Centurions was that, like the US Army, doubts at the beginning about the viability of armour in Vietnam were dispelled by experience in the field. This extended to urban fighting at the Battle of Binh Ba in June 1969. According to the after-​action report produced by the 5th Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment, tanks had been the ‘battle-​winning factor’ in the engagement, not least of all keeping Australian infantry casualties low: only one man was killed, and most of the eleven wounded were from the tank crews.37

The Vietnam War (1968–​75): The NVA experience Despite the fact that the North Vietnamese Army had founded its armoured force on 5 October 1959 with the creation of the 202nd Armoured Regiment, equipped with 30 T-​34 tanks and 16 self-​propelled guns, there appear to be only five documented occasions when NVA armoured forces participated in combat in South Vietnam before the end of 1973: first, on 24 January 1968, elements of the 203rd Armoured Regiment engaged ARVN units at Ta May, near Khe Sanh; second, on 6–​7 February 1968, an NVA combined-​arms attack using Russian PT-​76 AFVs broke through the defensive positions of the Lang Vei Special Forces Camp near Khe Sanh; third, in March 1969 at Ben Het, the only clash of American and NVA armour occurred; fourth, in 1971 the NVA employed an armoured regiment and used well-​coordinated tank-​infantry attacks against a South Vietnamese force which had launched an offensive into Laos; and fifth, in the 1972 spring offensive, the NVA employed the largest single tank force of the entire war.38 127

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Not surprisingly, the action at Ben Het has provoked disproportionate attention because it was the only occasion when US armour, crewed by American soldiers, came up against Soviet AFVs. There are, however, no significant conclusions that can be drawn from the action, which resulted in the destruction of two PT-​76s and an infantry troop carrier after they attacked a well-​protected position. In the American official history of armour in Vietnam, the PT-​76 is rather optimistically referred to as a ‘tank’, when in fact it was a very light, amphibious vehicle which, although fully tracked and mounting a 7.62mm gun in a turret, was intended more for fire support rather than tank versus tank combat; its armour was 15mm thick and thus only designed to protect the occupants from shell fragments and small-​arms fire. The actual attack by the NVA was limited in its aims –​essentially to knock out American 175mm guns due to the key position of the Ben Het Special Forces Camp which overlooked Ho Chi Minh trail at the point where the borders of Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam met. Still, the result of the only US-​NVA armour clash provides a clue as to why this action remained the exception. The USSR may have sought to prevent battles which would have resulted in numerous Soviet AFVs being reduced to burning wrecks in the face of superior American tanks. Given that the cadre of the NVA’s armoured force had been trained in the Soviet Union in the 1950s, it is reasonable to assume that Soviet Army advisers strongly recommended the avoidance of any clash with US Army or ARVN tanks. Moreover, the NVA approach to the employment of armour was tailored to the guerrilla war they were fighting, so it did not emphasize the use of armour in mass at the decisive point. Instead, armour was to be employed to reduce infantry casualties; lack of supporting airpower had to be compensated for by the clever and extensive use of camouflage.39 However, this policy of caution changed even before the last US armoured unit which left Vietnam conducted its final combat operation on 6 April 1972. A large NVA conventional offensive was launched, with T-​54s tanks and PT-​76 light amphibious tanks in the vanguard of the attack. Not only did US airpower play a decisive role in blunting the assault, but American advisers were also inadvertently involved in several of the battles. Later accounts by these officers indicated that both the T-​54s and PT-​76s could be knocked out by the M72, hand-​held, light anti-​armour weapon (LAW), the wire-​guided TOW weapon and by the 106mm recoilless rifle.40 Prior to the 1972 offensive, US intelligence had estimated that the NVA probably possessed over 300 tanks, but large-​scale armoured operations were not anticipated. The 1972 Easter Offensive, launched on 30 March 1972 by the North Vietnamese, saw their forces using AFVs for the first time in a full-​scale conventional attack, with an estimated 200 T-​54s employed. Although the crews had received training in the Soviet Union, they performed badly, and the offensive spearheaded by armour proved unsuccessful. Launched on three fronts, initially it made good progress. But once the ARVN forces recovered from the first shock, they began to make effective use of their anti-​tank weapons and their own tanks. Moreover, once the rain and cloud which had accompanied the opening phase cleared, North Vietnamese armour and infantry forces fell victim to the devastating effects of concentrated airpower, with half the NVA tanks destroyed, 128

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many by aircraft. Casualties for the NVA have been estimated at 50,000 dead and 50,000 wounded, although some estimates go up to 75,000 dead, with at least 250 AFVs destroyed. Such were the losses that the NVA was unable to undertake major offensive operations until three years later. What had gone wrong with the North Vietnamese armour-​led attack? In addition to the American airpower still available to the South Vietnamese forces in 1972, there were a number of classic errors which were committed by the North Vietnamese. There was a lack of artillery support, an absence of supporting infantry and a poor performance in tank versus tank engagements. North Vietnamese armour units (which reputedly also included some Chinese T-​59 tanks) had persisted in advancing along roads, even on occasions when cross-​country movement would have obviously been the better course of action. When speed and initiative were essential, they advanced indecisively and too slowly. There was a lack of adequate technical training for the crews, while not enough provision had been made for anti-​aircraft defence. In addition, many AFVs fell victim to the American-​supplied M72 LAW employed by the ARVN. During the battles for An Loc and Kontum, tanks became bogged down in the rubble created by NVA artillery strikes and were picked off by anti-​tank teams.41 These were the classic errors of those inexperienced in armoured warfare. The dramatic success of the North Vietnamese offensive in 1975, however, which finally swept away South Vietnam and its government, provided plenty of proof that they had learned many lessons from their terrible failure in 1972. For one, the South Vietnamese could no longer rely on American air support. Yet, this time round, the ARVN was given no time to regroup and the offensive was pushed forward relentlessly. The leap-​frogging technique was used, whereby when enemy resistance was encountered, the units following up bypassed the fighting in order to maintain the momentum of the offensive. In 1975, more attention was paid to logistics, with more than 10,000 vehicles supporting the advance. The number of tanks was much higher: US intelligence estimated in March 1974 that 500–​700 tanks had been assembled, even if the ARVN was being resupplied by the United States. Portable air-​defence systems and surface-​to-​air missiles had been added to the NVA inventory. In contrast to 1972, the infantry was able to keep up with the army because they were transported in trucks and, in some cases, captured vehicles and civilian cars were used to maintain the pace of the infantry advance. This emphasis on speed meant that advances of 50–​60 km in a 24-​hour period could be maintained. A new doctrine for the employment of armoured forces had, in fact, been developed. This was based on using sudden assaults to overwhelm the enemy, opening the way for deep attacks into the enemy defensive system. Training was more thorough prior to the offensive than it had been three years earlier and now emphasized the importance of the commander to keep a forward position on the battlefield. Otherwise, sudden shifts in the tactical situation might be missed and tank-​infantry coordination might suffer. Standard operating procedures were introduced to improve cooperation between units, liaison officers were introduced and reconnaissance procedures were improved. Finally, learning the most bitter lesson of all, new mobile anti-​aircraft weapons supplied by the Soviet 129

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Union were integrated into the advance columns so that they had some form of anti-​ aircraft defence. The opening moves of the offensive began in mid-​December 1974, the final culmination of which was the breaking down of the gates of the Presidential Palace in Saigon by North Vietnamese T-​54s on 30 April 1975.42 All in all, the improvement in the NVA utilisation of armour in 1975 demonstrates the validity of many of the tried-​and-​tested principles for the conduct of armoured warfare. The improvement in performance suggests very strongly that armour played a decisive part in deciding the final phase of the war in favour of North Vietnam. What is most noteworthy is that training in the Soviet Union did not contribute to success in 1972; rather, it took the failure of that first, large-​scale offensive to force the North Vietnamese Army into examining the causes of failure and using the lessons in their preparations for what turned out to be the highly successful 1975 offensive.

Conclusion What conclusions can be drawn, then, from these four case studies in the use of armour in southeast Asia between 1945 and 1975? There are, indeed, several themes which repeated themselves from previous wars, but three areas stand out:  first, incorrect assumptions regarding terrain and climate at the beginning of each conflict; second, the role of technology; and third, the Cold War background, especially the role of military advisers in training and in the supply of equipment. There were several causes for the initial assumption on the part of Western officers that challenging terrain and climate, which would not sustain large armoured forces, precluded the employment of mechanised vehicles in general. American military thinking during this period was geared towards a potential clash of armour between Warsaw Pact and NATO forces in central Europe. Thus, there was an underestimation of the capacity of the Russians to prepare the North Koreans for a surprise attack conceived along the lines of their campaign in Manchuria in August 1945, while in Vietnam in the first half of the 1960s, commanders with little experience of armour drew too hasty conclusions over the impact of terrain on AFV mobility. In the case of Indo-​China, French commanders also failed to anticipate the possibilities of armour, partly due to the lingering influence of ‘cavalry concepts’. In each example, existing doctrine tended to contribute to inflexible thinking which could only be overcome once experimentation had taken place in the field. Although the faulty assumptions were understandable in 1950, what is harder to grasp is why the US Army failed to interpret the lessons of the Korean War and the French experience in Indo-​China correctly. The role of tank and AFV technology was important in each conflict because it saw a test of Western versus Russian technology. In Korea, the M24 Chaffee tank was shown to be inadequate for anything other than light reconnaissance duties; at the same time, it was established that the T-​34 was obsolete. Vietnam saw the transformation of the M113 from an armoured personnel carrier into a much more heavily armoured machine, from which infantrymen would fight rather than always dismount, almost a new form of light 130

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tank. The experience in each of the three conflicts demonstrated, in fact, that the light tanks of the Second World War, particularly the M24 Chaffee and the tank designed to replace it, the M41 Walker Bulldog (armed with a 75mm gun), could still be used in the role they were originally intended for, but that they were not capable of surviving high-​ intensity battles in which newer anti-​armour weapons were employed. The Pershing, M48 Patton and Centurion tanks, however, proved themselves highly effective, in terms of mobility, armour protection and firepower. Finally, there was a further Cold War dimension to the conflict –​that of the emerging significance for the United States and the Soviet Union of the armies of their client states. On both sides, there was an assumption that the preferred tactics and methods of their own armies could be imposed upon the armies they were supporting. In the case of the North Korean Army, Russian training was based on the hope that a rapid offensive would succeed before the US Army could transfer forces to the Korean peninsula. In the case of the ARVN, US Army advisers were right that the South Koreans were struggling with some of the basic tactical principles for the employment of armour; yet they sometimes failed to recognise the soundness of some ARVN experiments. But suspicions of their abilities meant that they were hesitant to supply them with medium tanks. When they did provide M48 tanks, these contributed to the success in defeating the NVA conventional offensive in 1972. At the same time, the Russian deliveries of T-​54s and PT-​76 AFVs provided the basis for the victorious NVA offensive in 1975. Clearly, the provision of training and the supply of AFVs had emerged as significant elements in superpower competition in the Cold War.

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CHAPTER 7 THE COLD WAR (II):  THE CENTRAL EUROPEAN BATTLEFIELD

The Cold War had many causes, but at least in part it was an inevitable result of the emergence of two new superpowers after the Second World War. Once the Federal Republic of Germany became a NATO member in May 1955, however, military planning had to take account of the possibility of conventional war breaking out at some point. The Communist takeover in Czechoslovakia in 1948 and the creation of armed units inside Eastern Germany had already contributed to a rise in tension. Gradually over the next decades, both German states, as well as Warsaw Pact member countries such as Poland, Czechoslovakia and Hungary, became territory on which increasing numbers of troops and equipment were stationed. The backbone of these forces consisted of armoured vehicles. While a ‘Third World War’ would have raged in other parts of the world as well had war broken out, most attention was focused on the ‘central European battlefield’: this was where the tectonic plates of superpower rivalry met.

The theatre of operations and the opposing forces The Red Army and the armies of the Western Allies had sought to demobilise at the end of the Second World War and send their troops home. The Red Army was renamed the Soviet Army in February 1946 and maintained a presence in Eastern Germany in order to secure its gains. In the late 1940s, the Western European countries, and especially the Americans, feared that the Russians were building up a large army of German prisoners of war as a ‘liberation army’ and that armed police and militia units in East Germany might be used for offensive purposes. The Russians, for their part, were worried that ex-​Wehrmacht personnel might be brought together as a liberation army to be used against the East. Yet, most nations (with the exception of the United States) were materially exhausted by the Second World War, so the tension in the early phase of the Cold War was as much due to rhetoric as it was military threats. However, the moment of shock for Western Europe came when North Korea invaded its southern neighbour on 25 June 1950. The official founding of the Warsaw Pact in January 1956 finally confirmed the existence of two antagonistic military blocs in central Europe. Within both alliances a debate began about the possible course of military operations in the event of war between NATO and the Warsaw Pact; it was predicted that the fighting would extend over vast areas, involving land, sea and air operations. In terms of

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armoured warfare, most of the attention was directed towards conventional warfare on the central European battlefield. While there may have been some scope for armoured operations on the Northern Flank, in other words, through neutral Sweden and into Norway, military planners on both sides assumed Warsaw Pact conventional forces would advance through Western Germany and the Low Countries in an attempt to capture the channel ports, thereby denying NATO the possibility of resupplying her forces from the United States and Britain. It was certainly possible that Warsaw Pact forces could have attacked through Austria and Switzerland, but the territory of both German states and Czechoslovakia was anticipated to be the most likely battleground. Before the unification of the two German states in 1991, the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG), excluding West Berlin, consisted of 248,144 square kilometres; from north to south it was 850 km long, but only 225 km across. The Inner-​German border zigzagged for 1,381 km, the FRG border with Czechoslovakia was 356 km, the border with neutral Austria 784 km, and with Switzerland 334 km. The main agricultural area was to be found in the south in Bavaria and Baden-​Württemberg, whereas the north of the country contained some dense conurbations around Hamburg and the Ruhr region. In the south there were heavily wooded areas; there were also major rivers (the Elbe, the Rhine and the Danube, and the Weser and Main) which presented significant obstacles to armoured forces, providing of course that bridges were not captured intact. The most likely routes for Russian armour were considered to be the ‘Göttingen Gap’, the ‘Fulda Gap’, the ‘Hof Corridor’ and the ‘Weiden Gap’, all areas which offered good terrain for mechanised ground forces to advance deep into West German territory. If much of the country offered opportunities for armour to advance rapidly, the scale of urbanisation by the mid-​1970s was such that well-​organised infantry units armed with modern anti-​ tank weapons would have had ample opportunities to inflict serious damage on Soviet armour from the cover of many buildings and other urban terrain features.1 During the second half of the Cold War, there was an increasing build-​up in the numbers of tanks in northern and central Europe. For the year 1968–​69, tanks belonging to forward or immediately reinforcing formations (so, excluding reserves) were for NATO approximately 4,800 to the 11,500 tanks of the Warsaw Pact. By 1972–​73, the number of NATO tanks had increased to 6,000 while the Warsaw Pact tank force had grown to 16,000. Between 1974–​75 and 1980–​81, NATO’s available tanks stagnated at 7,000, whereas the Warsaw Pact fleet rose to 19,500 (of which 12,000 were Soviet machines). There were fewer AFVs in southern Europe, but by 1980–​81, NATO had 4,000 tanks to the 6,700 belonging to the Warsaw Pact. By 1987–​88, the total number of tanks for NATO nations, calculated this time to include reserve stocks and low-​readiness units, amounted to 31,527 machines: if only the nations involved in defending the central front are counted, the number was 21,036 (excluding the US Marine Corps). For the Warsaw Pact, the total number was 67,600 tanks, with 53,300 belonging to the Soviet Army, and 14,100 belonging to other Warsaw Pact states. Throughout the Cold War, there was considerable debate over the actual number of tanks possessed by both alliances. Needless to say, numbers presented in statistical tables provide only a rough guide to actual combat power. Moreover, it has been estimated 134

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that between 1975 and 1987, around 11,000 T-​54s, T-​55s and T-​62s were ‘retired’ from service. The Russians have a military habit, though, of keeping old equipment, which complicates calculations of combat power. Another issue surrounding numbers was the presence of tanks in training units. Arriving at a reasonably accurate figure for tanks available to the Warsaw Pact was complicated by the war in Afghanistan in the 1980s and the requirement to station tank forces on the border with China. The various factors involved in reaching a conclusion as to the Warsaw Pact superiority in tanks led two analysts in 1988 to arrive at a modest superiority for the year 1987 of 1.18 to 1.0. In other words, the ‘massive superiority’ of Warsaw Pact tanks over NATO forces was often exaggerated, but was one way of convincing sceptical voters in Western Europe of the need for adequate defence spending.2 Where the Warsaw Pact possessed a big advantage, however, was in the limited space of the theatre of operations and the positioning of her own forces. For much of the Cold War, the Group of Soviet Forces in Germany (GSFG) consisted of Second Guards Army in the vicinity of Rostock (HQ Fürstenberg), Third Shock Army (HQ Magdeburg) and Eighth Guards Army (HQ Weimar-​Nohra), to the west of Berlin, Twentieth Guards Army (HQ Eberswalde) and, between Cottbus and Dresden, First Guards Tank Army (HQ Dresden). In addition, the National People’s Army of the GDR possessed one tank division and five motor-​rifle divisions. In Czechoslovakia, the First Soviet Central Group of Forces was deployed with three motor-​rifle and two tank divisions, together with Second Czech Army, consisting of three tank and five motor-​rifle divisions. These first echelon forces included a southern group in Hungary with a further two tank divisions, as well as a northern group in Poland, which likewise possessed two tank divisions. Second echelon forces were stationed in the Carpathian, Baltic and Belorussian Military Districts, which included ten tank and more motor-​ rifle divisions. For three decades the force levels in GSFG were largely maintained with at least 20 divisions and 400,000 men. A first modernisation programme was conducted during the 1950s, which included the withdrawal of Third Guards Tank Army which was replaced by units of the emerging GDR National People’s Army. Following the Prague Spring in 1968, which had required the deployment of at least five divisions to Czechoslovakia, border clashes with China erupted, leading to a crisis in force levels and morale. But the divisions used to intimidate the Czechs were maintained in the country until the end of the Cold War. Between 1970 and 1985 manpower rose significantly among Warsaw Pact first echelon forces. Despite the Eastern European uprisings in 1953, 1956 and 1968, the Warsaw Pact was able to rely on a relatively loyal cadre of Eastern European officers. In 1961 joint exercises were begun, even if the Soviet Army maintained control over the tactical nuclear weapons of the ‘alliance’. There were obvious limits to the degree of integration –​the Warsaw Pact had no unified mobilisation system, nor a command structure. The alliance represented a peace-​time administrative system, so that in wartime joint command might have resembled more the Central Powers during the First World War rather than the Western Allies in the Second World War.3 135

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The role of the United States in NATO was similar in that it was the dominant partner, although certainly not to the degree that the USSR dominated the Warsaw Pact. The planning for a serious defence of the Central Region began when the Federal Republic of Germany was accepted as a member of the alliance, which also officially ended the occupation of the Western zones of Germany. In the 1950s, British and American armoured forces were considered as a tripwire: in other words, they would not have been sufficient in strength to do anything more than delay a Soviet attack. In this era, Western security was to be guaranteed by nuclear weapons, although by 1959 ‘forward defence’ was emerging as the central NATO military philosophy, albeit more for political reasons than as a result of military logic: the type of fixed fortifications which would have been required to give forward defence a chance of success in the event of war were missing. Still, NATO moved away from the ‘trip-​wire strategy’ with the adoption of ‘flexible response’ in December 1967: according to the policy document MC 14/​3, it was stated that a range of options would be considered in the event of war, abandoning the idea that any attack would inevitably lead to an immediate nuclear response.

Map 4  The Cold War: The opposing forces in central Europe 136

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However, NATO’s defensive potential appeared to be weakening: first in 1966 when the French withdrew from the military planning and command structure, depriving NATO also of a rear area for conventional operations; second, in the 1970s, with the withdrawal of Belgian and Dutch forces to their home bases, with only a nominal military presence left in Germany. A further problem was caused by the creation for political reasons of the layer-​cake defensive arrangement. Ground forces came under two separate commands, Central Army Group (CENTAG) in the south and Northern Army Group (NORTHAG) in the north. The II West German Corps was stationed in southern Bavaria, to its north VII US Corps, further north, the V US Corps, and north of it, III West German Corps. The territory which NORTHAG was responsible for defending had the I Belgian Corps and I British Corps facing the Soviet Third Shock Army, to their north I West German Corps, to its north, I Dutch Corps, then in Schleswig-​Holstein, the 6th West German Mechanised Division. The essential problem lay in the north, which consisted of many areas that were good tank country, but these were defended by the weaker Dutch and Belgian corps, which would have had little time to reach the Inner-​ German border in the event of a surprise attack.4 In the mid-​1970s a major rethink started to occur in the United States, as many defence analysts began to question flexible response. Following the election of Ronald Reagan as president of the United States in January 1981, a new US defence policy was initiated which saw increased defence spending, including investment in conventional forces. This had been caused by the build-​up of Warsaw Pact forces, the need to shift the focus back to Europe following the major logistical task for the US Army of withdrawing from Vietnam from 1969 to 1973, not to mention the lessons of the 1973 Yom Kippur War. Among the lessons of Yom Kippur were that: in the future resupply would require improved means following the rates of ammunition expenditure during that war; anti-​ tank guided missiles (ATGMs) were best fired from AFVs rather than by infantry; tank transporters would be required in greater numbers to bring tanks forward; the BMP-​1’s 73mm smooth-​bore gun had been ineffective against IDF tanks; and IDF reservists were generally unfamiliar with their equipment which reduced their effectiveness, a problem that would have blighted NATO’s reserve forces as well.5 These lessons meant one thing for both alliances –​increased military spending. Against a background of increasing diplomatic and military tension, the 1980s witnessed the first serious conventional arms race, part of a wider trial of strength between the two superpowers. Under American leadership and backed by their industrial muscle, NATO adopted a new strategy, that of Follow-​On Forces Attack (FOFA), which aimed to degrade Warsaw Pact second and third echelon forces in the event of war through new precision-​guided conventional munitions. While the technologies required for FOFA had been under development since the 1970s, at the same time the strategy was one way to counter a new Soviet concept, dubbed the Operational Manoeuvre Group, which had been designed to exploit NATO defensive weaknesses within the first 24 hours of an attack.6 Fortunately, the Cold War arms race did not lead to war: when the Berlin Wall was breached on 9 November 1989, a political chain reaction was started, which ended in the collapse of the Warsaw Pact. 137

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Armoured forces and tactical nuclear weapons Among the major factors which influenced the development of armour during the Cold War was the prospect of AFVs fighting on a ‘nuclear battlefield’. Thinking on the subject in NATO nations in the 1950s began with the idea that tanks might be used in conjunction with tactical nuclear weapons. The US Armor School at Fort Knox undertook tests from 18 April to 9 May 1955 at the Nevada Proving Ground which led to little tactical insight, but which were considered, overall, to be ‘of tremendous importance’. Movement through areas which had just been hit by atomic weapons could be ‘accomplished efficiently using the same techniques adopted for night operations’. It was recommended that armoured units would require crews to be trained as ‘radiation monitors’, while there was also interest in whether tank forces could advance straight through a blast zone shortly after an atomic weapon had detonated. In fact, these tests led to the assumption that the ‘speed and formation of the task force is influenced by the terrain and enemy in the vicinity of ground zero rather than by the effects of the atomic detonation’.7 In other words, the idea took hold that tanks, armoured personnel carriers and self-​ propelled artillery offered protection from blast, heat and radiation. Armour officers concluded that the possible use of atomic weapons on the battlefield would lead to the need to adhere to three established principles of mechanised warfare: first, the principle of mass which should be applied when engaging an opponent; second, the principle of security which would involve dispersion of forces in order to avoid the destruction of concentrations of AFVs by nuclear strikes; and third, the principle of manoeuvre, which highlighted the requirement of forces to mass and disperse quickly. The need to avoid troop concentrations, which might otherwise invite destruction by atomic attack, meant that the smallest, self-​sufficient unit on the battlefield –​the battalion –​would become the basic fighting unit.8 Military officers writing on the tactical employment of atomic weapons in service journals raised a number of other important issues. One American colonel argued that if both sides possessed nuclear weapons, striking power would be neutralised. The massing of a force to achieve decisive results would expose it to the destructive effects of the enemy’s weapons; yet dispersed troops might not have the capacity to defeat their opponent. Moreover, the threat of failure would tax the general’s skills as never before. The well-​known military commentator F. O. Miksche thought that on many sectors of the front fighting would continue with conventional weapons, with atomic munitions only used to intervene in important battles. Due to their destructive powers, such weapons might actually lead to complete dispersion of forces, with infiltration of an enemy’s position the only option left.9 What military writers were discussing in public was reflected in internal documents, which also emphasized the importance of dispersion for armoured and artillery units, while river crossings would have to be accomplished with greater speed than ever before.10 Still, at the end of the 1950s, the prospect of atomic warfare becoming an integral part of the conventional battlefield was a very new idea. But the increasing number of delivery systems meant that some officers had begun to see smaller, tactical atomic weapons 138

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as merely ‘another source of firepower available to the field commander’. As thinking on the tactics for atomic weapons developed, theorists began to emphasize: the effects of heat, blast and radiation; the need for flexibility among even quite junior commanders; the main means of delivery in the 1950s was to be through artillery and missiles; that protection was largely afforded through standard tactical measures, such as smoke and manoeuvre, but with the suggestion that close proximity to enemy units might also provide a useful measure. The impact on the US armoured division appeared slight: it was reduced in size to 14,500 men, the former signal company became a battalion, while an Honest John missile battery gave the commander his own organic atomic weapons.11 By the mid-​1960s, many of the arguments which had been made in the previous decade had become enshrined in official doctrine: the advent of nuclear weapons had not altered basic armour doctrine, but atomic weapons had increased the significance of dispersion and mobility. According to a 1966 US armour manual, penetration of the enemy’s front on the nuclear battlefield was likely to become more frequent than under normal conventional conditions, while ‘limited visibility operations’ would increase in importance. It was emphasized that despite the destructive capacity of nuclear weapons, there were still defensive counter-​measures which could be taken. In addition to the protection offered by tanks in particular, concealment, camouflage and night operations would reduce the threat of nuclear strikes. For armour operations, atomic demolition mines could be employed to protect a flank during offensives or in the defence to delay the enemy.12 Interestingly, Soviet writings on the employment of tanks under nuclear conditions made frequent reference to Western military theories, partly as a way of avoiding pushing a particular idea which might fall out of favour later, but also because foreign ideas were monitored closely. Nonetheless, writings in the 1960s were fairly clear that armoured forces were ‘the basic striking force of the land-​based troops’, which would advance behind the nuclear strikes, eliminating all surviving enemy strong-​points or operational reserves. The armoured forces would overcome the nuclear mine-​belt and then conduct flanking attacks against the remaining enemy forces. The advent of nuclear weapons had not only introduced the need for dispersion, it had rendered the ‘occupation’ of territory impossible, so that the goal was now the ‘control of territory’. And it was speculated that under nuclear conditions, there would be a need for tanks to be airlifted to different parts of the battlefield.13 During the 1970s, the concept of operations for the Soviet Army continued to highlight the use of armoured forces in conjunction with tactical nuclear weapons, although the option was available to decide not to use them. Atomic strikes, regardless of their intensity, would still require the use of speed by tank and motorised rifle units as they attempted to overcome NATO’s anti-​tank defences, which were considered to be quite formidable; nuclear weapons were deemed to be one of the best means to overcome anti-​tank forces. Nonetheless, senior Soviet officers realised that an atomic strike would not necessarily solve the problem of how to break through stubborn defences. In the first instance, nuclear fire could not be employed too close to one’s own forces as the use of nuclear weapons would probably provoke a nuclear response by NATO which would 139

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negate the value of the Soviet strike and, potentially, cause escalation to a full-​blooded nuclear war. Nonetheless, the tank was still acknowledged as the best weapon to exploit the use of nuclear weapons.14 In the United States during the 1970s, however, the question of the utility of tactical nuclear weapons was revisited by analysts and military officers. A major flaw was identified in NATO’s position: the use of tactical nuclear warheads would be interpreted as a clear signal that NATO was about to move up the ladder of nuclear escalation. Yet, due to this assumption, if the decision to employ tactical nuclear weapons was delayed in the event of a large Warsaw Pact conventional offensive against Western Europe, a ground commander would potentially be forced to commit all his available units to prevent a breakthrough, which would leave few resources available to exploit the results of any nuclear strikes. The decision to employ nuclear weapons might be further complicated by an attack by Warsaw Pact forces not made in sufficient strength to suggest that nuclear release was justified. The decision to release nuclear weapons would require communications to have survived the opening missile, air and artillery strikes, quite apart from the political technicalities of the decision-​making process for the release of the weapons which might last several days. Hence, as a result of the improvements in weapons systems, it appeared that a conventional war might not necessarily escalate immediately into a full-​scale nuclear exchange and, hence, it was concluded that conventional forces required strengthening.15 In part, due to the apparent lack of a doctrine for the actual use of low-​yield tactical nuclear weapons, changes in policy were undertaken in Washington. The decision was made to strengthen conventional forces and to depart from the previous informal doctrine of the nuclear trip-​wire through the development of conventional munitions which could perform the types of missions previously considered the task of tactical nuclear strikes. Indeed, there was a shift away from the earlier assumptions enshrined in field manuals regarding mechanised forces operating under nuclear conditions. Whereas in the US Army field service regulations FM 100–​5. Operations (1976) a complete chapter had been devoted to tactical nuclear weapons, which repeated the doctrine of the previous two decades, in the 1982 version of the manual nuclear and chemical weapons were dealt with in fewer than four pages of one chapter. Moreover, the effects of large losses from nuclear and chemical strikes were acknowledged, which were considered likely to ‘shock and confuse poorly trained or psychologically unprepared troops’. Significantly, in a 1980 armour manual, tactical nuclear weapons were relegated to a few paragraphs in the chapter covering defensive operations only within the context of Warsaw Pact tactics, it being noted that ‘[n]‌uclear and chemical weapons may be employed together or separately’ (emphasis added).16 The de-​emphasis of tactical nuclear weapons by NATO and the United States was caused by the lack of credibility of its actual deterrent effect in the case of a Warsaw Pact offensive. In addition, the new precision-​guided munitions under development offered the prospect of similar levels of destruction without the physical and political fallout. Moreover, there may have been a realisation that the question raised by Basil Liddell Hart in the 1950s as to whether war would actually be possible under nuclear conditions 140

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was legitimate.17 Given the levels of destruction which a combined use of conventional and tactical nuclear weapons would have caused in the first few days of a general war, it seems unlikely that tank crews would have been able to move around a devastated battle­ field ‘buttoned up’ for days at a time while receiving horrific reports over the radio –​if indeed communications were still functioning at all.

Soviet/​Warsaw Pact concepts for armoured warfare The major concept underlying the employment of armour by the Soviet Army during the Cold War was the primacy of the offensive, explained, for example, in a book published in 1970 by a member of the Frunze Military Academy, Colonel A. A. Sidorenko. Not surprisingly, the Russian concept of armoured warfare was based to a great extent on their experience in the Great Patriotic War. The aim of the opening phase of an offensive was to defeat the forces in the forward defensive zone as quickly as possible, fight the enemy reserves and conduct a pursuit of the remaining forces. The need to fight a battle, dispersed over a wide area, was a consequence of the role of tactical nuclear weapons and the increase in firepower on the battlefield. Two particular points were seen as essential for defeating NATO forces: the first was the ability to cross water obstacles; the second was the need to continue the advance during the hours of darkness.18 Soviet military thought assumed there was no contradiction between a defensive military philosophy and the ability, when threatened, to launch an all-​out conventional offensive at short notice. In order to carry out this mission, military planning aimed to achieve a numerical advantage in tanks and other armoured vehicles at decisive breakthrough points. As AFV technology developed after 1945, it was possible to see simply by looking at the vehicles what the Soviet concept of mobile warfare was. What characterised postwar Soviet tanks was their low height. The Warsaw Pact was able to make full use of its manpower pool, with most tank crews well below average height, a typical crew member being 5 foot 4 inches, many coming from the Asian republics. The height of the T-​10 tank was 2.43m, whereas the T-​54 was 2.7m, the T-​62 had a height of 2.4m, while the T-​72 was 2.26m. The idea was, in essence, to rush forward and swamp NATO’s defences before they had a chance to form a continuous defensive line. What was required, then, were tanks with good cross-​country speed, with a low profile which would make them harder to hit. One of the most important tanks in the Soviet inventory was the T-​54 main battle tank, first introduced into the Soviet Army in 1950. It represented a logical development of the T-​44 tank of the Second World War. An improved version of the T-​54, the T-​55, was introduced in the late 1950s. In all, it has been estimated that 60,000 to 70,000 of all models of the T-​54/​55 were built. The T-​54 was also produced in China, Czechoslovakia and Poland as the T-​59. It was the first Soviet tank to have the distinctive rounded turret form which was continued in the T-​62 and T-​64. Armoured recovery, bridge-​laying and mine-​clearing versions of the T-​54 and T-​55 were produced. It was possible to add 141

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additional fuel tanks to the rear of the hull to increase the range, and it could lay its own smokescreen by injecting vaporised diesel fuel into the exhaust system on either side of the vehicle. Early versions did not have an NBC (nuclear-​bacteriological-​chemical) protective system. But later versions did: these were designed to protect the crew from fast neutrons and offer some protection against gamma radiation.19 This model was followed by the T-​62, introduced in 1962, although it was not seen in public until May 1965. It was very similar in appearance to the T-​54, but it had a longer and wider hull, a new turret, and its gun was equipped with a bore evacuator. When it first entered service it did not have anti-​aircraft machine-​guns, but later versions were issued with this addition, becoming the T-​62A. The T-​62 was provided with an NBC system, infrared driving lights and an infrared searchlight. A logical progression from the T-​62 was the T-​64, although the first versions of the T-​64 were plagued with mechanical problems, including a malfunctioning auto-​loader. Still, the auto-​loader achieved a reduction in the crew size from four to three –​commander, driver and gunner. Then followed the T-​72, introduced in 1972. The major difference between the T-​64 and the T-​ 72 was their suspension system. The T-​72 was superior in terms of firepower (a 125mm smooth-​bore gun) and mobility, with some improvements in armour as well.20 One can learn even more from the accompanying support vehicles, such as the PT-​76 light amphibious tank, which first came into service in 1952. Its chassis was in fact the basis for a range of AFVs –​the ASU-​85 air-​portable anti-​tank gun, which first appeared in 1962, the ZSU-​23-​4 self-​propelled anti-​aircraft gun as well as the BMP-​1. The PT-​76 indicates that the Soviet Army perceived it had a need for a river-​crossing capability, which revealed the offensive military concept behind its approach to operations. The main problem with the BMP-​1, as the Egyptian Army discovered in 1973, was its low level of protection, which reduced its survivability on the battlefield. But the Soviet concept of mobile warfare was to give all their main vehicles a river-​crossing capability and to produce a range of vehicles which were air-​portable. Speed was to compensate for lack of protection, the aim being to rupture NATO’s defence before it had a chance to form and keep the momentum of the advance going until their forces had penetrated deep into Europe, preferably reaching the English Channel.21 There were a number of principles for Soviet mobile operations which grew from their experience during the Second World War, modified by the requirements for a large conventional offensive. In the 1950s and 1960s, their strategy only required the capability to bludgeon their way through NATO’s defences, using all firepower available. By the 1980s, however, the nuclear arms race had reached such a level that the goal was to secure victory before the confrontation escalated into an all-​out nuclear war. For that reason, achieving surprise and completing the campaign within the shortest time possible became the key to success. Forward detachments and reconnaissance elements were important, since they offered the chance of hindering the formation of a continuous front line in central Europe. Tanks were equipped with river-​crossing equipment so that the advance could be maintained. Airborne units were another means by which confusion could be sown deep inside NATO territory. If surprise were to be achieved, one of the most likely forms of combat would have been the ‘meeting engagement’, essentially a 142

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tactical manoeuvre, performed when a unit runs into an opponent unexpectedly while advancing and must deploy quickly to envelop and defeat his formation. In the late 1970s, the aim was to achieve advance rates of 100 km per day –​highly optimistic given the logistic requirements of Soviet units.22 Improvements in NATO’s ability to defend, not least of all increased emphasis on active defence, caused Warsaw Pact planners to consider ways of preventing the employment of NATO nuclear weapons after the first few days of a conflict. In 1982, a British analyst published an account of what was claimed to be a new Soviet concept, the Operational Manoeuvre Group (OMG). Based on the mobile groups used in the Second World War, these forces were intended to operate far in advance of the main body of troops, in combination with air-​landing troops, with the aim of destroying NATO’s nuclear launch sites, command posts, electronic warfare capabilities and anti-​aircraft defences. Another key task was to hinder the forward movement of NATO reserves, paralyse logistics and capture key parts of the road network. The size of the OMG was not clear, but it was speculated that it could be up to divisional level, while the likely intention was that it would be operating behind NATO’s main defensive line by the end of the first day of the offensive. While the capacity of Warsaw Pact armies to achieve the level of training and skill necessary to make the idea workable was open to question, there were other measures which they pursued during the 1980s to improve the survivability of their offensive capability given the threat of NATO’s FOFA technologies. There was, for instance, considerable interest in the use of helicopter and transport aircraft for resupply, which might have been less vulnerable than road-​bound, soft-​skinned vehicles. The capability of Warsaw Pact forces was further improved by the introduction of a new MBT, the T-​80, which built on the T-​64 and entered production early in the 1980s. By 1987, over 2,250 T-​80s were deployed in GSFG.23

US/​NATO concepts for armoured warfare NATO’s concept for the use of armoured forces in central Europe was dictated by two fundamental factors:  first, the nature of the theatre of operations (and the political requirement for forward defence); and second, that it proved impossible to achieve any agreement on a standardised NATO tank. While NATO nations’ tanks were obviously superior to those of their opponents, the lack of standardisation could have had serious consequences had it come to war as it would have complicated the resupply of spare parts and fuel for four different types of main battle tank. In terms of tank design there were actually two fundamentally opposed philosophies at work within NATO nations. The British and Americans thought firepower was the route to dominance on the battlefield, while the French and Germans tended towards mobility as the key design factor. For the first three decades of the Cold War, the backbone of the NATO tank fleet was the US Army M48 Patton tank. It followed the M47, which had been rushed into production during the Korean War. In addition to automotive improvements, it was the 143

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first American medium tank to possess a crew of four rather than five, this reduction freeing up space for more ammunition stowage. A new range-​finder greatly increased the chances of a first-​round hit at longer ranges with the 90mm gun. The first upgrade came in 1955: the M48A2 entered service the following year with double the range of its predecessor (160 miles). A  further upgrade came in 1963 with the M48A3, which was fitted with an improved engine. A subsequent upgrade programme which converted M48A1 and M48A3 tanks into the M48A5 began in 1974, with this version mounting a 105mm gun. The M48A2 was an important tank because it was the first machine used by the West German Bundeswehr before the Leopard I became available: M48s were still in service in the German Army in the 1970s. Despite the long life of the M48, it was realised in the 1950s that a replacement would be needed due to the improved armour on the T-​54 and, later, a new and more deadly munition used by the T-​62. The new tank, the M60, entered production in December 1958, with a total of 2,205 machines produced; it was later replaced by the M60A1, which entered service in October 1962 after the discovery of certain problems in the M60. Despite its similar appearance, it broke with tradition by using a diesel engine; it used a new range-​finding device, a coincidence range-​finder; it mounted a 105mm gun; it had the same road-​speed as the M48, but a longer range at 310 miles; and it had a larger commander’s cupola. It remained in production for 20 years. A different version equipped with a 152mm gun-​missile launcher was developed in the 1960s, which required a redesigned turret. In entered service in 1974, but had a number of drawbacks which made it unpopular. Due to difficulties encountered in other tank development programmes, it became necessary to extend the life of the M60. Various improvements were made, such as an air-​cleaning system, which was introduced into the production-​improved M60A1 in 1971; the following year a new stabilisation system was added, which increased the gun’s hit probability when firing on the move, with track improvements following. The Yom Kippur War led, however, to a production crisis for the M60 as demand outstripped supply: this highlighted a number of painful lessons, not least of all around funding in peacetime. Nevertheless, the M60A1 (RISE) tank began to appear in 1975 with a vastly improved engine, as well as a smaller searchlight which produced both white and infrared light. Further improvements found their way into the M60A3 which entered production in 1978: a laser-​range finder and a solid-​state computer and thermal sights for the gunner –​upgrades which meant the gunner could spot targets in smoke, fog and rain. These innovations laid the basis for some of the features which were later incorporated into the M1 Abrams.24 While they were produced in far fewer numbers compared to the Patton series, the major British tanks should not be forgotten, either. In the early phase of the Cold War, the British Army relied on the Centurion and Conqueror as its principal tanks. In 1956 a prototype for a new tank, the FV4202, was built, which later became the basis for the FV4201 Chieftain MBT. The project suffered, however, from numerous delays and setbacks, with only 900 Chieftains eventually built, finally entering service in 1967, although Iran placed an order for around 700 in 1971. Although the Chieftain developed 144

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a reputation for mechanical unreliability among its crews, its 120mm gun and thick armour would have made it a tough opponent on the high-​intensity battlefield. A few variants of the tank were also produced: the FV4202 Armoured Recovery Vehicle, the FV4205 Armoured Vehicle-​Launched Bridge and a 155mm self-​propelled gun. While various upgrades were made, the main problem with the Chieftain was the length of time it took to bring it into service.25 The establishment of the Federal German armed forces, the Bundeswehr, was significant for NATO for both political and military reasons. One of the motivations for the acceptance of the FRG into the Alliance was that NATO needed West German manpower in order to provide any form of coherent deterrent. Moreover, German armed forces were able to call on a wealth of wartime experience, especially in mechanised operations. Still, everything had to be created from scratch, with the original goal of 12 divisions proving unattainable. The first American AFVs the Germans received in 1956 were 1,110 M47s, 152 M41s, 100 M39s and 300 M74s. In late 1957 there was a vain hope that a standard NATO division might be a goal which could be realised but, almost inevitably, this came to nothing. Although the Bundeswehr considered the US Army’s Pentomic-​Division structure, and while they were initially equipped with M48 tanks, their military traditions were so different that it was not surprising that they demanded their own divisional structure.26 The Bundeswehr soon set about developing its own family of armoured vehicles  –​ weapons projects which progressed surprisingly well, especially given the difficult starting position for the German engineers. The first Marder infantry combat vehicles, equipped with a 20mm cannon mounted in a small turret, were delivered in 1971. The Leopard I MBT, armed with a 105mm gun, with a road speed of 40 mph and a range of 373 miles, entered service in 1965. The Leopard I continued to be produced until 1979; it was sold to the Danish, Belgian, Canadian, Italian, Dutch and Norwegian armies. Total Leopard I production reached 4,561 tanks. It was not only successful because it was used to equip several other NATO armies, but also due to the variants for which it provided the chassis: the Leopard AS1 armoured recovery vehicle, the Gepard anti-​aircraft vehicle, armed with twin 30mm guns, which entered service in 1976; the Jagdpanzer ATGW vehicle; the Jagdpanzer JPZ 4–​5, armed with a 90mm gun; and the Beaver bridge-​layer tank, which featured a telescopic projection system and could prepare a bridge in two-​ and-​a-​half minutes.27 If the British, Germans, French and Americans developed their own tanks, this was not only a question of maintaining national arms industries which could export weapons abroad. It was as much due to specific doctrines for the use of armour, often based around long military traditions and national command styles. As a result, not a great deal of progress was made in NATO doctrine. Military thinking on the use of armour was, of course, still influenced heavily in the 1950s by the experience of the Second World War, in particular the differing national structures for the armoured division. Nonetheless, a certain degree of unanimity over basic principles in the conduct of armoured warfare can still be identified. According to a British manual of 1952, the chief characteristic of the armoured division was mobility, but it also required flexibility of organisation. 145

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Orders needed to be issued by the commander in person or over the radio, but speed would be lost if the working relationships within the division were not based on mutual trust.28 The Bundeswehr field service regulations of September 1973 indicated, likewise, little real deviance from the lessons of the Second World War. Armour was considered the ‘weapon of main effort’ which was employed mainly against enemy armour. While the advances in anti-​tank weaponry meant the vulnerability of the tank had increased, a resolutely conducted mobile defence could wear down attacks by superior enemy forces and inflict considerable losses on them. In close terrain, at night and during periods of poor visibility tanks required the support of mechanised infantry, whose main task was to combat opposing infantry forces and anti-​tank units. Tank-​destroyer units were usually employed to support motorised and mechanised infantry. The manual did give a hint of changes to come, however. In prefatory remarks it stated that, ‘it is still uncertain when anti-​tank helicopters will be introduced into the armed forces, [although] this regulation already refers to the tactical possibilities of their employment in order to prepare staffs and troops for the use of this new anti-​tank weapon’.29 After the Yom Kippur and Vietnam Wars, US Army doctrine pronounced that the battlefield was becoming increasingly lethal for tanks due to the increasing range and accuracy of anti-​tank weapons, although paradoxically Warsaw Pact doctrine continued to emphasize the mass employment of heavy armour. The revolution which had taken place in tank firepower also needed to be taken seriously: improved munitions and range-​finding equipment meant that the probability of a first-​round hit on another tank at 1500 m had increased dramatically. Nonetheless, the tank retained the ability to mass rapidly, break through enemy defences and strike deep into his rear, which meant it could still decide the outcome of battles. A future trend would be the contribution made to anti-​tank warfare by helicopters. In the 1982 field service regulations, following the usual missions of armour, it was noted that tanks could break through suppressed defences, an expression of the belief that the tank could still survive on the high-​intensity battlefield.30 Although thinking on armoured warfare in the British, German and American armies was based on national doctrine and traditions, there was some attempt within NATO to create a common doctrine. A tactical doctrine for land forces was published in 1978, which was intended ‘to establish common NATO doctrine for the use by land force commanders in military operations where NATO forces are placed under their command’, as well as to establish unified tactical terminology. As was to be expected, several nations expressed official reservations; the Germans, for instance, recorded their wish that ‘ATP-​35 will be used as a directive in the conduct of multinational operations, but will not replace national tactical doctrine’. While much of the manual was an amalgam of different nations’ thinking, and generally accepted military principles, the chapter on defence came before offensive operations, with ‘concentration of combat power’ highlighted as one of the means to ‘offset the numerical superiority of the enemy’. It was also important that the four key terms for fighting the defensive battle were accepted by all nations: forward edge of battle area, covering force area, main defence area and rear area. 146

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Armoured forces were considered to enable the defence to be conducted with greater flexibility; they gave troops a greater degree of protection, although they would always be a primary target for air attack.31 The final decade of the Cold War saw the introduction of the FOFA concept by the Supreme Allied Commander Europe, General Bernard W. Rogers. The declared aim of FOFA was not to replace flexible response, but to improve its conventional component. The use of air-​delivered munitions and the Multiple-​Launched Rocket System, as well as improved target-​acquisition technologies, were to be used to attack Warsaw Pact second and third echelon forces. The aim was to prevent them entering the fight at the forward edge of the battle area, thus tipping the struggle in NATO’s favour. NATO’s strategy was ultimately based on the need to buy enough time to allow reinforcements to arrive from the United States. In fact, the Alliance’s defences were further improved at this time by the introduction in 1980 of the Leopard II MBT into the West German Army, the introduction of the M1 Abrams tanks into the US Army in the same year and, finally, the delivery of the first Challenger tanks to the British Army in 1983.32

Scenarios if war had broken out How a war might have developed on the central European battlefield was a question which occupied military planners in both NATO and Warsaw Pact nations for the duration of the Cold War. The nature of the scenarios varied, depending upon which decade the planners were working in, but the outlines of how a war on the central European battlefield might have unfolded is worthy of closer examination. This is not only necessary in order to place the military policies of the two alliances and the main technological developments in a clearer context, but also because the discussion of such scenarios played a central role in thinking on the design and tactical-​operational employment of armoured forces. Of course, it should not be forgotten that, arguably, the closest Europe came to a war between the two alliances was on 27/​28 October 1961 when US M48 and Soviet T-​55 tanks faced off for 16 hours at Checkpoint Charlie, one of the crossing points between East and West Berlin. One of the first scenarios considered involved the implications of a withdrawal of British and American occupation forces from the Western zones of Germany. The issue had been raised by the Chief of Staff, US Army, in November 1947, due to a Soviet proposal made for an early withdrawal of occupation forces from Germany. A memorandum on the subject noted that, were a Soviet attack to take place, the existing American, British and French forces would be unlikely to hinder its progress. It was considered, though, that the USSR was unlikely to initiate a war ‘in the near future’. Nevertheless, between the lines the proposal to remove all occupation forces from Germany was considered to be another Soviet ploy, as their forces would remain on the European continent, while those of the United States would be shipped back home, leaving the USSR as the dominant military power with little prospect of European nations being able to resist Communist penetration. In the event of a war between the United States and the 147

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Photo 7  T-​55 tanks during the standoff at Checkpoint Charlie, 28 October 1961 USSR, Soviet military forces would then be in a position to occupy the whole of Europe up to the English Channel. The only viable policy to prevent this was the establishment of a government in Western Germany and a rejection of any Soviet proposal for the withdrawal of occupation forces.33 The reaction to the memorandum by the Joint Chiefs of Staff was one of extreme caution, to the extent that they simply noted the conclusion and the recommendations. The assertion in the memorandum that ‘the Germans have the military and economic potential for providing effective resistance to Soviet expansion’ was, however, at odds with the policies then being pursued of the demilitarisation and disarmament of the Western zones of Germany.34 Yet the military logic to the argument was unassailable, so that before West German rearmament became official policy, the US Army issued requests that former German generals working for the US Army Historical Division (German Section) provide assessments relating to the defence of Western Europe. In two memoranda, written in late 1948 and early 1949, former general Bodo Zimmermann argued that the territory east of the Rhine River had to be regarded as an outpost area, since there were only a few Western divisions stationed there. In the future, it would be necessary to build up around 20 divisions, with 50 other divisions stationed to the west of the Rhine. The divisions to the east would need to engage in 148

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mobile warfare in the event of a Russian attack in order to trade space for time. He argued, further, that in the outpost area, defensive lines for a phased withdrawal would need to be constructed. The Soviet attackers would need to be defeated in the zone west of the Rhine through the use of a powerful reserves and air attacks. If the Rhine could be successfully defended, however, then a strategic counter-​offensive ought to be launched, although he cautioned that ‘a considerable amount of time might have to pass until such a counteroffensive can be put into effect’. His assumption was that the fighting in Europe would be part of a world war, so that the moment to go on the offensive might depend upon events taking place in other parts of the globe.35 Well into the 1950s, Western military thought considered the Rhine as the natural defence line. But with acceptance of the FRG into NATO, and the gradual expansion of the Bundeswehr, German generals such as Adolf Heusinger began to argue that German forces could not simply evacuate their own territory without a fight. While the idea of a ‘forward strategy’ had been informally accepted within NATO in 1952, its practical implementation could not commence until an adequate number of divisions was available. Once West German divisions started to appear, it was considered necessary to integrate the new German air force into the planning, the main task for which would be to assist army units unable to hold back advancing Warsaw Pact forces. Part of the logic behind the West German desire to adopt forward defence was that membership of NATO appeared meaningless to their population unless Federal territory was to be defended.36 While the forward strategy had first been agreed upon at a meeting in New York in September 1950, it was reaffirmed in December 1956, once again at a defence planning meeting in Brussels on 28 May 1969, while it was mentioned in the Final Communique of the NATO Ministerial Meeting for 4/​5 December 1969. By the late 1970s, though, the military viability of forward defence was being called into question, not least of all as it had always been reinforced by the option of the employment of nuclear weapons. As the emphasis shifted back to conventional forces in an attempt to avoid nuclear escalation, forward defence sat incongruously with the ground forces doctrine of several nations. By attempting to create a linear defence, Warsaw Pact forces would have been invited to mass their forces on specific attack axes and, according to one calculation, would have been able to achieve a superiority of 6.5 to 1, possibly advancing 50 km per day. In fact, forward defence threatened to create a scenario in which during the course of a week NATO defences would be shattered and most of Germany occupied; but defence in depth promised to limit the attack to two penetrations which could have been brought to a standstill.37 According to one fictional scenario sketched out in 1983 by a British general, Sir John Hackett, Warsaw Pact forces attacked the central region on 7 August in a future year, projected as 1985. By the end of 8 August, all of the Federal Republic, east of a line running south from Bremen to east of Augsburg, had been lost (thus, the major cities of Hanover, Minden, Kassel, Nuremberg and Munich), although Berlin and Hamburg had been bypassed. The Bremen airfield had been secured by the Soviet 103rd Airborne Division. By 14 August, there were 40 Warsaw Pact divisions in the Central Region, but only half of them had been in action. By 15 August, according to Hackett’s crystal-​ball gazing, the north of the Federal 149

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Republic and much of Holland had been occupied, although Bonn, Frankfurt, Mannheim and Stuttgart were still in Allied hands. The Allied line needed to hold so that US and French reinforcements could be brought to the front. A heavy air attack on the Twentieth Guards Army and the timely arrival of a US corps blunted the momentum of the offensive. The commander of Third Guards Army then mutinied as the Soviet offensive ground to a halt and events elsewhere led to defeat for the Warsaw Pact and the USSR.38 In considering possible scenarios for war on the central European battlefield, much of the literature presumes that war would have begun with an all-​out Warsaw Pact offensive. NATO planning grew largely from fear of a surprise attack or an offensive launched with superior forces on specific axes of advance. Certainly, Warsaw Pact documents which became available after the fall of the German Democratic Republic indicate that in the latter half of the 1970s, some plans envisaged the use of SS-​20 tactical nuclear weapons (with a yield of 150kt) and the shorter-​range SS-​23 and SS-​21 missiles in conjunction with conventional forces. In such scenarios, NATO nuclear facilities, air bases and other targets would have been attacked (probably mainly in northern Germany), then followed by air-​landing troops and armoured forces, driving forward rapidly in the hope of preventing a NATO defensive line forming. On the other hand, by the early 1980s Soviet military thinking and planning was becoming noticeably more defensive, assuming that any war would first begin with some form of NATO aggression. Moreover, Soviet generals were becoming worried by NATO’s increasing power in conventional munitions which were perceived as capable of achieving levels of destruction previously reserved for tactical nuclear strikes.39 This raises another issue in relation to the employment of armoured forces on the central European battlefield: namely, would NATO ground units have been bound exclusively to a defensive use of their armour? Needless to say, even without recourse to classified material, it seems reasonable to assume that some offensive plans must have been drawn up, however unrealistic they might have been. In fact, two US military officers suggested in a study in 1980 that one way to achieve the defeat of Warsaw Pact forces could have been, presuming the adjustment of some of the dispositions of NATO units in the FRG, the launching of a counter-​offensive. A fighting withdrawal would have been made to the River Ems in the north, but the attackers held in the south. By counter-​ attacking through Austria and into Czechoslovakia, it was proposed that a powerful surprise attack of armoured forces could have been launched on first and second echelon Warsaw Pact forces in Czechoslovakia, Poland and East Germany.40 Whether such an attack could ever have succeeded on the high-​intensity battlefield of the 1970s or 1980s is an open question, but the element of surprise might have been effective under certain sets of circumstances.

Conclusion One of the most obvious conclusions which can be reached about the conventional balance in central Europe during the Cold War is that, although there was little theoretical 150

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literature on the question of a ‘conventional balance of terror’, there were parallels in land warfare with the deterrent effect of strategic nuclear weapons.41 It now seems certain that neither Warsaw Pact officials and officers nor NATO planners and commanders could have had any certainty that they could have either defended or attacked successfully without complete disaster overtaking them. In the case of the Warsaw Pact, their commanders were terrified of the capabilities of NATO armour and its anti-​tank weaponry, many of them probably aware of the technical deficiencies in their own armoured vehicles. For NATO, a sudden Warsaw Pact offensive, preceded by massive air and artillery strikes could have swamped their defences before they had had the chance to mobilise sufficient armoured forces to parry the first blows. One question which emerged during the 1980s as the military build-​up of both superpowers increased was whether it might have been possible to create a ‘tank-​free zone’ in central Europe. The idea was to create, through negotiation, a form of demilitarised zone in central Europe, based around a lattice-​work of infantry strong points. However, in 1988 the concept was considered to be militarily unviable due to the appearance of Soviet reactive armour on their MBTs and the lack of powerful enough anti-​tank guided missiles, while the sum total of munitions would not have been enough to stop Warsaw Pact armour since only other tanks could ultimately have created the basis for an operational counter-​stroke. The scheme would have been simply too expensive. Moreover, part of the reason for the presence of Soviet divisions in Eastern Europe was to keep these populations in check, so they may have been unwilling to have agreed to such a proposal.42 As it turned it out, the Cold War was not settled by a massive armoured battle on central European soil, which –​had it taken place –​would have caused millions of civilian and military casualties and conceivably led to a full-​scale global war, complete with the mass launch of intercontinental ballistic missiles. Instead, the opening of one gate in the Berlin Wall on 9 November 1989 created a small crack, which rapidly spread across the whole of the Eastern bloc, bringing down the Communist empire in its wake. The US strategy of dragging the Soviet Union into an arms race, both conventional and nuclear, which it could not win, finally brought the Cold War to a conclusion. It ended with wide-​spread optimism in the West and many illusions about the future employment of superior armoured forces in foreign wars to achieve ‘easy wins’. In time, these illusions were to be shattered.

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CHAPTER 8 THE ARAB-​I SRAELI WARS, 1948–​2 006

The wars in the Middle East provide further examples of the successful and unsuccessful employment of armoured forces, from the fairly primitive mobile operations of Israel’s War of Independence (1948–​49) to the use of new and complex weapons systems in Lebanon in 1982 and 2006. The Arab-​Israeli wars provide many lessons on the use of armour in desert terrain and the fundamentals of good tank commanding, as well as insights into why Arab armies have struggled to exploit mechanised formations to the full in battle. Furthermore, the wars in the region have always been closely intertwined with developments in armour technology and doctrine elsewhere, especially during the Cold War in Europe. While the Arab-​Israeli wars have had very specific, regional features, at the same time they have often been part of a much wider, global picture.

Armour in the 1948/​49 and 1956 wars The origins of Israeli armour can be traced back to before the outbreak of the Second World War when, in 1936, the Jewish Haganah underground units fighting together with British forces in Palestine made some use of armoured cars. More importantly, those Jews who fought with the British Army during the Second World War acquired mechanical skills which proved vital in the early days of Israeli armour. Once the United Nations had voted on 29 November 1947 to allow the creation of a Jewish state, the Haganah realised that the likely battle with their opponents would require them to keep the major roads open between Jewish settlements. To succeed in this struggle, they came to the conclusion that mobile forces would be essential. Various commando-​style actions were conducted to try and rescue Sherman tanks which the British were officially committed to destroying before they left Palestine, one of which was seized and returned to working order. The main vehicles used in the embryonic armoured forces were, however, Dodge and Chevrolet trucks, with primitive armour-​plating around the driver’s compartment. Early disasters in the fight for the roads led to an attempt to create armoured cars with stronger metal plates and a lightly armoured turret, mounting a German MG-​ 34 machine-​gun.1 Although the War of Independence, sometimes referred to as the First Arab-​Israeli War, was essentially an infantry war, there was involvement on the battlefield of at least mobile forces.2 The five Arab nations who set out in May 1948 to eradicate the new state of Israel –​Egypt, Transjordan, Syria, Iraq and Lebanon –​possessed a variety of tanks and armoured cars. The Egyptians possessed the strongest mobile force, with around

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200 AFVs. These included British Mark IV and M22 Locust light tanks, a few Valentines and Matildas, and a company of M4 Shermans; in addition, they possessed Humber Mk IV and Staghound armoured cars, as well as some Bren-​Gun carriers. The Syrians were able to field one battalion of 45 Renault R35 and R39 light tanks, which had previously belonged to Vichy French forces; they also possessed a variety of armoured cars. The Jordanian Arab Legion fielded various types of armoured car, while the Iraqi Army held one battalion of CV-35 Italian tankettes and several armoured car companies. But while numerically superior, the Arab armoured forces were just as inexperienced as the Israelis in the use of armour.3 Nonetheless, lighter mobile units and the few tanks available did play a part in the war. After the fighting started, the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) made efforts to obtain AFVs to bolster its makeshift units. Among the machines purchased were some pre-​ 1939 French Hotchkiss H35 infantry tanks, while light armoured troop carriers were purchased from Czechoslovakia. The mobile units consisted of half-​tracks, armoured cars and jeeps, the use of which was more compatible with the military culture of the Palmach units, with their anti-​hierarchical ethos. The tank battalion (the 82nd) of the 8th Armoured Brigade made a rather subdued contribution due to lack of equipment and training, with one company of Hotchkiss tanks and another consisting of two Cromwells and one Sherman. By the close of the War of Independence, the armoured forces were concentrated in two brigades and had played a part in all the major operations after May 1948: Dani (July 1948); Yoav and Hiram (both October 1948); Horev (December 1948–​ January 1949); and Uvdah (March 1949). During the fighting in the Western Negev, IDF tanks were used to break up an attack by Egyptian Locust tanks, while the two Shermans and one Cromwell tank drove the defenders from Abu Agelia.4 The opening moves by the Egyptian forces were marked by an underestimation of the determination of Israeli infantry, as well as a failure to coordinate their own armour and infantry; in fact, mobile units retreated when they encountered resistance from IDF forces armed with light anti-​tank weapons or Molotov cocktails. Still, Egyptian forces used their armour successfully in the capture of Yad Mordechai in May 1948 and Nitzanin the following month, although an assault on the Israeli settlement of Negba in June was repulsed with the loss of four tanks and two armoured cars, and 100 infantry casualties. Despite the fact that by the time of the second truce, Egyptian forces had 135 tanks and 139 Bren-​Gun carriers, their armour was unable to prevent successful Israeli counter-​attacks. During the fighting in northern Samaria, and despite their armoured battalion, Iraqi forces fought poorly, showing themselves to be too passive. Syria made some use of its French armour, but overall its performance was indifferent. The best-​equipped Arab army was the Jordanian Arab Legion, which possessed 50 British armoured cars; it performed well, especially in combined-​ arms tactics, although it did lose several armoured cars to PIAT anti-​tank rounds and Molotov cocktails in the fighting in Jerusalem.5 Following their contribution to victory in 1949, the IDF mechanised forces gradually began to expand. In December 1952, the Armoured Corps possessed only 50 Shermans, a few armoured cars and approximately 200 M3 half-​tracks. Moreover, the original 154

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Palmach infantry forces had an ethos which rejected discipline and new technology, and was more in the mould of Orde Wingate’s Chindits than Heinz Guderian’s Panzer Troops. Still, by 1955, the Corps had grown, now fielding around 200 Shermans, while 13-​ton French AMX-​13 tanks were purchased. By the eve of the 1956 war, the IDF had built up a force of 100 AMX-​13s, 250 Shermans and between 400 and 500 M3 half-​tracks. Yet, there was no clear agreement within the IDF on basic doctrine for the employment of mobile forces in conjunction with air strikes, although there was a recognition of the need to compensate for the lack of strategic depth which Israel’s geography dictated by launching rapid strikes. Meanwhile, the Egyptian Army concluded a large arms deal with the USSR, via Czechoslovakia, in late 1955, which saw the delivery of, in addition to 200 aircraft and 500 artillery pieces, 230 tanks, 200 armoured troop carriers and 100 self-​propelled guns.6 Before war broke out, Egypt’s president, Gamal Abd al Nasser, had employed several former German officers to assist in defensive planning. The German plan had suggested the employment of screening forces consisting of mechanised reconnaissance units which would trade time for space to allow the Egyptians to identify the direction of the main Israeli thrust. However, for political reasons, the Egyptians wanted to defend the northern Sinai border itself, so they left the southern Sinai area poorly defended, concentrating the bulk of their forces in the north and east. The bulk of their armour, which consisted of T-​34/​85s and SU-​100 assault guns, was held back west of the Suez Canal in anticipation of the Anglo-​French attack. Moreover, in the Sinai, the Egyptians relied on static defensive positions. Launched on 29 October 1956, the Israeli blow in the Sinai benefited greatly from the fact that Egypt was preoccupied with the Anglo-​French invasion. Israel’s strategic intention was to break the Egyptian blockade of the Gulf of Aqaba, remove guerrilla bases from the Gaza Strip, deal Nasser’s armed forces a decisive blow and pre-​empt any Egyptian attack. Britain and France, who at the time it was suspected had colluded with Israel in the preparations for the war, had sought to regain control of the Suez Canal and force Nasser from power. The main concentration of Egyptian armour in the Sinai was at Bir Gafgafa, a town on the central route across the north of the Sinai Desert, although the key battle took place at Abu Agelia, a fortified position which was much closer to Israel, where the Israelis surrounded the Egyptians at the beginning of the war. Still, the Egyptians held out and Israeli command and control began to break down as the forces available failed to capture Abu Ageila. In fact, the employment of armour in its classic role was limited during the 1956 war, with only one Israeli armoured brigade in evidence. There was confusion over the correct role for armour; as a result, the IDF’s mechanised forces were split up and scattered throughout infantry units so that on no occasion during the war were they ever employed in a truly decisive role. By the end of the third day, the 7th Armoured Brigade had been divided into three separate mobile task forces, which were all moving in separate directions: none of these formations seized any terrain or defeated any substantial Egyptian force. The war ended, in fact, with Israeli tanks firing on each other in broad daylight, causing casualties.7 Armour was also used in the fighting in and around the Gaza Strip. During the battle for Rafah, the 27th Armoured Brigade played a key part. It consisted of one motorised 155

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infantry battalion, two companies of Super-​Shermans, a company of Shermans and an AMX-​13 light tank company. As the battles in Sinai were already raging, surprise was not possible. During the approach to Rafah, several IDF AFVs were destroyed in a minefield; in fact, Egyptian anti-​tank positions were destroyed by hand-​held weapons rather than by tank guns. Rafah fell after heavy fighting on 1 November. Lieutenant-​General Moshe Dayan, the charismatic, one-​eyed Chief of the Israeli General Staff, who had been a commander during the War of Independence, then captured El Arish on the following day; during the advance on the town, the IDF captured 40 abandoned T-​34s. The attack on the outer defences of the Gaza strip began on 2 November: an IDF tank squadron, supported by half-​tracks, succeeded in breaking through, which heralded a quick advance and a rapid Egyptian surrender.8 During the conflict, the Egyptian Army performed well in static defence. But what ultimately decided the outcome of the war was the Franco-​British assault on the Suez Canal which forced Egypt to divide her forces, and by the fact that only half of Egypt’s new tanks were operational by the outbreak of hostilities. The Egyptian Army lost 1,000 killed, 4,000 wounded and 6,000 captured, while Israel suffered only 189 dead and 400 wounded; significantly, the Egyptians lost at least 100 tanks. In terms of armoured warfare, the Sinai campaign has been considered as a model of a lightning mechanised advance. The Egyptian commanders rarely showed initiative on the ground, with slow advance rates marking their use of armoured vehicles, with poor maintenance another problem. They failed to use combined-​arms tactics, not least of all due to an overreliance on firepower at the expense of shock action and manoeuvre. The Egyptian command structure was too rigid, discouraging local commanders from delivering bad news and encouraging them to exaggerate successes.9 Still, the war forced the IDF to rethink its doctrine which had emphasized the use of trucks and half-​tracks to transport infantry around the battlefield and their use in rushing enemy positions, which could be successful, but was disastrous when employed against infantry dug into prepared defensive positions. Despite the success which Israel had been able to achieve in the Sinai, assisted by Egyptian errors in their initial deployments, their performance had still demonstrated a number of obvious weaknesses, not least of all as the IDF was still engaged in a process of learning the basic principles of mechanised warfare.

The Six-​Day War (1967) and its aftermath In the wake of the Sinai War, the Armoured Corps became a priority within the IDF under the leadership of Colonel Israel Tal, who had been a junior officer during the War of Independence and served with distinction in 1956. A firm believer in the primacy of the tank, he served as commander of the 7th Armoured Brigade (1959–​60), then in 1964 becoming the commander of the Corps itself. Beginning around 1960, a process of reform had been underway, which aimed at turning it into an elite force, with strict discipline and training, while efforts were made to learn from the mistakes in doctrine and 156

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command revealed in 1956. An extensive reorganisation took place, with new armoured brigades formed, companies restructured and doctrine revised. In 1959, the first heavy tanks were acquired  –​50-​ton Centurions, armed with 20-​pounder guns; in 1964–​65, M48 Patton tanks were purchased from West Germany. Those Sherman tanks which were already part of the army’s inventory began to be converted, with a 105mm gun and a new engine added. In 1962, work began on up-​gunning the Centurions with a 105mm L7 gun, while training and gunnery practice were improved. In addition, a new family of mobile artillery was introduced, which included M50 French and M7 American self-​ propelled howitzers.10 Between November 1964 and the outbreak of the Six-​Day War a series of duels took place between the Syrian forces positioned on the Golan Heights and IDF units, with Syrian tanks and artillery firing on Israeli settlements engaged in the diversion of waters from the Jordan River. The Syrians made use of German Panzer IV tanks dug into hilltop positions. The first fire returned by modified Centurions was inaccurate, but by 1965 the shooting had improved. In addition to the ‘War over the Waters’, the major reorganisation of the IDF Armoured Corps had been spurred on by the massive rearming of the Egyptian Army by the Soviet Union. By the outbreak of the Six-​Day War, the Egyptians in the Sinai were able to field 950 tanks, 1,100 APCs and over 1,000 artillery pieces, backed up by 450 aircraft. The border clashes between Syria and Israel and the strategic calculations of Nasser certainly contributed to the outbreak of the war, although there were many wider regional and international factors involved.11 The Six-​Day War has gone down in history as a classic ‘pre-​emptive strike’. By late May 1967, 250,000 Arab troops had massed on Israel’s borders, supported by around 2,000 tanks, with 700 front-​line aircraft prepared to strike. On the ground, the IDF fielded around 1,000 tanks:  110 M48A2Cs, 150 AMX-​13s, 250 Centurions and 450 Shermans of various types. President Nasser thought he could provoke a war, which he would win due to weight of numbers. On the morning of 5 June, at 07.45, the Israeli Air Force began attacks on 19 Egyptian air bases. In the course of 500 sorties, they destroyed 309 out of 340 combat aircraft, including a considerable number of bombers. On the same morning, Jordanian, Syrian and Iraqi air forces began attacks on Israel; yet, by the evening, the Jordanian Air Force had been wiped out and the Syrian Air Force had lost two-​thirds of its strength. This success paved the way for a dramatic series of ground operations. Egyptian forces were deployed in the Gaza Strip and in forward positions in the Sinai, with two armoured divisions positioned in the central Sinai to the rear of the main defence lines. The IDF launched a three-​pronged attack in the Sinai: in the first phase they broke through the Egyptian defences; during the second they drove deep into Sinai; while the third saw the seizure of two mountain passes which cut off the Egyptian retreat. By the end of the second day’s fighting, the main Egyptian defences had been overrun; by the fourth day of the war IDF units had reached the banks of the Suez Canal. It was while an intense battle was being fought in the Gaza Strip that some IDF AFVs succeeded in reaching and blocking the main escape route for the Egyptian Army in the Sinai, the Mitla Pass. Only one Egyptian tank succeeded in breaking through. Many Egyptian tanks and soft-​skinned vehicles were destroyed by the Israeli Air Force as they 157

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Cities/Towns Armoured Units

Map 5  The Six-​Day War, 1967: The Israeli advance in the Sinai

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tried to escape; others were knocked out in several tank battles, some conducted by Israeli tanks at long range. Lieutenant Yael Dayan recorded that the ‘road from Jebel Libni to El Arish was a long cemetery of unburied dead . . . Trucks and guns, tanks and armoured cars and jeeps and more tanks, an endless convoy of defeat’.12 According to IDF estimates, 15,000 Egyptians were killed, 5,500 taken prisoner, with around 800 Egyptian tanks either captured or destroyed. The Israelis lost 300 killed and 1,000 wounded. On the other two fronts, the IDF Armoured Corps was also successful. Two armoured brigades in the Jordan Valley contributed to the destruction of the Jordanian Army, which had been able to field 270 tanks, mainly M48 Pattons and Centurion Mark IIIs. On the northern front, around 360 Syrian tanks –​mainly Soviet machines, but including some German Panzer IVs  –​were defeated in the final phase of the war, despite the terrain being unfavourable to IDF armour.13 Even taking account of the advantage of virtual air superiority, the performance of IDF mechanised units had been outstanding. What were the causes of this stunning and unexpected victory? In the Six-​Day War, the IDF Armoured Corps adhered to a series of basic principles not dissimilar to those practised by German tank troops in the Second World War. The first of these was the necessity of taking the fight to the enemy’s territory as early as possible, a task for which the Corps was best suited among the ground troops. This did not mean, however, that armour could not fulfil defensive missions as well. Despite the need to disperse forces between three fronts, the IDF adhered to the principle of concentration of armour, whereas their enemies did not. The superiority of Israel’s formations over its opponents, despite being outnumbered, was due to the quality of training of the tank crews, especially the high standards of gunnery achieved in long-​range sniping, firing on the move and at night. It was realised that commanders needed to lead from the front so they could respond quickly to rapidly changing battlefield situations. It was obvious that air superiority enabled mechanised forces to concentrate: without this, they would have had to disperse during the day and support elements would have had to move at night. Finally, one of the keys to success was the ability of IDF armour to gain and maintain the initiative, despite two attempts by the Egyptian Army to regain it.14 While these principles can be found in other historical examples of the successful employment of armour, there are certain details which help explain more clearly the Israeli success with mechanised forces. The high quality of training was not simply a matter of gunnery practice: in addition to a high number of hours driving, there was an emphasis on creating tank crews who stayed together. Some crews who fought in 1967 had previously fought together in 1956. An indication of the superior levels of training was that an Israeli crew spent at least ten times the amount of time firing and driving than an Arab crew. Moreover, in contrast to their Arab opponents, Israeli commanders followed an informal policy of driving through hostile towns with their turret hatches open. While this led to high casualties among commanders, it drastically reduced tank losses from short-​range anti-​tank weapons. The willingness to take risks was carried through into another tactic used in the Sinai and West Bank –​driving through towns or defensive systems, shooting at everything and not stopping to mop up. And IDF armour was willing to seek paths through areas considered by others as impassable terrain: when 159

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crossing desert areas, chicken wire was sometimes laid by a specially adapted four-​wheel vehicle in order to give tracked vehicles better traction when moving across sand.15 In addition to IDF strengths, there were a series of Arab problems caused by Soviet doctrine and equipment which further explain the magnitude of the victory, especially over the Egyptians. One reason why the rapidity of the Arab defeat came as such a shock was that, by the time of the outbreak of the war, 3,500 Egyptian officers and specialists had graduated from Eastern bloc military academies. In fact, the two Egyptian armoured divisions followed Soviet Army doctrine and force structure closely. But this gave the commanders a divisional structure for desert warfare with no bulldozer capability, as well as PT-​76 amphibious vehicles. Other equipment deficiencies could be seen in a lack of tank transporters within units, which the IDF possessed in large numbers, together with tank-​and bulldozers, whereas Egyptian units were required to await the arrival of engineer units. Soviet doctrine dictated that AFV crews move with their hatches closed as protection against the anticipated radiation from nuclear strikes; as a result, the crews of PT-​76s and Josef Stalin III heavy tanks had to endure high temperatures in their machines, reducing their responsiveness and so leading to a slow rate of fire. Egyptian divisions and tank brigades moved in columns which were easy to ambush; if ambushed, they fought as individual machines rather than offering a coordinated response. The Egyptians often placed their tanks or SU-​100s behind fortified positions or revetments, thus depriving them of their mobility. Soviet doctrine provided for a system of centralised artillery control, which was designed for large artillery strikes with hundreds or thousands of guns: such a system was inappropriate for a fast-​moving battle under desert conditions. There are two major factors to bear in mind when considering the outcome of the Six-Day War: first, the air superiority achieved by Israel at the outset of the conflict; and second, that Israel had to fight a war on three fronts. On the central front, the Jordanian Army had deployed two armoured brigades and seven infantry brigades, some 270 M48s and Centurion Mark IIIs in total, but Israeli armour succeeded in destroying the Jordanian Army. On the northern front with Syria, Israel was faced with around 360 Syrian tanks of Russian origin, as well as some German Panzer IV tanks dug in as pill-​ boxes, but still succeeded in capturing the Golan Heights. When the results of the fighting on all three fronts are considered, the final outcome was impressive. Only 50 Israeli tanks were destroyed beyond repair, while about 1,100 tanks and 1,500 APCs were captured from the Arab armies. Around 700 Israelis were killed. The territorial results were spectacular as the Sinai Peninsula, the Golan Heights and the West Bank were seized. Both the West Bank and the Golan Heights were conquered in three days.16 The impact of the Six-​Day War could be seen rapidly in both Israel and the Arab states. In Israel there was a sense of euphoria. The Sinai region had become a buffer zone, while the strategically vital Golan Heights had been conquered, so the threat to Israel’s security had been reduced. In Egypt, the defeat almost toppled Nasser, but a thorough reorganisation of the army was undertaken. Moreover, Egypt began to receive large supplies of new Soviet equipment, including many T-​55s to replace the losses sustained in the war. In fact, there was little evidence of peace: on 8 September 1967, Nasser began 160

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a strategy of attrition against Israeli forces close to the Suez Canal, with 10,000 rounds being fired at Israeli positions. This was the beginning of the ‘War of Attrition’ (1967–​70), which also pushed Israel towards the construction of the Bar-​Lev Line, designed to provide underground shelters for IDF troops defending the eastern bank of the Suez Canal. Apart for long-​range sniping with tank guns (this was so difficult that IDF crews were given a bottle of champagne if they scored a hit), the War of Attrition saw two significant tank raids. The first of these took place on 9 September 1969 when a company-​size group of captured T-​55s, BTR-​50s and wheeled Soviet APCs launched a daring raid against a radar installation and surface-​to-​air missile sites. Commanded by Colonel ‘Pinko’ Harel, this small force, supported by coordinated air attacks, even managed to capture one of five T-​62 tanks which were under evaluation in Egypt at the time. The second followed sporadic fire-​fights along the Golan Heights when an IDF tank raid into Syrian territory took place in June 1970. Commanded by Colonel Moshe Bril, a force of around 30 Centurions were used together with engineer half-​tracks and tank-​dozers. Following an air attack, and using supporting artillery fire, the IDF force succeeded in ambushing a Syrian tank brigade sent to assist their own forces, destroying around 35 T-​55s. Following this raid, the Israeli-​Syrian border remained quiet until the outbreak of the Yom Kippur War. These two successful raids may have assisted General Israel Tal in his campaign for all-​tank brigades, an argument based on the disappointing performance of mechanised infantry during the Six-​Day War, the belief that APCs had poor survivability on the battlefield and the recent successes of Israeli heavy armour. Aware of the rearming of the Egyptian Army in particular by the USSR, the IDF began to re-​equip its own forces. Further M48A1 Patton tanks and Centurions, and, beginning in 1970, American M60A1 tanks, were purchased, together with M113 APCs and M107 self-​propelled artillery. Moreover, the tanks and APCs which had been captured from Arab armies underwent a programme of upgrading. In fact, shortly before the Yom Kippur War, 78 per cent of IDF tanks were assessed as superior to the standard version of the T-​55.17 Nevertheless, Israel was still taken by surprise in 1973.

The Yom Kippur War (1973) When the Yom Kippur War broke out, the IDF was outnumbered in main battle tanks, fielding 1,700 to the 3,050 of their opponents. The Egyptians under President Anwar Sadat aimed to secure a limited military victory over Israel and improve their international standing, while destroying the ‘myth’ of Israeli military superiority, thereby causing the United States to question their support for Israel. The Syrians sought to cooperate with Egypt, launching a simultaneous offensive, with the goal of conquering the Golan Heights. What proved decisive in terms of armour were many of the factors which had decided the Six-​Day War, among them superior initiative and training amongst Israeli tank crews. The scale of the armoured battles, the largest fought since the Second World War, led to intense interest on the part of Western military officers and analysts, as it 161

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seemed to hold many insights relevant to the situation in central Europe, even if the results of the war were open to a variety of interpretations.18 The most immediate observation which was made on the war was that the Egyptian and Syrian armies had succeeded in achieving strategic and technological surprise over Israel. In fact, the IDF had already been warned about the danger posed by Sagger anti-​ tank missiles. During clashes along the Golan Heights in the winter of 1972–​73, the Syrians had employed Saggers and knocked out a number of Israeli tanks. The Israeli Army subsequently used mortars to suppress the Sagger fire and lost no more tanks. However, despite the collation of considerable data, the creation of an instructional manual on the Sagger and the communication of this to the Armoured Corps, this wealth of information was only absorbed by Northern Command and not picked up by Southern Command or the reserve forces.19 When the Egyptians successfully crossed the Suez Canal on 6 October 1973, the next few days turned into the worst ever disaster for the IDF’s mechanised force. As a result of intelligence failures, misperceptions of Egyptian preparations, poor staff work and obsolete infantry equipment, the IDF was forced to fight a static type of war in the first few days which increased their losses.20 The Egyptian planning for the attack was extremely good. Their Defence Minister and Commander-​in-​Chief, Ahmed Ismail Aly, had tried to develop a plan which aimed at negating the Israeli strengths, particularly in terms of their air superiority, and exploiting their aversion to high casualties. SA-​2 and SA-​3 surface-​to-​air missiles were supplemented by SA-​6 missiles and the automatic cannon of the ZSU-​23-​4 in an effort to protect troops against the Israeli Air Force (IAF). The crossing of the Suez Canal and the subsequent occupation of the Bar Lev Line was a masterpiece of planning. Although the IDF reacted very quickly, and the two reserve divisions which were intended for use in the Sinai were at the front before midday on 7 October, 20 hours after the Arab offensive had begun, this did not prevent some catastrophic attacks. On 6 October, the armoured reserve which was to the rear of the Bar Lev Line had been thrown forward and almost 100 tanks had been destroyed by the Egyptian Sagger missile screen. The following day the Sinai garrison threw around 100 tanks into action, which were all virtually destroyed, although they did prevent the further expansion of the bridgehead. On 8 October, the third day of the war, around 50 tanks were lost in poorly organised counter-​attacks. These opening actions have attracted much attention and, at the time, provoked various claims that the tank was finished as a weapon. But close analysis does show that the causes of Israeli failures were due to errors which could have been avoided. One of the reasons for the armour losses was that the experience of the 1967 war had caused Israel to neglect mechanised infantry because it could not keep pace with the tanks. In addition, artillery support was ignored because it was assumed the IAF would provide the armour with supporting fire. To these weaknesses was added the fact that 225 tanks were in positions 20 km east of the Suez Canal, but were not moved forward prior to the Egyptian attack as the Israeli cabinet did not want to provoke an increase in political tension. Furthermore, the failure of Israeli tanks in unsupported counter-​attacks was due to delays because they had waited to try and identify where the direction of the main thrust would come: in fact, the Egyptians had advanced on a broad front. Then, as the 162

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Photo 8  IDF Sho’t Centurions on the Golan Heights, October 1973 tanks moved forward, some of them, in trying to occupy pre-​prepared firing positions, ran into minefields, then Egyptian anti-​tank infantry teams armed with RPG-​7s. Once this threat had been countered, they were faced with a high density of Sagger anti-​tank weapons.21 In the opening days of the war on the northern front, the initial Syrian attacks threatened to swamp Israel’s defences. When the offensive started, the Syrian Army possessed around 1,700 tanks to the 170 Israeli machines, a ratio of 10:1. To the north of the Golan Heights, the Israeli 7th Armoured Brigade halted the advance of the 7th Syrian Infantry Division towards defensive positions in rugged terrain. On the southern sector, however, the Syrians came extremely close to achieving a complete breakthrough. By the evening of the first day, the Israeli 188th (Barak) Brigade had been reduced to 15–​20 tanks and it was facing 400 Syrian tanks; by the afternoon of 7 October, the Barak Brigade had virtually disappeared. Yet, the fact that it had held the Syrians up for as long as it did allowed time for reserves to be brought up and the gaps in the line to be plugged. Strangely, even though the Syrians came within an ace of overrunning the Israeli assembly zone at the base of the Golan Heights, they were not able to break through. Explanations vary as to why they did not force home their attack: one version is that they did not want to advance beyond their air defence umbrella; another is that they had not expected to achieve such a success and were psychologically unprepared to exploit it; and, finally, that they planned to try and destroy units as they were rushed to the front. Meanwhile, in the northern sector, after 72 hours of combat the 7th Brigade was no longer capable of resistance; but, just as they had informed the division commander they could not hold out any longer, the Syrians began to retreat. 163

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On the morning of 10 October, Israel started a counter-​offensive. The 7th Armoured Brigade launched an attack in the north followed by Major-​General Dan Laner’s division which broke through the main Syrian defensive line along the Kuneitra-​Damascus road. On 11 October, a strong Iraqi counter-​attack was beaten back by Laner who inflicted considerable losses on the Iraqi armoured force. By 12 October, Israeli artillery was starting to hit Damascus. The following day, an Iraqi armoured division, which had been sent to reinforce the Syrians, was ambushed by an Israeli division which inflicted heavy tank losses on the Iraqis. The Syrians were now extremely worried by the way in which their offensive had disintegrated, so they appealed to the Egyptians to launch an offensive in Sinai to take some of the pressure off them. The reluctant compliance by the Egyptian Army on 14 October led to their strong showing in the opening days of the war unravelling.22 On 14 October, General Ismail ordered the Egyptian 21st Armoured Division, the 3rd Armoured Brigade of the 4th Armoured Division and some other brigades to move over bridges into Sinai and to launch an attack. Both field army commanders objected, but President Sadat wished to take pressure off the Syrians. While some temporary gains were made in thrusts towards the Mitla Pass and Abu Rudeis, the spearheads were too far apart. They received a battering first from the Israeli Air Force since they had advanced beyond their air umbrella. Then a counter-​attack by Israeli paratroopers and armour inflicted further attrition, supported by recently delivered TOW anti-​tank missiles. By the end of the day the Egyptians had lost around 264 tanks to Israeli losses of less than 30 (some writers give Israeli losses as six tanks), a fairly healthy exchange rate for the IDF. This success now encouraged the Israelis to put into action what they had already been planning –​a crossing of the Suez Canal. They picked the point where the Canal flows into the Great Bitter Lake since the lake itself would protect one flank of the force conducting the crossing. There then began some extremely heavy fighting, and the battle see-​sawed back and forth over the next eight days. The aim of the Israelis was to isolate the Egyptian Army to the east of the Suez Canal by occupying the western bank. After some initial successes, particularly by paratroopers led by Ariel Sharon, two armoured divisions became bogged down. General Avraham Adan’s division was, though, able to destroy the 25th Egyptian Tank Brigade in an ambush on 17 October. Slowly Israel’s counter-​offensive began to take shape. On 19 October, they drove into the rear of the Egyptian Third Army. An attempt was made to call a ceasefire on 22 October, but the raiding Israeli units and Egyptian forces around the area of the bridgehead were so mixed together that the ceasefire proved impossible to implement. On 23 October, elements of General Adan’s division began to cut off Suez City from contact with the west. Moreover, by 24 October, General Magen’s division continued to push south, successfully isolating the Third Army. On the same day, IDF forces attempted to capture Suez, but although they penetrated into the centre of the town, fierce resistance forced them back. On the evening of 24 October, the second ceasefire was brought into effect. On the Sinai front, Israel had turned the tables on Egypt, but the final result was not clear cut. Still, if the war in the Sinai had come close to a draw, the Israeli performance on her northern front had been remarkable.23 164

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By the time of the final ceasefire on 24 October 1973, Israel had destroyed in total 2,300 enemy tanks (1,300 on the northern front, 1,000 in the south). In addition, they had destroyed 450 aircraft and killed 15,000 enemy soldiers, with 35,000 wounded. The Israelis themselves had suffered 8,000 casualties; of these 2,400 were killed. They lost 102 aircraft and 800 tanks, although of the tanks only half could not be recovered for reconstitution or cannibalisation. Not surprisingly, around half the tank and aircraft losses occurred in the opening three days of the war. In the aftermath of the war, considerable attention was focused on the anti-​tank weaponry, especially the Soviet-​supplied Sagger missile system, which had apparently delivered such a high kill rate for the Egyptian Army. Some accounts implied that the IDF had been surprised by new technology. But beyond the ill-​advised IDF tank counter-​attacks without infantry and artillery support, the Egyptian success was based on their employment of a range of old and new Soviet anti-​tank weapons, including recoilless tube 82mm and 107mm artillery-​fired shaped-​charge rounds. The RPG-​7 was used more effectively than its predecessor (the RPG-​2) had been in 1967 because Egyptian infantry had been trained to wait until IDF tanks were in range. While some Sagger missiles were fired from BMP-​1s, more effective were infantrymen equipped with the weapons which had a range of 2,500 m. One reason for the improved performance was that the USSR had provided Arab armies with mobile training ranges; in the Egyptian Army, Sagger teams were able to fire 25 practice rounds a day for several months before the outbreak of war. Saggers were responsible for more IDF armour destroyed than any other weapon because the operator was in control of the missile in flight, so in the absence of suppressive fire it was relatively simple to hit a tank on the move. The explanation for the scale of the IDF armour losses from 6–​8 October was a combination of anti-​armour weapons, that the Egyptian infantry had been well trained in their use and the effectiveness of bridging equipment and techniques which enabled to Egyptians to cross the Suez Canal. To make matters worse, though, the Israelis possessed no mobile, direct-​fire, anti-​ tank artillery in 1973. How then did the IDF achieve the later successes in the Sinai against the Egyptian Army? After the opening three days, a lull in the fighting took place as the Egyptians began to move their SAM systems across the Suez Canal. Once they began their advance, they moved forward in three largely uncoordinated columns. Each of the three IDF armoured divisions could tackle one of the columns. This time, IDF tanks employed their main guns from hull-​down positions or bunkers, opening fire on the basis of carefully coordinated company fire plans. Sagger teams were dealt with by concentrated small-​arms fire from mechanised infantry mounted in M113s, who simply aimed at the source of a Sagger missile, thereby disrupting the control of the missile by the operators. Given that the flight time per 1,000 m was at least 10 seconds, it was possible to suppress the Sagger teams even during IDF counter-​attacks which hit the Egyptian columns from one or both flanks.24 The fighting on the Golan Heights had led to an even more remarkable recovery, after the Syrians had come within a hair’s breadth of breaking through. The armoured units had never had more than 400 tanks at any one time on the Golan, whereas the Syrians had deployed almost 1,400 tanks and 800–​900 APCs, together with 60,000 men. But by 165

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the time of the ceasefire on 22 October, the IDF had not only regained the territory lost on 6 and 7 October, but had also seized control of 300 square miles of Syrian territory. They had lost around 250 tanks, although nearly 150 were later repaired; 800 of their personnel and 3,500 Syrians were killed. But 1,150 Syrian tanks were knocked out along with 100 Iraqi and around 50 Jordanian tanks. Around 870 Syrian tanks were recovered by the Israelis from the Golan Heights; some of these were subsequently restored to working condition. This success on the Golan suggested that the tank would remain a decisive weapon in the Arab-​Israeli conflict.25 But how was the IDF success to be explained? The Syrians, after all, began their attack on 6 October at night using T-​62 tanks which were equipped with infrared searchlights and which allowed them to identify targets in the dark, whereas Israeli Sho’t Centurions had to rely on either moonlight or searchlights which would give their positions away. Another disadvantage for the Israelis was that their armour was fighting a defensive action for the first time: this required the tanks to be used in a type of combat with which they were much less familiar. Two brigades were also unfamiliar with the terrain. Apart from the luck which the IDF enjoyed at key moments in the fighting on the Golan, the reasons given by the commander of the 77th Battalion, 7th Armoured Brigade, Avigdor Kahalani, fighting on the northern sector, help explain the dramatic success against overwhelming odds. First of all, the IDF armour was able to exploit the terrain, an anti-​tank ditch and pre-​ prepared firing positions. Important in securing the element of surprise was the maintenance of radio silence, switching off searchlights and infrared Starlight scopes. What also helped the IDF defenders was that, although the Syrians did use anti-​tank guided weapons against them, the quality of the gunnery was poor. Moreover, Syrian tank crews lacked initiative, they remained stationary too often and their attacks were uncoordinated. The Syrians also followed Soviet doctrine, which required commanders to enter combat ‘buttoned up’; although IDF tank commanders increasingly kept their heads as low as they could during the fighting or closed the hatches when under artillery fire, they did have an advantage when commanders identified targets with their own eyes. One advantage which holding the high ground offered was that damaged tanks could be recovered more easily, repaired, then returned to the front line. Kahalani believed that good leadership was vital in defending the Golan, as were crews who had been trained to a high standard. He understood the individual situation of each company, something which was communicated to the crews via radio messages during the course of the fighting.26 The Yom Kippur War held many lessons for the IDF, the Arab armies and also the two superpowers. A direct comparison of tanks suggested that the 105mm guns mounted on the Israeli Centurions and M48 Pattons possessed range-​finding systems and ammunition which outperformed the T-​54/​55 tanks; the 105mm gun also outranged the gun of the T-​54/​55. Israeli armour was more mechanically reliable under desert conditions than the Soviet machines, partly due to the better maintenance standards in the IDF.27 Israeli examination and subsequent upgrading of captured T-​54/​55 and T-​62 tanks revealed further reasons for the indifferent Arab tactical performance. The original smoke generator 166

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system was inadequate; bad ventilation and cramped conditions inside the turret and driver’s compartment caused exhaustion during combat; there was even less headroom for the crew in the T-​62 than the T-​54/​55.28 The sheer number of lessons, not to mention tactical and technical data, made the Yom Kippur War one of the most studied conflicts during the Cold War.29

The wars in Lebanon (1976, 1982, 2006) In considering the Arab-​Israeli wars, armour was also to play a key role in the fighting in three separate wars in Lebanon, even if the first of these did not directly involve Israel. The Syrian invasion of Lebanon in 1976 provides, nonetheless, an interesting example of the overestimation of the capabilities of armoured forces by political and military leaders. Given the decision taken in Damascus to intervene in the Lebanese Civil War on the side of the Christians, the Syrians sent an invasion force of 6,000 troops, including a brigade from the 3rd Armoured Division, artillery units and some special forces. The only mobile forces which stood in their way were a handful of armoured cars in the hands of the Muslim, Palestinian Liberation Organisation (PLO) and Druze forces. The Syrians clearly assumed that the appearance of heavy armoured columns would be sufficient to subdue the ‘leftist militias’, an assumption which suggested that they had not seriously considered many of the lessons from the Yom Kippur War. On 1 June 1976, 2,000 troops and 60 T-​54 tanks drove down from the north; in the east, 4,000 men were used together with an armoured brigade equipped with T-​62s and BMP-​1s. Although the Syrians quickly occupied the Beqa’a Valley, the failure to undertake reconnaissance led to one column being ambushed in Sidon by anti-​tank teams firing RPGs and ATGMs, with the loss of 30 T-​62s and the same number of BMP-​1s. The column which advanced on Beirut suffered the same fate due to a failure to support the armour properly. After the failure of the June invasion, reinforcements in September raised troop levels to between 22,000 and 25,000. As part of this build-​up, the 47th Armoured Brigade reinforced the 3rd Armoured Division, bringing the number of tanks in Lebanon to at least 500. Phase 1 of the operation commenced on 28 September and phase 2 on 12 October. Both phases saw heavy but uncoordinated bombardment of the defenders with artillery, mortar and tank fire. Although the Syrians had learned that it was best to advance columns along multiple axes, their tactical performance indicated poor mastery of the basics of combined-​arms combat so essential in the employment of armour.30 The War in Lebanon (1982–​85), like the Yom Kippur War, was characterised by the IDF anticipating aspects of the previous conflict, but adapting quickly when they ran into difficulties. On 6 June 1982, an IDF armoured force moved into southern Lebanon, thereby launching Operation ‘Peace for Galilee’. There were short-​term factors which led to the invasion, in particular the attempted assassination of the Israeli ambassador in London on 3 June by the Abu Nidal group, as well as strategic calculations relating to the presence of the PLO and sizeable elements of the Syrian Army in Lebanon. The official 167

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reason given at the time was the need to create a demilitarised zone so that Israeli settlements would be beyond the range of PLO artillery and rocket strikes. The terrain was not suited to armour: on the costal route north to Beirut, various towns acted as ideal ‘road blocks’; the two mountain ranges (the Lebanon and the Anti-​Lebanon) provided ideal defensive country; the Beqa’a Valley in the east of the country could be swept by fire from surrounding mountains. The PLO in Lebanon consisted of around 15,000 fighters who, in addition to artillery and a variety of anti-​tank and anti-​aircraft weapons, possessed a handful of T-​34 tanks and some UR-​416 personnel carriers. The Syrian Army had around 30,000 troops stationed in Lebanon, as well as around 300 tanks. In addition to the terrain, major air operations also influenced the course of the ground war. On 9 June, the IAF destroyed 19 Syrian surface-​to-​air missile batteries supplied by the USSR, with no Israeli planes lost. During the first week’s fighting 86 Syrian aircraft were shot down, with Israel losing two helicopters and a Skyhawk to PLO missile fire. The air war –​and the Israeli achievement of air superiority –​generated immense interest among NATO nations, but it did not prevent Syrian commando units from delaying Israeli armoured forces with a variety of anti-​tank weapons. During combat operations, helicopters also played a significant role. A ceasefire line was agreed on 12 June, which extended across the country from Beirut through the Beqa’a Valley. After fighting flared again, a new line was agreed on 26 June. The war dragged on during the period of Israeli occupation; a withdrawal of Israeli forces was not sanctioned until June 1985.31 In the advance on the coastal road, IDF forces were presented with three difficult urban battles in Tyre, Sidon and Beirut. In Tyre, the infantrymen remained mounted in M113 APCs as they moved through the city to keep up with the tanks. But PLO fighters with anti-​tank weapons ambushed a paratrooper unit, leading to IDF infantry only advancing on foot in urban areas, with M113s avoiding contact and acting in support roles. Although the PLO defences in Tyre were quickly overcome by one division, in Sidon three divisions were used in the face of fierce resistance. A combined-​arms force was used by the IDF, with smoke employed extensively. In clearing the PLO camps, tanks were used to break through the outer defence after which infantry led the attack inside the camps. Tanks and self-​propelled guns were used in Beirut as infantry moved in to slice off small sections of PLO-​held ground.32 The IDF armoured advance had consisted of four prongs, one took the coastal route to Beirut, another moved through the centre of the country, reaching Ein Dara by 8 June, the other two thrusts moved through the east of the country, the third passing through the town of Karoun, the fourth moving through the area around Rashaiya. In the area east of Lake Karoun, forces commanded by Major-​General Avigdor Ben-​Gal were engaged in a heavy battle with the Syrian 1st Armoured Division, which lost some 150 tanks. As the IDF advance progressed, the Syrian 3rd Armoured Division, equipped with T-​72 tanks, was moved into the Beqa’a Valley, which raised the Syrian tank strength in Lebanon to 700.33 On 11 June, nine Syrian T-​72s were destroyed by Israeli fire, although contrary to claims they were destroyed by Merkavas, these kills appear to have been scored by 105mm 168

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guns firing armour-​piercing, fin-​stabilised, discarding-​sabot ammunition (which relies on kinetic energy) and helicopter-​launched TOW anti-​tank guided weapons. Manned by a crew of three, with a 125mm main gun, the T-​72 was considered superior to the US M60 tank; that it was possible to destroy it, apparently with ease, was as noteworthy as the destruction of the SAM batteries by the Israeli Air Force. According to Israeli military sources the T-​72 was a good tank but one which demanded proper training for the crews: poor maintenance could lead to the engine overheating and in-​bore detonations in the gun barrel. It was concluded in Israel that the engine was underpowered given the heavy armour which had been adopted for the T-​72, which had caused difficulties in the rugged terrain of Lebanon.34 In terms of its armour, around 1,240 tanks were sent into Lebanon by the IDF, including Centurions with add-​on armour. Probably no more than 250 Merkava tanks saw action, marking effectively its first serious battlefield test. The design work for the Merkava had begun in 1970 under the direction of General Israel Tal. With a crew of four, the Merkava 1 proved itself to be a safe vehicle for the crews: there were no secondary explosions in any Merkavas, not a single crewman died and only six cases of light burns were reported. This impressive record was due to self-​sealing fuel tanks and fireproof containers for ammunition. However, 25 per cent of the casualties of M60 and Centurion crews were due to burns. According to IDF calculations, in 31 per cent of all hits on a tank it would catch fire. The Merkava, however, caught fire only 15 per cent of the time. The Merkava also performed well when it came to using its infantry rear compartment: three tanks would carry a minimum of ammunition, while a fourth would bring up additional ammunition. The use of the infantry compartment proved extremely useful in street fighting in Beirut; at the same time, the evacuation of wounded soldiers was much easier (in one case 12 soldiers were evacuated in one trip under heavy fire).35 Yet, the employment of the traditional combination of heavy armour with APCs in mountainous and rocky terrain led to heavy and possibly more casualties than necessary. Around 130–​140 Israeli tanks were hit and, of these, 30–​40 were kills. From the evidence available, it appears that the majority of hits were caused by a range of anti-​tank weapons, including RPGs, Sagger missiles and helicopter-​launched HOT missiles. The modified IDF M113 APCs proved particularly vulnerable to anti-​tank fire and burned quickly. Infantry took to advancing behind them on foot. In terms of real success in combat, the record of armour in 1982 does not appear to be particularly good, an observation which applies as much to Syrian armour as it does Israeli. The IDF armour force spent more of its time fighting lone RPG-​armed infantry and helicopters than it did enemy tanks, but Syrian T-​62 tanks appeared fairly simple to destroy, while the BMP-​1 was even more vulnerable than the M113. Despite the short duration of the main clashes between the IDF, PLO fighters and Syrian regulars, the war saw a number of military innovations which were observed for the first time. The Sho’t (‘Scourge’), the Israeli version of the Centurion tank, and the US M60 tank appeared with Blazer reactive armour mounted on the hulls and turrets. This add-​on armour contained an explosive charge which would detonate when hit by a shaped-​charge projectile, thus disrupting the incipient jet’s formation. Nonetheless, the 169

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Merkava still enjoyed higher survivability rates. Another development which pointed to the future battlefield was the use of TOW anti-​tank missiles fired from helicopters. Israeli AH-​1S Cobra and Hughes Defender helicopters apparently knocked out 29 Syrian tanks, while Syrian Gazelle helicopters fired HOT rounds on 100 different occasions. While remotely piloted vehicles had been used by the IDF during the Litani operation in Lebanon in 1978, they were used in 1982 for the first time on a large scale during combat operations. In purely military terms, by previous standards of performance, the cost of the war was quite high for the IDF. Against the PLO, relatively limited casualties were suffered; the vast majority of the casualties were suffered in the fighting with the Syrians. In total, during the war in the south and the siege of Beirut, the IDF lost 368 dead and 2,383 wounded; during the following year of occupation, 148 men were killed and 340 wounded. For a country of Israel’s size these were heavy losses, especially considering the disproportionately high number of officers killed. In addition to the 140 tanks hit (with between 30 and 40 –​mainly M60s –​destroyed), 135 APCs were damaged beyond repair. Syrian dead were estimated at around 1,000, with tank losses estimated at around 400 (at least 72 T-​62s, 120–​130 T-​55s and 9 or 10 T-​72s), with around 90 BMP-​1s destroyed.36 While Israel showed itself to be reticent to be drawn into a ground war in Lebanon after 1985, fighting flared between the IDF and light infantry forces belonging to the Iranian-​backed Hezbollah movement in 2006, a small war sometimes referred to as the Second Lebanon War (12 July–​14 August 2006). Following an attack on a border patrol and the kidnapping of two Israeli soldiers, which led to a bombardment of Hizbollah positions, the IDF attempted to destroy Hezbollah’s capability to launch missile strikes against the Israeli population using mainly airpower. The results were extremely poor. While the involvement of ground troops was limited, the results were disappointing and seemed to suggest that the IDF emphasis on counter-​insurgency had blunted the skills of its tank crews. Hezbollah fighters proved to be well-​trained and determined; they were able to employ a variety of tactics against IDF armour in particular. They often emerged from tunnels to fire anti-​tank weapons, before disappearing again. The employment of IDF ground forces was haphazard, often appearing to have been launched for political effect rather than to achieve specific operational goals. In total 48 to 52 Merkava MBTs were hit during the fighting, and 40 were damaged; projectiles penetrated 20 to 22 tanks, with five completely destroyed (one by an IED on 12 July). Twenty-​four Merkavas were caught in an ambush on 12 August at Wadi al-​Salulei and, of these, 11 were hit by anti-​tank weapons. It was later discovered that tank crews had failed to use their smoke-​generator systems and were lacking the skills to use indirect fire, an indication of the poor level of training. Before the conflict, the emphasis on counter-​insurgency against Palestinians and the increased funds for the IAF had led to cuts in the training budget for the ground forces, especially for divisional and brigade training; training for reserve tank crews had been virtually forgotten. Training for the type of terrain encountered in Lebanon had not been undertaken, while inadequacies in combined-​arms operations were no doubt a result of the considerable training deficiencies. Of 114 IDF personnel killed, 30 were tank crewmen.37 170

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It is ironic that, despite the high technological level achieved in the upgraded Merkava 4 tank, the IDF failed to achieve any demonstrable success against Hezbollah. While Hezbollah fighters were only equipped with anti-​tank weapons, albeit a range of sophisticated systems, they had created a series of impressive defensive positions and were frequently able to predict Israeli moves. Some of the causes of Arab failures in the use of armour since 1948 were, in fact, replicated by the IDF Armoured Corps in Lebanon in 2006.

Conclusion What makes any assessment of the Arab-​Israeli wars problematic is that the majority of informed accounts have been authored or influenced by Israeli writers; in fact, in some standard accounts, IDF unit designations and individuals’ names have been altered for security reasons.38 Nevertheless, the IDF employment of armoured forces since 1956 confirms many of the previous lessons which can be drawn from the conduct of armoured warfare: the importance of intense, frequent and realistic training, flexible communications, tank-​infantry and combined-​arms cooperation, the establishment of air superiority at the start of a campaign, or at least local air superiority, concentration at the decisive point, initiative, an emphasis on manoeuvre and flanking attacks, and a willingness to learn lessons from failures. Tank crews benefited from a militia concept which drew men from different professions who possessed the technical skills and mental flexibility so essential in tank combat. The regularity of wars meant that many were able to draw on previous combat experience when commanding larger formations. Hence, IDF ability in mobile warfare grew incrementally and was based on continual analyses of battle experience. For these reasons, the claim by Brian Bond that Basil Liddell Hart influenced Israeli military theory and practice seems highly questionable.39 Israeli success was, however, often assisted by the tactical and command errors committed by their Arab opponents. There has been a tendency in Israel and the West to explain Arab defeats as stemming from fatalism or their long tradition of bandit-​style operations. If these claims are contentious, it cannot be denied that the structure of Arab societies has meant that the ‘lack of hierarchy’ so essential for tank warfare was rarely present. There seems little doubt, either, that the dictatorial and monarchical political systems in Egypt, Syria, Iraq and Jordan have bred highly centralised command structures which have prevented initiative being exercised or field commanders from making quick decisions. The later reliance of Egypt and Syria on arms supplies from the USSR led to Soviet military instructors hindering them developing their own tactics or procedures, ‘dictating’ at the same time Warsaw Pact doctrine which was designed for central Europe and not the Middle East.40 Recent developments in the region, however, most notably the civil war in Syria, have suggested the future is less likely to involve divisional-​level battles being fought across swathes of desert terrain with large numbers of AFVs. Some of the newer IDF vehicles point more to the increasing significance of combat in built-​up areas, such as the 171

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Nakpadon and Nagmachon IFVs. The Nagmachon, developed for use in Lebanon, is indicative of a trend towards more heavily armoured vehicles, designed to protect the occupants from a range of threats. Based on the Centurion Sho’t hull, it includes thicker belly armour as protection against mines. Later versions feature a large fighting compartment, with several bullet-​proof observation windows, equipped with three or four 7.62mm FN machine-​guns. Its purpose is to carry infantry into urban areas, to enable them to fight from the vehicle, as well as to protect them from mines and a variety of anti-​tank weapons.41 As such, the war in Lebanon in 2006 seems to have confirmed a trend towards a more deadly, high-​intensity, infantry-​based battlefield.

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CHAPTER 9 IRAQ AND THE GULF WARS, 1980–​2 016

It is unfortunate that in the United States Operation ‘Desert Storm’ has sometimes been referred to as ‘Gulf War I’. This is misleading because the wars in Iraq, including the spread of the civil war in Syria into Iraqi territory, should be considered as part of a more or less continuous conflict involving the country which can be traced back to 1980. While still connected to the Arab-​Israeli conflict, these wars have had their own specific dynamic; they also form a key chapter in the history of armoured warfare. The major conflicts have been the Iran-​Iraq War (1980–​88), the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in 1990, and the ensuing multinational operation to eject the invaders, followed by the 2003 Anglo-​American invasion of Iraq, not to mention the use of armour in prolonged occupation and counter-​insurgency duties. Finally, the rise of ISIS and the arming of the Kurdish forces opposing them have created new examples of militia-​type forces attempting to employ mechanised and lightly armoured vehicles.

The Iran-​Iraq War (1980–​88) The Iran-​Iraq War broke out on 22 September 1980 when the Iraqi Air Force launched a surprise attack against ten Iranian airfields; this strike was followed by ground attacks along four separate axes. The war was fuelled by traditional antipathies between Sunnis and Shi’ites, but Saddam Hussein was confident of a quick and easy victory, first because the Iranian revolution of 1979 had led to a reduction in the size of the armed forces in favour of militias and, second, because Saddam had built up Iraqi’s armed forces through a huge arms spending-spree. However, the large stockpile of equipment did not lead to anything other than pitiful territorial gains. By March 1981, Iraqi offensive operations had ground to a halt, and all they occupied were a series of narrow strips along the 1,100 km border. Iraqi units had shown a lack of initiative, often sitting outside undefended towns, only attacking once the Iranians had brought up reinforcements. Another cause of failure was the lack of tactical reconnaissance by units. The embattled Iranian government now appealed to national and religious sentiment among its people, which was certainly one factor which assisted in prolonging the war.1 Another major factor which extended the duration of the fighting was the huge arms shipments which found their way to both belligerents. It is probably the case that the war helped sustain the international arms trade for a decade. Fear of the Iranian Revolution meant that, as the conflict progressed, states became less willing to supply arms to Iran. Hence, while in the first year of the war the USSR sold fuel to Iran and stopped arms

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shipments to Iraq, in January 1982 she signed an agreement with Iraq for the delivery of planes and missiles; in 1983 and 1984 she also completed deliveries of tanks. It has been suggested, and not without good reason, that the superpowers and other leading nations were happy to supply both sides in order to maintain the stalemate, thereby preoccupying the two Islamic states and weakening their military capability.2 After having failed to execute a knock-​out blow, Iraq was faced with a long war and an Iranian mobilisation of its larger population resources. From September 1981 to May 1982, Iran launched a series of cumbersome offensives, led by human-​wave attacks. Still, the Iranians began to learn and they started to launch night attacks, supported by tanks and helicopters. By the end of June 1982 Saddam Hussein had ordered the evacuation of most of Iraq’s paltry initial gains. This merely spurred Iran on: in July she launched a massive attack to try and capture the predominantly Shi’ite city of Basra. Once this failed, an offensive was begun on the central front in October 1982 with Baghdad as its goal. The Iraqi defences held, but they started to employ mustard gas to disrupt the human-​wave assaults. Nonetheless, while Iran held the initiative in the ground war, Iraq was able to maintain air superiority. Due to the stalemate on the ground, a phase known as the ‘War of the Cities’ took place from March to June 1985 which saw missile strikes on Teheran and Baghdad. The following year, Iran launched two major offensives simultaneously: one attack was launched north of Basra, the other in the Fao peninsula, to the west of the Shatt-​al-​Arab waterway. Although the Iraqis launched several counter-​ attacks, the Iranians were able to hold the Fao peninsula, thus severing Iraq’s direct access to the Persian Gulf. The year 1988 turned out to be the year of decision: Iran was by now too exhausted to launch an offensive; in mid-​April Iraq launched an attack which pushed Iranian forces across the Shatt-​al-​Arab. In late July, Iraq attacked in the northern, central and southern sectors, in one attack penetrating 60 km into Iranian territory. The country was now on the brink of military collapse, so the Iranians sued for peace. The war was finally ended on 20 August 1988.3 Given that the Iran-​Iraq War was concluded with both sides militarily exhausted, the obvious question is why did armoured forces not play a more decisive role? In a conflict which seemed to resemble the First World War, why was armour not able to break the deadlock? This question is even more pressing when the size of the mechanised forces available to both sides is considered. At the beginning of the conflict, Iran possessed around 1,700 main battle tanks, including a number of Chieftains, 460 M60A1s, 400 M47s, 240 M48s, as well as around 250 British Scorpion light tanks. She also had 2,000 APCs, including 325 M113s and 500 BTR-​40, BTR-​50 and BTR-​60 vehicles. In contrast, Iraq started the war with 2,850 tanks, including 1,350 T-​55 and T-​62 tanks, as well as between 50 and 100 T-​72s and 4,000 APCs. As a result of the Soviet arms embargo at the outset of the war, Iraq began to purchase French AMX-​30 tanks.4 Thus, the Iraqis enjoyed numerical superiority, while the Iranians possessed better quality tanks. One explanation as to why armour played essentially a supporting role can be sought in the geography of the main theatre of war. Although most of Iraq’s terrain is flat, to the east it is bordered by a mountain range which extends 60 miles north of Basra. On the Iraqi side of the border there is also a large marsh area, which offers ideal defensive 174

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terrain. The ground over which large-​scale armoured operations could have been conducted was Khuzistan, in the south of Iran, but in the summer dry dust is not only sent up into the air by vehicles, betraying their positions, but also very quickly clogs engines. In the winter the rivers swell, filling up the marshes. Both sides undertook deliberate acts of flooding to curtail the trafficability for AFVs. The factor of terrain and its influence on supply suggests that large tank battles would have been difficult to conduct.5 The real reasons for the failure to employ armour more effectively can be sought, however, in the first instance in the rate at which both sides lost and captured AFVs. By 1983, Iran had apparently captured a total of 1,460 tanks and APCs; yet, by late 1985 Iran had only 700–​950 operational APCs. At the time of the invasion, Iraq was in possession of around 2,850 tanks, but in early 1988, it held in its inventory more than 4,500 Soviet T-​54, T-​55, T-​62 and T-​72 tanks, as well as 1,500 Chinese T-​59s and T-​69s, and 60 Romanian M-​77s. Losses during the conflict often appeared to have been caused by factors other than combat. On 10 September 1980, the Iranians claimed that a column of 200 Iraqi tanks, APCs and armoured cars had ended up stranded in salt marshes to the south of Abadan. On 10 October 1980, the Iraqis put a number of Iranian Chieftains on display, which appeared to have been abandoned by their crews; at the end of 1980, Iraqi forces captured 25 Chieftains, 25 M-​60s and over 40 other types of AFV. These losses on both sides of intact or only lightly damaged tanks and AFVs points to an inability to assess terrain properly, logistics failures, refuelling problems, tactical mistakes and poor planning. It provides one very obvious indication of the inability of Iran and Iraq to master the basic techniques of armoured warfare.6 The tactics employed by both sides provides a further indication as to why armoured forces were never exploited in a decisive fashion. During the opening offensives, Iraqi tanks moved into hull-​down positions, but waited until heavy artillery bombardments had been completed before moving forward. This methodical, cautious approach, which was characterised by using tanks as mobile artillery, squandered their numerical advantage. At the same time, in the first two or three years of the war, they possessed too few divisions and units were often spread too thinly along the front. Iraqi armour floundered when drawn into urban fighting, often falling victim to Iranian RPGs and ATGMs. Iran initially used its armour in a more flexible way, even though its offensives were invariably based around infantry forces; and, while Iran proved adept at countering Iraqi armour, it struggled to employ armour in offensive operations. Like the Iraqis, the Iranians were unable to use tanks in manoeuvre-​based actions, tending to employ them in infantry support roles and as part of static defences. In short, the type of professional leadership necessary for mobile war was lacking on both sides.7 At the start of the conflict, Iranian forces committed many of the basic errors made by poorly trained armies unfamiliar in the conduct of mechanised operations. Tactics were poor, combined-​arms cooperation was, at best, primitive, and the tactical siting of tanks in static positions often invited their destruction. In a badly organised counter-​ attack on 11 January 1981, the Iranians lost 100 tanks and, at the end of September 1981, they simply abandoned 150 M48A5 tanks; a further 196 tanks were lost on 22 March 1982. But as the war progressed, the Iranians began to learn, illustrated by the offensive 175

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operation in February 1986 on the Fao peninsula. The marshy terrain was not suited to armoured vehicles; but Iran had by this point learnt the importance of dispersing their forces so that the Iraqi Air Force could not find any inviting targets. They also used US-​ supplied TOW ATGMs against Iraqi tanks and bunkers, for instance, during a counter-​ attack on Mehran on 2 July 1986 when they captured 20 AFVs. The Iranian offensive in January and February 1987 saw them successfully destroy 95 tanks and APCs, again partly through their employment of TOW ATGMs; in April 1987, many more vehicles were destroyed in a similar fashion. These examples seem to indicate Iran’s growing ability to counter the threat of Iraqi armour. Given the limited capabilities of the Iranian revolutionary militias who fought alongside the regular army, their exploitation of anti-​armour weapons and tanks in the face of Iraqi air superiority appears to have been fairly competent. The real question, however, is why the Iraqis proved so inept given their consistent numerical advantage in AFVs. It appears that for much of the war they thought in terms of defending territory rather than destroying enemy units. This led to their tendency to wear out tank gun barrels by using them as mobile artillery. Yet, paradoxically, they achieved relatively few hits on Iranian tanks with ATGMs, although like their opponents they used RPG-​7s effectively in close combat. At the same time, in the opening phase of the war, Iraqi T-​72 tanks were reportedly held close to Baghdad, either to protect the capital or as a form of ‘insurance policy’ against a coup. The main problems for Iraq were, however, poor maintenance of their armoured vehicles and low technical skills, coupled with their failure to manoeuvre tanks in combat.8 The final phase of the war did, however, see the Iraqis mastering the basics of combined-​arms warfare. On 17 April 1988, Iraq launched a campaign which lasted four months and destroyed Iran’s powers of resistance. There were five major battles –​Al Faw, Fish Lake, Majnoon, Dehloran and Qasre Shirin –​with the decisive offensive Al Faw, which saw two main thrusts combined with amphibious landings behind enemy lines. In a manner reminiscent of earlier First World War battles, the Iraqis dispensed with the long artillery preparation taught them by Soviet advisors, limiting their artillery barrage to one hour. In the remaining battles, mechanised forces were employed on a large scale, exploiting ground which had become dry; on some occasions they made sweeping thrusts. With Iranian armour depleted to dangerously low levels, the Iraqi forces were at last able to launch the type of mobile offensives which might have been possible earlier had they been supported by coordinated close air support and well-​directed artillery fire. Another key to the final successes was that the aim was limited –​to convince the Iranians that they could no longer continue the war. For this reason, Iraq’s army did not overextend itself.9 Nonetheless, the failure of both sides to employ armour effectively was at least in some measure a function of their respective political systems. The leadership of Iraq, in other words Saddam Hussein, would not permit one branch of the army to contact another, in case they used the communications system to plan an uprising. An army commander could not call for immediate air support; he would have to send his request

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via Baghdad; and since the requests took so long to process, the situation had changed by the time the air support arrived. Moreover, the Iraqi Army was prevented from learning lessons from its defeats. The loss in 1986 of the city of Mehran led to Major-​General Adin Tawfiq receiving a recall to Baghdad; he was never heard of again. In the case of Iran, the Shi’ite government sought to exploit revolutionary and religious fervour, secure in the knowledge that it had a population of 45 million, while the population of Iraq was only around 15 million. Hence, there appeared to be no pressing need to save lives through the ‘economy of force’ missions typically undertaken by armoured units, as this would have required a professional officer corps, and that had been disbanded in the wake of the revolution in favour of militias and revolutionary guard units. Instead, in the latter half of the war, Iranian operations deliberately sought to wear down a better-​equipped opponent psychologically as well as through attrition. Attacks were often limited in their goals, aiming to inflict damage on their opponents, but without sustaining too high casualty levels in their own units. In fact, the Iranians proved more innovative in their development of infantry tactics, in their use of helicopters and in marsh fighting, accepting that they could not challenge Iraq in large battles between mechanised forces.10

The Persian Gulf War (1990–​91) Needless to say, the Persian Gulf War was intimately linked to Iraq’s costly victory in the Iran-​Iraq War. The conflict had caused immense financial damage to the country, quite apart from the lives lost. Saddam’s shackling of his generals had caused considerable discontent in the army, leading to two attempts on his life by officers in late 1988, another in September 1989, followed by a fourth in January 1990. In addition to debts to arms-​supplier nations running into billions of dollars, the war with Iran had plunged Iraq into a deep crisis. Building on the widespread feeling that Iraq had legitimate claims on Kuwaiti territory, Saddam’s solution was to invade the small neighbouring state of Kuwait on 2 August 1990, which was led by a helicopter-​borne assault on Kuwait City. The invasion force consisted of 140,000 troops, 1,800 tanks, and was spearheaded by the Republican Guard Hammurabi and Medina armoured divisions. The 16,000-​man Kuwaiti Army had not been mobilised to avoid creating any provocations, so resistance was swept aside within hours, although sporadic fighting went on for several days.11 In many accounts of what is sometimes referred to as the Gulf War of 1991, the actual Iraqi invasion of Kuwait is often discussed only within the context of diplomatic reactions. It should not be forgotten, however, that on the first day Kuwait’s 35th Brigade managed to deploy and engage the Hammurabi and Medina divisions. Late on 1 August, the operations officer of the 35th Kuwaiti Brigade learned of the imminent invasion and alerted his unit. Although the actual number of Iraqi vehicles destroyed will probably never be known, the Kuwaiti 35th Brigade succeeded in inflicting considerable losses

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using its Chieftain tanks. The key to success was that, in the midst of a confused situation, the commander of the brigade trusted his own judgement and ignored orders which he thought made no sense; and the Iraqi divisions clearly did not anticipate any opposition. The following day, the brigade escaped into Saudi Arabia. This was, in effect, the first tank action of the 1990–​91 Persian Gulf War.12 The result of the Iraqi occupation of Kuwait was that Saudi Arabia declared itself to be willing to accept American troops on its soil, in part to prevent an Iraqi attack on the kingdom, but also to create the basis for a military campaign to eject the Iraqi Army from the country it had just occupied. Gradually a multinational coalition began to be put together, which was essential given the sensitivities surrounding large numbers of Western troops arriving in Saudi Arabia. The opening phase was known as ‘Desert Shield’, since the initial aim was to protect Saudi Arabia from further Iraqi aggression. Already by 24 August the 82nd Airborne Division was in place, including a battalion of M551 Sheridan tanks, to deter the Iraqis from launching any form of cross-​border incursion into Saudi Arabia. In the ports, some units were able to exchange older M1 tanks for the M1A1 (which had improved armour) and M3 Bradleys for the M3A1 (it had a fire suppression system and filter equipment to counter NBC threats). General Carl Vuono conducted an upgrade of the M1 so that armour battalions were equipped with the 120mm gun; reactive armour was fitted to the older M60 tanks. The first units of US VII Corps began arriving in December 1990, the final ones only arriving at the front just before the beginning of the ground campaign. Important in the build-​up was also the part played by the leading commanders: the overall US commander, General H. Norman Schwarzkopf, had a sound knowledge of the Gulf region, while Lieutenant-​ General Prince Khalid Bin Sultan al-​Saud acted as an important bridge between the Western-​dominated coalition and Saudi Arabia.13 The move to drive Iraqi forces out of Kuwait was named Operation ‘Desert Storm’. It saw one of the largest concentrations of heavy armour since the Second World War. The troop numbers were as significant:  532,000 US troops, 35,000 British, 13,500 French, 95,000 Saudi Arabian, 40,000 Egyptian and 20,000 Syrian, as well as various other smaller contingents. A total of 1,904 M1A1 Abrams tanks and 1,730 Bradley IFVs were assigned to deployed units, while there were other American, British and French tanks and tracked vehicles, including self-​propelled artillery. One of the initial difficulties which the M1 and British Challenger tanks posed was their weight. Only one M1 could be transported at any one time by the C-​5 Galaxy, the largest cargo aircraft in the US Air Force. The vast majority had to be transported by cargo ship. There were also fears that sand would interfere with the combat capability of the heavy tanks and that the desert conditions might affect the complex electronics. The Iraqis were only able to field around 500 T-​72s, 1,600 T-​62s and 700 obsolete T-​55s.14 The advance of the mechanised forces was to be facilitated by the extensive air campaign which was launched on 16/​17 January 1991. Massive air strikes not only lowered Iraqi morale, but they also accounted for some tanks, disrupted command and control, and made resupply of many Iraqi units virtually impossible. Iraqi armoured forces were also severely hampered  –​continuing the habits of the Iran-​Iraq War  –​by too much 178

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micro-​management from the top and the active discouragement of any initiative on the part of lower-​level commanders. The Iraqi leadership made the mistake of trying to defend Kuwait. However, the American-​led forces simply outflanked their defensive positions, divided the Iraqi forces by threatening an amphibious landing on the coast with Marines Corps units and by employing vastly superior and accurate firepower through artillery and multiple rocket-​launchers. Before the ground offensive opened, a first clash of forces occurred when the brief but bloody battle at Al Khafji took place on 29 January. The Iraqi 5th Mechanised Division, supported by brigades from the 1st Mechanised and 3rd Armoured Divisions, attacked the almost empty Saudi city near the Kuwaiti border. Accounts vary as to what happened and where Iraqi units were actually hit. Saudi and Qatari ground forces retook the town on 31 January. What does seem to have occurred was that an Iraqi brigade-​sized force became stuck in an obstacle belt when it attempted to re-​enter Iraqi defensive positions at the wrong point after having been driven back from the town. A second attack was hit by aircraft and missiles before it passed through Iraqi lines. Another mechanised brigade was driven back from the town by coalition ground and air attacks. The Iraqi operation had been probably too complex to execute successfully; what it did demonstrate was that the vastly superior air power resources of the Coalition would make any significant movement by Iraqi armour extremely difficult.15 The operational plan for driving Iraqi forces out of Kuwait, together with the aim of inflicting serious damage to their military capabilities, was based on the knowledge that air superiority would be achieved quickly. This would allow Coalition air power to bombard Iraqi forces relentlessly over a period of weeks, reducing their powers of resistance. The ground forces consisted of Joint Forces Command (East), an essentially Arab grouping moving up the Kuwaiti coastline towards Kuwait City and Joint Forces Command (North), another Arab grouping moving through the western areas of Kuwait. Positioned between these two forces was 1st Marine Expeditionary Force, while the 4th Marine Expeditionary Brigade was to tie down Iraqi forces by threatening an amphibious landing. Finally, US VII Corps would launch a thrust into Iraq, close to Kuwait’s western border, with strong mechanised forces consisting of the US 1st and 3rd Armored Divisions, 3rd Infantry and 1st Mechanized Infantry Divisions, the UK 1st Armoured Division (4th and 7th Armoured Brigades), a cavalry regiment, a helicopter brigade and artillery brigades. To the west of this force, a sweeping ‘left hook’ would be made around the main Iraqi defensive line by XVIII Corps, consisting of the French 6th Light Armoured Division, together with US helicopter and artillery brigades, the 82nd Airborne, 24th Mechanized Infantry Division and 101st Airborne. The greatest element of uncertainty was how long Iraqi resistance would last.16 On 24 February 1991, the ground offensive was launched on the already weakened Iraqi forces in Kuwait. In tank versus tank combat, the M1A1 proved to be vastly superior to the best tank in the Iraqi inventory, the Russian T-​72. The T-​72 often had its turret blown off by secondary explosions when it was hit, something which did not occur in T-​55s. Western tanks were equipped with long-​range target-​acquisition systems, laser range-​finders and computerised fire-​control systems. The M1 and the Challenger could 179

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Photo 9  An abandoned Iraqi T-​62, Persian Gulf War, 1991 both destroy the T-​72 from beyond the range of its 125mm cannon. In fact, a Western APC equipped with a TOW missile could hit a T-​72 from 3,500 metres, again outside the range of the T-​72’s gun. The M1 outranged the T-​72 by around 1,000 metres and was able to fire on the move due to its stabilised gun mount. Iraqi tank tactics seemed to be based on their bad habits from the Iran-​Iraq War, as many of them were dug-​in in hull-​down positions; but this made them vulnerable to Allied air strikes. When Iraqi tanks tried to engage in mobile warfare, they suffered badly. One of the decisive differences between Soviet armour and the M1A1 was the latter’s thermal sights, which were not affected by the thick clouds of smoke coming from the burning Kuwaiti oil wells. Many gunners were able to use their night sights in daylight, giving them a decisive advantage over the Iraqi tank crews who could not see their opponent because of the smoke and due to the long ranges at which M1 tanks were able to engage them.17 The performance of US armoured units and equipment is illustrated well by the case of the Battle of 73 Easting fought on 26–​27 February. This saw the US 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment, part of US VII Corps, pitted against the 18th Brigade of the Tawakalna Mechanised Division and the 9th Armoured Brigade, which had taken up a blocking position to allow retreating Iraqi units to escape north. Although A-​10 attacks had softened up the Iraqi positions, a sandstorm mixed with rain had reduced visibility through thermal sights to 1,500 metres. Task Force 1-​7 and Task Force 7-​6 became engaged in an intense exchange of fire, principally with T-​72s and BMP-​1s. The M1A1 Abrams destroyed many Iraqi tanks at ranges between 2,200 and 2,800 metres, although some fired at over 3,000 metres.  Four M1A1s were hit, but the Halon fire suppression system gave each 180

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crew time to escape. The M2 Bradley also performed well in combat; some took several hits without catching fire thanks to the Halon system. The 25mm cannon could destroy the BMP-​1, while the TOW ATGM proved itself capable of killing tanks. The only problem which emerged was that the coaxial machine-​gun tended to jam. By the end of the wider battle of 73 Easting, the Iraqi units had lost 160 tanks, 180 APCs, as well as other equipment, at a cost of three Bradley IFVs destroyed and three damaged.18 The British role in Desert Storm offers a number of points of interest. During Desert Shield, the 7th Armoured Brigade, commanded by Brigadier Patrick Cordingley, arrived in Saudi Arabia in October 1990, equipped with 114 Challenger 1 tanks, along with an armoured infantry battalion with 45 Warrior IFVs. By the end of January 1991, the 1st (UK) Armoured Division, under the command of Major-​General Rupert Smith, had been placed under the command of US VII Corps, by this point reinforced with more armour, including Scorpion and Scimitar light tanks. On the evening of G+1 at 20.30 an assault was made on an Iraqi divisional defensive system. Challengers used their thermal imaging to knock out Iraqi tanks positioned behind sand berms. The heavy rain and soot from burning oil wells did, however, affect the thermal imaging devices in the Challengers. Tank engagements took place at 500 metres or less. Moreover, the Iraqis had discovered that a tank whose engine was not running could not be picked up by thermal weapons. Nonetheless, the Challenger’s 120mm gun proved devastating against Iraqi armour. By dawn of G+3, the 7th Armoured Brigade had defeated elements of the Iraqi 12th Armoured Division and reserves of the 25th Infantry Division. It had advanced 304 km within four days; it had destroyed 60 tanks, numerous guns, APCs and other vehicles. Of the 117 Challengers, 104 were still operational. One of the reasons for this was that special cooling fans and air filters had been added to protect them against the desert conditions, the thermal sights were adjusted and reactive armour was added. No Challenger was hit by enemy fire.19 The French experience was affected by the role which their division had been assigned, that of screening the outer left-​hand flank of the coalition force as it advanced into Iraq. This may have been decided on the basis of French doctrine which still emphasized a cavalry role for tanks; and due to the fact that the AMX-​30 was lighter than the other Western MBTs, with a weight of 34 tonnes. Armed with a 105mm gun, it could reach 65 km/​h in fifth gear.20 The calculation made was the right one as the French Division Daguet encountered T-​55s as it moved forward. What slowed the French advance down were first hundreds, then thousands, of Iraqis surrendering after artillery and air attacks on their positions. During the advance, helicopters destroyed large numbers of APCs, artillery pieces, bunkers and supply depots. When faced with T-​55s, the AMX-​30 invariably ended any engagement as the winner. The French division was successful against the 45th Iraqi Division because its commander had fought manoeuvre battles, coordinating Marines, paratroopers, the Daguet’s 4th Dragoons, artillery and air elements to enable the tanks to approach the Iraqi positions from angles rather than frontally.21 The speed with which the ground campaign was concluded raises interesting questions about the experience of war for the tank crews. Many incidents which had characterised mechanised war throughout the twentieth century could be observed again; 181

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for example, accidents in offloading tanks from their transporters and thrown tracks which needed to be repaired. Once the air campaign had started, Captain David Norton, a platoon leader in US 1–​34 Armor, recalled: ‘The next six weeks were filled with fear, anxiety, and extreme boredom as we waited to see if a ground war would be necessary.’ The preparation for combat was thorough, with all weapons being tested. Still, the tank crews were told that 10 per cent killed in action (30 per cent wounded) for the breaching force were the casualties which should be expected. After a brief contact on the first day with an Iraqi infantry brigade, which surrendered after the first HEAT round hit a bunker, Norton observed: ‘The adrenaline that pumped through our veins during the day began to slowly leave our systems.’ Despite the extremely short 100 hours ground war, he experienced genuine fear on the second day when told that his platoon would be going into action against a Republican Guard Division equipped with T-​72M1 tanks.22 The casualty statistics have been a subject of considerable controversy since the war. At the time, casualties were given as 148 US service personnel killed, with 458 wounded, while other Coalition dead stood at 92, with 318 wounded. The official figures are now slightly higher: 378 Coalition dead (all countries) and around 1,000 wounded. The UK armed forces suffered 47 dead (including nine to US friendly fire), and the United States suffered 147  ‘battle-​related’ deaths. Iraqi deaths at the time were estimated at around 35,000, with total casualties around 100,000, these figures including civilians, many of whom were probably killed during the bombing of installations in Baghdad. The statistics quite clearly show that the Iraqi forces were hopelessly outclassed, outmanoeuvred and outfought. In the course of the war, only 23 M1A1s were damaged or destroyed. Of the nine destroyed, seven were hit by friendly fire, with two deliberately destroyed by US forces to prevent their capture after previous damage had been sustained. The only American tank crew casualty as a result of combat was a tank commander who was outside his tank when an Iraqi T-​72 tank blew up. M1A1s could survive direct frontal hits from the T-​72. Interesting was also the performance of the M1A1 in friendly fire incidents: the front armour and side turret armour survived direct hits from other M1A1s. According to intelligence sources shortly after the conflict, equipment destroyed or captured amounted to 3,700 Iraqi tanks, 1,856 APCs and 2,140 artillery pieces.23 There was no doubt that Anglo-​American combat superiority in armoured warfare was a major factor in the rapid expulsion of Iraq’s ground forces from Kuwait. The superiority of Western armour had been proved beyond doubt, just at the moment when the lid had been slammed shut on the Cold War. After the war, one of the most significant controversies surrounded the accusation by the Coalition Commander-​in-​Chief Norman Schwarzkopf that the commander of VII Corps, Lieutenant-​General Frederick Franks, had moved his armoured divisions too slowly, the implication being that he had allowed Republican Guard divisions to escape when the aim had been to destroy them. Given the size of the corps, the obstacles it had to overcome and the fact that ground war lasted 100 hours, the accusation is questionable. Franks highlights in his memoirs the difficulty of moving an entire corps during a

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sandstorm, with high winds blowing, not to mention the vulnerability of a long logistics chain. There was, in addition, the danger of units running into each other as they advanced. Franks had calculated that it would take two days to reach the Republican Guards, four days to destroy them and two to consolidate. As he put it: ‘Those first two days were not only a function of the Iraqi army, but of time/​distance, the coherence of our formations, and the freshness of our troops for the anticipated fight.’24 In making the criticism, Schwarzkopf appears to have had two motives: first, concern about his reputation in history as the commander who did not complete the mission and destroy the elite Iraqi divisions completely; second, as his background lay in special forces he did not understand the logistics and other demands involved in moving a large corps of armoured divisions. He also appears to have assumed that the pursuit taking place on other parts of the front could be replicated against the Republican Guards units, which were in fact dug-​in and prepared to fight. The problem was compounded by the fact that Franks did not communicate clearly how long it would take to complete the task he had been allotted. Moreover, the destruction by air power of Iraqi columns fleeing towards Basra caused political complications, leading to a ‘premature’ halt to combat operations. The devastating and rapid defeat of Iraq’s army led not only to an intense discussion of the lessons of the war for the US military and close analysis in Western countries of the performance of various types of military hardware, it also came as a huge shock to the Soviet military. This was exacerbated when the USSR collapsed as a political system, with the concomitant trauma for members of the armed services. The performance of Russian equipment was, however, played down in the ensuing debate in military journals, not least of all due to the possible impact on already battered morale which an open discussion would have caused. The ease with which the T-​72 (albeit inferior export versions of the tank) could be destroyed was not mentioned in public. The defensiveness which marked the debate was characterised by Marshal Dimitri T. Yazov who was keen to highlight the fact that the Syrian 9th Tank Division, equipped with Soviet armour, had covered 1,100 km through desert terrain with no breakdowns, whereas he claimed that US M1 tanks were required to halt every 100–​150 km to have their filters cleaned. The argument was made that the Iraqi Army had been much too passive and could have attacked the coalition forces while they were still assembling. As an Iraqi attack into Saudi Arabia might have been successful, Soviet officers began to reconsider the importance of pre-​emptive strikes. While officers were anxious to avoid comparisons of Soviet and American technology, military reformers used the performance of coalition forces to underpin their arguments for a professional military. But while they did not say so in public, military planners must have drawn the lesson that high tank production alone would not guarantee their security in the future. What did emerge clearly from the debate was the new significance of precision-​guided munitions on the battlefield. The major lesson of the Gulf War for Russia was, however, that ground forces (which included tanks) had been overtaken in significance by air and missile power in thinking on combined-​arms warfare.25 For most Western nations, the first major conflict after the

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Cold War had raised questions about the role of the main battle tank on the battlefield. It provoked a debate as to whether in fact light vehicles, which would be easier to transport by air, would be required in greater numbers in the future.

The Anglo-​American invasion of Iraq (2003) The three-​week conventional war waged by an Anglo-​American force in 2003 provides an additional perspective on the employment of well-​trained mechanised forces against those of a second-​world dictatorship. While the campaign was short and demonstrated again the complete superiority of Western armour over Soviet equipment, there are nonetheless some conclusions to be drawn from the advance of the US Army towards Baghdad and the British conquest of Basra, even if the real test was to come later after the Allied occupation of Iraq first developed into lawlessness, then a full-​blown insurgency. The Iraqi ground forces were able to muster 350,000 active personnel, including 100,000 reservists; although the Coalition had 263,000 troops, the actual forces available for the invasion on the ground were considerably lower. Around 100,000 US forces took part in the invasion of Iraq, along with 26,000 British troops, essentially the 1st (UK) Armoured Division, together with the 16th Air Assault Brigade and the 102nd Logistics Brigade. In addition, there were 2,000 Australians and 2,400 Polish troops. The Iraqis possessed somewhere between 2,200 and 2,600 MBTs, 3,700 other AFVs and 2,400 artillery pieces. The US forces possessed no more than 850 M1 tanks; US V Corps fielded 406 Bradley M2 IFVs. The British forces deployed 116 Challenger 2 tanks, 26 Challenger armoured recovery vehicles, 140 Warrior IFVs, 26 Warrior command vehicles, 46 Warrior recovery and repair vehicles and 66 Scimitar light tanks.26 The ground war opened on 20 March 2003, with conventional hostilities formally concluded on 1 May 2003. Prior to the opening of the campaign, many anticipated it would be a repeat of Operation Desert Storm, with a preliminary air campaign to degrade Iraq’s command and control infrastructure. However, the plan aimed at a concept much closer to Blitzkrieg: speed, manoeuvrability and shock action were to paralyse the enemy; points of resistance were to be bypassed in an attempt to reach Baghdad quickly, so causing the Iraqi defence to be reduced to pockets fighting in cities. In a sense, the plan was an extremely bold one, capitalising on US technological superiority, particularly in terms of precision-​guided munitions which took a heavy toll of Iraqi tanks, predominantly T-​64s and T-​55s. The Iraqi defence plan appeared to put some faith in retreating into cities and trying to draw the Allied forces into urban warfare, making use of irregular forces. A number of things went wrong with this approach: first, the deployment of forces around Baghdad was faulty; second, it underestimated the accuracy of precision-​guided munitions; and third, it failed to take account of the power and flexibility of modern infantry in Western armies, especially their improved communications equipment.27 In addition to the US Army forces, the Marine Expeditionary Force (MEF), consisting of the 3rd Marine Air Wing and the 1st and 2nd US Marine Divisions, participated 184

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in the advance on Baghdad and the fighting inside the city. The two marine divisions were extremely large units: 1st Marine Division comprised 22,200 marines, with 8,000 vehicles in total, which required on a daily basis 200,000 gallons of fuel. The marine divisions formed a secondary thrust; the main effort by US Army V Corps was tasked to advance on the Iraqi capital from the west in the form of a left hook towards weaker defences. Once they had advanced a few kilometres into Iraq, the marines discovered abandoned T-​54 Iraqi tanks which had been dug into revetments, which were just big enough to provide the tanks with hull-​down cover, but which had restricted the tanks’ field of vision. The digging-​in of obsolete tanks in the forward areas to slow down the enemy met with little success. In fact, in the first few days the marines were surprised at the small number of prisoners taken and the large numbers of abandoned vehicles. As regimental combat teams belonging to 1st Marine Division advanced through Nasiriyah, the Amtrac amphibious assault vehicle (AAV), capable of carrying 23 marines, proved vulnerable to RPG attack. It was not designed to withstand anything more than small-​arms fire; it was only armed with a 0.5 calibre machine-​gun and a 40mm grenade launcher. Essentially a transport vehicle, it was packed with ammunition, so its only opportunity for defence was if those in the vehicle could use their weapons to suppress any opponents attempting to ambush them. Several simply exploded when hit by fire. This was the inevitable outcome of the ‘risk-​taking’ inherent in the plan; in fact, in the march up to Nasiriyah, several Marine Corps vehicles were hit by an A-​10 Warthog jet in a friendly fire incident.28 While preparing for the invasion, the British forces in Kuwait were significantly reorganised, with the 7th Armoured Brigade creating four battle groups. In contrast to the American drive north, the British began by besieging Basra, Iraq’s second largest city in the southeast of the country. Although Ba’athist officials remained in control for several weeks, British units refused to be drawn in and began by using Challengers to destroy Iraq tanks at long range. On the night of 26/​27 March, a group of Iraqi T-​55s headed to the outskirts of the city in a planned raid, but the Royal Scots Dragoon Guards destroyed 14 Iraqi tanks with not a single hit suffered on their own tanks. The following night, Warrior IFVs began probing the defences of the city. After this action, Iraqi resistance in the country’s second largest city began to wither away. On 5 April, a three-​pronged attack into the centre of the city was launched with tanks and APCs, breaking the last Ba’athist resistance. The only British tank crew casualties were caused when a Challenger 2 of the Queen’s Royal Lancers was hit by another Challenger, killing two crewmen. The only other tank crew fatality was also caused by friendly fire. Those Challengers which came under RPG attack did not sustain any crew casualties.29 In the march of US forces towards Baghdad, the 1st MEF took two routes, one direct route through Ad Diwaniyah and the second heading northeast towards Kut. Meanwhile, V Corps moved north to the west of An Najaf. On 5 April, a group of US armoured vehicles, 29 tanks and 14 Bradley IFVs probed Iraqi defences in the centre of Baghdad, meeting with heavy resistance but successfully returning to their main base at Baghdad International Airport. The occupation of one of Saddam Hussein’s palaces by a similar battle group led to the collapse of Iraqi morale and the city surrendered on 9 April 2003. 185

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Map 6  US Army advance on Baghdad, March/April 2003

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On the face of it, it seemed as if the strategy of Donald Rumsfeld had led to a dramatic success. In around 21 days a large Middle Eastern country had been conquered at minimum cost to the Coalition and with dramatically reduced casualties to Iraqi military personnel and civilians compared to the 1990–​91 Persian Gulf War.30 The performance of the M1A1 during the ground campaign can best be described as flawless. No Abrams’ crew members were killed during the three-​week drive towards Baghdad up until the Iraqi surrender. The conclusion which can be reached on the war in terms of armoured warfare is twofold. First, the Challenger, M1A1 and M1A2 proved to be remarkably robust in combat situations, confirming previous lessons from Operation Desert Storm; it was also proved that both tanks could play an important role in urban combat. In addition, the Warrior and the Bradley IFVs, although more vulnerable, particularly to IEDs, showed themselves to be robust against most types of anti-​tank weapon. Second, the ground campaign and ensuing occupation demonstrated, on the other hand, that massive conventional superiority cannot guarantee a lasting victory. A  conventional victory, won with few casualties, will not necessarily convince the opponent that they should cease fighting. Without going into detail about the many false assumptions upon which the invasion of Iraq was based, there were two historical analogies used, which demonstrated the muddled thinking of the Bush administration and its military planners. The first was the frequent references made to the way in which the United States had ‘rebuilt’ Germany; yet there was no reference, or even apparent awareness, of the presence of two other occupying powers, the scale of resources and the number of occupation personnel required over an extended period of time to rebuild the Western half of the country. A large security apparatus had been required to guard against any subversive activities –​ and this after a war which had lasted six years. The second misleading analogy was of the French Campaign in 1940:31 the obsession with a rapid campaign, characterised by statements such as ‘speed kills’, betrayed a belief that a quick conventional campaign would topple the regime and bring the population cheering on to the streets demanding an American-​style democracy. This did not happen –​Iraq was not a Western country. The lack of planning, lack of resources and numerous American mistakes led to a gradual escalation in violence, which by 2004 had turned into an insurgency, wrapped within a civil war and surrounded by lawlessness and criminality.

Armour during the insurgency in Iraq (2004–​11) While the Anglo-​American ground invasion of Iraq in 2003 appeared at the time to have been a stunning success, it soon became apparent that the ‘victory’ had turned to dust. The issue was not simply why Iraq had been invaded in the first place, it was in some ways a repetition of other cases of swift ‘victories’ achieved by armoured forces where little serious fighting had taken place. Like the German campaign directed against the Yugoslav Army in April 1941, there was an obvious problem because the national

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army had simple melted away in the face of an irresistible air and ground force. But an opponent who refuses to fight one day can reappear the next. In short, the Iraqi armed forces –​although disbanded in 2004 –​had not actually been defeated in battle. Both the British and the US Army now entered a period when their armour would prove to be extremely important in maintaining order; it would also prove vital in protecting their own forces. This development was, naturally, unwelcome as the need to use heavy armour in an occupation situation demonstrates that the population contains many dissenters. Once the situation degenerated, however, armour proved to be useful in several different ways. Challengers and M1 Abrams together with Bradley and Warrior IFVs were employed in convoy protection, as supplies had to be taken by road into the major cities. Important buildings and military bases could often be best protected by parking a tank outside. The former Iraqi Defence Ministry was one of the first buildings to have an M1 tank parked in front of it to prevent looting. The British air base at Basra used a Challenger tank to deter reckless drivers from speeding towards the check-​point at the main gate, as wild Iraqi driving often encouraged fear among troops that a suicide bomber was about to attack. The positioning of the Challenger made an immediate impression on drivers approaching the gate. During the course of the occupation and the insurgency, armour proved itself once again in roles in which it had already been used in other ethnic conflicts, such as Bosnia. In both Bosnia and Iraq, tanks proved useful as a means of protecting religious and government buildings, and as traffic control points. A tank can usually subdue a civil disturbance very quickly. At the same time, though, a main battle tank can cause damage very easily, whether this involves running over civilian cars or damaging bridges and roads. The failure to plan for a long-​term occupation, the decision to disband the Iraqi Army, the failure to secure Iraqi arms dumps, the inability to secure vital services and the attraction of the country for foreign jihadi fighters all contributed to a gradual deterioration in the security situation in Iraq towards the end of 2003. On 29 October 2003, two soldiers were killed and one wounded when their tank ran over an anti-​tank mine; this was the first time M1 crew members had been killed in combat. In April 2004 the number of attacks on American forces began to climb, reaching over 2,000 a month for the first time. In August and November 2004, and in January and October 2005, they spiked at over 3,000 a month. With this intensity of violence, heavier AFVs became the most secure form of transport. Humvee jeeps and supply lorries became easy targets for Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs), often leading to the deaths of the occupants. While the 1st Cavalry Division apparently lost 70 tanks during a one-​year tour in Baghdad in 2003/​4, this number probably includes Bradley IFVs. On 2 June 2004, tanks and IFVs from the 1st Infantry Division led a mission to rescue ambushed US soldiers in Baqubah: the lead M1 tank was fired at repeatedly on a 1 km stretch of road and was struck by seven RPG rounds. At one point during the fighting, the M1 had to withdraw for hasty repairs. On 27 November 2004, an M1 was badly damaged and its driver killed as a result of shrapnel wounds caused by an IED consisting of three 155mm shells, although the other three crew members were able to escape, indicating the strength of the M1’s armour. On 25 188

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December 2005, one M1A2 was damaged by another IED, one crew member was killed, while the driver survived inside for two hours until he was rescued, demonstrating again the strength of the tank’s armour.32 Mechanised units also proved extremely important in dealing with unrest in cities, which by 2004 had spiralled into a full-​scale insurgency, during some phases in the occupation attacks on US forces occurred on a daily basis. A case in point was the city of Fallujah, situated in the centre of Iraq, west of Baghdad. After a brief five-​day battle in April 2004, the operation was suspended following negotiations. As the situation remained unresolved, a major assault was launched from 8 to 16 November 2004 against around 3,000 insurgents, armed with AK-​47s, RPG-​7s, mines and explosives, who had had several months to prepare their defences. Around 10,000 American and 2,000 Iraqi government troops were used in the assault. Central to the eventual success were the M1 tanks, M2A3 Bradley IFVs and Marine Corps AAV-​7A1 vehicles. Intelligence-​gathering before the start of the operation had been excellent, while the units involved –​especially the 2-​7 Cavalry and 2-​2 Mechanized Infantry –​had had the opportunity to train and rehearse the attack. The plan to recapture Fallujah and to destroy the insurgent base there was –​contrary to the usual approach to the employment of armour in cities –​based around the use of M1A2 tanks advancing first. This was possible due to their high survivability levels; many received multiple hits from RPG-​7s without suffering significant damage. Apparently only two M1A2s were knocked out. Tanks operated in pairs, with other machines providing supporting fire. The city was divided into zones, which were cleared methodically. Strong points were eliminated by air and artillery strikes. Fifty-​two Americans were killed, 425 wounded seriously, 5 Iraqi soldiers were killed and 43 wounded, with estimates of insurgent deaths running from 600 to 2,000. Tactically speaking, the operation was a remarkable success given the difficulties which have always occurred when ground forces have to conquer cities in street fighting. But the destruction was huge, thus providing recruiters with emotive arguments as to why someone should join the insurgency.33 Although at first the British Army units in Basra and in southern Iraq experienced less violence, gradually the insurgency spread there as well. Attacks similar to those in the north were made on armoured vehicles with small arms and RPG-​7s. Typical of this type of ambush were two incidents in Amara, north of Basra, which led to the award of the Victoria Cross to Private Johnson Beharry. On 1 May 2004, he led a column of Warriors out of an ambush after the lead IFV in which he was travelling was hit several times by RPG rounds. In a second incident on 11 June 2004, he drove his Warrior IFV out of another ambush, despite suffering a head wound.34 While the Warrior showed the same type of vulnerabilities as those of the Bradley, both these IFVs were upgraded during the course of the insurgency. Given the weaponry and the types of ambushes they faced, on the whole they performed well up to the withdrawal from Iraq by the British in May 2011, followed by the Americans in December 2011. The British Army suffered 136 combat deaths in Iraq, the US Army well over 4,000. Challenger 2 and M1 tanks proved robust, suffering very limited losses; without the tanks and IFVs, there is no doubt that losses would have been significantly higher. 189

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ISIS and its opponents in Iraq and Syria (2014–​16) It may seem almost a postscript to consider the role of mobile units in the activities of the so-​called Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), which began in the chaos of the Syrian Civil War, but which gradually spilled over into northern Iraq in 2014. The extremist Islamist movement soon became part of the history of armoured war in Iraq when in June 2014 it swept into Mosul, then Tikrit, stampeding the fragile Iraqi armed forces into headlong flight, abandoning tanks and wheeled vehicles in their haste to escape. Within a relatively short space of time ISIS became an armed militia with its own armoured and light mobile forces. According to one set of estimates, 3–​5 T-​72s, 10–​20 T-​54/​55s and 20–​30 T-​64s, along with other vehicles had fallen into the hands of ISIS by the late summer of 2014.35 The disintegration of the Shi’ite-​dominated armed forces meant that the West had only one reliable partner remaining which could hold their ground against ISIS –​the Kurds, consisting of the ‘official’ Peshmerga forces and the People’s Protection Units, the YPG. The capture of Mosul illustrated two recurring features in the history of armoured warfare in the Gulf region. The first was that the new Iraqi Army had not been able to shake off its previous weakness –​in particular, its capacity to crumble when faced with determined opposition. There seems little logic in simply abandoning armoured vehicles when faced with a ruthless militia. Yet, there were plenty of examples in the Iran-​Iraq War of crews baling out of their vehicles when under air or artillery bombardment. During the Second World War, crews would often bale out of AFVs if subjected to intense air attack –​but ISIS in 2014 was a militia force which did not possess fighter aircraft. The second point regarding the capture of a quantity of tanks and APCs by ISIS from the Iraqi Security Forces is that possession of armour can lend a militia a degree of military credibility which it would not otherwise possess; in turn, such credibility can often result in improved recruitment. The Kurdish Peshmerga force has, in fact, been in possession of its own armoured force for some time. They were able to seize some Soviet tanks and APCs, first, in the wake of Iraq’s defeat in the 1990–​91 Persian Gulf War, then after the Anglo-​American invasion in 2003. Among these weapons are reputedly some T-​72s, T-​62s and T-​55s, together with a variety of lighter vehicles. It seems clear, however, that in 2013 many of these weapons were not operational, probably due to a lack of spare parts.36 That few of its tanks were actually in working order in 2014, following the capture of Mosul by ISIS, does seem to be confirmed by the ‘home-​made’ AFVs constructed from waste-​disposal lorries, tractors and farm machinery by the Peshmerga.37 A few of the vehicles may have been used for morale-​boosting purposes, but some footage does suggest that at least some of them have been used in battle. However, by 2015, clips could be viewed on YouTube which showed that T-​55 and T-​62 tanks had been returned to working order and were able to fire their main guns. The YPG has likewise employed tanks, while they have also captured wheeled vehicles from ISIS. If the Peshmerga and YPG seem to have created their own mobile force of sorts, then ISIS continues to be able to profit from the Iraqi forces’ tendency to abandon equipment. 190

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During 2015, ISIS was able to capture AFVs from the Iraqi Security Forces, on one occasion near Khaladiya in late February 2015. Video evidence shows over ten largely undamaged M113s by the side of a road, which had clearly been abandoned by their crews.38 The Peshmerga and YPG possess a mix of AFVs including some Russian MTLB multipurpose tracked vehicles, although the number of AFVs available has not been sufficient for major armour operations. More decisive has been the delivery of TOW and other ATGMs to them by the United States. These weapons have been employed against both tanks and wheeled vehicles used by ISIS with considerable success.39 In fact, in early 2016, open-​topped ISIS APCs had begun to appear with additional steel protection bolted on. This suggested either an increase in the need for mobile forces, or that they were losing so many armoured vehicles that they had been forced to press any available machine into service.

Conclusion For the historian, it is always difficult to reach conclusions on conflicts which are still raging, especially one of such fundamental importance as the collapse of Iraq and the rise of various jihadist groups in the region, most recently ISIS. For the student of armoured warfare, however, there are observations to be made in relation to the employment of first-​world armoured forces against those of the second world, especially when equipped with Russian/​Soviet equipment. One of the most obvious points is that Western armies always appear superior when it comes to the maintenance of tanks and APCs. One telling example is given by Norman Schwarzkopf in his memoirs. He received a complaint from a Saudi battalion commander during Desert Shield that the Saudis had been sold defective American equipment: 24 out of 28 M60 tanks had been declared ‘broken’ when the only problem was that the air filters were dirty and required changing.40 In terms of the employment of armour in conventional ground wars, the Gulf Wars illustrate that all the recognised principles for mechanised war remained valid. While air superiority does not guarantee success, as demonstrated in the Iran-​Iraq War, usually the side with superior air power will prevail. But given the complete air superiority held by the Coalition in 1991, complemented by technological superiority in the shape of precision-​guided munitions, the question is whether or not the Iraqi Army could have performed better. During Desert Shield there were two credible options open to Saddam Hussein. The first would have been to attack the Coalition forces in August or September 1990 as they tried to assemble a screen to protect Saudi Arabia. A prolonged occupation would have been out of question, but the defeat of even a small Allied force might have raised Saddam’s prestige across the Arab world. The second would have been to have evacuated Kuwait and positioned his forces along the border, with some divisions concealed in towns. This latter option was the one he seems to have chosen in 2003, but by then morale and military equipment were inadequate. Where the Iranian, Iraqi and foreign jihadi fighters appear to have been able to perform well has been in the use of anti-​armour weapons against armoured vehicles, 191

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especially in built-​up areas. Huge IEDs accounted for at least a few M1 tanks in Iraq, even though it is never clear from video footage posted on the web whether some of the tanks being attacked had not been abandoned earlier. Yet the question remains to be answered whether or not ISIS, Kurdish and other forces will be able to create their own armoured forces and conduct true combined-​arms operations in the future. There are signs, though, that both the Kurdish Peshmerga and YPG forces are starting to learn how to coordinate infantry with lighter forces consisting of ‘home-​made’ AFVs, Humvee jeeps and pick-​up trucks with machine-​guns and automatic cannon mounted on the back. Jeeps and pick-​up trucks also provide important means of transport for their infantry. As Iraq and Syria continue to go through major convulsions, armoured warfare has returned to its earliest origins in the Middle East with the appearance of improvised armoured vehicles, some of which bear similarities to a number of the earliest experimental prototypes.

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CHAPTER 10 THE ‘POLITICAL HISTORY’ OF THE TANK

The ‘political history’ of the tank is as important as any other aspect of its development, although its complexity and significance has only been touched on in any detail by one historian. Although Patrick Wright has recounted the controversy surrounding the painting pink of a Josef Stalin II tank in Prague in 1991, as well as explaining much of the early fascination of the general public with the new war machines,1 little serious thought has been given to the subject of the ‘political iconography’ surrounding images of armoured vehicles. But any political history of armoured warfare is not simply a question of propaganda; it also relates to how images of armoured vehicles, and the tank in particular, communicate political messages and influence perceptions of state power. The way in which the tank has come to communicate victory, political legitimacy or the evils of occupation in newsreels, parades and in photographs has turned it into a weapon of considerable symbolic value.

Political symbolism From its first appearance on the battlefield, there was intense public interest as to what a tank actually looked like:  artists’ impressions contained some amusing guesswork as to the ‘identity’ of the new weapon.2 In early 1917, the ‘corporate identity’ of the British Army’s Tank Corps became closely linked to the rhomboid shape of the British Marks I, II, III and IV. Following the issue of a provisional arm-​band with an image of a Mark I tank, complete with rear wheels, a new badge was approved for the Corps by the King on 11 September 1917. It showed a tank between the words Tank and Corps, but a motto was initially refused on the grounds that this was a distinction only appropriate for a corps with a long tradition. It took until May 1923 before an army order authorised the wearing of a new badge with the motto ‘Fear Naught’.3 However, if the battle for a cap badge in the corridors of Whitehall had been difficult, the image of the tank had already become ‘public property’. The combination of an instantly recognisable shape, cartoons featuring tanks in newspapers during the war, and the wide distribution of photographs of the new machine, pointed towards the emergence of a form of political symbolism emerging around armoured fighting vehicles in the wake of the First World War. But what is meant here by political symbolism? The use of symbols, in other words, visual representations of information through pictorial symbols, has long been a part of certain cultures and civilisations, sometimes those without a written language. The need

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for a science of symbology was debated in 1960 by the Art Directors Club of New York, who viewed symbology as a form of visual communication. One art designer observed that elements which possessed common characteristics were grouped into a single unit, while depth and movement were important features. In fact, visual symbols possessed five basic functions: ‘They identify events in time and space, characterize the qualities of objects, evaluate by producing positive or negative feelings, prescribe a form of behaviour, or provide a general frame of reference for comparison purposes.’4 In other words, if we apply then the concept of symbology to the political history of the tank, visual images of AFVs can convey a range of messages about time and place, while rapid movement or static situations can provoke negative or positive emotions, interpretations or associations, depending upon the level of context communicated. Images of armoured vehicles can transport meaning about current, recent or historical events, or other general associations: the crew of a tank, for example, can represent visually a value such as teamwork. The context of time and place, and the degree to which the situation, location and people involved can be identified, can immediately communicate a political message or provoke a political reaction on the part of the viewer of the photograph, film or an individual witnessing an event. Governments or armies can, in turn, present tanks or other AFVs within civilian spaces in order to communicate specific political messages. Therefore, the political symbolism of an AFV can be intentionally transmitted by state authority, or it can be a result of an interpretation placed on a visual image by an individual viewing it. During the early history of the tank it was not only visual images which communicated a message or specific values, the weapon itself was laden with symbolic meaning. According to some historians of technology, traditional military officers considered the tank threatening because it endangered the horse cavalry. Those who were suspicious of the tank sought to exaggerate the threats to it and downplay its strengths; those who were attracted to it possessed a very specific form of military mentality. The tank attracted those with both male and female psychological characteristics: the tank represented a specifically ‘male exterior’, with guns and machine-​guns protruding, while its interior represented a womb-​like space. But beyond the psychological interpretations of what made the tank a fascinating new weapon, it required those with flexible and creative military minds to understand its possibilities and the internal ‘social implications’ for armies should they integrate it into their organisational structures.5 As the tank has always been invested with, first, military, but later political symbolic meaning, it is worth reflecting on what the new discipline of visual history might contribute to a further examination of an underexplored aspect of the history of armour. Recently, historians have begun to argue that all forms of visual production, whether paintings, photographs, films, posters, presentations in museums or political events, can be investigated and can assist in explaining various historical phenomena. This new-​ found interest has not just led to considerations of the legitimacy of visual images as historical sources, it has also led to increased awareness of the effect of images on historical memory and the visual expressions of state power.6 Given the varieties of meaning which armoured vehicles can communicate, this seems a useful avenue of enquiry –​images of 194

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tanks advancing can symbolise rapid victory, static tanks fighting in cities can symbolise impending defeat. The sources which can be used in writing the visual history of the tank are illustrations, photographs, political posters and newsreels. Press photographs of armoured vehicles continue to be published, but newsreels have now been replaced by television reports, and added to by front-​line footage from war zones posted on YouTube, sometimes shortly after combat actions have occurred. This vast array of source material offers considerable possibilities for the historian. At the same time, it would be a mistake to see the political history of the tank as restricted to visual images. There are political controversies associated with armoured vehicles which only occasionally find their way into the press, usually involving arms deals, cost overruns or mismanagement in the development of new weapons systems. They, too, belong to the political history of the tank.

The tank as a symbol of victory What is most remarkable about the history of the tank is the speed with which it came to be invested with symbolic meaning. Within a year of its invention it had aroused a remarkable degree of fascination among citizens in Britain, France and Germany. In Britain, the distinctive rhomboid shape quickly found its way into advertisements and cartoons in newspapers and illustrated journals. It did not take long, either, before it had become part of the promise that victory would be achieved in the war, despite the setbacks. A week after the opening of the Battle of Cambrai on 20 November 1917, Punch published a cartoon which depicted the British Commander-​in-​Chief, Sir Douglas Haig, sitting on the roof of a Mark IV tank. He was dressed as a Roman centurion, holding a shield with the cross of St George painted on it, and was about to impale a dragon-​like creature with a spear, with the creature already under the tracks of the tank, and wearing –​inevitably –​a German Pickelhaube. The caption read, ‘St. George Out-​Dragons the Dragon’. The subtitle read, ‘With Mr. Punch’s jubilant compliments to Sir DOUGLAS HAIG and his tanks’.7 Remarkably, even after the successful German counter-​attack at Cambrai, the public continued to perceive the tank as representing the qualities which would ensure that Britain survived the crises to come and emerge victorious. A cartoon in one newspaper shows a pacifist looking at five mountains, each labelled, from left to right, ‘Air Raids’, ‘Man Power’, ‘Food Problem’, ‘Russia’s Failure’ and ‘U Boat Menace’. On top of the ‘Man Power’ mountain there is a signpost, containing the words, ‘To Victory’. A  tank is already climbing the mountain labelled ‘U Boat Menace’ at a steep angle, with a determined human face visible on its side, where the words ‘British Tenacity’ can also be seen. Nonetheless, while many were convinced that Britain had ‘invented’ the tank, there was still an acknowledgement of the part played by French tanks in the final victory. A cartoon of August 1918 in Punch depicts a group of German soldiers running from charging French infantry, bayonets fixed, with a Renault FT-​17 leading the attack.8 195

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Photo 10  British tanks taking part in the Lord Mayor’s parade, London, November 1918

What helped cement the association in the minds of the British public of the connection between the tank and victory was the campaign launched in October 1917 to persuade citizens from all classes to purchase war bonds. The campaign was boosted by the idea of a ‘Tank Bank’, initially trialled at Trafalgar Square, where only those who had bought bonds were allowed to approach the tank and peer inside. So successful was the Tank Bank in London that events were organised throughout Britain during 1918. These ‘displays’ made a considerable impression on those who witnessed them, not least of all as some of the tanks used were ‘battle-​scarred’. The excitement created is attested to by contemporary photographic evidence and by a cartoon in the Daily Mirror, which depicts a tank, behind bars in a cage, as if in a zoo, with eyes visible behind the two front hatches and its mouth open, the notice on the bars proclaiming, ‘You are requested to feed the tank.’ In the foreground, men, women and children are throwing coins and bags of cash into the open mouth of the beast.9 Once the war was over, tanks featured significantly in commemoration events, victory parades and the erection of war memorials. In Britain, Mark V and Whippet tanks were part of the Lord Mayor’s Procession in London in November 1918, essentially a victory parade, while contemporary photographs show Mark V* tanks parading across Westminster Bridge and down Whitehall at the big victory parade on 19 July 1919. 196

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French Renault FT-​17 tanks also participated in the Allied victory parade through the centre of Paris on 14 July 1919. Other tanks took part in victory parades in New York and Dublin in the same year.10 There could have been no more emphatic way to celebrate victory. The association of the tank with the Allied victory was, moreover, further reinforced through the use of British tanks as a form of war memorial. The National War Savings Committee handed over 265 ‘presentation tanks’ to cities and towns with a population of over 10,000 who could claim ‘conspicuous achievements’ in the purchases of war bonds and savings certificates. During 1919, ceremonies took place across the length and breadth of the British Isles at which officials handed over tanks to mayors and other dignitaries, with large crowds attending the ceremonies as tanks were driven to their new resting places. Contemporary photographs and newspaper reports indicate that the ceremonies were usually accompanied by military bands and troops marching with the tank; some machines were then displayed in parks or in the centre of a town with fencing erected around the tank. One photograph, typical of these ceremonies, shows Sir Phillip Sassoon standing on the roof of a machine on 11 July 1919, presenting the tank to the Mayor of Hythe, a small town in Kent, in front of the White Hart Hotel.11 British First World War tanks were to appear, though, only a few years later in a completely different context as war memorials. Once the Red Army had captured British Mark V tanks in the latter half of the Russian Civil War, at a later point they began to display them in public places as a symbol of the Red Army’s victory over the ‘capitalist interventionists’. The display of the captured machines sent a powerful message:  it was intended to communicate that the otherwise backward Soviet Union, which had inherited a decrepit industrial infrastructure, had triumphed over its own inadequacies through the heroism of its soldiers. Man had triumphed over machine. There was also the implication that the capitalist ‘bullies’ had been employing their great industrial might to try and take over Mother Russia with little regard for the population’s welfare. These memorials will have awakened other associations communicated in political posters which showed the greedy capitalists, clutching bags of money, and encouraging the rabid dogs of the White armies.12 This type of propaganda, produced during the 1920s, was to be gradually overtaken in the 1930s by a relatively new medium –​the newsreel. The possibilities of this new form of communication were seized on by the National Socialists, not least of all as the ‘motor’ represented an important part of Nazi ideology and political propaganda. The weekly newsreels, the Wochenschau, reported in the early summer of 1940, for instance, on the progress of German troops in Belgium, Holland and France. In the spirit of Nazi ideology, which had communicated in the previous years the faster tempo of life in Germany through the successful use of machines, the newsreel commentators emphasized the rate of the German advance and that it could not be stopped. If there was opposition, it was quickly broken by the Luftwaffe. The Wochenschau of 22 June 1940 showed an attack by Panzer IVs and a Sturmgeschütz which had quickly ended the resistance of a French unit.13 After the Second World War, tanks were used again as part of victory celebrations by the British, American and Russian armies. T-​34/​85s and self-​propelled artillery 197

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drove past Lenin’s mausoleum at the victory parade in Moscow on 24 June 1945, with Stalin, S. M. Budenneyi and Kliment Voroshilov watching. A joint Allied victory parade took place in the centre of Berlin on 7 September 1945 at which US M24 Chaffee and Cromwell tanks could be seen together with a new Russian tank, the Josef Stalin III, 52 of which paraded for the first time. Although the Cold War had not yet broken out, Eisenhower and Montgomery did not attend, and the Russians clearly used the opportunity to show off a powerful new tank which had not been employed against the Germans in the war.14 Of course, in addition to victory parades, tanks of all the Allied nations were used as war memorials. The Western Allies made use of tanks to commemorate their liberation of Europe. Sherman tanks can still be found in France and Belgium fulfilling this function, some to commemorate American crews, others with French markings to pay tribute to the French armoured units which took part in the campaign in northwest Europe. And, across the entire USSR, numerous memorials were erected, mainly with T-​34 tanks, but including assault guns and KV-​1 tanks. Some were placed on plinths angled upwards, sometime with the dates of a particular battle chiselled into the front or side of the plinth. These memorials reversed the message of their civil war predecessors which had communicated much about the defeat of the industrial might of the ‘capitalist interventionists’. In the case of the Second World War memorials, the previous message could now be stood on its head: instead of being the victim of superior nations, the industry of the USSR had triumphed over the technologically advanced Germans through superior tank production. The tank memorials erected after 1945 in the USSR differed from other countries because of the large number of them and the fact that they were to be found throughout Soviet territory. Some were positioned on the sites of battlefields where it was to be expected that a memorial would be placed. For instance, on 12 July 1973, the first memorial featuring a T-​34 was ‘consecrated’ on the field where the Battle of Prokhorovka had taken place in July 1943. Subsequently, nine tanks were laid out next to the Victory Memorial on the same battlefield. Other memorials were to be found in cities such as Gomel in Belorussia, Donetsk and other cities in the Ukraine, and in front of the Dzerzhinsky tractor factory in Volgograd (formerly Stalingrad), to give just a handful of examples.15 Given the different ethnic groups within the Soviet Union and the fears about their reliability, there was the obvious intent to stamp the memory of the victory over the fascists on all the peoples in the USSR. The memory of victory in the war was to serve as a way of binding different ethnic groups together, hence the practice of couples holding part of their wedding ceremony next to war memorials. Tank memorials possessed another important function, most notably in the occupation of Germany. In divided Berlin, a war memorial featuring two T-​34 tanks could be found in the British sector. This was one way of communicating to the Germans that they had been defeated by the Red Army and their superior armoured forces. Moreover, after the Berlin Wall was erected in 1961, a new form of ‘memorial’ was created. Concrete plinths were erected, which jutted out over the top of the wall angled in a threatening fashion into West Berlin. Any citizen of the Federal Republic travelling by car through 198

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the GDR on the transit route to West Berlin was greeted with this intimidating sight when entering the western sectors of the city. This was the basic concept of a war memorial re-​thought, in order to send a defiant and unnerving message to the West at the height of the Cold War. The practice of making use of tanks as memorials on the site of major battlefields has been taken up by the Israeli Defence Forces, too. On the Golan Heights, for example, where there are monuments to both the 1967 and 1973 wars, a Sho’t Centurion, although not one actually used in the fighting, stands on one of the firing ramps on a southern ridge south of Mount Hermon, known in Israel as the ‘Booster position’. A memorial to the 679th Reserve Brigade features a tank turret placed on a sheet of metal supported by stones, with a Hebrew inscription which means ‘We will remember and not forget.’ The tank gun, to which metal wings have been fixed, juts high into the air. A memorial to the 7th Armoured Brigade is positioned next to Route 87, which features, in Hebrew letters on a pile of stones, the epitaph, ‘Memorial to the 7th Brigade –​in fire they will come.’ Part of the monument is a Centurion with lettering meaning ‘Storm’, but again a version of the Centurion not used in the fighting. Although much of the Golan remains under military control, there are parts open to the public which include battlefield relics, deliberately left as a reminder of the intensity of the fighting: as part of a memorial to the 77th Battalion, 7th Armoured Brigade, a knocked out T-​62 has been left among a copse of trees.16 In other countries, memorials communicate less a sense of reflection and seem more a demonstration of military prowess with captured enemy equipment on display, such as a French AMX-​13 seized by the Pakistan Army from India during the 1965 war on display in Sialkot.17 For the United States, the victory in the Persian Gulf War of 1990–​91 was more than a campaign to recapture oil fields and organise a form of police action against a state with no respect for the sovereignty of its neighbours. In addition to the military superiority demonstrated by American airpower, the US M1A1 tank became a symbol of the capacity of the US Army to produce a tank which was clearly superior to the Soviet-​era T-​72. The better performance in combat against the Russian tanks seemed to put a final seal on the West’s ‘victory’ in the Cold War. There was a deeper meaning to the victory, however. It represented the final recovery of the US armed services after the humiliation of Vietnam, especially for the army which felt the defeat most keenly, as many of the senior commanders in the Gulf War were veterans of that war. Both memoirs and histories of the war emphasize the contrast between the Persian Gulf War and the Vietnam War. The M1A1 tank was part of the symbolism of that cathartic victory. On 8 June 1991, the Bradley and the M1A1 Abrams could be seen participating in the victory parade in Washington DC.18

AFVs as an expression of state power The majority of countries which possess tanks and other tracked AFVs have at one time or another made use of them in military parades. This practice took on a new 199

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connotation in the interwar period when it became part of the visual language of propaganda in National Socialist Germany and the Soviet Union. Hitler was the first to understand the message which could be transported by images of columns of tanks on parade. Reputedly, when he first saw an early version of the Panzer I, operating with motor-​ cycles and heavy armoured cars, he exclaimed, ‘That’s what I need! That’s what I want to have!’ It can only be speculated as to why he made this statement, but it is possible he already envisioned tanks parading through Berlin. Parades were organised in the mid-​1930s with dozens of Panzer I tanks driving through the capital. At Hitler’s birthday parade in April 1939, Panzer I, Panzer II and Panzer IV tanks drove past the gallery of German and foreign dignitaries. The message was a dual one: on the one hand, Hitler could communicate modernity and a sense of technological achievement to a still sceptical population; on the other hand, he could send a signal to the other nations that Germany was resurgent.19 As the Soviet Union underwent a process of militarisation in the 1930s, Stalin was quick to adopt practices introduced by Hitler which appealed to him. One of these was military parades consisting of large quantities of mechanical hardware. Once again, the message was a dual one: first, directed at his own population; second, it was directed at Western observers, the message being  –​do not underestimate the Soviet Union. There may have been a similar intent behind the Kiev manoeuvres of September 1936, which were visited by a number of foreign observers, among them the high-​ranking British Army officers. According to the commander of the 2nd Division, Major-​General Archibald Wavell, ‘all the situations were carefully staged with a view to providing an impressive spectacle, mainly we imagine for the foreign delegations’.20 For smaller, or emerging, nations, or even sub-​state actors, acquiring tanks and AFVs has often been an important symbol of either legitimacy or the confirmation of credible military capability. One photograph shows three British Mark V tanks, flying the Estonian flag, driving through Tartu on Independence Day on 24 February 1925. For the new nation, created in the wake of the First World War, armed forces formed a significant part of the attempt to create a new national identity. Other smaller nations in northern Europe followed the same practice, with the Finnish armed forces, for instance, purchasing 32 French Renault FT-​17 tanks in the 1920s, one of which can be seen in a photograph parading past Helsinki Central Station with onlookers lining the route. Although by the time of the Soviet invasion in 1939, the Renault FT-​17s were effectively obsolete, they proved important in training and communicating a sense of sound military preparedness.21 The military parades of tanks in Red Square, introduced in the 1930s, became one of the rituals of the ruling Communist Party. After 1945, armour was displayed for around four decades at the annual May Day parades as a way of sending a message to the outside world about the military readiness of the USSR. It became an important platform on which new military equipment could be unveiled, which made it a key event for Western defence correspondents; at times, though, there was the suspicion that some new equipment was only available in small numbers, so the intention was simply to create a false impression of an advanced army. In the perestroika period, instituted by 200

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Mikhail Gorbachev in the late 1980s, there was an attempt to move away from these parades, as soldiers dressed in historical uniforms replaced the traditional flaunting of military hardware. But under Vladimir Putin the old habits have returned as the latest tracked vehicles are paraded during the annual celebrations commemorating the Soviet victory in the Second World War.22 Sub-​state actors have also sought to acquire armoured forces, but not always primarily for publicity or media purposes. Sometimes they have been forced to by military circumstances, or they have acquired them unexpectedly. In the case of the Polisario, a rebel group fighting principally the Moroccan Royal Armed Forces in the war in the Western Sahara (1976–​91) over territory which had been the ‘Spanish Sahara’, they were forced to escalate the war from guerrilla to conventional tactics. Although they began the conflict with surprise attacks launched through groups of jeeps and land-​rovers, the tactics of the Moroccan Army forced them to obtain T-​54 and T-​55 tanks from Algeria and Libya, with the Moroccans receiving tanks from France and the United States. The use of armour was problematic for the guerrillas due to the challenges of maintenance and the lack of an air force, even if they were able to shoot down some Moroccan aircraft with Soviet SAM-​6 missiles. Nonetheless, for the force fighting for the ‘Democratic Republic of the Sahara’ there seemed little alternative given their claims to represent a new state; moreover, the Polisario also needed battlefield successes to maintain their credibility with their Algerian ally. Still, Morocco was eventually brought to the negotiating table as a result of economic exhaustion.23 However, some sub-​state actors have grasped the potential media impact of parading captured armoured vehicles. More recently, ISIS militia forces were able to seize substantial quantities of tanks, other AFVs and wheeled vehicles when they captured Mosul from the Iraqi Security Forces in June 2014. Some of these AFVs, flying the black and white ISIS flag, including T-​62 tanks and T-​72 tanks, BMP-​1 infantry vehicles and 2S1 Gvozdika self-​propelled artillery, as well as some Bradley M3 IFVs, were paraded in Mosul shortly after the fall of the city. The appearance of tanks, APCs and wheeled vehicles immediately created an impression of military success and, possibly in the eyes of some of the inhabitants, of a form of political legitimacy. AFVs were paraded again by ISIS in Mosul in April 2015 as part of a morale-​boosting campaign following their defeat at the end of March when the Iraqi government claimed to have recaptured Tikrit.24 Images of tanks can also encapsulate the power of particular alliances. One of the best examples of this was a series of photographs taken during the Berlin crisis in 1961. Following the commencement of work on the Berlin Wall which was undertaken to stem the flow of citizens leaving the German Democratic Republic, tension increased dramatically in the city in October of that year. Soviet and American tanks were photographed parked on either side of Checkpoint Charlie, a crossing point between the American and Soviet sectors in the divided city. With their guns pointing directly at each other, the image continues to represent the escalation in the crisis over Berlin –​and it remains one of the enduring symbols of the Cold War. In keeping with the idea of the tank as a symbol of state power, the series of photographs taken on 27/​28 October 1961 symbolise the military might of two superpowers in the nuclear age. Had the tanks of either side 201

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opened fire, there would have been the grave danger of not simply an urban tank battle but of escalation to an all-​out nuclear exchange.25

The tank as an ‘oppressor’ One of the earliest symbolic guises into which the tank slipped in its formative years was as a symbol of occupation. Following Imperial Germany’s surrender in November 1918, and the subsequent proclamation of the Weimar Republic, one of the tasks of British troops was to guarantee order in the Ruhr region. A photograph from 1919/​20 shows two British Mark V tanks parked in the centre of a square in the city of Cologne as people go about their daily business. Fuller recalled in his memoirs just how effective they had proved since the commander of the British Army of the Rhine had noted in April 1920 that they had had a significant effect on the civilian population. He requested more tanks, ‘with a view to their presence acting as a deterrent in possible eventualities’, by which he meant a Communist uprising against the armed forces of the Weimar Republic.26 Of course, tanks were not just used to make an impression on the citizens of other countries occupied by the British or the French. During 1919, when there was fear of a Bolshevik revolution in Britain, tanks were dispatched to Glasgow as a means of preventing or dealing with possible revolutionary activity. But there are question marks about whether a famous photograph of a tank amid a crowd of ‘revolutionaries’ was actually one of the machines dispatched. In fact, it seems more likely that the photograph was taken in early 1918 when an enthusiastic crowd turned out to see a ‘Tank Bank’ on its first visit to Glasgow. However, Medium C tanks were sent to Glasgow as a precautionary measure during the Miners’ Strike of 1922; as photographs show, they were stationed inside the cattle market in Belgrove Street, but never deployed on the streets. In 1919 in Liverpool, after serious rioting had broken out in the wake of a strike by the local police force in the city, Mark V* tanks were parked outside St George’s Hall to quell the wave of disturbances, much to the outrage of local trade union members.27 During the Second World War, the advance of tanks through northwest Europe in 1944–​45 was cheered by crowds of Belgian, Dutch and French citizens as the forces of the Western Allies advanced, freeing them from German occupation. This reversed the previous experience of tanks as oppressors when the Germans had marched into France and the Low Countries in 1940. But the idea of tanks as ‘oppressors’ belongs less to military campaigns and much more to periods of occupation, or where AFVs have been used as a means of suppressing a revolutionary or popular uprising. Some of the best examples of the tank as a symbol of oppression can be seen in three separate uprisings in Eastern Europe during the Cold War when Russian tanks and AFVs were employed to suppress revolutionary political activity and threats to Soviet rule. Among the first images of tanks as a symbol of oppression were the T-​34s which were sent on to the streets of East Berlin and other cities in the GDR in June 1953 to suppress a rising of workers. Pictures of the working-​class citizens of East Berlin hurling rocks at 202

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tanks became one of the most important symbolic images of the nature of Soviet rule. In the Federal Republic of Germany, the date of the workers’ rising became a public holiday: in fact, 17 June was celebrated as the Day of German Unity from 1954 until 1990. It was also commemorated on stamps. From 17 June until 11 July 1953 the Soviet military became the state authority after they had declared a state of emergency. This demonstrated that the East German regime was, up to a point, only able to exist with the support of the USSR. It had a major impact on the thinking of the Socialist Unity Party, which continued to speak of the ‘Trauma of 17 June 1953’ up until the collapse of East Germany in 1990, even if internally the uprising was referred to as the ‘day of fascist provocation’. There were in total 55 deaths, with 20 other deaths which have been left unexplained; after the rising had been put down, there were 1,600 convictions of GDR citizens, with two death sentences. In Western Europe it was not difficult to provide visual interpretations of the events. An Italian cartoon showed an East German protestor holding up a placard which read ‘Free Elections’ being crushed beneath the tracks of a Russian tank.28 In 1956, there was a revolt against communist rule in Hungary. This time the disturbances were not restricted simply to demonstrations: in Budapest these turned into a full-​scale uprising, which lasted from 23 October to 10 November 1956. The scale of the revolt was greater than in East Germany, as 2,500 Hungarians and 700 Soviet troops died in the fighting, with 13,000 Hungarians and 1,250 Russians wounded. In addition, around 3,000 civilians were killed. The Soviet forces employed around 1,130 tanks. The international impact was more far-​reaching than three years earlier in East Berlin. During the East German uprising, Churchill had publicly legitimised the Soviet actions. However, the brutal military reaction of the USSR alienated some of its supporters in Western Europe. Following its bloody suppression, it was forbidden to discuss the uprising in Hungary until 1989. But the images of the fighting went around the world, communicating a message of civilian fighters attempting to deal with the tanks of the oppressors.29 The association of Soviet tanks being used against freedom-​seeking, oppressed peoples was repeated in the Prague Spring in 1968. On this occasion, reformers in Czechoslovakia caused consternation in Eastern Europe due to their discussions of the need for a free press and political reform. On the night of 20–​21 August 1968, Soviet forces together with Polish, Bulgarian and Hungarian units entered the country with 200,000 troops and 2,000 tanks. Unlike the fighting in Hungary, there was no organised, mass uprising, but rather a form of passive resistance, although some photographs show Russian tanks burning after attacks with Molotov cocktails. There were considerable political reverberations within the Warsaw Pact, while internationally there was strong criticism of the Soviet action which was considered to have been based on a fake request for assistance from the Czechoslovak Communist government.30 In each of these three cases  –​East Germany, Hungary and Czechoslovakia  –​the imagery became part of the political vocabulary in the West. The association which was thereby created between tanks on the streets of cities and oppressive regimes acted as a strong deterrent to Western European democracies which might otherwise have been 203

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tempted to use tanks during civil disturbances. In Northern Ireland, the British Army did use Centurion AVRE bulldozer tanks on 31 July 1972 during Operation Motorman in order to clear away barricades from Catholic areas in Belfast and Free Derry; but tanks were never again used in an active role in the province due to the disturbing parallels which press photographs could create with East Berlin, Budapest and Prague. The risk of international condemnation was simply too high given the interpretation which such pictures had the power to invoke.31 Perhaps the culmination of the tank as a symbol of Soviet oppression was the famous pink tank in Prague. A Joseph Stalin II tank which stood as a Soviet war memorial was painted pink by a young Czech artist, David Cerny, during the night of 28 April 1991. An immediate apology was issued to the Soviet Union by the Czechoslovak government, who covered up the tank and ordered it to be repainted olive green. By 8 May, Cerny had been charged under a public order act; this inflamed opinion in the country, though, especially after pro-​Communists painted a memorial to Jan Pallach who had set himself alight in 1969 to protest against the Soviet occupation of the country. On 7 May, parliamentary deputies arrived in boiler suits, armed with paintbrushes and ‘repinked’ the tank. In this way, an artistic protest escalated into a major national dispute over the nature of the independence of the state. Yet, interestingly, as part of an attempt at diplomatic damage limitation, the president of Czechoslovakia, Václav Havel, noted that respect needed to be given to the citizens of the USSR, as the tank was a memorial to the Soviet war dead.32 In the same year, from 18–​21 August, there was an attempted putsch in Moscow. Mikhail Gorbachev was removed from power, as die-​hard communists and senior military officers attempted to gain control of the country; among the group was the defence minister, Dmitri Yazov. The political resistance coalesced around Boris Yeltsin, who gave an important speech standing on top of a tank on 19 August at the height of the uncertainty as to how events would unfold. On 21 August 1991, the majority of the troops declared themselves opposed to the putsch, which then collapsed. During the attempted seizure of power, some civilians lay or stood in front of tanks, with the crews unsure how to react. Some citizens tried to pull the tankers out of their vehicles.33 During the two Palestinian ‘intifadas’, images appeared in the press around the world of Palestinian boys hurling stones at Israeli tanks: 1987 and 2000 were the years in which the ‘war of stones’ seriously upset Israeli security policy. In 1987, there seems to have been genuine grassroots unrest among the Palestinians. Clearly, photographs of children throwing stones at tanks was in media terms much more effective on the world stage than suicide bombers. But the violence, particularly in the Second Intifada, did more to damage the Palestinian cause given the chain of events which it unleashed. Still, the images of ‘children versus tanks’ communicated the established political symbolism of ‘oppression’.34 Once the conventional phase of the 2003 Anglo-​American invasion of Iraq had been completed, a new era was entered in the symbolic meaning of tanks. The M1 Abrams could be seen in the guise of the Western bully, crushing civilian cars as a punishment for looters, or driving over other vehicles, increasing hatred of the invader. The reverse 204

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side of the coin was that the insurgents did everything they could to try and destroy M1 tanks –​they knew as much as anyone the high symbolic value which a picture of a burning, knocked-​out M1 would have for the world’s media, even if it proved an extremely difficult task to accomplish. For the British public, however, the symbol of the war became a burning Warrior IFV in Basra in September 2005, which seemed to encapsulate the disastrous nature of Tony Blair’s decision to go to war. Photographers captured images of burning crew members baling out of the IFV after it was hit by petrol bombs. The drama of the images did not, of course, communicate that the damage to the IFV was limited and only the gunner was seriously injured.35 Just over five years later, the domino effect of the disintegration of some states which the Arab Spring set in motion began with the toppling of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi during the Libyan Civil War (February–​October 2011). During this brief conflict, Soviet tanks of the Libyan Army appeared impotent against Western airpower which was employed in support of the rebel groups, some of which used captured tanks. At the time of the overthrow of Gaddafi, the images of rebels in pickup trucks taking on the tanks of the Libyan Army appeared to communicate a message of heroic resistance. But as the Arab Spring spread to Syria, the old symbolic connotations of tanks in cities started to become more blurred. The rise of ISIS and other groups has removed any sense of just causes. Battlefield footage of rebels in Syrian towns destroying Syrian tanks with handheld anti-​tank weapons has demonstrated graphically the deadly nature of employing tanks in cities. Such YouTube footage, although often hard to interpret with absolute certainty as to the time, place and combatants, does seem to serve as a warning to Western nations of the likely perils of becoming involved in fighting for cities in the Middle East against armed groups which are well-​supplied with anti-​tank weapons.36

The politics of AFV development Given the symbolism of tanks and AFVs as guarantors of state power, political controversies have sometimes emerged around perceived governmental failures in the development of new armoured fighting vehicles. One such high-​profile political controversy occurred in Great Britain during the Second World War, as the country struggled to produce a medium tank capable of taking on the German machines. After the near total loss of heavy equipment in the Battle of France, the United Kingdom was bereft of adequate tanks. Yet, the urgency of the situation led to de facto obsolete machines continuing in production, with a concomitant delay in developing faster, better armoured and properly armed tanks. The mismanagement surrounding the development of what was to become the Churchill tank, which only appeared in 1943 armed with a 75mm gun, came to be known as the ‘Tank Scandal’. In a newspaper article published as late as 1944, J. F. C. Fuller was able to heap contempt upon the inefficiencies of the Tank Board, highlighting the lack of qualifications of its members and the refusal by the government to respond to repeated questions about the lack of progress from members of the House of Commons.37 205

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One of the key issues for alliances equipped with armoured vehicles has been the question of standardisation of procedures and equipment –​put another way, creating vehicles which can be used by several different nations, thus saving research and development costs, but also facilitating interoperability in terms of communications, fuel, ammunition and spares. During the Cold War, NATO nations continually worried about the fighting potential of Warsaw Pact nations’ armies, who all used the same equipment because the United States, Britain, France and West Germany continued to produce their own tanks. A degree of interoperability was achieved as the Dutch, Belgian and Canadian armies bought the German Leopard tank, but joint inter-​Allied AFV projects, such as the 155mm SP-​70, invariably failed.38 A consideration of the reasons for the failure of the American-​German MBT-​70 joint tank project highlights some of the difficulties associated with collaborative projects. An initial agreement was reached in 1963 by both countries on tank specifications, but by 1969 the project had been abandoned. Although US Secretary for Defense Robert S. McNamara had pushed the project to demonstrate solidarity within the NATO alliance, Germany joined after embarking upon its own MBT programme, the one that ultimately resulted in the Leopard I. Despite their interest in American technology, the Federal German armed forces used the project mainly as a form of insurance policy in the event that their own MBT programme failed. Serious differences over weight, armour protection and the most desirable range at which tanks could fight dogged the joint project, mostly because the US Army requirements were too ambitious. As it turned out, only the hull and turret layout were the result of joint work. Duplication of effort drove up costs and, in the end, finally swamped McNamara’s original, noble objectives.39 While the politics of vehicle development has remained a contentious issue since 1945, it has not been restricted to joint projects. In the United States, considerable political debate occurred during the 1980s around the development of AFVs. In a hearing held by a subcommittee of the House of Representatives on the swim capability of the Bradley IFV in April 1987, the chairman began by noting that ‘the Bradley continues to be a controversial program’; he stated that the army needed ‘to come clean on the Bradley’s problem’ if it expected further support from Congress.40 At the end of the year, at another hearing, this time about ongoing tests to improve its survivability, it was noted that as a result of live-​fire tests, the army had selected a new version of the Bradley (the M2A2) which had integral 30mm protection, a spall liner, attachment points for reactive armour, relocation of the ammunition, changes in the fuel system and a modified fire suppression system. The level of detail provided, not only on improvements being made to the Bradley IFV but also upgrades to the M60A3 and M1 tanks, was surprising. Tellingly, a House representative from California, Robert E.  Badham, noted ‘the high level of interest at this proceeding, as represented by the unusually large attendance here this morning.’ His explicit mention of the ‘methods and tactics employed by Bradley critics over the years’ indicated that the Bradley IFV had been a subject of intense public controversy.41 The ‘politics of AFV development’ does not cease, though, once the first vehicle leaves the production line: the export of vehicles has been one way of offsetting high 206

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development costs. As the sale of fighting vehicles usually takes place well away from the gaze of journalists and the general public, it is normally uncontroversial. In 1980, the US Army M41 Walker Bulldog tank, which had entered service in 1951, and been replaced by the Sheridan in the late 1960s, was still in service with the armies of –​although not all these nations bought the tank directly from the United States –​Argentina, Belgium, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Denmark, Ecuador, Ethiopia, Japan, Lebanon, New Zealand, Pakistan, the Philippines, Portugal, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Spain, Taiwan, Tunisia, Turkey and Vietnam. The export of MBTs to alliance partners has been even less controversial. In the same way as the United States supplied its allies, Soviet T-​54/​55, T-​62 and T-​64 tanks were supplied to many countries friendly towards the USSR, such as North Korea, Libya, Cuba, East Germany, Czechoslovakia, Egypt and Bulgaria. Furthermore, one area of superpower competition during the Cold War was in arms exports to the Middle East, as the supply of armoured vehicles was another way of extending superpower influence in the region. This can be seen quite clearly in the build-​up to the Yom Kippur War. Between 1970 and 1972, the USSR supplied 350 T-​54, 400 T-​55 and 200 T-​62 tanks to Egypt; the following year, 50 T-​54, 100 T-​55 and 300 T-​62 tanks, 75 PT-​76 light tanks and 125 BMP-​1 IFVs were delivered. Between 1970 and 1972, the United States supplied Israel with 120 M-​48 Patton tanks, 100 M60 tanks and 24 M109 155mm howitzers, while Britain delivered 300 Centurion tanks, with a further 100 Centurions arriving in Israel in 1973. Both the Soviet Union and the United States sought to influence the military policies of the main regional actors, although opinions differ as to the actual impact of American supplies of fresh equipment and spare parts on the peace negotiations at the end of the conflict. But there can be little doubt that both superpowers used arms shipments, including AFVs, to try to exert indirect control over other states through the delivery or withholding of spare parts.42 In other words, when governments spend heavily on AFVs, they will seek to ‘recoup’ the costs of that investment through arms exports, which are then used to create leverage in regional conflicts.

Conclusion What is especially striking in the history of the tank has been the way in which its symbolic meaning has changed within a relatively short space of time. During the First World War, the Germans regarded tanks as a monstrous invention, representing the dehumanisation of warfare. It became a supreme test to remain calm in the face of a tank attack. As in the case of the Soviet Union during the Civil War, the tank seemed to be viewed as a form of ‘unfair means’ which was being used against the nation. Yet, once the Freikorps units began to battle against the Spartacus uprising in 1919, captured British tanks and at least one A7V were employed against communist irregulars. The tank was now a weapon which German commanders could accept. Still, during the final two years of the Second World War, two British First World War tanks were displayed in the Tiergarten in the centre of Berlin, almost certainly Red Army trophy machines looted from the USSR. 207

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Here was a final attempt by the Germans to invert the symbolic meaning which the tank had acquired for them during the Great War: the intention was to turn a symbol of their defeat into one of victory.43 It can be argued, then, that armoured and mechanised vehicles throughout the last hundred years of their history have symbolised certain values related to success or failure in war. The communication of these messages has sometimes been in the form of war memorials, but much of the symbolism has been communicated through newsreels, television reports, press photographs and other forms of representation. As self-​contained war memorials, tanks have communicated clear messages about sacrifice in war. In photographs and newsreels, in particular, the tank has symbolised victory, or become a metaphor for occupation (and therefore the humiliation of defeat). During the course of military operations, tanks moving towards their goal or pursuing enemy forces has communicated rapid advance, and therefore military success, whereas tanks engaged in close combat in cities and towns have suggested unsuccessful occupation and looming defeat. A complete ‘visual language’ has emerged around the tank which cannot be ignored.

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CONCLUSION

Armour has been at the heart of modern warfare since 1916. As tracked vehicles and combined-​arms formations have evolved, a number of recurring patterns have emerged: the reasons for success continue to be similar regardless of the war; and the reasons for failure usually seem to be variations on familiar themes. Although the conditions under which crewmen fight have vastly improved since the first tanks crossed no-​man’s land during the Battle of the Somme on 15 September 1916, some aspects have remained constant. The sense of anticipation, exhilaration and fear which the crewmen go through before they go into action are the same and the exertions of combat are still taxing on the body and mind. Some elements of mobile warfare, however, have changed –​in particular the ranges at which tank engagements now take place, as well as the lethality of supporting AFVs. Against this background of continuity and change, three areas require mention by way of conclusion: recurring patterns in campaigns, the global context and the future of armour.

Continuity in armoured warfare The historical examination of armoured forces raises the inevitable question as to whether any pattern can be identified in the case of striking successes where AFVs are employed. In a report completed in 1976 for the US Defense Nuclear Agency in which 14 breakthrough operations were examined, running from September 1918 to June 1967, some interesting conclusions were drawn, which provide some useful pointers in answering this question. The factors used to analyse each operation were force quality, reserves, superiority in mobility, air superiority and force preponderance. Two environmental elements affected each operation –​terrain and weather. The attacker was influenced by the quality of planning and whether surprise could be achieved, whereas the performance of the defender was regulated by fortifications, reserves and leadership. The factors which were adjudged to be of most importance in the majority of these operations were force quality, training, experience, morale and availability of weapons. In 12 of the cases, the defenders were considered to have contributed to the breakthrough due to their own shortcomings (in four there were insufficient reserves, in eight cases leadership failures). The report argued that in order to achieve a breakthrough, the attacker required an advantage in numbers or firepower, superior combat effectiveness, mobility, air support, surprise or a combination of these factors. Considering the 14 case studies, in eight the attacker enjoyed more manpower, in seven more guns and in nine more

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tanks; in five cases, all three of these advantages were present; in only two cases did the attackers have an advantage in tanks only.1 The results of this study highlight the importance in armoured warfare of combined-​ arms formations and that, if a defender is unprepared for a combined-​arms attack in which mechanised vehicles play a prominent part, he is likely to lose if the other key elements such as leadership, morale and force ratios are not in his favour. While researchers have not been able to establish a link between advance rates and manpower, firepower and combat power ratios, one obvious pattern has emerged in the employment of armoured forces. Defenders will usually suffer if they have not engaged in combat operations over the previous two or three years, if they assume that certain terrain is ‘unsuitable’ for mobile operations (thereby ignoring the need for defensive preparations), if their gunnery skills have not been practised, if they cannot disrupt the opponent’s superiority, if their leadership is poor or divided and if their initial unit dispositions are too close to the forward edge of the battlefield. The range of factors which govern operations on land, however, make it very difficult to discover the key to victory through statistical analysis. But the mistakes made by commanders who have lost campaigns do conform to a definite pattern in those cases where armoured forces have played a central role. In terms of combat between individual armoured vehicles, two constants have been the range and quality of tank and anti-​tank guns and the strength of the protective armour of a vehicle. But setting aside the quality of tactics, what are the main causes of the destruction of vehicles? One study of tank losses among the Western Allies during the Second World War came to the conclusion that 54 per cent of tank casualties were caused by gun-​fire, 20 per cent by mines, 13 per cent by non-​enemy causes, 7.5 per cent through hollow-​charge weapons and 6 per cent through other miscellaneous causes. Needless to say, on the German side matters looked rather different. The ‘immobilisation’ of German tanks was due to gun-​fire in 40 per cent of the sample, 20.8 per cent the result of measures taken by the crew, 18.4 per cent due to abandonment by the crew, air attack was only 8 per cent, hollow-​charge 4.5 per cent, mechanical causes 4.1 per cent and mines and other weapons represented only 1 per cent. If applied to wars after 1945, these statistics illustrate that superior armour-​plating will have a positive benefit for one side, but that a significant proportion of tank losses will be caused by non-​combat factors, such as lack of fuel, low morale among crews, or mines. Noteworthy is that in 1945, leading panzer generals were unable to give accurate statistics on the causes of German tank losses to Allied interrogation officers, perhaps due to the higher rates of mechanical breakdown in the final year of the war.2 Still, the data highlights that at the very least there are a number of threats to AFVs other than enemy tank shells. In addition, historical experience suggests that there are recurring patterns in terms of advance rates. Even in the case of successful campaigns against limited resistance, and regardless of the terrain, there are definite limits on armour advance rates. In the Sinai Campaign in 1967, some Israeli spearheads achieved rates of 35–​65 miles on the first day. During the Second World War, while there were occasional spectacular advances by some German units of 60 miles a day, these were exceptions and impossible to maintain. No large formation managed more than 35 miles per day.3 Of course, it should 210

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be borne in mind that these advance rates were usually achieved by units which had received excellent training and were highly motivated. Where military organisations are not popular within their societies, or where training budgets have been cut, such advance rates will prove difficult to achieve, regardless of which part of the world a war is being waged in.

The global context The largest armoured battles over the last hundred years have taken place in Western and Eastern Europe, North Africa and in the Persian Gulf. But this does not mean that the employment of armoured forces has not occurred in other areas across the globe: the Korean peninsula, Vietnam and the Indo-​Pakistan border region have all seen battles involving armour. Some parts of the world are, though, quite obviously less inviting for the employment of mechanised vehicles on a large scale. Despite the size of the country, China’s People’s Liberation Army has not placed as much emphasis as some of its neighbours on armoured forces. Quite apart from the tradition of ‘people’s war’ established by Mao Tse-​Tung, 80–​90 per cent of Chinese territory has been characterised as poor or unsuited to the passage of AFVs. While it has been estimated that China produced 3,500 Type-69 MBTs between 1977 and 1981, China’s armoured force has been largely directed towards border security or protection of major cities, as part of her preparations for a defensive war, with the most likely aggressor before 1989 the Soviet Union.4 Nonetheless, even in countries where there is a much lower probability of a mechanised war taking place, substantial armoured forces are maintained as part of the armed forces. In those cases where armies are confronted with unfamiliar terrain in regions of the world in which they have not fought recently, there is a constant danger of incorrect assumptions being reached about which ground is unsuitable for the employment of armour. A study of history reveals some spectacular errors, such as the French failure in May 1940 to identify the Ardennes Forest as an area through which tank divisions could pass, or the Japanese Kwantung Army’s inability in August 1945 to recognise the opportunities which mountain roads could offer to the tank-​heavy forces of the Red Army. Yet, even armies with considerable experience in the use of mechanised formations have shown themselves capable of failing to spot opportunities. When fighting on the Falklands Islands in 1982, one British commander initially assumed that the few Scorpion and Scimitar light tanks which were available would not be able to cross boggy ground. As was subsequently discovered, both light tanks were capable of crossing soggy peat and other wet ground; indeed, they went on to provide invaluable fire support in some engagements with Argentine forces.5 The end of the Cold War suggested to some that large mechanised forces in Europe could be mothballed. This general optimism may have led some in the United States to think that war against Saddam Hussein in 2003 would be straightforward. However, as gradually became clear, a quick conventional victory does not guarantee a grateful population or insulate a recently conquered country from a violent insurgency. At the 211

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same time, the outbreak of the conflict in eastern Ukraine in 2014, and the accusation that Moscow is fuelling the conflict by supplying heavy weapons, including tanks, armoured personnel carriers, artillery and advisers to the rebels, shows that land warfare involving the use of sizeable armoured formations has returned to European soil. The civil war which broke out in Syria in March 2011 in the wake of the Arab Spring has also demonstrated that, despite the poor levels of training among many of the combatants, armoured vehicles will be used whenever they are available, even though there has been a steady supply of powerful anti-​tank weapons to many of the combatants. It can be concluded, therefore, that many of the lessons which have been learned through many wars, counter-​ insurgencies and peace-​ keeping operations since the invention of the tank will continue to hold relevance for the future, regardless of the geographical region in which conflicts take place. Among the most obvious of these is the importance of good battlefield intelligence, the ability of mechanised forces to operate as part of a combined-​arms team, which now includes helicopter forces, and, what has always been the greatest of challenges, the effective command and control of units. But without training and adequate equipment, communication in armoured warfare becomes extremely difficult; furthermore, attrition of units due to casualties, illnesses and transfers can further degrade their capacity to operate effectively. In the opening days of the fighting in the Sinai Desert in 1967, artillery airbursts destroyed Israeli antennas and electronic warfare devices. Thus, a combination of training and an understanding of how to protect command vehicles may continue to decide the outcome of armoured battles in the future.6 Or, seen from another perspective, careful preparation can close the gap between second-​and first-​world armies, even if first-​world armies initially possess the upper hand in command and control technology.

The future of armoured warfare Given the changes which military technology can bring to the battlefield it would be a courageous historian or commentator who would attempt to predict the future of armoured warfare. Nonetheless, technological changes usually follow predictable paths and tend to move in 20–​30-​year cycles:  precision-​guided munitions were under discussion in the 1970s, but were first used to devastating effect on a large scale during Operation Desert Storm in February 1991. Among the major developments of the last two decades have been the use of drones for intelligence gathering and the increasing importance of helicopters for battlefield mobility in counter-​insurgency operations. These innovations have been integrated gradually into combined-​arms formations, so that military change has been, once again, evolutionary rather than revolutionary. But despite the rise of helicopter and ATGMs, the future of the tank and its mechanised support vehicles does not appear to be in any great danger as the most important weapons system in ground warfare. The employment of heavy armoured forces in the fighting in eastern Ukraine since 2014 is but one example of the continued use of mechanised units in Europe. The army of the Russian Federation still places a strong emphasis 212

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on armoured vehicles; if it is to survive, Ukraine will also need to train and maintain armoured units. As both sides cannot afford large infantry armies, armour and artillery will remain at the heart of future combat operations. Indeed, there has been no desire in the Syrian Army to focus more on infantry and less on tanks. YouTube footage suggests that armoured vehicles remain as important as infantry in the fighting in cities in the bloody Syrian Civil War. In essence, wherever armies are not in a position to rely on vast and expendable infantry forces, armour will remain as the key component in their force structures. But what of future technology? In an article published in 1997, a US Army officer, Ralph Peters, portrayed what he considered to be possible future trends in armoured warfare. He identified three main fields in technology:  first, on a typical battlefield, lighter tanks would be required, as would increased ranges for tank guns through the use of sensors and the emergence of electro-​magnetic armour; second, he predicted that the future would bring robotic and remote-​control tanks, which could operate on ground contaminated by weapons of mass destruction; and third, he saw new technology for urban warfare as essential, including a gun capable of firing both demolition munitions and intelligent munitions, support for armour provided by drones and ground robots to peer into buildings, nimble AFVs with a ‘sprint capability’ and the securing of conquered areas by robots and air-​deliverable vehicles.7 How far has technology moved towards the fulfilment of this vision twenty years on? In terms of standard tank technology, while there has been increased experimentation with lighter vehicles in Western nations, this has not prevented armies seeking to upgrade their main battle tanks. There are new versions of existing designs currently planned or coming into service, such as the Leopard IIA6, the Merkava IVm and the Abrams M1A3. Among the many upgrades, the suggestion to equip the M1A3 with the IDF Lahat ATGM would create a range of 8 km, trumping the current maximum range of 5 km enjoyed by the guns on the Russian T-​80 and T-​90 tanks, especially if drones could be used to assist in target acquisition. Just as interesting is the technology to be found in the Polish PL-​01 ‘concept tank’. The unmanned turret, made possible through an auto-​loader, has reduced the profile of the vehicle, while its radar signature has been reduced through the application of radar-​absorbent material to the external surface of the tank. Further, a series of hexagonal plates can switch the temperature of the tank to that of its immediate environment, making it difficult to detect with an infrared sensor; cooling of the exhaust also contributes to a reduced infrared presence. It can even generate a false signature, suggesting to enemy systems that it is a civilian car.8 While technological improvements such as these are still being tested, they do suggest that at least some of Peters’ a predictions are coming true, even if they call into question his thinking on the need for ‘light armour’. The development which is most difficult to predict is the future of unmanned, tracked vehicles, or ‘land drones’. Experiments have already been conducted with relatively small tracked vehicles. The British Talon light robot mounts a machine-​gun on a track system, using a camera to allow the operator to control it; the two missions it is designed for are reconnaissance and weapons delivery. In open countryside it would be extremely easy to 213

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destroy, but it might have its uses in urban combat. A larger vehicle is the AvantGuard Unmanned Ground Combat Vehicle, one variant of which mounts more powerful armament and has four separate tracks, akin to some snow vehicles. Given that the Israel Defence Forces already employs the Guardium system for border patrol purposes, does the future perhaps lie with unmanned vehicles?9 There is no easy answer to this question. On the one hand, light infantry forces are generally less interested in these weapons systems because they add to their logistics tail, are difficult to transport and hamper their mobility. Quickly assembled drones equipped with cameras, which can fly over enemy positions in their immediate vicinity, are much easier to transport, although an insurgent can stay out of view of a drone’s camera. Yet, despite the obvious deficiencies at present, it would be foolhardy to write off the future possibilities of unmanned vehicles. As technology improves, there may well be a role for unmanned vehicles in combination with traditional, crewed vehicles. In fact, large areas of a front line can be impossible to cover without sizeable infantry forces. The Russian Army appears to have reached this conclusion. It is developing the Uran-​6 counter-​mine robot, which can detect and destroy mines of up to 60 kg of TNT, the Uran-​14, an obstacle-​breaching machine, and the Uran-​9, a combat robot which is equipped with four Ataka 9M120 AT missiles and four SAM missiles, as well as a 27A2 automatic 30mm cannon and a coaxial 7.62mm machine-​gun in a turret.10 The third area of future development in AFV technology is in weapons for urban warfare. Once again, the Russians appear to be leading the way. Part of the reason for this was the disaster they experienced in Grozny in Chechenya on New Year’s Eve 1994. After arriving in the centre of the city unopposed, they were attacked by a guerrilla force armed with RPGs which caused losses of 800 men, 20 out of 26 tanks and 102 of 120 other armoured vehicles. This chastening experience led them to conclude that more lightly armoured support vehicles such as the ZSU-​23-​4 were too vulnerable in urban environments. The likely result may well be the BMOP vehicle, built on a T-​72 or T-​90S chassis, which is armed with two 2A42 automatic cannon, a 7.62mm coaxial machine-​gun and two automatic grenade launchers with 600 rounds of ammunition. It has an anti-​tank capability in the shape of four Ataka-​T guided missiles. With a crew of five, all the weapons can be operated from inside the vehicle, and the commander and crew have various optical devices which gives them a 360-degree view of the battlefield. While the vehicle’s future is not entirely certain, it does appear to confirm the conclusion that there is a need for heavy vehicles designed to support tanks for fighting in urban environments.11 Future urban warfare will most likely require heavy, tough vehicles, with modifications of the type which can already be seen on some IDF vehicles, combined with robots and drones capable of using cameras to identify forces concealed in buildings. Some experimental robots have cameras mounted on telescopic poles which can peer into rooms on the first floor of buildings, while robot tanks could secure ground which has been won, or move in advance of heavy armour, causing opponents to reveal their positions. In fact, rumours have begun to circulate that the Russians have already tested some of their robotic vehicles in the fighting in Syria. While mini-​tanks with cameras are vulnerable to enemy counter-​measures, such as a guerrilla armed with an aerosol spray 214

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can who could ‘blind’ the vehicle, multiple vehicles launched simultaneously under cover of supporting fire might be much harder to deal with. Still, regardless of how the various new vehicles and devices develop, it seems certain that they will be employed in urban warfare only in conjunction with heavy armour.

Epilogue Writing in his 1923 book The Reformation of War, J. F. C. Fuller wrote in the chapter on ‘The Future of Land Warfare’: ‘In the past, wars have frequently been decided by manpower; in the future they will almost certainly be decided by machine-​power, begotten of brain-​power’.12 This was his claim for future warfare after the First World War. In great measure, his prediction has come true. In fact, his arguments about the gradual decline of the infantry of mass armies, made in his important contribution to the theory of mechanised warfare, Lectures on F.S.R. III:  Operations between Mechanized Forces (1932), also seem to have reached fulfilment. But because mass armies have become too expensive, the ‘motorised guerrilla fighter’ identified by Fuller has come into his own.13 As infantry in open terrain find it difficult to resist armoured attack, fighting in the recent wars in Ukraine and Syria has often been concentrated in urban areas. The inability of smaller armies to create continuous front lines has led, in turn, to bases capable of all-​round defence occupied by armour and artillery. Where armour has not been available, or has been employed only in small numbers, combat machines have been constructed from waste-​disposal lorries and agricultural machinery, such as those built by the Kurdish Peshmerga and YPG forces in northern Iraq and Syria. These home-​made combat vehicles, at least some of which have been used in actual combat, bear a remarkable similarity to some of the curious constructions which were produced in the early days of the tank. It is just one illustration of the way in which history has a tendency of, if not repeating itself, at least creating a sense of déjà vu. This is not to say that Western TOW anti-​tank weapons have not been just as important in dealing with ISIS wheeled and tracked vehicles. But the desire and the need to create mobility, firepower and protection on the battlefield, combined in one vehicle, will remain –​especially where there are difficulties in obtaining tanks and other fighting vehicles. In the immediate future, primitive vehicles will continue to be employed alongside highly sophisticated weapons systems. In the field of armoured warfare, we live truly in a new age of military contradictions.

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Introduction 1 H. G. Wells, ‘The Land Ironclads’, Strand Magazine, No. 26 (December 1903): 751–​64. 2 J. P. Harris, Men, Ideas and Tanks: British Military Thought and Armoured Forces, 1903–​1939 (Manchester, 1995), pp. 36–​39. 3 J. F. C. Fuller, Tanks in the Great War 1914–​1918 (London, 1920), pp. 1–​17, quote, 2. 4 An example is B. H. Liddell Hart, ‘Mediaeval Cavalry and Modern Tanks’, English Review, 40 (July 1925): 83–​96. 5 J. M. Kistler, War Elephants (Lincoln, NE, 2007), esp. pp. 35–​36, 148, 204; R. E. Simpkin, ‘Tank Hunting’, Infantry, 74 (July/​August 1984): 23–​27; D. Fletcher, British Mark I Tank 1916 (Oxford, 2004), p. 47. 6 H. O. Mance, Armoured Trains, Royal Engineers Professional Papers, 4th Series, Vol. 1, No 4, 1905; G. Balfour, The Armoured Train: Its Development and Usage (London, 1981). 7 M. Pöhlmann, ‘Images of War, Armament and Mechanization in Imperial Germany, 1880–​ 1914’, in A. Searle (ed.), Genesis, Employment, Aftermath: First World War Tanks and the New Warfare, 1900–​1945 (Solihull, 2015), pp. 13–​30. 8 R. L. DiNardo and Austin Bay, ‘The First Modern Tank: Gunther Burstyn and his Motorgeschütz’, Military Affairs, 50 (January 1985): 12–​15. 9 Haig’s Despatch of 23 December 1916, in J. H. Boraston (ed.), Sir Douglas Haig’s Despatches (December 1915–​April 1919) (London, 1920), pp. 17–52, here, 42. 10 O. Lahaie, ‘The Development of French Armoured Warfare on the Western Front, 1916–​1918’, in Searle (ed.), Genesis, Employment, Aftermath, pp. 57–​79, here, 61. 11 TMARL, Major-General George M.  Lindsay Papers, T49, Tank Corps Box 3, War Office, ‘DISARMAMENT: Committee on the Abolition of Tanks (March 1932). REPORT’, SECRET, 31 March 1932. 12 TMARL, Lindsay Papers, T49, Tank Corps Box 3, Frederick Pile (UK Delegation to the Disarmament Conference, Geneva) to Maj.-​Gen. S. C. Peck, 25 March 1932. 13 LNA, League of Nations, Conference for the Reduction and Limitation of Armaments, Land Commission, Conf. D/​CT/​Experts/​45, Proposal by UK Delegation, 25 May 1932, Conf. D/​CT/​ CE/​43, Proposals of UK and French delegations, 25 May 1932, Conf. D/​CT/​CE/​51, Proposal by UK Delegation, n.d., Conf. D/​CT/​CE/​48, Proposals by UK Delegation, 26 May 1932. 14 R. M. Ogorkiewicz, Design and Development of Fighting Vehicles (London, 1968), p. 55. 15 C. F. Foss (ed.), Jane’s Armour and Artillery 1984–​85 (London, 1984), pp. 55–​57; R. E. Simpkin, ‘Tank or Tank Destroyer?’ Military Technology, 7/​5 (1983): 14–​33. 16 Definition of mechanisation and motorisation, in Anon., Tactics and Techniques of Cavalry. Advanced (A Text and Reference Book of Cavalry Training) (Harrisburg, PA, 1939), p. 253.

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Notes 17 ‘Introduction’, in J. P. Harris and F. N. Toase (eds), Armoured Warfare (London, 1990), p. 1. 18 ASRL, US Army Armor School, ‘ST-​17-​1-​2, History and Role of Armor’, unpublished study, April 1974, p. 54. 19 HQ, Dept. of the Army, FM 17-​1. Armor Operations (Washington, DC, 1966), p. 7. 20 For the principles of tank design, R. Simpkin, Tank Warfare (London, 1979), pp. 78–​138. 21 I. F.  B. Tytler et  al., Vehicles and Bridging (London, 1985), pp. 19–​167; R. E. Simpkin, ‘The Broad and Narrow of It’, Armor, 92 (July/​August 1983): 23–​25; idem, ‘Room at the Top’, Armor, 94 (January/​February 1985): 18–​23. 22 W. Trojca and M. Jauglitz, Sturmtiger and Sturmpanzer in Combat (Katowice, 2008); P. J. Donahoe, ‘Flamethrower Tanks on Okinawa’, Armor, 103 (January/​February 1994): 6–​10. 23 E. W. Besch, ‘Infantry Fighting Vehicles:  Their Evolution and Significance’, Marine Corps Gazette, 67 (July 1983): 50–​60. 24 D. C. Isby, ‘Mobility on the Battlefield’, Journal of Defense & Diplomacy, 4 (October 1986): 19–​26. 25 TMARL, Lindsay Papers, T49, Tank Corps Box 3, Pile to Peck, 25 May and 1 June 1932. 26 LNA, League of Nations, Conference for the Reduction and Limitation of Armaments (Land Commission), Conf. D/​CT/​CE/​49, Proposal by Italian Delegation, 26 May 1932, Conf. D/​CT/​ CE/​50, Proposal by Hungarian Delegation, 27 May 1932. 27 J. F.  C. Fuller, ‘What is an Aggressive Weapon?’ English Review, 54 (June 1932):  601–​5; B. H.  Liddell Hart, ‘Aggression and the Problem of Weapons’, English Review, 55 (July 1932): 71–​78. 28 R. E. Simpkin, Race to the Swift: Thoughts on Twenty-​First Century Warfare (London, 1985); idem, ‘The Renaissance of the Light Combat Vehicle’, NATO’s Sixteen Nations, 28 (June/​July 1983): 89–​96. 29 T. Pidgeon, The Tanks at Flers: An Account of the First Use of Tanks in War at the Battle of Flers-​ Courcelette, the Somme, 15th September 1916 (Cobham, 1995). 30 B. Hammond, ‘Practical Considerations in British Tank Operations on the Western Front, 1916–​1918’, in Searle (ed.), Genesis, Employment, Aftermath, pp. 31–​56, esp. 39–​46. 31 K. Tout, Tank! 40 Hours of Battle August 1944 (London, 1987), pp. 13–​16. 32 TNA, WO 203/​ 691, Medical Report on the Use of Benzedrine by Armoured Troops, December 1942. 33 War Dept., FM 17–​76. Crew Drill and Service of the Piece Medium Tank, M4 Series (105mm Howitzer) (Washington, DC, 14 September 1944), p. 49. 34 C. P. Worick, ‘The Battle of Suoi Tre’, Armor, 109 (May/​June 2000): 23–​28. 35 See the British Army manual, S.S. 214. Tanks and their Employment with Other Arms (General Headquarters, August 1918), esp. chs. II, IV, V. 36 ASRL, US Army Armor School, ‘ST-​17-​1-​2, History and Role of Armor’, pp. 54–​63. 37 M. A. Henry, ‘French Armor in Algeria’, Armor, 81 (November/​December 1972): 12–​16. 38 J. Karamat, ‘The Tank Attack That Failed’, Pakistan Army Journal, 24 (September 1983): 39–​49; K. P. Kandeth, The Western Front: The Indo-​Pakistan War 1971 (New Delhi, 1984), pp. 96–​99, 167–​68. 39 J. M. House, Combined Arms Warfare in the Twentieth Century (Lawrence, KS, 2001); and B. I. Gudmundsson, On Armor (Westport, CT, and London, 2004).

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1  The new warfare: The First World War, 1914–​18 1 Harris, Men, Tanks and Ideas, pp. 9–​23. 2 On conditions for crews and the demands of training: Hammond, ‘Practical Considerations in British Tank Operations’, pp. 39–​46; and D. E. Hickey, Rolling into Action: Memoirs of a Tank Corps Section Commander (London, 1936), esp. pp. 28–​34. 3 Harris, Men, Ideas and Tanks, pp. 23–​39. 4 B. H. Liddell Hart, The Tanks. Vol. I: 1914–​1939 (London, 1959), pp. 53–​55. 5 LHCMA, Major-​General J. F. C. Fuller Papers, I/​1/​1, SECRET, ‘Notes on the Employment of “Tanks” ’, E. D. S., February 1916. 6 C. & A. Williams-​Ellis, The Tank Corps (London, 1919), pp. 24–​31; Pidgeon, The Tanks at Flers; and Harris, Men, Ideas and Tanks, pp. 61–​68. 7 Lahaie, ‘French Tank Warfare’, pp. 59–​64. 8 Williams-​Ellis, Tank Corps, pp. 53–​58; Fletcher, British Mark I, pp. 40–​43. 9 Williams-​Ellis, Tank Corps, pp. 59–​62. 10 T. Gale, The French Army’s Tank Force and Armoured Warfare in the Great War: The Artillerie Spéciale (Farnham, 2013), pp. 10–​11, 33–​59; Lahaie, ‘French Tank Warfare’, pp. 71–​74. 11 Williams-​Ellis, Tank Corps, pp.  63–​64; D. Fletcher, British Mark IV Tank (Oxford, 2007), pp. 3–​13. 12 Williams-​Ellis, Tank Corps, pp. 64–​69; Harris, Men, Ideas and Tanks, p. 99. 13 Williams-​Ellis, Tank Corps, pp. 73–​99. 14 Gale, Artillerie Spéciale, pp. 79–​105. 15 Harris, Men, Ideas and Tanks, pp. 107–​33; Liddell Hart, The Tanks. Vol. I, pp. 128–​53; J. F. C. Fuller, Memoirs of an Unconventional Soldier (London, 1936), pp. 192–​219; D. G. Browne, The Tank in Action (London, 1920), pp. 267–​96, quote, 282; D. Haig, ‘The Cambrai Operations’, despatch, 20 February 1918, in Boraston (ed.), Sir Douglas Haig’s Despatches (December 1915–​ April 1919), pp. 151–​73. 16 TMARL, J.  F. C.  Fuller Papers, Acc. No. 1880, Private Journal, A1, The Utility of Tanks in Third Army Operations, n.d. [December  1917], A2, Tanks as Time and Man Savers, 12 December 1917. 17 TNA, WO 158/​844, SECRET, Brig.-​Gen. W. D. Bird to GHQ, France, 30 October 1916, WO 95/​ 4366, fol. 57, SECRET, Hugh Elles to GOC, Egyptian Expeditionary Force, 20 November 1916; Williams-​Ellis, Tank Corps, p. 145. 18 TNA, WO 95/​4407, EEF, War Diary, Heavy Branch, Machine-​Gun Corps, January–​April 1917. 19 TNA, WO 95/​4407, report of 19 April 1917, EEF War Diary, Heavy Branch, Machine-​Gun Corps, April 1917. 20 TNA, WO 95/​4597, Maj.-​Gen. W. E. B. Smith, Report of Operations 16th–​20th April 1917, 6 May 1917. 21 On the Second Battle of Gaza, D. R. Woodward, Hell in the Holy Land: World War One in the Middle East (Lexington, KY, 2006), pp. 56–​80. 22 TNA, WO 95/​4407, EEF, War Diary, Detachment, Tank Corps, September–​November 1917, and Appendix to War Diary of November 1917, No. 2; Williams-​Ellis, Tank Corps, pp. 149–​52; A. P. Wavell, The Palestine Campaigns (London, 3rd edn, 1931), pp. 94–​141.

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Notes 23 TNA, WO 95/​4407, EEF, War Diary, Tank Detachment, November 1917 and April 1918; Williams-​Ellis, Tank Corps, pp. 151–​52. 24 Harris, Men, Ideas and Tanks, pp. 137–​51; Williams-​Ellis, Tank Corps, pp. 159–​71. 25 Fuller, Tanks in the Great War, p. 201; Fuller, Memoirs, pp. 265–​66; Williams-​Ellis, Tank Corps, pp. 172–​73; [Ernst] Volckheim, ‘ “Vor zehn Jahre”: Angriffsschlacht bei Villers-​Bretonneux am 24. April 1918’, Deutsche Wehr, No. 15 (18 April 1928): 304–​5. 26 TMARL, Fuller Papers, Private Journal, B46, German Tank Operations, Villers-​Bretonneux, 14 April 1918, H. J. Elles to General Staff, GHQ, 26 April 1918. 27 J. Beach, ‘British Intelligence and German Tanks, 1916–​1918’, War in History, 14 (December 2007): 454–​75. 28 R. Raths, ‘From the Bremerwagen to the A7V:  German Tank Production and Armoured Warfare, 1916–​1918’, in Searle (ed.), Genesis, Employment, Aftermath, pp. 80–​107. 29 Gale, Artillerie Spéciale, pp. 134–​43. 30 D. Fletcher, Mark V Tank (Oxford, 2011), pp. 7–​20, 26–​27. 31 Williams-​Ellis, Tank Corps, pp. 174–​90. 32 Gale, Artillerie Spéciale, pp. 145–​88. 33 J. P. Harris and N. Barr, Amiens to the Armistice: The BEF in the One Hundred Days’ Campaign, 8 August–​11 November 1918 (London, 1998), pp. 87–​143. 34 TMARL, Fuller Papers, Private Journal, B62, The Tactics of the Attack as Affected by the Speed and Circuit of the Medium D Tank, [handwritten draft] 24 May 1918. 35 Harris, Men, Ideas and Tanks, pp. 165–​80. 36 T. Travers, ‘Could the Tanks of 1918 have been War Winners for the British Expeditionary Force?’ Journal of Contemporary History, 27 (July 1992): 389–​405. 37 Fuller, Memoirs, p.  341; J. P. Harris, ‘Haig and the Tank’, in B. Bond and N. Cave (eds), Haig: A Reappraisal 70 Years On (Barnsley, 1999), pp. 145–​54. 38 J. Beach, ‘Issued by the General Staff: Doctrine Writing at British GHQ, 1917–​1918’, War in History, 19 (December 2012): 464–​91, esp. 484–​87. 39 E. D. Swinton, Eyewitness (London, 1932), pp. 294–​99; W. S. Churchill, The World Crisis, 1911–​ 1918 (London, rev. edn, 1931), pp. 651–​53; Fuller, Tanks in the Great War, p. 59. 40 E. Greenhalgh, ‘Technology Development in Coalition: The Case of the First World War Tank’, International History Review, 22 (December 2000): 806–​36. 41 D. E. Wilson, Treat ‘Em Rough! The Birth of American Armor, 1917–​1920 (Novato, CA, 1990), esp. pp. 89–​118; Fletcher, Mark V Tank, p. 14. 42 War Office, Statistics of the Military Effort of the British Empire during the Great War 1914–​1920 (London, March 1922), pp. 65–​66, 178–​80, 219, 479; Gale, Artillerie Spéciale, pp. 227–​30, 235–​44. 43 Fletcher, British Mark I, p. 24.

2  Innovation versus stagnation: The interwar period, 1919–​39 1 Fuller, Tanks in the Great War, pp. 308–​21. 2 J. F.  C. Fuller, ‘Gold Medal (Military) Prize Essay for 1919’, RUSI Journal, 65 (May 1920): 239–74, here, 261; idem, The Reformation of War (London, 1923), p. 154. Some of his journal articles were reproduced in J. F. C. Fuller, On Future Warfare (London, 1928).

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Notes 3 J. F. C. Fuller, Lectures on F.S.R. III (Operations between Mechanized Forces) (London, 1932), pp. xvii–​xix, 16; War Office, Field Service Regulations. Vol. III. Operations –​Higher Formations. 1935 (London, 1936). 4 C. de Gaulle, The Army of the Future (London, 1940), esp. pp. 119–​35. 5 R. A. Doughty, ‘De Gaulle’s Concept of a Mobile, Professional Army:  Genesis of French Defeat?’ Parameters, 4 (Summer 1974): 23–​34. 6 E. Volckheim, Der Kampfwagen in der heutigen Kriegführung: Organisation, Verwendung und Bekämpfung (Berlin, 1924); J. S. Corum, The Roots of Blitzkrieg: Hans von Seeckt and German Military Reform (Lawrence, KS, 1992), pp. 126–​30. 7 L. R. von Eimannsberger, Der Kampfwagenkrieg (Munich, 1934), esp. pp. 113–​209; W. Nehring, Panzer und Motor im fremden Heeren (Potsdam, 1935). 8 W. Nehring, Kampfwagen an die Front! (Leipzig, 1934); idem, Panzerabwehr: Eine Untersuchung über ihre Möglichkeiten (Berlin, 2nd edn, 1937); H. Guderian, Die Panzertruppen und ihr Zusammenwirken mit den anderen Waffen (Berlin, 1937; first published, 1936); idem, Achtung –​ Panzer! (Berlin, 1937). 9 V. K. Triandafillov, The Nature of the Operations of Modern Armies (London, 1994), pp. 28–​29, 63, 78, and, for biographical details, xxix–​xxxii, xliv. 10 G. S. Isserson, The Evolution of Operational Art, English trans. of 2nd edn, 1936 (Fort Leavenworth, KS, 2013), pp. 50–​51; M. N. Tukhachevskii, ‘The Red Army’s New (1936) Field Service Regulations’, Red Star, 6 May 1937, trans. in R. Simpkin, Deep Battle (London, 1987), p. 163. 11 L. R. von Eimannsberger, Tankovaia voina (Moscow, 1937); A. J. Trythall, ‘Boney’ Fuller: The Intellectual General 1878–​1966 (London, 1977), p. 210; Fuller, Memoirs, p. 455. 12 A. Searle, ‘Die Rezeptionsgeschichte der Theorien von J. F. C. Fuller und Basil Liddell Hart im Spiegel deutscher Militärzeitschriften der Zwischenkriegszeit’, in M. Pöhlmann (ed.), Deutsche Militärfachzeitschriften im 20. Jahrhundert (Potsdam, 2012), pp. 49–​60. 13 War Office, Tank Training. Vol. I. Training and War. (Provisional.) 1920 (London, 1920), pp. 9–​10; War Office, Field Service Regulations. Vol. II. Operations. 1924 (London, 1924), pp. 21–​22, 123. 14 R. H. Larson, The British Army and the Theory of Armored Warfare, 1918–​1940 (London, 1984), pp. 150–​52. 15 H. Winton, To Change an Army: Sir John Burnett-​Stuart and British Armoured Doctrine, 1927–​ 1938 (London, 1988), pp. 174–​219; War Office, F.S.R. Vol. III. 1935, pp. 46–​47. 16 Ministère de la Guerre, État-​Major de l’Armée, Instruction provisoire sur l’emploi des chars de combat comme engins d’infanterie, 23 mars 1920 (Paris, 1929); idem, Instruction sur l’emploi des chars de combat (Paris, 1930), p. 12. 17 Ministère de la Guerre, Notice provisoire sur l’emploi des unités motorisées et mécanique de la cavalerie (Paris, 1935);  R. A. Doughty, The Seeds of Disaster: The Development of French Army Doctrine, 1919–​1939 (Hamden, CT, 1985), pp. 136–​60. 18 Corum, Roots of Blitzkrieg, pp.  124–​ 26, 130–​ 43; Reichswehrministerium, H.Dv. 100/​1. Truppenführung. 1933 (Berlin, 1936), p. 183. 19 Der Oberbefehlshaber des Heeres, Panzerangriff im Rahmen einer Infanteriedivision vom 23. Juni 1936 (Berlin, 1936), pp. 11–​12, 23–​45. 20 Oberkommado des Heeres, Richtlinien für die Führung und Einsatz der Panzer-​Division vom 3. Dezember 1940 (Berlin, 1940), pp. 5, 8.

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Notes 21 J. Erickson, The Russian Imperial/​Soviet General Staff (College Station, TX, 1981), p.  78; RKKA, Vremenniy boevoi ustav bronevykh sil RKKA, 1925 (Moscow, 1925); RKKA, Vremenniy instruktsii po boevomu primeneniyu tankov, RKKA 1928 (Moscow, 1928). 22 RKKA, Polevoi Ustav RKKA 1929 (Moscow-​Leningrad, 1929), JPRS trans. UMA-​85-​019, p. 51; S. A. Tyushkevich, The Soviet Armed Forces:  A  History of their Organizational Development (Washington, DC, 1984), p. 162. 23 G. F. Hofmann, ‘Doctrine, Tank Technology, and Execution:  I.  A. Khalepskii and the Red Army’s Fulfillment of Deep Offensive Operations’, Journal of Slavic Military Studies, 7 (June 1996): 283–334, here, 304; RKKA, Vremennyi Polevoi Ustav RKKA 1936 (Moscow, 1937), JPRS trans., UMA-​85-​019, p. 51. 24 US War Dept., Chief of Infantry, Infantry Field Manual. Vol. II. Tank Units (Washington, DC, 1931), p. 211. 25 Anon., Tactics and Techniques of Cavalry. Advanced, p. 285. 26 War Dept., FM 100–​5. Operations (Washington, DC, 22 May 1941), pp. 263–​66. 27 Doughty, Seeds of Disaster, pp. 136–​77; idem, ‘French Anti-​tank Doctrine, 1940: The Antidote that Failed’, Military Review, 56 (May 1976): 36–​48; Gudmundsson, On Armor, pp. 5–​9. 28 Larson, Theory of Armored Warfare, esp. pp. 108–​31, 197–​233; LHCMA, Sir Basil Liddell Hart Papers, LH 15/​12/​8, Lindsay to Montgomery-​Massingberd, 5 February 1934, and Brig. G. M. Lindsay, Experimental Mobile Division, 5 March 1934. 29 LHCMA, Liddell Hart Papers, LH 15/​12/​15, Lindsay to Charles Broad, 24 December 1929. 30 J. Erickson, The Soviet High Command, 1918–​1941 (London, 1962), pp. 339–​57, 365, 436–​45. 31 R. T.  Burke, ‘The German Panzerwaffe, 1920–​ 1939:  A  Study in Institutional Change’, unpublished PhD thesis, Northwestern University, 1969, pp. 15–​36, 182–​228. 32 C. R. Gabel, ‘Evolution of U.S. Armor Mobility’, Military Review, 64 (March 1984):  54–​63; J. T. Hendrix, ‘The Interwar Army and Mechanization: The American Approach’, Journal of Strategic Studies, 16 (March 1993): 75–​108. 33 D. Fletcher, Mechanised Force: British Tanks between the Wars (London, 1991), p. 127. 34 For further details, see S. J. Zaloga, French Tanks of World War II (1): Infantry and Battle Tanks (Oxford, 2014), and idem, French Tanks of World War II (2): Cavalry Tanks and AFVs (Oxford, 2014). 35 F. M.  von Senger und Etterlin, German Tanks of World War II (London, 1969), pp. 24–​28, 34–​36, 43–​45. 36 G. F. Hofmann, ‘Army Doctrine and the Christie Tank: Failing to Exploit the Operational Level of War’, in G. F. Hofmann and D. A. Starry (eds), Camp Colt to Desert Storm: The History of U.S. Armored Forces (Lexington, KY, 1999), pp. 92–​143; Hofmann, ‘I. A. Khalepskii’, 283–​334. 37 P. Chamberlain et al., German Fighting Vehicles, 1939–​1945 (London, 1975), pp. 8–​25. 38 S. J. Main and A. Searle, ‘Beyond the Western Front: Tanks in Palestine and Russia, 1916–​1921’, in Searle (ed.), Genesis, Employment, Aftermath, pp. 163–​90, here, 171–​87. 39 J. E. Alvarez, ‘Tank Warfare during the Rif Rebellion, 1921–​1927’, Armor, 106 (January/​ February 1997): 26–​28. 40 B. W. Farcau, The Chaco War: Bolivia and Paraguay, 1932–​1935 (Westport, CT, 1996), pp. 92–​93, 132–​33, 142; ‘Wim’ Brandt, ‘The Tank Experience in the Chaco War’, Royal Tank Corps Journal, 1 (January 1937): 41–​43, first published in 1934 in the Beihefte zum Militär-​Wochenblatt. 41 S. J. Zaloga, ‘Soviet Tank Operations in the Spanish Civil War’, Journal of Slavic Military Studies, 12 (September 1999): 134–​48; R. L. Proctor, Hitler’s Luftwaffe in the Spanish Civil War (Westport, CT, 1983), p. 219. 222

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Notes 42 Zaloga, ‘Soviet Tank Operations’, 149–​62. 43 E. J. Drea, Nomonhan: Japanese-​Soviet Tactical Combat, 1939 (Fort Leavenworth, KS, 1981), pp. 4, 7, 34, 39, 71–​90; A. D. Coox, Nomonhan:  Japan against Russia, 1939 (Stanford, CA, 1985), pp. 371–​95, 572–​90. 44 A. Gat, British Armour Theory and the Rise of the Panzer Arm:  Revising the Revisionists (Basingstoke, 2000); M. R. Habeck, Storm of Steel:  The Development of Armor Doctrine in Germany and the Soviet Union, 1919–​1939 (Ithaca/​London, 2003).

3  Blitzkrieg: The initial German armoured successes, 1939–​41 1 R. M. Kennedy, The German Campaign in Poland (1939), Dept. of the Army Pamphlet 20–​255 (Washington, DC, 1956), esp. p. 120. 2 S. J. Zaloga, ‘Polish Cavalry against the Panzers’, Armor, 93 (January/​February 1984): 26–​31. 3 MGFA (ed.), GSWW:  Germany’s Initial Conquests in Europe, ii (Oxford, 1991), pp. 81–​126; and, R. Steiger, Panzertaktik im Spiegel deutscher Kriegstagebücher 1939–​1941 (Freiburg i.Br., 1973), pp. 16–​19. 4 TNA, HS 4/​223, British Military Mission to Poland: Despatch by Major-​General Carton de Wiart, 1939, Part I, pp.  3–​5, Part II, pp 2–​7, WO 193/​763, Observations and Remarks of Polish General Staff on Campaign in Poland in 1939 and in France in 1940, 6 August 1940, 1A, p. 3. 5 Kennedy, German Campaign in Poland, p. 120; and MGFA (ed.), GSWW, ii, pp. 101, 124. 6 W. Nehring, Die Geschichte der deutschen Panzerwaffe 1916 bis 1945 (Berlin, 1969), pp. 96–​ 106, 147–​53. 7 A. Rukkas, ‘The Red Army’s Troop Mobilization in the Kiev Special Military District during September 1939’, Journal of Slavic Military Studies, 16 (March 2003):  105–​ 36; A. Hill, ‘Voroshilov’s “Lightning” War  –​The Soviet Invasion of Poland, September 1939’, Journal of Slavic Military Studies, 27 (July/​September 2014): 404–​19. 8 W. Murray, ‘The German Response to Victory in Poland:  A  Case Study in Professionalism’, Armed Forces & Society, 7 (Winter 1981): 285–​98. 9 H.-​ A. Jacobsen, ‘Motorisierungsprobleme im Winter 1939/​ 40’, Wehrwissenschaftliche Rundschau, 6 (September 1956): 497–​519. 10 W. Murray, Military Adaptation in War (Alexandria, VA, 2009), ch. 4, 4-​8–​4-​30. 11 K.-​H. Frieser, The Blitzkrieg Legend: The 1940 Campaign in the West (Annapolis, MD, 2005), pp. 60–​99, 145–​97. 12 Frieser, Blitzkrieg Legend, pp. 229–​74; and J. A. Gunsberg, ‘The Battle of the Belgian Plain, 12–​ 14 May 1940: The First Great Tank Battle’, Journal of Military History, 56 (April 1992): 207–​44. 13 Frieser, Blitzkrieg Legend, pp. 273–​90; and L. F. Ellis, The War in France and Flanders 1939–​ 1940 (London, 1954), pp. 87–​101. 14 Frieser, Blitzkrieg Legend, pp. 36–​54. 15 R. A. Doughty, ‘The Enigma of French Armoured Doctrine 1940’, Armor, 83 (September/​ October 1974): 39–​44. 16 R. E. Bell, ‘Division Cuirassée 1940’, Armor, 83 (January/​February 1974): 25–​30. 17 LHCMA, Liddell Hart Papers, LH 9/​24/​62, Guderian to Liddell Hart, 24 January 1949.

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Notes 18 H. Guderian, Panzer Leader (London, 1952), pp. 89–​120; B. H. Liddell Hart (ed.), The Rommel Papers (London, 1953), p. 84. 19 Battelle Columbus Laboratories, Translation of Taped Conversation with General Hermann Balck, 12 January 1979 (Columbus, OH, 1979), p. 20. 20 CMH, Foreign Military Studies, MS # B-​246, Heinz Guderian, Panzer Organization, 1940, 16 August 1946. 21 Battelle Columbus Laboratories, Translation of Taped Conversation with General Hermann Balck, 13 April 1979 (Columbus, OH, 1979), pp. 12–​13. 22 Evidence of this is K. Kaufmann, Panzer-​Kampfwagenbuch (Berlin, 1940). 23 C. Bekker, The Luftwaffe War Diaries (London, 1972), pp. 121–​85. 24 F. O. Miksche, Blitzkrieg (London, 1941), p. 85. 25 Battelle Columbus Laboratories, ‘Conversations with a Stuka Pilot’: Conference featuring Paul-​ Werner Hozzel, Brig. Gen. (Ret.), German Air Force (Columbus, OH, 1978), p. 34. 26 LHCMA, Viscount Bridgeman Papers, 2/​4, Notes on the Operations in Belgium and Flanders, 10 May–​3 June 1940, compiled by the General Staff of GHQ, BEF, n.d.; Ellis, France and Flanders, pp. 15–​33. 27 MGFA (ed.), GSWW, ii, p. 290; Ellis, France and Flanders, p. 327. 28 MGFA (ed.), GSWW: The Attack on the Soviet Union, iv (Oxford, 1996), pp. 226–​92. 29 MGFA (ed.), GSWW: The Mediterranean, South-​East Europe and North Africa, 1939–​1941, iii (Oxford, 1995), pp. 497–​526; and Nehring, Gechichte der deutschen Panzerwaffe, pp. 175–​81. 30 MGFA (ed.), GSWW, iii, pp.  499–​516; F. W. von Mellenthin, Panzer Battles:  A  Study of the Employment of Armour in the Second World War (London, 1955), pp. 38–​45. 31 MGFA (ed.), GSWW, iv, pp. 315–​20. 32 K. Macksey, ‘Russian Armour in June 1941  –​A  Reassessment’, The Tank Journal, 70 (May 1988): 12–​14; G. A. Dickson, ‘The Counterattack of the 7th Mechanized Corps, 5–​9 July 1941’, Journal of Slavic Military Studies, 26 (April/​June 2013): 310–​40. 33 R. H.  S. Stolfi, German Panzers on the Offensive:  Russian Front  –​North Africa, 1941–​1942 (Atglen, PA, 2003), pp. 10, 14, 16–​46. 34 F. Bayerlein, ‘With the Panzers in Russia’, Marine Corps Gazette, 38 (December 1954): 46–​65. 35 C. B. MacDonald, ‘Blitzkrieg’, Encyclopedia Americana, iv (New York, 1977), p. 81; ‘Blitzkrieg’, New Encyclopaedia Britannica, ii (London, 15th edn, 1981), p.  84; ‘Blitzkrieg’, Great Soviet Encyclopedia, xvi (London, 2nd edn, 1977), p. 6. 36 W. J. Fanning, ‘The Origin of the Term “Blitzkrieg”: Another View’, Journal of Military History, 61 (April 1997): 283–​302. 37 G. Raudzens, ‘Blitzkrieg Ambiguities: Doubtful Usage of a Famous Word’, War & Society, 7 (September 1989): 77–​94. 38 Battelle Columbus Laboratories, Armored Warfare in World War II:  Conference featuring F.W. von Mellenthin, General Major a.D., German Army, May 10, 1979 (Columbus, OH, 1979), p. 3; D. N. Spires, Image and Reality: The Making of the German Officer, 1921–​1933 (Westport, CT, 1984), pp. 1–​17. 39 Miksche, Blitzkrieg, pp. 79–​96, quote, 79; J. S. Corum, The Luftwaffe: Creating the Operational Air War, 1918–​1940 (Lawrence, KS, 1997), pp. 182–​282. 40 B. R. Kroener, ‘Squaring the Circle:  Blitzkrieg Strategy and the Manpower Shortage’, in W. Deist (ed.), The German Military in the Age of Total War (London, 1985), pp. 282–​303.

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Notes 41 Miksche, Blitzkrieg, pp. 58–​112. 42 W. P. Franz, ‘Operational Concepts’, Military Review, 64 (July 1984): 2–15, here, 3; G. P. Groß, Mythos und Wirklichkeit: Geschichte des operative Denkens im deutschen Heer von Moltke d.Ä. bis Heusinger (Paderborn, 2012), esp. pp. 199–​241.

4  Quality versus mass: The Soviet-​German War, 1941–​45 1 B. I. Fugate, Operation Barbarossa: Strategy and Tactics on the Eastern Front, 1941 (Novato, CA, 1984), pp. 163–​83. 2 A. Statiev, ‘The Ugly Duckling of the Armed Forces: Roumanian Armour, 1919–​1941’, Journal of Slavic Military Studies, 12 (June 1999): 220–​44. 3 Fugate, Operation Barbarossa, pp. 285–​315. 4 O. Munzel, Panzer-​Taktik. Raids gepanzerter Verbände im Ostfeldzug 1941/​42 (Neckargemünd, 1959), pp. 122–​23. 5 D. M. Glantz, Colussus Reborn: The Red Army at War, 1941–​1943 (Lawrence, KS, 2005), pp. 17–​21; Nehring, Geschichte der deutschen Panzerwaffe, pp. 235–​40; C. Hartmann, Wehrmacht im Ostkrieg: Front und militärisches Hinterland 1941/​42 (Munich, 2009), p. 355. 6 Glantz, Colussus Reborn, pp.  21–​25; C.  J. Dick, ‘The Operational Employment of Soviet Armour in the Great Patriotic War’, in Harris and Toase (eds), Armoured Warfare, pp. 88–​123, here, 93–​95. 7 J. Erickson, The Road to Stalingrad:  Stalin’s War with Germany, Vol. 1 (London, 1975), pp. 343–​472. 8 G. M. Nipe, Last Victory in Russia: The SS-​Panzerkorps and Manstein’s Kharkov Counteroffensive, February-​March 1943 (Atglen, 2000); D. M. Glantz, Colussus Reborn, pp. 37–​48. 9 CMH, F.  v. Senger u.  Etterlin, Panzer Retreat to Counter-​Offensive (Change-​Over from Withdrawal to Pursuit Tactics), lecture script, n.d. [1956]. Foreign Military Studies Branch, Historical Div., HQ, U.S. Army Europe. 10 J. Erickson, The Road to Berlin: Stalin’s War with Germany, Vol. 2 (London, 1983), pp. 45–​55. 11 E. von Manstein, Lost Victories (London, 1958), pp. 443–​49; MGFA (ed.), DRZW: Die Ostfront 1943/​44, viii (Munich, 2007), p. 74. 12 P. Rotmistrov, ‘The Role of Armoured Forces in the Battle of Kursk’, in I. Parotkin (ed.), The Battle of Kursk (Moscow, 1974), pp. 169–​75; V. Zamulin, Demolishing the Myth: The Tank Battle at Prokhorovka, Kursk, July 1943. An Operational Narrative (Solihull, 2011), esp. pp. 46–​158, 516–​59; D. M. Glantz and J. M. House, The Battle of Kursk (Lawrence, KS, 1999), pp. 225–​81, 344–​45. 13 MGFA (ed.), DRZW:  Die Ostfront 1943/​ 44, viii, pp.  81–​ 208; Erickson, Road to Berlin, pp. 215–​30. 14 S. R. McMichael, ‘The Battle of Jassy-​Kishinev’, Military Review, 65 (July 1985):  52–​65; Erickson, Road to Berlin, pp. 346–​66. 15 CMH, F. Wentzell, Combat in the East: Experiences of German Tactical and Logistical Units in Russia, MS # B-​266, Historical Division, HQ EUCOM, April 1952, pp. 46–​51. 16 Dept. of the Army Pamphlet 20–​242, German Armored Traffic Control during the Russian Campaign (Washington, DC, 1952), pp. 1–​23, 31–​39. 17 Senger und Etterlin, German Tanks, pp. 45–​48, 59–​73.

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Notes 18 Gen.St.d.H./​Ausb.Abt.(II), Nr. 650/​44, Geheim! Vorläufige Richtlinien für den Einsatz von Panzerabwehrwaffen in der Verteidigung vom 20. Mai 1944 (Berlin, 1944), pp. 19–​21; Senger und Etterlin, German Tanks, pp. 30–​31, 39–​40. 19 BA-​ MA, RH 10/​ 29, fol. 13–​ 18, Geheime Kommandosache, Weiterentwicklung der Panzerjägerwaffe, Vortrag von Oberstleutnant Schmitdgen, Leiter der Gruppe VIII (Panzerjäger) im OKH, Insp.d.Pz.Tr., In 6, 21. September 1943. 20 BA-​MA, RH 10/​30, fol. 127–​132, Geheime Kommandosache, General der Artillerie beim Chef Generalstab des Heeres, Entwicklung der Sturmartillerie, 23.12.1943. 21 BA-​MA, RH 10/​53, fol. 5–​6, Der Generalinspekteur der Panzertruppe, Betr.: Stellungnahme zu Schreiben des Oberst Gerhardt, Pz.Rgt. 7, 10. Pz.Div., Berlin, 6. April 1943, fol. 7, Chef des Generalstabes des Heeres an den Generalinspekteur der Panzertruppen, 25. April 1943, fol. 8, OKH, Chef d. Generalstabes, Bb.Nr.885/​43 geh., 25. April 1943. 22 M. V. Gareev, M.V. Frunze: Military Theorist (London, 1985), p. 213. 23 Gen.St.d.H/​Gen.d.Schn.Truppen, H.Dv. 470/​10. Ausbildungsvorschrift für die Panzertruppe. Vom 18. Januar 1941 (Berlin, 1941), esp. pp. 6–​7, 12–​36. 24 Nr. 650/​44, Einsatz von Panzerabwehrwaffen . . . vom 20. Mai 1944, p. 3. 25 Dept. of the Army Pamphlet 20–​234, Operations of Encircled Forces: German Experiences in Russia (Washington, DC, January 1952), esp. pp. 52–​66. 26 CMH, OKH Project #7, MS # P-​041P, H.  Guderian, Representation of Armored Interests, Historical Div., HQ, EUCOM, 1952, pp. 7, 18–​21, 39–​41; R. L. DiNardo and A. Bay, ‘Horse-​ Drawn Transport in the German Army’, Journal of Contemporary History, 23 (1988): 129–​42. 27 S. J. Zaloga, ‘Technological Surprise and the Initial Period of War: The Case of the T-​34 Tank in 1941’, Journal of Slavic Military Studies, 6 (December 1993): 634–​46; B. Kavalerchik, ‘Once Again About the T-​34’, Journal of Slavic Military Studies, 28/​1 (2015): 186–​214. 28 Kavalerchik, ‘About the T-​34’, 187; E. Bacon, ‘Great Patriotic War Soviet Losses in World War II’, Journal of Slavic Military Studies, 6 (December 1993):  617–​24; A. Hill, ‘The Bear’s New Wheels (and Tracks):  US-​Armored and Other Vehicles and Soviet Military Effectiveness during the Great Patriotic War in Words and Pictures’, Journal of Slavic Military Studies, 25/​2 (2012): 204–​19. 29 E. Bessonov, Tank Rider: Into the Reich with the Red Army (London, 2005), pp. 77–​79, 95–​96, 153–​61, 175–​77, 182–​85. 30 P. Martell, ‘The Soviet Concept of Waging Major Operations in World War II’, History, Numbers and War, 1 (Spring 1977): 24–​33. 31 M. Parrish, ‘The Soviet Mechanized Corps in 1941’, Military Affairs, 47 (April 1983): 63–​66. 32 A. Z. Connor and R. G. Poirier, ‘Soviet Wartime Tank Formations’, Armor, 92 (May/​June 1983): 19–​25. 33 Glantz, Colussus Reborn, pp. 216–​84; CMH, F-​7176, trans., People’s Commissariat for Defense, ‘Service Regulations for the Armored and Mechanized Forces of the Red Army’ (13 February 1944); JPRS-​UMA-​85-​006, Red Army Field Regulations 1944 (Moscow, 1944), esp. ch. 7, pp. 71–​72. 34 Martell, ‘Soviet Concept of Waging Major Operations’, 26–​30. 35 Erickson, Road to Berlin, pp. 411–​30. 36 MGFA (ed.), DRZW: Der Zusammenbruch des Deutschen Reiches 1945, x/​1 (Munich, 2008), pp. 491–​515; Erickson, Road to Berlin, pp. 446–​47. 37 Erickson, Road to Berlin, pp. 431–​46.

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Notes 38 MGFA (ed.), DRZW, x/​1, pp. 516–​31; Erickson, Road to Berlin, pp. 447–​76. 39 Dick, ‘Operational Employment of Soviet Armour’, p. 120; Erickson, Road to Berlin, pp. 552–​ 640; MGFA (ed.), DRZW, x/​1, pp. 625–​79; C. K. Kliment, ‘Last Tank Battle of World War 2’, Military Journal, 1 (May/​June 1977): 12–​16. 40 Dick, ‘Operational Employment of Soviet Armour’, pp. 108, 114–​15, 120–​21. 41 Bacon, ‘Soviet Losses in World War II’, 617–​24. 42 N. Zetterling and A. Frankson, ‘Analyzing Eastern Front World War II Battles’, Journal of Slavic Military Studies, 11 (March 1998): 190–​92.

5  Difficult terrain: Deserts, mountains, hedgerows, jungles, 1940–45 1 S. Hamilton, Armoured Odyssey (London, 1995), pp. 2–​ 3, 51–​ 54; R. Leakey, Leakey’s Luck: A Tank Commander with Nine Lives (Stroud, 1999), p. 27. 2 P. G. Griffith, ‘British Armoured Warfare in the Western Desert, 1940–​43’, in Harris and Toase (eds), Armoured Warfare, pp. 70–​87; I. S. O. Playfair, The Mediterranean and the Middle East. Vol. II: “The Germans Come to the Help of their Ally” (1941) (London, 1956), pp. 1–​41, 107–​19, 153–​76. 3 Hamilton, Armoured Odyssey, pp. 2–​3, 21; P. Chamberlain and C. Ellis, British and American Tanks of World War II (New York, 1981), pp. 58–​63. 4 MGFA (ed.), GSWW: The Global War, vi (Oxford, 2001), pp. 661–​748; Chamberlain and Ellis, British and American Tanks, pp. 108–​13. 5 MGFA (ed.), GSWW, vi, pp.  765–​90; C. Barnett, The Desert Generals (London, 1962), pp. 222–​303. 6 Stolfi, German Panzers on the Offensive, pp. 85–​142; Barnett, Desert Generals, passim, but esp. pp. 21–​38, 328–​32. 7 War Office, Anti-​Tank Tactics, Military Training Pamphlet No. 59A (London, July 1943), pp. 2–​4, 28–​30. 8 Hamilton, Armoured Odyssey, p.  2; Griffith, ‘Armoured Warfare in the Western Desert’, pp. 75–​78. 9 C. R. Gabel, ‘World War II Armor Operations in Europe’, in Hofmann and Starry (ed.), Camp Colt to Desert Storm, pp. 144–​84, here, 150–​52. 10 B. H. Liddell Hart, The Tanks: Vol. II, 1939–​45 (London, 1959), pp. 259–​69. 11 Liddell Hart, The Tanks: Vol. II, pp. 270–​79; J. Ehrman, Grand Strategy. Vol. V: August 1943–​ September 1944 (London, 1956), pp. 58–​75; and G. Forty (ed.), Tanks Across the Desert: The War Diary of Jake Wardrop (London, 1981), pp. 164–​68. 12 Hamilton, Armoured Odyssey, pp.  100, 127; Chamberlain and Ellis, British and American Tanks, pp. 114–​21. 13 W. Jackson, The Mediterranean and Middle East. Vol. VI: Victory in the Mediterranean. Part II (June to October 1944) (London, 1987), esp. pp. 225–​313. 14 Hamilton, Armoured Odyssey, pp. 108–​30. 15 Forty, Diary of Jake Wardrop, p. 157; Hamilton, Armoured Odyssey, pp. 96–​149. 16 D. Ose, ‘Rommel and Rundstedt: The 1944 Panzer Controversy’, Military Affairs, 49 (January 1985):  7–​11; A. F. Wilt, ‘An Addendum to the Rommel-​Rundstedt Controversy’, Military

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Notes Affairs, 39 (December 1975): 176–​81; MGFA (ed.), GSWW: The Strategic Air War in Europe and the War in the West and the East 1943–​1944/​5, vii (Oxford, 2006), p. 522. 17 Chamberlain and Ellis, British and American Tanks, pp. 132–​33. 18 A. Beevor, D-​Day: The Battle for Normandy (London, 2009), p. 136. 19 R. J. Jarymowycz, Tank Tactics from Normandy to Lorraine (London, 2001), pp. 110–​21. 20 Ibid., pp. 147–​84. 21 MGFA (ed.), GSWW, vii, pp. 610–​13. 22 Jarymowycz, Tank Tactics, pp. 255–​84. 23 T. Greenwood, D-​Day to Victory: Diaries of a British Tank Commander (London, 2012), p. 62. 24 H. M. Cole, The Lorraine Campaign (Washington, DC, 1993), pp. 198–​201. 25 Ibid., pp. 222–​33. 26 G. F. Hofmann, ‘Armor History and Operations in 1944: The 6th Armored Division Experience in the European Theater of Operations’, Armor, 103 (September/​October 1994):  6–​11; and Cole, Lorraine Campaign, pp. 293, 468. 27 A. H. Ganz, ‘Patton’s Relief of General Wood’, Journal of Military History, 53 (July 1989): 257–​73. 28 I. Gooderson, ‘Allied Fighter-​Bombers versus German Armour in North-​West Europe 1944–​ 1945: Myths and Realities’, Journal of Strategic Studies, 14 (June 1991): 210–​31. 29 T. N. Dupuy, Hitler’s Last Gamble:  The Battle of the Bulge (December 1944–​January 1945) (Shrewsbury, 1995), esp., for equipment losses, pp. 478–​86. 30 J. Zimmermann, Pflicht zum Untergang:  Die deutsche Kriegführung im Westen des Reiches 1944/​45 (Paderborn, 2009), pp. 203–​17. 31 For further details, see S. Zaloga, Japanese Tanks 1939–​45 (Oxford, 2007). 32 M. N. Stanton, ‘A Study in Armored Exploitation. The Battle of the Slim River:  Malaya, 7 January 1942’, Armor, 105 (May/​June 1996): 26–​31. 33 War Dept., FM 31-​20. Basic Field Manual:  Jungle Warfare (Washington, DC, 15 December 1941), pp. 21, 23; War Dept., FM 100–​5. Operations (Washington, DC, 22 May 1941), pp. 235–​37, 263. 34 B. Anderson, ‘Company C, 194th Tank Bn in the Philippines, 1941–​42’, Armor, 105 (May/​June 1996): 32–​36. 35 K. C. Holzimmer, ‘In Close Country: World War II American Armor Tactics in the Jungles of the Southwest Pacific’, Armor, 106 (July/​August 1997): 21–​31. 36 War Dept., FM 17–​36. Armored Employment of Tanks with Infantry (Washington, DC, 13 March 1944), pp. 77–​82. 37 War Dept., FM 100–​5. Operations (Washington, DC, 15 June 1944), p. 281. 38 J. H. Alexander, ‘Marine Corps Armor Operations in World War II’, in Hofmann and Starry (eds), Camp Colt to Desert Storm, pp. 185–​216; J. A. Isley and P. A. Crowl, The U.S. Marines and Amphibious War: Its Theory, and Its Practice in the Pacific (Princeton, NJ, 1951), esp. pp. 540–​41, 575–​77. 39 Liddell Hart, The Tanks:  Vol. II, pp.  296–​301; http://​web.archive.org/​web/​20110914225644/​; http://​www.australian-​armour.com/​AAR_​WW2.html. 40 War Office, The Cooperation of Tanks with Infantry Divisions, Military Training Pamphlet No. 63 (London, May 1944), pp. 26–​27.

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Notes 41 D. M. Glantz, August Storm: The Soviet 1945 Strategic Offensive in Manchuria (Leavenworth, KS, 1983), pp. 153–​72, 219; A. D. Coox, Soviet Armor in Action against the Japanese Kwantung Army, August 1945, Technical Memo ORO-​T-​38 (Baltimore, MD, 1952), pp. 1–​3, 27–​37. 42 R. M. Neiman, Tanks on the Beaches: A Marine Tanker in the Pacific War (College Station, TX, 2003), p. 70.

6  The Cold War (I): Armour in Korea, Indo-​China and Vietnam 1 Pickett, G. B., ‘Tanks in Korea’, Armor, 59 (November/​December 1950): 6–9, here, 6. 2 Ibid., 6–​9. 3 For an overview of the major events of the war, D. Rees, Korea: The Limited War (London, 1964). 4 D. S. Stelmach, ‘The Influence of Russian Armored Tactics on the North Korean Invasion of 1950’, unpublished PhD thesis, St. Louis University, 1973, chs. 2 and 3. 5 ASRL, Employment of Armor in Korea –​The First Year: Research Report by Armored Officers Advanced Course, 1951–​52, May 1952, Vol. I, pp. 38–​64; P. L. Bolté, ‘Post World War II and Korea: Paying for Unpreparedness’, in Hofmann and Starry (eds), Camp Colt to Desert Storm, pp. 217–​62, here, 220, 227, 237. 6 CMH, US Army Far Eastern Command, ORO, The Employment of Armor in Korea, 8 April 1951, AG 381, Specific Comments, 10 September 1951, and, ORO-​R-​1, 15 May 1951, pp. 1–​3. 7 ASRL, Employment of Armor in Korea –​The First Year, Vol. I, pp. 18–​19, 62. 8 For an overview of this period, B. C. Mossman, United States Army in the Korean War: Ebb and Flow, November 1950–​July 1951 (Washington DC, 1990). 9 ASRL, Employment of Armor in Korea  –​The First Year, Vol. II, pp.  121–​57, 206–​32; G. B. Pickett, ‘Tanks in the Defense’, Armor, 60 (July/​August 1951): 14–​17. 10 ASRL, Employment of Armor in Korea –​The First Year, Vol. II, pp. 196–​205; G. B. Pickett, ‘Tanks in Korea, 1950–​51’, Armor, 60 (November/​December 1951): 12–​16. 11 B. O. Norman and M. L. Carey, ‘Tank-​Infantry Teamwork’, Armor, 61 (May/​June 1952): 54–​56. 12 A. Farrar-​Hockley, The British Part in the Korean War. Vol. I: A Distant Obligation (London, 1990), pp. 447–​50. 13 B. Munro, The Centurion Tank (Ramsbury, 2005), pp. 158–​62; S. Dunstan et  al., Centurion Universal Tank 1943–​2003 (Oxford, 2003), pp. 16–​17; A. Farrar-​Hockley, The British Part in the Korean War. Vol. II: An Honourable Discharge (London, 1995), pp. 358–​63, 370–​71, 382–​83. 14 R. S. Harper, ‘Offensive by Fire!’ Armor, 62 (January/​February 1953): 34–​40. 15 G. F. Hofmann, ‘Tanks and the Korean War: A Case Study in Unpreparedness’, Armor, 109 (September/​October 2000): 7–​12. 16 C. H. D’Alzon, Le Presence Militaire Française en Indochine 1940–​1945 (Vincennes, 1985); J. Sicard, ‘Cavaliers et blindés en Indochine 1919–​ 1947’, Militaria, No. 77 (December 1991): 47–​50. 17 M. Henry, ‘French Armor in Indochina’, Armor, 76 (November/​December 1967): 11–17, here, 11. 18 Ibid., 11–​16. 19 D. A. Starry, Mounted Combat in Vietnam (Washington, DC, 1989), p. 3.

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Notes 20 For an account of the battle, see B. B. Fall, Hell in a Very Small Place: The Siege of Dien Bien Phu (Philadelphia, 1967), and for an official Vietnamese version, V. N. Giap, People’s War, People’s Army (Hanoi, 1961), pp. 151–​88. 21 Fall, Dien Bien Phu, pp. 96–​98, 123, 149, 150–​51, 154, 182, 206–​7. 22 Henry, ‘French Armor in Indochina’, 17. 23 Starry, Mounted Combat, pp. 4–​6. 24 HQ, Dept. of the Army, FM 17-​1. Armor Operations: Small Units (Washington, DC, 23 August 1957), pp. 342–​44. 25 Starry, Mounted Combat, pp. 22–​33, 52–​54. 26 A. F. Krepinevich, Jr., The Army and Vietnam (Baltimore and London, 1986), esp. pp. 164–​214. 27 HQ, Dept. of the Army, FM 17-​1. Armor Operations (Washington, DC, 14 October 1966), p. 169. 28 S. T. Ashworth, ‘Armor Can Operate in the Delta’, Armor, 76 (March/​April 1967): 4–​10. 29 W. F. Dougherty, ‘Maintain to Fight’, Armor, 76 (November/​December 1967): 22–​28. 30 G. Famiglietti, ‘Military Reverses Position on the Role of Armor in Counterinsurgency, Vietnam’, Data, December 1967: 30–​32. 31 W. W. Cobb, ‘Mounted Combat in Vietnam’, Armor, 77 (July/​August 1968): 9–​11. 32 Starry, Mounted Combat, pp.  21–​24, 37–​47; L.  Sorley, ‘Adaptation and Impact:  Mounted Combat in Vietnam’, in Hofmann and Starry (eds), Camp Colt to Desert Storm, pp. 324–​59, here, 330–​32. 33 Starry, Mounted Combat, pp.  84–​112; R. Zumbro, Tank Sergeant (New  York, 1986), esp. pp. 17–​41. 34 Starry, Mounted Combat, pp. 138–​45; and, for an account of combat action involving Sheridans in early 1970, J. B. Poindexter, ‘The Anonymous Battle’, Armor, 109 (January/​ February 2000): 18–​33. 35 L. K. Cole, ‘Armor in Urban Combat’, Armor, 79 (May/​June 1970):  27–​33; Starry, Mounted Combat, pp.  116–​23; Zumbro, Tank Sergeant, pp.  132–​46; DTIC AD-​391061, After Action Report, Long Binh/​Saigon –​Tet Offensive, 199th Infantry Brigade, 12 January–​12 February 1968, fol. 21–​22. 36 K. D. Gott, Breaking the Mold: Tanks in the Cities (Fort Leavenworth, KS, 2006), pp. 23–​45; Starry, Mounted Combat, p. 116. 37 See the official website at http://​vietnam-​war.commemoration.gov.au/​armour/​; and J. Coates, ‘Preparing Armoured Units for Service Overseas’, in P. Dennis and J. Grey (eds), The Australian Army and the Vietnam War 1962–​1972 (Canberra, 2002), pp. 74–​95. 38 D. Pike, PAVN:  People’s Army of Vietnam (Novato, CA, 1986), pp. 105–​6; Starry, Mounted Combat, pp. 149–​50. 39 Starry, Mounted Combat, pp. 150–​53. 40 D. Andradé, Trial by Fire: The 1972 Easter Offensive, America’s Last Vietnam Battle (New York, 1995), esp. pp. 369–​450; Starry, Mounted Combat, p. 200. 41 K. N. Stacey, ‘Armour in Vietnam: The Lessons of 1972 and 1975’, Defence Force Journal, No. 22 (May/​June 1980): 42–​49; Starry, Mounted Combat, pp. 199–​219; G. Lewy, America in Vietnam (New York, 1978), pp, 196–​201. 42 Stacey, ‘Armour in Vietnam’, 42–​49; Lewy, America in Vietnam, pp. 205–​15; N. K. Vien, The Long Resistance (1858–​1975) (Hanoi, 2nd edn, 1978), pp. 231–​77.

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7  The Cold War (II): The central European battlefield 1 H. Faringdon, Confrontation: The Strategic Geography of NATO and the Warsaw Pact (London, 1986), pp. 277–​315. 2 IISS, The Military Balance (London, 1968–​69 to 1987–​88); M. Chalmers and L. Unterseher, ‘Is There a Tank Gap? Comparing NATO and Warsaw Pact Tank Fleets’, International Security, 13 (Summer 1988): 5–​49. 3 Faringdon, Confrontation, pp. 254–​59; J. Erickson et al., Soviet Ground Forces: An Operational Assessment (Boulder, CO, and London, 1986), pp. 36–​47. 4 Faringdon, Confrontation, pp. 259–​76; NATO Information Service, NATO Facts and Figures (Brussels, 1971), pp. 25–​76. 5 T. B. Winfield, ‘The Future of Mechanized Warfare. Part II:  The Lessons of Yom Kippur’, Canadian Defence Quarterly, 8 (Winter 1978): 26–​32; R. Rikhye, ‘US Army Shifts Emphasis to Armour Warfare’, Journal of the United Service Institution of India, 105 (April–​ June 1975): 147–​58. 6 D. Gouré and J. R. Cooper, ‘Conventional Deep Strike: A Critical Look’, Comparative Strategy, 4/​3 (1984): 215–​48. 7 DTIC AD-​A080 235, HQ, Armor School, Fort Knox, KY, Final Report of Test: Exercise Desert Rock VI, 1 August 1955. 8 W. L. Boyston, ‘Armor on the Atomic Battlefield’, Armor, 66 (May/​June 1957):  24–​29; J. R. Beishline, ‘Armor in Atomic War’, Military Review, 34 (September 1954): 3–​7. 9 G. C. Reinhardt, ‘Notes on the Tactical Employment of Atomic Weapons’, Military Review, 32 (September 1952):  28–​37; F. O. Miksche, ‘Atomic Defense’, Military Review, 35 (July 1955): 22–​30. 10 LHCMA, Major-General H. E. Pyman Papers, PYMAN 8/​3, SECRET. The Atomic Bomb as a Tactical Weapon on the Battlefield with Particular Reference to an Armoured Division, 15 October 1953. 11 T. C. Mataxis and S. L. Goldberg, Nuclear Tactics, Weapons, and Firepower in the Pentomic Division, Battle Group, and Company (Harrisburg, PA, 1958), pp. vii, ix, 7–​9, 11–​44, 117–​18. 12 HQ, Dept. of the Army, FM 17-​1. Armor Operations (Washington, DC, October 1966), pp. 9–​10, 386–​89, 402–​8. 13 DTIC AD-​762 558, A. Kh. Babadzhanyan (ed.), Tanks and Armoured Troops (Moscow, 1970; US trans.), chs. 5 and 6 (sect. 1), pp. 261–​79. 14 J. Erickson, ‘Soviet Combined Arms Operations:  An Evaluation’, Armor, 89 (May/​ June 1980): 16–​21; J. Erickson, et al., Soviet Ground Forces, pp. 97–​98. 15 DTIC AD-​A021 816, J. A. Quinlan, Viability of a Tactical Nuclear Defense for NATO (US Army War College, PA, October 1975); DTIC AD-​A014 177, R. W. Wilmot et al., An Examination of the Utility of the First Use of Tactical Nuclear Weapons in the Defense of Western Europe (US Army War College, PA, June 1975); DTIC AD-​A042 857, R. E. Rogan, The Role of Nuclear Artillery in the Defense of Western Europe (US Army War College, PA, May 1977). 16 HQ, Dept. of the Army, FM 100–​5. Operations (Washington, DC, 1 July 1976), ch. 10; idem, FM 100–​5. Operations (Washington, DC, 20 August 1982), chs 4, 4-​1; idem, FM 71–​3. Armoured and Mechanized Brigade Operations (Washington, DC, 25 July 1980), ch. 4 4-​6–​4-​8. 17 LHCMA, Pyman Papers, PYMAN 8/​10, Pyman to Liddell Hart, 3 January 1955. 18 A. A. Sidorenko, The Offensive (Moscow, 1970; USAF trans., Washington, DC, 1984), pp. 57–​64.

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Notes 19 S. J. Zaloga, Modern Soviet Armour (London, 1979), pp. 9–​19. 20 Ibid., pp. 20–​26; W. Schneider, ‘From the T-​64 to the T-​80’, International Defense Review, 20 (June 1987): 745–​49. 21 Technical details in Zaloga, Modern Soviet Armour, pp. 26–​28 (PT-​76), 40–​49 (BMP-​1), 55–​56 (ASU-​85), 79–​85 (ZSU-​23-​4). 22 R. Simpkin, Red Armour: An Examination of the Soviet Mobile Force Concept (London, 1984), pp. 98–​117, 171–​86. 23 C. N. Donnelly, ‘The Soviet Operational Manoeuvre Group:  A  New Challenge for NATO’, Military Review, 63 (March 1983):  43–​60 [first published,  1982]; S. Stoecker, ‘Soviets Plan Countermeasures to FOFA’, International Defense Review, 19 (November 1986):  1607–​8; Schneider, ‘T-​64 to the T-​80’, 749–​50. 24 S. J. Zaloga and J. W. Loop, Modern American Armour (London, 1982), pp. 8–​12; O. C. Decker, ‘The Patton Tanks: The Cold War Learning Series’, in Hofmann and Starry (eds), Camp Colt to Desert Storm, pp. 298–​323, here, 304–​18. 25 Foss (ed.), Jane’s Armour and Artillery 1984–​85, pp. 87–​92, 469–​70. 26 H. R. Hammerich et al., Das Heer 1950 bis 1970: Konzept, Organisation, Aufstellung (Munich, 2006), pp. 367–​411, 532. 27 Foss (ed.), Jane’s Armour and Artillery 1984–​ 85, pp.  20–​26, 286–​89, 426–​30, 505–​10; Hammerich et al., Das Heer, pp. 557–​77. 28 War Office, The Armoured Division in Battle 1952 (London, 12 February 1952), pp. 10–​11, 27–​28. 29 FRG Ministry of Defence, H.Dv. 100/​100. Führung im Gefecht (Bonn, 28 September 1973), paras. 424–​28, quote, para. 5. 30 HQ, Dept. of the Army, FM 100–​5 (1976), ch. 2, 2-​2–​2-​6, 2-​30; idem, FM 100–​5 (1982), ch. 7, 7-​5. 31 NATO, Military Agency for Standardization, ATP-​35: Land Force Tactical Doctrine (Brussels, 3 April 1978), pp. vi, xiii, 2–​3, 2–​6. 32 B. W. Rogers, ‘Sword and Shield:  ACE Attack of Warsaw Pact Follow-​On Forces’, NATO’s Sixteen Nations, 28 (February/​March 1983):  16–​26; Foss (ed.), Jane’s Armour and Artillery 1984–​85, pp. 16–​20, 106–​10, 80–​83. 33 UMI, Records of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS), Part 2: Europe and NATO, reel 1, 0905-​6, JCS 1811, Note by the Secretaries to the JCS, 23 October 1947, 0907-​11, JCS 1811/​1, Report by the Joint Strategic Survey, Committee to the Joint Chiefs of Staff on Military Implications in an Early Withdrawal of Occupation Forces from Germany, 14 November 1947. 34 UMI, Records of the JCS, Part 2, reel 1, 0914, JCS 1811/​2, Memorandum by the Chief of Staff, US Army, 1 December 1947, 0913, JCS 1811/​3, Memorandum by the Chief of Staff to the Commander-​in-​Chief of the Armed Forces to the JCS, 2 December 1947. 35 CMH, Foreign Studies Office, US Army, MS # C-​040, Generalmajor Bodo Zimmermann, Ideas on the Defense of the Rhine and Western Germany as an Outpost Area of Western Europe, 10 December 1949, MS # 040a, Ideas Pertaining to a Strategic Counter-​offensive by the West, 20 January 1949. 36 A. F. Gablik, Strategische Planungen in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland 1955–​1967: Politische Kontrolle oder militärische Notwendigkeit? (Baden-​Baden, 1996), pp. 137–​41. 37 NATO Information Service, Facts and Figures, pp. 28, 37, 62, 373; T. N. Dupuy, ‘The Problem of NATO Forward Defense’, Armed Forces Journal International, 118 (July 1981): 64–​67.

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Notes 38 J. Hackett, The Third World War: The Untold Story (London, 1983), pp. 164–​219. 39 B. Heuser, ‘Warsaw Pact Military Doctrines in the 1970s and 1980s:  Findings in the East German Archives’, Comparative Strategy, 12/​4 (1993): 437–​57. 40 DTIC AD-​A089 759, P.  W. Handley and A.  Karemaz, Nine Days to Oder:  An Alternative NATO Strategy for Central Region, Europe (US Army War College, PA, June 1980). 41 On this subject, J. J. Mearsheimer, Conventional Deterrence (Ithaca, NY, 1983). 42 DTIC AD-​A195 565, M. T. Wilson, A Tank-​Free Zone for NATO’s Central Front? (US Army Command and General Staff College, Fort Leavenworth, KS, May 1988), pp. 37–​38.

8  The Arab-​Israeli wars, 1948–​2006 1 D. Eshel, Chariots of the Desert:  The Story of the Israeli Armoured Corps (London, 1989), pp. 1–​11. 2 For accounts of the War of Independence: C. Herzog, The Arab-​Israeli Wars (London, rev. edn, 2005), pp. 17–​108; T. N. Dupuy, Elusive Victory: The Arab-​Israeli Wars, 1947–​1974 (London, 1978), pp. 3–​125. 3 Eshel, Chariots of the Desert, pp. 11–​12. 4 E. Luttwak and D. Horowitz, The Israeli Army (New York, 1975), pp. 53–​70; Eshel, Chariots of the Desert, pp. 13–​23. 5 K. M. Pollack, Arabs at War: Military Effectiveness 1948–​1991 (Lincoln, NE, 2002), pp. 15–​27, 149–​55, 269–​84, 448–​57. 6 Luttwak and Horowitz, Israeli Army, pp.  71–​85, 91–​92; K. S. Brower, ‘The Israeli Armored Corps’, Armor, 82 (May/​June 1973): 18–​22, here 18–​19; Herzog, Arab-​Israeli Wars, p. 112. 7 Herzog, Arab-​Israeli Wars, pp. 111–​41; G. W. Gawrych, Key to the Sinai: The Battles for Abu Ageila in the 1956 and 1967 Arab-​Israeli Wars (Fort Leavenworth, KS, 1990), pp. 1–​60. A good overview of the war can be found in Dupuy, Elusive Victory, pp. 127–​218. 8 Herzog, Arab-​Israeli Wars, pp. 129–​34. 9 Pollack, Arabs at War, pp. 27–​47; Gawrych, Key to the Sinai, pp. 61–​68. 10 Eshel, Chariots of the Desert, pp. 51–​57; Brower, ‘Israeli Armored Corps’, 19–​20; P. Kesseli, In Pursuit of Mobility: The Birth and Development of Israeli Operational Art (Helsinki, 2001), pp. 162–​65. 11 Eshel, Chariots of the Desert, pp. 52–​53; Pollack, Arabs at War, p. 59; M. B. Oren, Six Days of War: June 1967 and the Making of the Modern Middle East (Oxford, 2002), pp. 33–​126. 12 Y. Dayan, A Soldier’s Diary: Sinai 1967 (Harmondsworth, 1969), pp. 188–​89. 13 Herzog, Arab-​Israeli Wars, pp. 154–​66; Gawrych, Key to the Sinai, pp. 87–​122; J. L. Wallach, ‘The Israeli Armored Corps in the Six-​Day War’, Armor, 57 (May/​June 1968): 34–​43, here, 34–​39. 14 Wallach, ‘Israeli Armored Corps’, 39–​43. 15 J. Weller, ‘Israeli Armor:  Lessons from the Six-​Day War’, Military Review, 51 (November 1971): 44–​50. 16 L. Heiman, ‘Armored Forces in the Middle East’, Military Review, 48 (November 1968): 11–​19. 17 A. Kahalani, The Heights of Courage (Westport, CT, 1992), p. 70; Eshel, Chariots of the Desert, pp. 87–​93; Pollack, Arabs at War, pp. 88–​98; Brower, ‘Israeli Armored Corps’, 21.

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Notes 18 Excellent analysis and data can be found in: T. N. Dupuy, ‘’73 War –​The Arab-​Israeli Conflict’, Strategy and Tactics, No. 90 (January/​February 1982):  39–​48, 57; idem, Elusive Victory, pp. 385–​617. 19 M. Finkel, On Flexibility: Recovery from Technological and Doctrinal Surprise on the Battlefield (Stanford, CA, 2011), pp. 153–​55. 20 E. Sakal, Soldier in the Sinai (Lexington, KY, 2014), pp. 79–​110. 21 G. W. Gawrych, The 1973 Arab-​Israeli War: The Albatross of Decisive Victory (Fort Leavenworth, KS, 1996), pp. 5–​59. 22 Eshel, Chariots of the Desert, pp. 94–​119; M. J. Hatcher, ‘The Tank is Alive and Well’, Military Review, 58 (February 1978): 75–​87, esp. 85; Herzog, Arab-​Israeli Wars, pp. 285–​306. 23 Gawrych, The 1973 Arab-​Israeli War, pp. 56–​74. 24 J. Weller, ‘Middle East Tank Killers’, RUSI Journal, 139 (December 1974): 28–​35; R. F. Timmons, ‘AT Missiles in the Yom Kippur War’, Infantry, 64 (January/​February 1974): 18–​21. 25 Pollack, Arabs at War, pp. 483, 498. 26 G. G. Prosch, ‘Israeli Defense of the Golan’, Military Review, 59 (October 1979): 2–​13; Kahalani, Heights of Courage, pp. 60–​92; Pollack, Arabs at War, pp. 505–​12. 27 L. W. Bentley and D. C. McKinnon, ‘The Yom Kippur War as an Example of Modern Land Battle’, Canadian Defence Quarterly, 4 (Summer 1974): 13–​19, here, 18–​19. 28 D. Eshel, ‘Soviet Tanks: An Israeli View’, Armor, 97 (May/​June 1988): 14–​18, here, 15–​16. 29 For instance, DTIC AD-​A058 334, P. A. Erickson, ‘The ’73 War: Implications for US Army Forces in NATO’, MMAS thesis, Fort Leavenworth, KS, June 1978. 30 Pollack, Arabs at War, pp. 514–​23. 31 Herzog, Arab-​Israeli Wars, pp.  347–​54, 365–​80; Z. Schiff and E. Ya’ari, Israel’s Lebanon War (London, 1986), pp. 78–​180; B. S. Lambeth, Moscow’s Lessons from the 1982 Lebanon Air War (Santa Monica, CA, 1984). 32 J. D. Leaf, ‘MOUT and the 1982 Lebanon Campaign: The Israeli Approach’, Armor, 109 (July/​ August 2000): 8–​11. 33 Herzog, Arab-​Israeli Wars, pp. 354–​59. 34 Foss (ed.), Jane’s Armour and Artillery 1984–​85, pp. 62–​67; Anon., ‘Lessons of Lebanon’, Defence Attaché, 4/​1982: 23–​35, here, 29–​31; A. Sella, ‘The USSR and the War in Lebanon: Mid-​1982’, RUSI Journal, 128/​2 (1983): 35–​41, here, 40. 35 R. A. Gabriel, ‘Lessons of War: The IDF in Lebanon’, Military Review, 64 (August 1984): 47–​65, here, 50–​54; Foss (ed.), Jane’s Armour and Artillery 1984–​85, pp. 31–​34. 36 Anon., ‘Lessons of Lebanon’, 26–​27, 31–​33; Gabriel, ‘Lessons of War’, 62–​65; S. Katz, Merkava Main Battle Tank Marks I, II and III (Oxford, 2004), p. 24. 37 M. M. Matthews, We Were Caught Unprepared: The 2006 Hezbollah-​Israeli War (Fort Leavenworth, KS, 2006), pp. 2, 54–​55, 63–​64; ‘The War in Numbers’, Jane’s Defence Weekly, 23 August 2006. 38 S. Dunstan, The Yom Kippur War 1973 (1): The Golan Heights (Oxford, 2003), p. 94. 39 B. Bond, Liddell Hart: A Study of His Military Thought (London, 1977), pp. 238–​72; Kesseli, In Pursuit of Mobility, pp. 196–​204, 337–​41; T. Ben-​Moshe, ‘Liddell Hart and the Israeli Defence Forces –​ A Reappraisal’, Journal of Contemporary History, 16 (1981): 369–​91. 40 J. B. Bell, ‘National Character and Military Strategy: The Egyptian Experience, October 1973’, Parameters, 5/​1 (1975): 6–​16; Pollack, Arabs at War, pp. 552–​78. 41 M. Gelbart, Modern Israeli Tanks and Infantry Carriers 1984–​2004 (Oxford, 2004), pp. 15–​19.

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9  Iraq and the Gulf wars, 1980–​2016 1 Pollack, Arabs at War, pp. 183–​93; W. Murray and K. M. Woods, The Iran-​Iraq War: A Military and Strategic History (Cambridge, 2014), pp. 85–​131, esp. 108–​24. 2 M. Brzoska and F. S. Pearson, Arms and Warfare:  Escalation, De-​escalation and Negotiation (Columbia, SC, 1994), pp. 134–​59, 254–​56. 3 J. Laffin, ‘The Gulf War’, in idem, War Annual 1 (London, 1986), pp. 73–​87; J. Laffin, ‘Iran-​Iraq (Gulf) War’, in idem, War Annual 2: A Guide to Contemporary Conflicts (London, 1987), pp. 105–​18. 4 A. H. Cordesman and A. R. Wagner, The Lessons of Modern War, Vol. II: The Iran-​Iraq War (Boulder, CO, 1990), pp. 435–​37; A. R. Tucker, ‘Armoured Warfare in the Gulf ’, Armed Forces, 7 (May 1988): 223–​26, here, 224–​25; Pollack, Arabs at War, p. 186. 5 Tucker, ‘Armoured Warfare in the Gulf ’, 223–​24. 6 Cordesman and Wagner, Lessons of Modern War, Vol. II, pp. 435–​37; A. R. Tucker, ‘Armies of the Gulf War’, Armed Forces, 6 (July 1987): 319–​23, here, 321. 7 Cordesman and Wagner, Lessons of Modern War, Vol. II, pp.  437–​41; K. M. Woods et  al., Saddam’s Generals: Perspectives of the Iran-​Iraq War (Alexandria, VA, 2011), pp. 12, 119. 8 Tucker, ‘Armoured Warfare in the Gulf ’, 225–​26; Cordesman and Wagner, Lessons of Modern War, Vol. II, pp. 442–​45; Pollack, Arabs at War, pp. 229–​35. 9 S. C. Pelletiere, The Iran-​Iraq War: Chaos in a Vacuum (New York, 1992), pp. 141–​49. 10 Laffin, ‘Iran-​Iraq (Gulf) War’, pp. 112–​14; Murray and Woods, Iran-​Iraq War, pp. 244–​52. 11 L. Freedman and E. Karsh, The Gulf Conflict 1990–​1991: Diplomacy and War in the New World Order (London, 1993), pp. 19–​69. 12 R. A. Nelson, ‘The Battle of the Bridges:  Kuwait’s 35th Brigade on the 2d of August 1990’, Armor, 104 (September/​October 1995): 26–​32. 13 D. Hiro, Desert Shield to Desert Storm: The Second Gulf War (New York, 2003), pp. 156–​89, 237–​62; R. H. Scales, Certain Victory: The US Army in the Gulf War (Fort Leavenworth, KS, 1994), pp. 39–​101; S. A. Borque, ‘The Hundred-​Hour Thunderbolt: Armor in the Gulf War’, in Hofmann and Starry (eds), Camp Colt to Desert Storm, pp. 497–​530, here, 502–​3. 14 ‘Appendix E: Ground Forces’, in B. W. Watson et al., Military Lessons of the Gulf War (London, 1991), pp. 240–​47; US General Accounting Office, Desert Storm: Early Performance Assessments of Bradley and Abrams (Washington, DC, 1992), pp. 2–​3. 15 Scales, Certain Victory, pp. 189–​91; Hiro, Desert Shield to Desert Storm, pp. 344–​45. 16 Scales, Certain Victory, pp. 103–​55; A. Bin, R. Hill and A. Jones, Desert Storm: A Forgotten War (Westport, CT, 1998), pp. 63–​82. 17 Bin et  al., Desert Storm, pp.  225–​26; Anon., ‘Aftermath of the Reveille Battle’, Armor, 100 (September/​October 1991): 14–​15. 18 V. Crawley, ‘Ghost Troop’s Battle at the 73 Easting’, Armor, 100 (May/​June 1991): 7–​12; R. M. Bohannon, ‘1–​37 Armor in the Battle of 73 Easting’, Armor, 101 (May/​June 1992):  11–​17; Scales, Certain Victory, pp. 213–​15. 19 D. Eshel, ‘British Armor in Desert Storm’, Armor, 101 (July/​August 1992):  12–​16; P. Cordingley, In the Eye of the Storm: Commanding the Desert Rats in the Gulf War (London, 1996); idem, ‘The Gulf War: Operating with Allies’, RUSI Journal, 137 (April 1992): 17–​21. 20 Foss (ed.), Jane’s Armour and Artillery 1984–​85, pp. 11–​16. 21 J. J. Cooke, 100 Miles from Baghdad: With the French in Desert Storm (Westport, CT, 1993), pp. 95–​142. 235

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Notes 22 D. Norton, ‘Cecil’s Ride:  A  Tank Platoon Leader in Desert Storm’, Armor, 108 (November/​ December 1999): 30–​35, quote, 31. 23 Freedman and Karsh, Gulf Conflict, pp.  407–​9; US GAO, Desert Storm:  Early Performance Assessments, p. 24. 24 H. N. Schwarzkopf, The Autobiography: It Doesn’t Take a Hero (New York, 1992), pp. 380, 383, 433, 455–​56, 462–​64, 482, 490; T. Clancy and F. Franks, Into the Storm: A Study in Command (New York, 2004), pp. 308–​36, quote, 31; Bourque, ‘Hundred-​Hour Thunderbolt’, pp. 509–​11. 25 E. T. Bacon, ‘The Former Soviet Union and Analysis of the 1991 Gulf War’, Journal of Soviet Military Studies, 5 (June 1992):  169–​86; S. Kaufman, ‘Lessons from the 1991 Gulf War and Russian Military Doctrine’, Journal of Slavic Military Studies, 6 (September 1993): 397–​425. 26 A. H. Cordesman, The Iraq War: Strategy, Tactics, and Military Lessons (Westport, CT, 2003), pp. 36–​41. 27 For general background, see W. Murray and R. H. Scales, The Iraq War: A Military History (Cambridge, MA, 2005), pp. 38–​87. 28 B. West and R. L. Smith, The March Up: Taking Baghdad with the 1st Marine Division (London, 2004), pp. 18–​19, 28, 31–​48. 29 Murray and Scales, Iraq War, pp. 129–​53. 30 West and Smith, March Up, pp. 153–​209; Murray and Scales, Iraq War, pp. 184–​233. 31 Murray and Scales, Iraq War, pp. 94–​95. 32 M. P. Moore, ‘An Armor Battalion in Kosovo’, Armor, 108 (November/​December 1999): 26–​ 29; T. E. Ricks, Fiasco: The American Military Adventure in Iraq (London, 2007), pp. 395–​97; privately communicated information. 33 Gott, Tanks in the Cities, pp. 91–​109; Ricks, Fiasco, pp. 398–​406. 34 R. Norton-​Taylor, ‘Private Twice Rescued Colleagues while under Heavy Fire in Iraq: Soldier wins First VC since Falklands’, The Guardian, 18 March 2005; and J. Beharry, Barefoot Soldier (London, 2006). 35 http://​blog.tankpedia.org/​2014/​09/​04/​armoured-​units-​of-​the-​islamic-​state-​of-​iraq-​and-​the-​ levant/​. 36 http://​www.al-​monitor.com/​pulse/​originals/​2013/​06/​iraq-​asks-​krg-​for-​pre-​saddam-​weapons. html#. 37 J. Hall, ‘ “Mad Max” Battle Buses and Tanks Built by Kurdish Fighters to Repel ISIS Soldiers in Syria’, MailOnline, 29 September 2014. 38 C. Weiss, ‘Video shows abandoned Iraqi Security Force armored vehicles near Ramadi’, 2 March 2015, http://w ​ ww.longwarjournal.org/a​ rchives/2​ 015/​03/​video-​shows-​abandoned-​iraqi​security-​forces-​armored-​vehicles-​near-​ramadi.php. 39 https://​www.youtube.com/​watch?v=3GJJB1P0PjU. 40 Schwarzkopf, Autobiography, p. 340.

10  The ‘political history’ of the tank 1 Wright, Tank, esp. pp. 113–​33, 377–​408. 2 See the various drawings by Percy T. Reynolds in Punch, 151 (27 September 1916): 238.

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Notes 3 LHCMA, Liddell Hart Papers, LH 1/​302/​497, ‘Tank Arm Badge’, note by Fuller to Liddell Hart, n.d. [1957/​58]; http://​www.royaltankregiment.com/​en-​GB/​capbadgemotto.aspx. 4 E. Whitney (ed.), Symbology: The Use of Symbols in Visual Communication (New York, 1960), pp. 17–​30, 115–​38, quote, 130. 5 B. C. Hacker, ‘Imaginations in Thrall:  The Social Psychology of Military Mechanization’, Parameters, 12 (Spring 1982): 50–​61; E. L. Katzenbach, ‘The Horse Cavalry in the Twentieth Century’, Public Policy, 7 (1958): 120–​49. 6 G. Paul, ‘Von der Historischen Bildkunde zur Visual History’, in idem (ed.), Visual History: Ein Studienbuch (Göttingen, 2006), pp. 7–​36; R. Howells and R. W. Matson (eds), Using Visual Evidence (Maidenhead, 2009); C. Westwell, ‘Critical Approaches to the History of Film’, Rethinking History, 11/​4 (2007): 577–​88. 7 ‘St. George Out-​Dragons the Dragon’, Punch, 153 (28 November 1917): 367 8 Untitled cartoon, Daily Graphic, 21 December 1917; and, untitled cartoon, Punch, 155 (21 August 2018): 123. 9 Wright, Tank, pp. 81–​100; untitled cartoon, Daily Mirror, 4 December 1917. 10 Images:  victory parade, London, July 1919, https://​www.pinterest.com/​pin/​ 495466396479852007/​; victory parade, Paris 1919, http://​www.alamy.com/​stock-​photo-​9fk-​ 1919-​7-​14-​a1-​18-​e-​victory-​celebrations-​paris-​1919-​paris-​14-​july-​20741627.html. 11 Photo at http://​www.warrenpress.net/​FolkestoneThenNow/​FolkestoneMilitary_​Wartime. html; and Wright, Tank, pp. 90–​94, 122–​24. 12 For a photograph of one British tank memorial in Kharkov, probably taken by German troops in 1941, see H. v. Manteuffel, Die 7. Panzerdivision (Friedberg, 1978), p. 131. 13 D. Hochstetter, Motorisierung und ‘Volksgemeinschaft’: Das Nationalsozialistische Kraftfahrkorps (NSKK) 1931–​1945 (Munich, 2005), esp. pp. 39–​66; Die Deutsche Wochenschau, 27 June 1940. 14 See the newsreels:  https://​www.youtube.com/​watch?v=c2DqWGY1QHM, and https://​www. youtube.com/​watch?v=Q6LrqSfeFzs; and also S. Zaloga, IS-​2 Heavy Tank 1945–​1973 (Oxford, 1994), p. 18 15 Zamulin, Demolishing the Myth, plates 26 & 27, pp. 224–​25; https://​mamayevkurgan.wordpress. com/​page/​10/​?app-​download=ios. 16 Dunstan, Yom Kippur War (1): The Golan Heights, pp. 88–​93. 17 Photo at http://​www.panoramio.com/​photo/​71179209. 18 See photos at http://​www.usmilitariaforum.com/​forums/​index.php?/​topic/​122634-​gulf-​war-​ victory-​parade-​washington-​dc/​. 19 Guderian, Panzer Leader, p.  30; and the Ufa newsreel reporting on the parade to celebrate Hitler’s fiftieth birthday on 19 April 1939, https://​www.youtube.com/​watch?v=VHbzRYjjKto. 20 LHCMA, Liddell Hart Papers, LH 15/​12/​14, Notes on a Visit to the Red Army and the Soviet Union, n.d. [1936], p. 2. 21 Image of Mark V tank in Tartu, https://​upload.wikimedia.org/​wikipedia/​en/​5/​57/​EST-​Tanks-​ Mark_​V-​On_​the_​Republics_​anniversary_​parade_​%2824.02.1925%29.jpg; and http://​ftr.wot-​ news.com/​2014/​08/​05/​finnish-​armored-​forces-​in-​ww2/​. 22 http://​military.wikia.com/​wiki/​T-​26_​variants for a photo of a T-​ 26 in Red Square on 1 May 1937. 23 Brzoska and Pearson, Arms & Warfare, pp.  160–​79; Anon., ‘There’s A  New Armoured War Being Fought’, Defense & Foreign Affairs, 1 (1982): 6–​9, 26–​27.

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Notes 24 Photos at: http://​www.worldtribune.com/​2014/​08/​28/​pentagon-​confirms-​isil-​captured-​tanks-​ building-​faster-​military-​force/​; http://​rudaw.net/​english/​middleeast/​iraq/​020420151. 25 Photo of tanks facing off at Checkpoint Charlie on 27 and 28 October 1961 during the Berlin crisis, http://​diplomacy.state.gov/​berlinwall/​www/​archive/​IMG022.html. 26 Fletcher, Mark V Tank, p. 33; Fuller, Memoirs, p. 396. 27 http://​urbanglasgow.co.uk/​archive/​tank-​on-​trongate_​_​o_​t_​_​t_​677.html; and tanks in Liverpool, http://​www.illustratedfirstworldwar.com/​item/​looting-​at-​liverpool-​troops-​tanks-​a-​war-​ship-​in-​ the-​mersey-​iln0-​1919-​0809-​0007-​001/​. 28 For a photo of demonstrators hurling stones at T-​34s, F. Werkentin, Recht und Justiz im SED-​ Staat (Bonn, 2nd edn, 2000), p. 34; Italian cartoon, C. Zentner, Illustrierte Geschichte der Ära Adenauer (Munich, 1984), p. 133. 29 J. P. C. Matthews, Explosion: The Hungarian Revolution of 1956 (New York, 2007); for images of tanks on the streets of Budapest, http://​adst.org/​2013/​10/​the-​hungarian-​revolution-​of-​1956/​. 30 Photo of demonstrators in front of a burning tank, Werkentin, Recht und Justiz im SED-​Staat, p. 53. 31 Wright, Tank, p. 133; and http://​armorama.kitmaker.net/​modules.php?op=modload&name= SquawkBox&file=index&req=viewtopic&topic_​id=152987&page=1&ord=1, for photographs of Centurions on 31 July 1972. 32 Wright, Tank, pp. 379–​90. 33 Images at: http://​www.emmitsburg.net/​archive_​list/​articles/​misc/​cww/​2012/​coup.htm; http://​ tilt.ft.com/​posts/​2011-​08/​28356/​if-​coup-​had-​succeeded-​2011-​ussr. 34 Image at: http://​www.kibush.co.il/​show_​file.asp?num=57463; and, for general background, A. Bregman, Elusive Peace: How the Holy Land Defeated America (London, 2005). 35 T. Harding, ‘Soldiers Tell How Torrent of Burning Petrol Poured Into Their Warrior’, The Telegraph, 22 September 2005. 36 A clip of a Syrian T-​72 hit in street fighting at https://​www.youtube.com/​watch?v=VegjIIN6CLk. 37 D. Fletcher, The Great Tank Scandal (London, 1989), esp. pp. 57–​86; J. F. C. Fuller, ‘Where Are Our Tanks? A Grave Exposure of Official Blunders’, Sunday Pictorial, 30 January 1944, p. 4. 38 Simpkin, Tank Warfare, pp. 206–​15; idem, Mechanized Infantry (London, 1980), pp. 119–​24. 39 T. L. McNaugher, ‘Problems of Collaborative Weapons Development:  The MBT-​70’, Armed Forces and Society, 10 (Fall 1983): 123–​45. 40 HASC No. 100–​40, Swim Capability of the Bradley Fighting Vehicle. Hearing  –​Committee on Armed Services, House of Representatives. 100th Congress, First Session, April 23, 1987 (Washington, DC, 1988), p. 1. 41 HASC No. 100–​39, DoD Reports Required by Fiscal Year 1988 Authorization Act on Live-​Fire Testing of the Bradley Fighting Vehicles. Hearing  –​Committee on Armed Services, House of Representatives. 100th Congress, First Session, December 17, 1987 (Washington, DC, 1988), esp. pp. 2–​3, 7, 57–​58, 72–​73, 86–​103. 42 R. Bonds (ed.), An Illustrated Guide to Modern Tanks and Fighting Vehicles (London, 1980), pp. 74–​75, 122–​33; Brzoska and Pearson, Arms and Warfare, pp. 90–​111. 43 P. Fox, ‘“A New and Commanding Breed”:  German Warriors, Tanks and the Will to Battle’, War & Society, 30 (March 2011):  1–​23; A.  Searle, ‘Introduction’, in Searle (ed.), Genesis, Employment, Aftermath, p. 12.

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Notes

Conclusion 1 DTIC AD-​ A036 492, Historical Evaluation and Research Organization, A  Study of Breakthrough Operations, Final Report, October 1976, prepared for the Defense Nuclear Agency, Washington, DC, pp. 5–​12. 2 A. D.  Coox and L.  Van Loan Naisawald, Survey of Allied Tank Casualties in World War II, Technical Memo ORO-​T-​117 (Washington, DC, 1 March 1951), pp. 3–​6, 92–​93. 3 J. Record, ‘Armored Advance Rates:  A  Historical Enquiry’, Military Review, 53 (September 1973): 63–​72. 4 G. Jacobs, ‘China’s Armoured Forces’, Asian Defence Journal, 4 (​1986):  4–​11; US Defense Intelligence Agency, The Chinese Armed Forces Today (London, 1979), pp. 11–​25, 175–​77; Foss (ed.), Jane’s Armour and Artillery 1984–​85, pp. 3–​5. 5 D. T. Head, ‘The 2nd Parachute Battalion’s War in the Falkland Islands: Light Armor Made the Difference’, Armor, 108 (September/​October 1999):  9–​12; J. Thompson, No Picnic. 3 Commando Brigade in the South Atlantic: 1982 (London, 1985), pp. 86, 104, 175–​78. 6 J. W. Mountcastle, ‘On the Move: Command and Control of Armor Units in Combat’, Military Review, 65 (November 1985): 15–​39. 7 R. Peters, ‘The Future of Armored Warfare’, Parameters, 27 (Autumn 1997): 50–​59. 8 K. Elmonairy, ‘The Tank is Dead! Long Live the Tank!’ Armor, 125 (January/​ March 2015): 121–​27. 9 C. Donnelly (ed.), The British Army 2011: A Balance of Capabilities for an Unpredictable World (London, 2011), p. 114. 10 http://​defense-​update.com/​20151231_​russian-​combat-​robots.html. 11 C. K. Bartles and L. W. Grau, ‘New System Preserves Armor Dominance of Future Battlefield: BMPT “Terminator-​2”  ’, Armor, 125 (April/​June 2015): 46–​52; Gott, Tanks in the Cities, pp. 71–​89. 12 Fuller, Reformation of War, p. 169. 13 J. F.  C. Fuller, Armored Warfare. An Annotated Edition of Lectures on F.S.R. III:  Operations between Mechanized Forces (Harrisburg, PA, 1943), esp. pp. 16–​20.

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Archives Bundesarchiv-​Militärarchiv, Freiburg i.Br. Defense Technical Information Center, Fort Belvoir, VA League of Nations Archives, United Nations Office at Geneva Liddell Hart Centre for Military Archives, King’s College, London The National Archives of the United Kingdom, Kew Tank Museum Archive and Research Library, Bovington, Dorset US Army Armor School Research Library, Fort Knox, KY US Army Center of Military History, Carlisle Barracks, PA

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RKKA, Vremenniy boevoi ustav bronevykh sil RKKA, 1925 (Moscow-​Leningrad: NKO SSSR, 1925). RKKA, Vremennye instruktsii po boevmu primeneniyu tankov, RKKA 1928 (Moscow: NKO SSSR, 1928). RKKA, Vremenny Polevoy Ustav RKKA 1929 (Moscow: NKO SSSR, 1929). RKKA, Vremenny Polevoy Ustav RKKA 1936 (Moscow: NKO SSSR, 1937). trans. JPRS-​UMA-​86-​031.

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United States

US War Dept., Infantry Field Manual. Vol. II. Tank Units (Washington, DC: USGPO, 1931). Anon., Tactics and Techniques of Cavalry. Advanced (A Text and Refence Book of Cavalry Training) (Harrisburg, PA: Military Service Publishing, 1939). Command & General Staff School, Antimechanized Defense (Tentative) (Fort Leavenworth, KS: Command and General Staff School, 1939). US War Dept., FM 100–​5. Operations (Washington, DC: USGPO, May 1941). US War Dept., FM 31-​20. Basic Field Manual:  Jungle Warfare (Washington, DC:  USGPO, 15 December 1941). US War Dept., FM 17–​100. The Armored Division (Washington, DC: USGPO, 1944). US War Dept., FM 17–​36. Armored Employment of Tanks with Infantry (Washington, DC: USGPO, March 1944). US War Dept., FM 100–​5. Operations (Washington, DC: USGPO, June 1944). US War Dept., FM 17–​76. Crew Drill and Service of the Piece Medium Tank, M4 Series (105mm Howitzer) (Washington, DC: USGPO, September 1944). HQ, Dept. of the Army, FM 7–​17. The Armored Infantry Company and Battalion (Washington DC: USGPO, March 1951). HQ, Dept. of the Army, FM 17-​1. Armor Operations. Small Units (Washington, DC:  USGPO, August 1957). HQ, Dept. of the Army, FM 17–​36. Divisional Armored and Air Cavalry Units (Washington, DC: USGPO, October 1965). HQ, Dept. of the Army, FM 17-​1. Armor Operations (Washington, DC: USGPO, October 1966). HQ, Dept. of the Army, FM 100–​5. Operations (Washington, DC: USGPO, July 1976). HQ, Dept. of the Army, FM 71–​3. Armored and Mechanized Brigade Operations (Washington, DC: USGPO, July 1980). HQ, Dept. of the Army, FM 100–​5. Operations (Washington, DC: USGPO, August 1982). HQ, Dept. of the Army, FM 100–​5. Operations (Washington, DC: USGPO, May 1986).

Unpublished/​limited circulation reports and projects The majority of these documents are held at the Defense Technical Information Center, VA. Battelle Columbus Laboratories, Proceedings of Seminar on Air-​Antitank Warfare (25–​26 May 1978), transcript, Columbus, OH, 1 May 1979. Battelle Columbus Laboratories, Translation of Taped Conversation with General Hermann Balck, 13 April 1979 (Columbus, OH: Battelle, 1979). Battelle Columbus Laboratories, ‘Conversations with a Stuka Pilot’:  Conference featuring Paul-​ Werner Hozzel, Brig. Gen. (Ret.), German Air Force (Columbus, OH: Battelle, 1978). Battelle Columbus Laboratories, Armored Warfare in World War II:  Conference featuring F.  W.  von Mellenthin, General Major a.  D., German Army, 10 May 1979 (Columbus, OH: Battelle, 1979). Canby, S. L., Short (And Long) War Responses:  Restructuring, Border Defense, and Reserve Mobilization for Armored Warfare, Final Report for Dept. of Defense, March 1978. Erickson, P. A., The ‘73 War:  Implications for US Army Forces in NATO, MMAS thesis, Fort Leavenworth, KS, June 1978. Handley, P. W., and A. Karemaz, Nine Days to Oder: An Alternative Strategy for Central Region, US Army War College, PA, June 1980. 242

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Literature Individual chapters from the edited collections listed below are referred to in the endnotes but not included in the bibliography.

General Citino, R. M., Quest for Decisive Victory:  From Stalemate to Blitzkrieg in Europe, 1899–​1940 (Lawrence, KS: UP of Kansas, 2002). Citino, R. M., Blitzkrieg to Desert Storm: The Evolution of Operational Warfare (Lawrence, KS: UP of Kansas, 2004). Fuller, J. F. C., Machine Warfare: An Enquiry into the Influences of Mechanics on the Art of War (London: Hutchinson, 1942). Gott, K. D., Breaking the Mold: Tanks in the Cities (Fort Leavenworth, KS: Combat Studies Institute Press, 2006). Groß, G. P., Mythos und Wirklichkeit:  Geschichte des operative Denkens im deutschen Heer von Moltke d.Ä. bis Heusinger (Paderborn: Schöningh, 2012). Gudmundsson, B. I., On Armor (Westport, CT: Praeger, 2004). Harris, J. P., and F. N. Toase (eds), Armoured Warfare (London: Batsford, 1990). Hofmann, G. F., and D. A. Starry (eds), From Camp Colt to Desert Storm:  The History of U.S. Armored Forces (Lexington, KY: UP of Kentucky, 1999). House, J. M., Combined Arms Warfare in the Twentieth Century (Lawrence, KS:  UP of Kansas, 2001). Isby, D. C., ‘Mobility on the Battlefield’, Journal of Defense & Diplomacy, 4 (October 1986): 19–​26. Mountcastle, J. W., ‘On the Move: Command and Control of Armor Units in Combat’, Military Review, 65 (November 1985): 14–​39. Murray, W., Military Adaptation in War (Alexandria, VA: Institute for Defense Analyses, 2009). Record, J., ‘Armored Advance Rates:  A  Historical Enquiry’, Military Review, 53 (September 1973): 63–​72. Simpkin, R. E., The Race to the Swift:  Thoughts on Twenty-​ First Century Warfare (London: Brassey’s, 1985). Simpkin, R. E., ‘Tank Hunting’, Infantry Journal, 74 (July/​August 1984): 23–​27. Weeks, J., Men Against Tanks: A History of Anti-​Tank Warfare (London: Book Club Associates, 1975). 243

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The origins of armour and the First World War Balfour, G., The Armoured Train: Its Development and Usage (London: Batsford, 1981). Beach, J., ‘British Intelligence and German Tanks, 1916–​1918’, War in History, 14 (December 2007): 454–​75. Beach, J., ‘Issued by the General Staff:  Doctrine Writing at British GHQ, 1917–​1918’, War in History, 19 (December 2012): 464–​91. Browne, D. G., The Tank in Action (London: Blackwood, 1920). Churchill, W. S., The World Crisis, 1911–​1918 (London: Thornton Butterworth: revised edn, 1931). DiNardo, R. L., and A. Bay, ‘The First Modern Tank: Gunther Burstyn and his Motorgeschütz’, Military Affairs, 50 (January 1986): 12–​15. Fuller, J. F. C., Tanks in the Great War, 1914–​1918 (London: John Murray, 1920). Fuller, J. F. C., Memoirs of an Unconventional Soldier (London: Ivor, Nicholson & Watson, 1936). Gale, T., The French Army’s Tank Force and Armoured Warfare in the Great War:  The Artillerie Spéciale (Farnham: Ashgate, 2013). Greenhalgh, E., ‘Technology Development in Coalition: The Case of the First World War Tank’, International History Review, 22 (December 2000): 806–​36. Harris, J. P., ‘Haig and the Tank’, in B. Bond and N. Cave (eds), Haig: A Reappraisal 70 Years On (Barnsley: Pen & Sword, 1999), pp. 145–​54. Harris, J. P., and N. Barr, Amiens to the Armistice: The BEF in the One Hundred Days’ Campaign, 8 August-​11 November 1918 (London: Brassey’s, 1998). Hickey, D. E., Rolling into Action:  Memoirs of a Tank Corps Section Commander (London: Hutchinson, 1936). Kistler, J. M., War Elephants (Lincoln, NE: U of Nebraska P, 2007). Liddell Hart, B. H., The Tanks:  The History of the Royal Tank Regiment and its predecessors, Heavy Machine-​gun Corps, Tank Corps and Royal Tank Corps, 1914–​1945. Vol. I: 1914–​1939 (London: Cassell, 1959). Liddell Hart, B. H., ‘Mediaeval Cavalry and Modern Tanks’, English Review, 40 (July 1925): 83–​96. Mance, H. O., Armoured Trains, Royal Engineers Professional Papers, 4th Series, Vol. 1 (1905). Miles, W., History of the Great War. Military Operations, France and Belgium, 1917: The Battle of Cambrai (London: HMSO, 1949). Pidgeon, T., The Tanks at Flers: An Account of the First Use of Tanks in War at the Battle of Flers-​ Courcelette, the Somme, 15th September 1916 (Cobham: Fairmile, 1995). Searle, A. (ed.), Genesis, Employment, Aftermath:  First World War Tanks and the New Warfare, 1900–​1945 (Solihull: Helion, 2015). Swinton, E. D., Eyewitness (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1932). Travers, T., ‘Could the Tanks of 1918 Have Been War-​Winners for the British Expeditionary Force?’ Journal of Contemporary History, 27 (July 1992): 389–​406. War Office, Statistics of the Military Effort of the British Empire during the Great War 1914–​1920 (London: HMSO, March 1922). 245

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The interwar period Alvarez, J. E., ‘Tank Warfare during the Rif Rebellion, 1921–​27’, Armor, 106 (January/​February 1997): 26–​28. Brandt, W., ‘The Tank Experience in the Chaco War’, Royal Tank Corps Journal, 1 (January 1937): 41–​43. Burke, R. T., ‘The German Panzerwaffe, 1920–​1939: A Study in Institutional Change’, unpublished PhD thesis, Northwestern University, 1969. Coox, A. D., Nomonhan: Japan Against Russia, 1939 (Stanford, CA: Stanford UP, 1985). Corum, J. S., The Roots of Blitzkrieg:  Hans von Seeckt and German Military Reform (Lawrence, KS: UP of Kansas, 1992). Daley, J., ‘Soviet and German Advisors Put Doctrine to the Test: Tanks in the Siege of Madrid’, Armor, 108 (May/​June 1999): 33–​37. De Gaulle, C., The Army of the Future (London: Hutchinson, 1940). De Lia, E., ‘The Role of Italian Armor in the Spanish Civil War’, Armor, 95 (May/​June 1986): 40–​44. Doughty, R. A., ‘De Gaulle’s Concept of a Mobile Professional Army: Genesis of French Defeat?’ Parameters, 4 (Summer 1974): 23–​34. Doughty, R. A., ‘French Anti-​Tank Doctrine, 1940: The Antidote that Failed’, Military Review, 56 (May 1976): 36–​48. Doughty, R. A., The Seeds of Disaster:  The Development of French Army Doctrine, 1919–​1939 (Hamden, CT: Archon Books, 1985). Drea, E. J., Nomonhan:  Japanese-​Soviet Tactical Combat, 1939 (Fort Leavenworth, KS:  Combat Studies Institute, 1981). Eimannsberger, L. R. von, Der Kampfwagenkrieg (Munich: Lehmanns, 1934). Eimannsberger, L. R. von, Tankovaia voina (Moscow: Voenizdat, 1937). Erickson, J., The Soviet High Command: A Military-Political History, 1918–1941 (London: MacMillan, 1962). Erickson, J., The Russian Imperial/​ Soviet General Staff (College Station, TX:  Texas A&M University, 1981). Farcau, B. W., The Chaco War: Bolivia and Paraguay, 1932–​1935 (Westport, CT: Praeger, 1996). Finch, M. P. M., ‘Outre-​Mer and Métropole: French Officers’ Reflections on the Use of the Tank in the 1920s’, War in History, 15 (July 2008): 294–​313. French, D., ‘The Mechanization of the British Cavalry between the Wars’, War in History, 10 (July 2003): 296–​320. Fuller, J. F. C., ‘Gold Medal (Military) Prize Essay for 1919’, RUSI Journal, 65 (May 1920): 239–​74. Fuller, J. F. C., The Reformation of War (London: Hutchinson, 1923). Fuller, J. F. C., On Future Warfare (London: Sifton Praed, 1928). Fuller, J. F.  C., Lectures on F.S.R. III (Operations between Mechanized Forces) (London:  Sifton Praed, 1932). Gabel, C. R., ‘Evolution of U.S. Armor Mobility’, Military Review, 64 (March 1984): 54–​63. Gat, A., ‘Liddell Hart’s Theory of Armoured Warfare: Revising the Revisionists’, Journal of Strategic Studies, 19 (March 1996): 1–​30. 246

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The Second World War The Blitzkrieg era, 1939–​41 Anon., ‘Blitzkrieg’, in New Encyclopaedia Britannica, ii (London: Britannica, 15th edn, 1981): 84. Anon., ‘Blitzkrieg’, in Great Soviet Encyclopedia, xvi (London: Macmillan, 2nd edn, 1977): 6. Ausems, A., ‘The Netherlands Military Intelligence Summaries 1939–​1940 and the Defeat in the Blitzkrieg of May 1940’, Military Affairs, 50 (October 1986): 190–​99. Bayerlein, F., ‘With the Panzers in Russia’, Marine Corps Gazette, 38 (December 1954): 46–​65. Bekker, C., The Luftwaffe War Diaries (London: Corgi, 1972). Bell, R. E., ‘Division Cuirassée 1940’, Armor, 83 (January/​February 1974): 25–​30. Citino, R. M., ‘Beyond Fire and Movement: Command, Control and Information in the German Blitzkrieg’, Journal of Strategic Studies, 27 (June 2004): 324–​44. Corum, J. S., The Luftwaffe: Creating the Operational Air War, 1918–​1940 (Lawrence, KS: UP of Kansas, 1997). Deighton, L., Blitzkrieg: From the Rise of Hitler to the Fall of Dunkirk (London: Cape, 1979). Dickson, G. A., ‘The Counterattack of the 7th Mechanized Corps, 5–​9 July 1941’, Journal of Slavic Military Studies, 26 (April/​June 2013): 310–​40. Doughty, R. A., ‘The Enigma of French Armoured Doctrine, 1940’, Armor, 83 (September/​October 1940): 39–​44. Ellis, L. F., The War in France and Flanders 1939–​1940 (London: HMSO, 1953). Fanning, W. J., ‘The Origin of the Term “Blitzkrieg”: Another View’, Journal of Military History, 61 (April 1997): 283–​302. Franz, W. P., ‘Operational Concepts’, Military Review, 64 (July 1984): 2–​15. Frieser, K.-​H., The Blitzkrieg Legend:  The 1940 Campaign in the West (Annapolis, MD:  Naval Institute Press, 2005). Glantz, D. M., Operation Barbarossa: Hitler’s Invasion of Russia, 1941 (Stroud: History Press, 2001). Gunsberg, J. A., ‘The Battle of the Belgian Plain, 12–​14 May 1940: The First Great Tank Battle’, Journal of Military History, 56 (April 1992): 207–​44. Hill, A., ‘Voroshilov’s “Lightning” War –​The Soviet Invasion of Poland, September 1939’, Journal of Slavic Military Studies, 27/​3 (2014): 404–​19. Horne, A., To Lose a Battle: France 1940 (London: Macmillan, 1969). Huard, P., Le Colonel de Gaulle et ses blindés. Laon (15–​20 mai 1940) (Paris: Plon, 1980). Jacobsen, H.-​A., ‘Motorisierungsprobleme im Winter 1939/​40’, Wehrwissenschaftliche Rundschau, 6 (September 1956): 497–​519. Kennedy, R. M., The German Campaign in Poland (1939), Dept. of the Army Pamphlet 20–​255 (Washington, DC: USGPO, April 1956).

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Iraq and the Gulf wars, 1980–​2016

Anon., ‘Aftermath of the Reveille Battle’, Armor, 100 (September/​October 1991): 14–​15. Bacon, E. T., ‘The Former Soviet Union and Analysis of the 1991 Gulf War’, Journal of Soviet Military Studies, 5 (June 1992): 169–​86. Bin, A., R. Hill and A. Jones, Desert Storm: A Forgotten War (Westport, CT: Greenwood, 1998). Bohannon, R. M., ‘1–​37 Armor in the Battle of 73 Easting’, Armor, 101 (May/​June 1992): 11–​17. Bourque, S. A., ‘Incident at Safwan’, Armor, 108 (January/​February 1999): 30–​36. Clancy, T., and F. Franks, Into the Storm: A Study in Command (New York: Berkley, 2004). Conroy, J., and R. Martz, Heavy Metal:  A  Tank Company’s Battle to Baghdad (Dulles, VA: Potomac, 2005). Cooke, J. J., 100 Miles from Baghdad: With the French in Desert Storm (Westport, CT: Praeger, 1993). Cordesman, A. H., and A. R. Wagner, The Lessons of Modern War. Volume II: The Iran-​Iraq War (Boulder and San Francisco: Westview Press, 1990). Cordesman, A. H., The Iraq War:  Strategy, Tactics, and Military Lessons (Westport, CT: Praeger, 2003). Cordingley, P., In the Eye of the Storm: Commanding the Desert Rats in the Gulf War (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1996). Cordingley, P., ‘The Gulf War: Operating with Allies’, RUSI Journal, 137 (April 1992): 17–​21. Crawley, V., ‘Ghost Troop’s Battle at the 73 Easting’, Armor, 100 (May/​June 1991): 7–​12. Eshel, D., ‘British Armor in Desert Storm’, Armor, 101 (July/​August 1992): 12–​16.

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Bibliography Freedman, L., and E. Karsh, The Gulf Conflict 1990–​1991: Diplomacy and War in the New World Order (London: Faber & Faber, 1993). Hiro, D., Desert Shield to Desert Storm: The Second Gulf War (New York: Authors Choice, 2003). Karsh, E., The Iran-​Iraq War: A Military Analysis (Adelphi Paper No.220) (London: IISS, 1987). Kaufman, S., ‘Lessons from the 1991 Gulf War and Russian Military Doctrine’, Journal of Slavic Military Studies, 6 (September 1993): 397–​425. Laffin, J., ‘The Gulf War’, in idem, War Annual 1 (London: Brassey’s, 1986), pp. 73–​87. Laffin, J., ‘The Iran-​Iraq (Gulf) War’, in idem, War Annual 2 (London: Brassey’s, 1987), pp. 105–​18. Macgregor, D., Warrior’s Rage: The Great Tank Battle of 73 Easting (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2009). Murray, W., and R. H. Scales, The Iraq War:  A  Military History (London and Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press of Harvard UP, 2003). Murray, W., and K. M. Woods, The Iran-​ Iraq War:  A  Military and Strategic History (Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2014). Nelson, R. A., ‘The Battle of the Bridges: Kuwait’s 35th Brigade on the 2d of August 1991’, Armor, 104 (September/​October 1995): 26–​32. Norton, D., ‘Cecil’s Ride:  A  Tank Platoon Leader in Desert Storm’, Armor, 108 (November/​ December 1999): 30–​35. Pelletiere, S. C., The Iran-​Iraq War: Chaos in a Vacuum (New York: Praeger, 1992). Popaditch, N., Once a Marine: An Iraq War Tank Commander’s Inspirational Memoir of Combat, Courage, and Recovery (New York: Savas Beatie, 2013). Ricks, T. E., Fiasco: The American Military Adventure in Iraq (London: Penguin, 2007). Royal United Services Institution, The Iran-​Iraq War:  The Conflict on Land, Whitehall Papers (London: RUSI, 1987). Scales, R. H., Certain Victory: The US Army in the Gulf War (Washington, DC: USGPO, 1993). Schwarzkopf, H. N., The Autobiography: It Doesn’t Take a Hero (New York: Bantam, 1992). Tucker, A. R., ‘Armoured Warfare in the Gulf ’, Armed Forces, 7 (May 1988): pp. 223–​26. Tucker, A. R., ‘Armies of the Gulf War’, Armed Forces, 6 (July 1987): 319–​23. US General Accounting Office, Desert Storm:  Early Performance Assessments of Bradley and Abrams (Washington, DC: GAO, 1992). Watson, B. W., et al., The Military Lessons of the Gulf War (London: Greenhill, 1993). West, B., and R. L. Smith, The March Up:  Taking Baghdad with the 1st Marine Division (London: Pimlico, 2003). Woods, K. M., et al., Saddam’s Generals: Perspectives of the Iran-​Iraq War (Alexandria, VA: Institute for Defense Analyses, 2011).

Political and global history of armour

Anon., ‘There’s a New Armored War Being Fought’, Defense & Foreign Affairs, January/​February 1982: 6–​9, 26–​7. Bregman, A., Elusive Peace: How the Holy Land Defeated America (London: Penguin, 2005). Brzoska, M., and F. S. Pearson, Arms and Warfare:  Escalation, De-​escalation and Negotiation (Columbia, SC: U of South Carolina P, 1994). Donnelly, C. (ed.), The British Army 2011: A Balance of Capabilities for an Unpredictable World (London: Newsdesk Communications, 2011). Fox, P., ‘“A New and Commanding Breed”: German Warriors, Tanks and the Will to Battle’, War & Society, 30 (March 2011): 1–​23. Fuller, J. F. C., ‘What is an Aggressive Weapon?’ English Review, 54 (June 1932): 601–​5. Fuller, J. F. C., Armored Warfare. An Annotated Edition of Lectures on F.S.R. III: Operations between Mechanized Forces (Harrisburg, PA: Military Service Publishing, 1943).

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Bibliography Hacker, B. C., ‘Imaginations in Thrall:  The Social Psychology of Military Mechanization’, Parameters, 12 (Spring 1982): 50–​61. Head, D. T., ‘The 2nd Parachute Battalion’s War in the Falklands: Light Armor Made the Difference in South Atlantic Deployment’, Armor, 108 (September/​October 1999): 9–​12. Henry, M., ‘French Armor in Algeria’, Armor, 81 (November/​December 1972): 12–​16. Hochstetter, H., Motorisierung und “Volksgemeinschaft”: Das Nationalsozialistische Kraftfahrkorps (NSKK) 1931–​1945 (Munich: Oldenbourg, 2005). House of Representatives, Committee on Armed Services, HASC No. 100–​ 39, Department of Defense Reports Required by Fiscal Year 1988 Authorization Act of Live-​Fire Testing of the Bradley Fighting Vehicle. Hearing Held, December 17, 1987 (Washington, DC: USGPO, 1988). House of Representatives, Committee on Armed Services, HASC No. 100–​40, Swim Capability of the Bradley Fighting Vehicle. April 23, 1987 (Washington, DC: USGPO, 1988). Howells, R., and J. Negreiros, Visual Culture (Cambridge: Polity, 2nd revised edn, 2012). Howells, R., and R. W. Matson (eds), Using Visual Evidence (Maidenhead: Open UP, 2009). Jacobs, G., ‘China’s Armoured Forces’, Asian Defence Journal, 4/​1986: 4–​11. Kandeth, K. P., The Western Front: The Indo-​Pakistan War 1971 (New Dehli: Lancer, 1984). Karamat, J., ‘The Tank Attack that Failed’, Pakistan Army Journal, 24 (September 1983): 39–​49. Katzenbach, E. L., ‘The Horse Cavalry in the Twentieth Century’, Public Policy, 7 (1958): 120–​49. Kemeny, J., ‘Professional Ideologies and Organizational Structure: Tanks and the Military’, Archives Europeennes de Soziologie, 24 (1983): 223–​40. Liddell Hart, B. H., ‘Aggression and the Problem of Weapons’, English Review, 55 (July 1932): 71–​78. Manteuffel, H. von, Die 7. Panzerdivision im Zweiten Weltkrieg: Einsatz und Kampf der “Gespenster-​ Division” 1939–​1945 (Friedberg: Podzun-​Pallas, 1978). Matthew, R. P.  C., Explosion:  The Hungarian Revolution of 1956 (New  York:  Hippocrene Books, 2007). McNaugher, T. L., ‘Problems of Collaborative Weapons Development: The MBT-​70’, Armed Forces and Society, 10 (Fall 1983): 123–​45. Moore, M. P., ‘An Armor Battalion in Kosovo’, Armor, 108 (November/​December 1999): 26–​29. Paul, G., ‘Von der historischen Bildkunde zur Visual History: Eine Einführung’, in G. Paul (ed.), Visual History. Ein Studienbuch (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Rupprecht, 2006), pp. 7–​36. Peters, R., ‘The Future of Armored Warfare’, Parameters, 27 (Autumn 1997): 50–​59. Thompson, J., No Picnic. 3 Commando Brigade in the South Atlantic:  1982 (London:  Leo Cooper, 1985). US Defense Intelligence Agency, The Chinese Armed Forces Today (London: Arms & Armour, 1979). Werkentin, F., Recht und Justiz im SED-​Staat (Bonn: Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung, 2nd edn, 2000). Westwell, C., ‘Critical Approaches to the History of Film’, Rethinking History, 11/​4 (2007): 577–​88. Whitney, E. (ed.), Symbology:  The Use of Symbols in Visual Communication (New York: Communication Arts Books, 1960). Wright, P., Tank: The Progress of a Monstrous War Machine (London: Faber, 2000). Zentner, C., Illustrierte Geschichte der Ära Adenauer (Munich: Bechtermünz Verlag, 1984).

258

259

INDEX

73 Easting, Battle of (February 1991) 180–​1 Abadan 175 Abu Ageila 155, 158 Abu Rudeis 164 Ad Diwaniyah 185 Adan, Gen. Avraham 164 Admiralty Landships Committee 16 AFVs, ‘home-​made’ 190, 192 aircraft A-​10 Warthog 180, 185 C-​5 Galaxy 178 C47 transport aircraft 120 P-​47 Thunderbolt 101, 104 P-​51 Mustang 101 Bristol transporter 120 Skyhawk 168 Stuka Ju-​87 55, 69 Typhoon 101, 105 Al Faw, Battle of (April–​July 1988) 176 Al Khafji 179 Alam Halfa, Battle of (August–​September 1942) 96 Alexandria 25, 93 Algerian War (1954–​61) 12 Alhucemas Bay 49 Alihuatá 49 Aly, Gen. Ahmed Ismail 162 American Expeditionary Force, Tank Corps 32–3 Amiens, Battle of (August 1918) 30–1 An Loc 129 An Najaf 185 Anglo-​American Gulf War (2003) 10, 184–​7, 190, 204 Antheuil, Battle of (July 1918) 29 anti-​armour weapons 7.92mm AT rifle (Polish) 54 37mm Model 36 AT gun (Polish) 54 37mm AT gun (German) 73 37mm AT gun (Japanese) 51, 110 47mm AT gun (Japanese) 109 57mm recoilless rifle 119 75mm recoilless rifle 119 88mm flak-​gun 60, 73, 95–​7 106mm recoilless rifle 128 6-​pounder AT gun 96 17-​pounder AT gun 96 B-​40 rocket 126

bazooka 103 Breda AT gun (Italian) 50 ‘K’ ammunition (German) 20 M72 LAW 128–​9 Panzerfaust 86, 90, 103 PIAT 103, 154 RPG 163, 165, 167, 169, 175–​6, 185, 188–​9 Sagger 8, 162, 165, 169 TOW ATGM 169, 191, 214 Aqaba, Gulf of 155 Ardennes Offensive (1944–​45) 88, 105–​6 Argentan 102 Armor School, US Army, Fort Knox 5, 115, 137 armour, advance rates 62–​3, 81, 86, 90, 210–​11 armour, debates on 7–​8 armour, future trends 213 armour, origins of 1–​3 armour, role in breakthrough operations 209–​10 armour, support vehicles, see support vehicles armour, technology 5–​7 armour, terminology 4–​5 armoured cars and scout cars, American M3A1 scout car 86 M8 armoured car 118 armoured cars, British Coventry 118 Humber Mark IV 118, 154 Rolls Royce 15, 94 Staghound 154 armoured cars, French AML armoured car 12 Panhard armoured car 118 armoured cars, German SdKfz 231 47 SdKfz 232 47 armoured cars, Russian BA-​10 armoured car 56 Armoured Personnel Carriers, see infantry vehicles armoured truck, Chevrolet 153 armoured truck, Dodge 153 armoured warfare, experience of 8–​10 armoured warfare, principles of 10–​12 Army Group Centre, destruction of see Bagration Arracourt, tank battles (September 1944) 103 Arras, Battle of (April–​May 1917) 18–​19 Arras, British counterattack at (May 1940) 60 Art Directors Club of New York 194

260

Index Artillerie Spéciale 18–​20 Asquith, Herbert 16, 29–​30 assault guns and tank destroyers, American M10 tank destroyer 103 assault guns and tank destroyers, German Hetzer 83 Jagdpanzer ATGW AFV 145 Jagdpanzer JPZ 4–​5 145 Marder III 83 Panzerjäger IV 101 Sturmgeschütz III 73, 83, 99, 197 Sturmgeschütz IV 99 assault guns and tank destroyers, Russian SU-​76 80, 114 SU-​85 87 SU-​100 155, 160 SU-​122 80 SU-​152 80 ATGMs 12 Athens 65 Atlantic, Operation (July 1944) 101 Auchinleck, Lt.-​Gen. Claude 96 Auftragstaktik 69, 71, 97 Augsburg 149 Australian Army, formations of, divisions and regiments 1st Armoured Regiment 127 9th Australian Division 95 2/​6th Armoured Regiment 109 3rd Cavalry Regiment 126–​7 1st Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment 126 5th Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment 127 Austria, occupation of (March 1938) 55 Badham, Robert E. 206 Baghdad 174, 176–​7, 185, 188–​9 Bagration, Operation (June–​August 1944) 80, 90 Balck, Gen.d.Pz.Tr. Hermann 69 Balkan Campaign (1941) 65–​6 Baqubah 188 Barbarossa, Operation (June–​December 1941) 64–​7, 74 Barce 93 Bardia 93 Bar-​Lev Line 161–​2 Basra 174, 185, 188–​9 Bastogne, siege of (December 1944) 105 Bataan 107 Beda Fomm, Battle of (February 1941) 94 Beharry, Pte. Johnson 189 Beirut 167–​9 Belfast 204 Belgorod 78–​9 Belgrade 65, 88 Ben-​Gal, Maj.-​Gen. Avigdor 168 Ben Het, action at (March 1969) 127–​8

260

Beqa’a Valley 167–​8 Berlin 90–​1, 149, 199–​200, 206–​7 Berlin, Checkpoint Charlie 147–​8, 201–​2 Berlin, East, uprising (June 1953) 202–​3 Berlin, Russian war memorial 198 Berlin Wall 137, 151, 198, 201 Bialystosk 67 Bilbao 50 Binh Ba, Battle of (June 1969) 127 Bir Gafgafa 155 Blair, Tony 205 Blaskowitz, Col.-​Gen. Johannes 103 Blau, Operation (June–​November 1942) 76 Blitzkrieg 4, 55–​7, 67–​72, 110, 184 Blum, Léon 37 Bock, Field-​Marshal Feodor von 56 Bond, Brian 171 Bonn 150 Bossut, Groupement 19 Bossut, Maj. Louis 19 Brandt, Maj. ‘Wim’ 49 Braunsberg 89 Breith, Gen.d.Pz.Tr. Hermann 89 Bremen 149 Breslau 89 Brest 102 Bril, Col. Moshe 161 British Army, formations of, armies and corps Fifth Army 26 Eighth Army 96 I British Corps 136–​7 XIII Corps 97 XXX Corps 97 British Army, formations of, divisions 1st Armoured Division 61, 179, 184, 186 2nd Division 200 2nd Armoured Division 95 7th Armoured Division 95 5th Division 60 50th Division 60 51st Highland Division 22 52nd (Lowland) Division 25 54th Division 25 British Army, formations of, regiments and brigades 8th King’s Royal Irish Hussars 117 13th/​18th Hussars 101 1st RTR 117 2nd RTR 109 4th RTR 97 46th RTR 97 50th RTR 97 Queen’s Royal Lancers 185 Royal Scots Dragoon Guards 185 Staffordshire Yeomanry 101 4th Armoured Brigade 179

261

Index 4th Independent Armoured Brigade 97 7th Armoured Brigade 109, 179, 181 23rd Independent Armoured Brigade 97 1st Army Tank Brigade 60 16th Air Assault Brigade 184 102nd Logistics Brigade 184 7th Armoured Brigade 185 British Army, Armoured Car Section, Motor Machine-​Gun Service 16 British Army, Heavy Branch, Machine-​Gun Corps 16, 18, 24 British Army, Heavy Section, Machine-​Gun Corps 16 British Army Medical Corps 9 British Army, Tank Corps 10, 20, 193 3rd Tank Battalion 26–​7 British Army, Tank Detachment 16, 25 British Army, Royal Tank Corps 44 Brittany Campaign (1944) 102 Brno 90 Broad, Lt.-​Gen. Charles 40 Browne, Capt. D. G. 22 Bucquoy, tank raid at (June 1918) 29 Budapest 89, 203 Budenneyi, Marshal S. M. 198 Bullecourt, attack on (May 1917) 19 Buna-​Goa, Battle of (November 1942–​January 1943) 109 Burma Campaign (1942–​43) 109, 111 Burg (Sturmgeschütz School) 83 Burstyn, Maj. Gunther 2–​3 Busch, Field-​Marshal Ernst 80 Byng, Field-​Marshal Sir Julian 21 Cachy 27 Cambrai, Battle of (November–​December 1917) 2, 10, 21–​4, 195 Capper, Gen. Sir John 31 Carton de Wiart, Maj.-​Gen. Adrian 55 Cercottes (training camp) 18 Cerny, David 204 Chaco War (1932–​35) 49 Chaffee, Brig.-​Gen. Adna R., Jr. 45 Chaubrès, Groupement 19 Chaudun, tank action at (May 1918) 28 Chemin des Dames, Battle of (April 1917) 19 Chindits, Wingate’s 155 Chinese Nationalist Army, formations of 38th Division 109 Chinese Spring Offensive (April–​June 1951) 116 Christie, J. Walter 47 Churchill, Winston S. 1, 15–​16, 32, 96 Cirene 93 Cobra, Operation (July 1944) 101 Cologne 202

Cordingley, Maj.-​Gen. Patrick 181 Crusader, Operation (November–​December 1941) 95 Cutry, Battle of (June 1918) 29 Daladier, Eduard 37 Damascus 164 Dani, Operation (May 1948) 154 Danzig 89 Dehloran, Battle of (April–​July 1988) 176 Democratic Republic of the Sahara 201 Denikin, Lt.-​Gen. Anton 48 Desert Shield, Operation (August 1990–​January 1991) 178, 191 Desert Storm, Operation (January–​March 1991) 178–​82, 212 Dien Bien Phu, Battle of (March–​May 1954) 119–​20 Dneprpretrovsk 78 Donetsk 198 Dunkirk 60 Dyan, Gen. Moshe 156 Dyan, Lt. Yael 159 eastern Ukraine, conflict in (2014–​) 212–​13, 215 East Berlin, see Berlin Egyptian Expeditionary Force 14 Egyptian Army, formations of Third Army 164 4th Armoured Division 164 21st Armoured Division 164 25th Tank Brigade 164 Eimannsberger, Gen.d.Art. Ludwig Ritter von 37–​8 Ein Dara 168 Eisenhower, Gen. Dwight D. 198 El Alamein, First Battle of (July 1942) 96 El Alamein, Second Battle of (October–​November 1942) 95–​6 El Arish 156, 159 Elles, Lt.-​Gen. Sir Hugh 20–​2, 24, 32 Estienne, Gen. of Artillery Jean Baptiste 17–​18 Falaise pocket 102 Falklands War (1982) 211 Fall, Bernard 121 Fallujah 189 Fao peninsula 174 Fish Lake, Battle of (April–​July 1988) 176 Flers-​Courcelette, Battle of (September 1916) 17 Flesquières Ridge 22 Foch, Marshal Ferdinand 29, 31 Follow-​On Forces Attack 137, 143, 147 Forager, Operation (June 1944) 109 Frankfurt am Main 150 Frankfurt an der Oder 89 Franks, Gen. Frederick 182–​3 Freikorps 69, 206

261

262

Index French, Field-​Marshal Sir John 16 French Army, formations of, armies Fifth Army 29 Sixth Army 29 Ninth Army 29 Tenth Army 29–​30 French Army, formations of, divisions 2nd Light Division 58 3rd Light Division 58 6th Light Armoured Division 179 1st Armoured Division 62 2nd Armoured Division 62, 102–​3, 118 3rd Armoured Division 62 4th Armoured Division 60 Daguet Division 181 French Army, Inspector-​General of Motorisation 43 French Campaign (May–​June 1940) 11, 56–​64, 72, 187, 197, 211 Frunze Military Academy 141 Fuller, Maj.-​Gen. J. F. C. 1, 8, 14, 20, 22, 24, 30–​2, 35–​9, 44, 47, 202, 205, 215 Gaddafi, Col. Muammar 205 Gaulle, Gen. Charles de 36–​7, 39 Gaza, Second Battle of (April 1917) 25 Gaza, Third Battle of (November 1917) 25–​6 Gazala, Battle of (June 1942) 95–​6 Gaza Strip 155–​7 Geneva Disarmament Conference (1932) 3–​4, 7–​8 German Army, formations of, army groups Army Group B 100 Army Group G 100–​1 Army Group North 67, 74–​5, 88 Army Group Centre 67, 74–​6, 80, 90 Army Group South 67, 75–​6, 78, 80–​1 Army Group Vistula 90 German Army, formations of, armies Fourth Panzer Army 76–​7 Fifth Panzer Army 102–​3 Second Army 64 Second Panzer Army 76 Seventh Army (Imperial German Army) 28 Seventh Army 102 Sixth Army 58, 78 Twelfth Army 64 German Army, formations of, corps I SS Panzer Corps 101 II SS Panzer Corps 102 III Panzer Corps 89 IV Panzer Corps 89 XV Panzer Corps 62 XIX Panzer Corps 56, 62 XXXXVII Panzer Corps 78 XXXXVIII Panzer Corps 103 LVII Panzer Corps 78

262

LVIII Panzer Corps 103 Panzer Group West 101 I West German Corps 137–​8 II West German Corps 137–​8 III West German Corps 137–​8 German Army, formations of, divisions 54th Division (Imperial German Army) 24 1st Panzer Division 58, 60, 62 2nd Panzer Division 58, 60, 62, 105 3rd Panzer Division 58 4th Panzer Division 53–​4, 58, 76 5th Panzer Division 58 6th Panzer Division 58 7th Panzer Division 60, 62 8th Panzer Division 58 9th Panzer Division 105 10th Panzer Division 57–​8, 62 14th Panzer Division 77, 88 15th Panzer Division 95, 97 17th Panzer Division 78 24th Panzer Division 77 Hermann Goering Panzer Division 97 Panzer Lehr Division 105 29th Panzer Grenadier Division 97 5th Light Division 94 6th West German Mechanised Division 136–​7 German Army, formations of, regiments and brigades 31st Panzer Regiment 58 111th Panzer Brigade 103–​4 112th Panzer Brigade 103 113th Panzer Brigade 103–​4 German Army, divisional manoeuvres (1939) 55 German Army, Motor Transport Service 44 German Army, Motorised Combat Troops 45 German Army, Panzertruppe 84 German Army, Panzertruppe, personnel losses 105–​6 Glasgow 202 Golan Heights 160–​3, 165–​6, 199 Gomel 198 Goodwood, Operation (July 1944) 101 Gorbachev, Mikhail 201, 204 Gothic Line, Battle of (September 1944) 98, 111 Great Bitter Lake 164 Greece, invasion of (1941) 65 Grodno 56 Grozny 214 Guderian, Col.-​Gen. Heinz 38, 56–​8, 60, 62, 69, 74, 76, 83–​4, 89, 100 Hackett, Gen. Sir John 149–​50 Haganah, Jewish underground organisation 153 Haig, Field-​Marshal Sir Douglas 3, 16, 24, 31

263

Index Halder, Col.-​Gen. Franz 56, 58, 64–​5, 74, 195 Halon fire suppression system 180–​1 Hamburg 149 Hamel, Battle of (July 1918) 28–​9 Hankey, Col. Maurice 15 Hannut 58 Hanover 149 Harel, Col. ‘Pinko’ 161 Harper, Maj.-​Gen. George M. 22 Havel, Václav 204 helicopters AH-​1S Cobra 170 Gazelle 170 Hughes Defender 170 helicopters, employment of 174, 179 Helsinki 200 Heusinger, Gen. Adolf 149 Hezbollah 170–​1 Hindenburg Line 30 Hiram, Operation (October 1948) 154 Hitler, Adolf 54–​5, 58, 64–​5, 69–​70, 74, 76, 78, 84, 88–​9, 100, 103, 105, 200 Honest John missile system 139 Hook, Third Battle of (May 1953) 117 Horev, Operation (December 1948–​January 1949) 154 Hoth, Col.-​Gen. Hermann 62, 69, 77 Hussein, Saddam 176, 185, 191, 211 Hythe 197 IED 187–​8, 192 Imjin River, Battle of (April 1951) 117 Indian Army, formations of 4th Indian Division 94 Indo-​China Conflict (1945–​54) 118–​20, 130 Indo-​Pakistan War (1965) 199 Indo-​Pakistan War (1971) 12 infantry vehicles/​APCs (tracked or half-​tracked) Amtrac AAV-​7A1 185, 189 BMP-​1 IFV 7, 137, 142, 165, 167, 169–​70, 180–​1, 201, 207 Bradley M2/​3 IFV 7, 178, 181, 185, 187–​9, 199, 201, 206 Carden-​Lloyd tankette 49 M2 half-​track 86 M3 half-​track 86, 104, 118, 154–​5 M113 APC 7, 121–​7, 161, 168–​9, 174, 191 Marder IFV 145 Nakpadon 172 Nagmachon 172 PT-​76 127–​8, 131, 141, 160, 207 Ram Kangaroo infantry carrier 7 SdKfz 251 half-​track 47 Universal (Bren-​Gun) Carrier 86, 154 Warrior IFV 184–​5, 188–​9, 205

infantry vehicles (wheeled) BTR-​40 174 BTR-​50 161, 174 BTR-​60 174 Humvee jeep 192 UR-​416 168 Inter-​Allied Tank Committee 32 Inter-​Ally Bureau of Munitions 32 Intifada (1987) 204 Intifada (2000) 204 Iran-​Iraq War (1980–​88) 173–​7 Iraq insurgency (2004–​11) 187–​9 Iraqi Army, formations of, divisions and brigades 25th Infantry Division 181 45th Infantry Division 181 1st Mechanised Division 179 5th Mechanised Division 179 Hammurabi Republican Guard Division 177 Medina Republican Guard Division 177 Tawakalna Mechanised Division 180 3rd Armoured Division 179 12th Armoured Division 181 9th Armoured Brigade 180 ISIS 190–​2, 201, 205 Israel, War of Independence (1948–​49) 153–​4 Israeli Defence Forces, formations of, brigades 7th Armoured Brigade 155–​6, 164, 166, 199 8th Armoured Brigade 154 27th Armoured Brigade 155 188th (Barak) Brigade 163 679th Reserve Brigade 199 Isserson, Brigade-​Cmdr. G. S. 38–​9 Italian Campaign (1943–​45) 97–​100 Italian Volunteer Corps (Spanish Civil War) 49 Iwo Jima, conquest of (February–​March 1945) 110 Janin, Gen. Maurice 18 Japanese Army, formations of 9th Tank Regiment 109 Jassy-​Kishinev, Battle of (August 1944) 80 Jebel Libni 159 Jebel mountains 93 Jerusalem 154 Joffre, Marshal Joseph 18 Joint Forces Command (East) 179 Joint Forces Command (North) 179 Kahalani, Brig.-​Gen. Avigdor 166 Kapyong, Battle of (April 1951) 116 Karkhov 78–​9 Karkhov offensive (March 1943) 79 Karoun 168 Kassel 149 Kazan 44, 47 Kesselring, Field-​Marshal Albert 99

263

264

Index Khaladiya 191 Khalkhin Gol, Battle of, see Nomonhan Khe Sanh 127 Kiev 67, 200 Kirosheev, G. F. 91 Kitchener, Field-​Marshal Lord Horatio 16 Kluge, Field-​Marshal Günther von 101 Koniev, Marshal I. S. 76, 89–​90 Königsberg 89 Kontum 129 Korean War (1950–​53) 113–​18, 130–​1 Krojanty 54 Küstrin 89–​90 Kursk 78 Kursk, Battle of (July–​August 1943) 79–​80 Kut 185 Kuwaiti Army, formations of 35th Kuwaiti Brigade 177 Kuwait City 177, 179 Kwantung Army, Japanese 91, 110 land drones, see tracked vehicles, unmanned landing craft/​vessels 101, 109 Laner, Maj.-​Gen. Dan 164 Lang Vei Special Forces Camp 127 Lattre de Tassigny, Marshal Jean de 119 Lebanon, Syrian invasion of (1976) 167 Lebanon War (1982–​85) 167–​70 Lebanon War, Second (2006) 170–​1 League of Nations, Conference for the Reduction and Limitation of Armaments (1932) 3, 7–​8 Leclerc, Lt.-​Gen. Philippe 118 Leeb, Field-​Marshal Wilhelm Ritter von 59, 75 Lefebvre, Groupement 19 Leningrad 67 Libyan Civil War, overthrow of Col. Gaddafi (2011) 205 Liddell Hart, Capt. B. H. 8, 37, 52, 140–​1, 171 Lindsay, Maj.-​Gen. George M. 40, 44 Litani, Operation (March 1978) 170 Liverpool, police strike (1919) 202 London 167 Long Bihn 123 Long Tan 126 Lord Mayor’s Procession, London (November 1918) 196 Lüttich, Operation (August 1944) 101 Lüttwitz, Gen.d.Pz.Tr. Heinrich von 103 MacArthur, Gen. Douglas 114 MacDonald, Charles 68 Magen, Gen. Kalman 164 Maginot Line 45, 52, 63, 100 Mailly-​Maillet 27 Mailly manoeuvres (1932) 43

264

Majnoon, Battle of (April–​July 1988) 176 Malayan Campaign (1941–​42) 106–​7, 111 Malmaison, Battle of (October 1917) 21 Manchurian Campaign (1945) 91, 110–​11, 211 Mannheim 150 Manstein, Field-​Marshal Erich von 57–​8, 78 Manteuffel, Gen.d.Pz.Tr. Hasso Eccard von 69, 103 Mao Tse-​Tung 211 March Offensive (March–​July 1918) 26 Marine Corps, see US Marine Corps Marly-​le-​Roi 18 Marne, Second Battle of (July–​August 1918) 29 Marshall, Gen. George C. 45 Marshall Islands Campaign 109 May Day parades 200 MBT-​70, US-​German tank project 206 McNamara, Robert S. 206 Mehran 176–​7 Mellenthin, Maj.-​Gen. Friedrich-​Wilhelm von 103 Messines, Battle of (June 1917) 20 Meuse River 58 Miksche, Col. Ferdinand Otto 69, 138 Minden 149 Minsk 67 Mitla Pass 157, 164 MLRS 147 Mokra 54 Montgomery, Field-​Marshal Bernard 96, 198 Moreuil, Battle of (March 1918) 29, 32 Moroccan Royal Armed Forces 201 Mortain, counter-​attack at (August 1944) 101 Moscow, Battle of (October 1941–​January 1942) 67, 74 Moscow, counter-​offensive (January–​April 1942) 76 Moscow, putsch attempt (1991) 204 Mosul 190, 201 Motorman, Operation (July 1972) 204 Munich 149 My Tho, Battle of (January–​February 1968) 125 Nanawa, Second Battle of (July 1933) 49 Nasiriyah 185 Nasser, Gamal Abd al 155, 157, 160–​1 National War Savings Committee 197 NATO, common doctrine 146–​7 NATO, formations of 6th West German Mechanised Division 137–​8 I West German Corps 137–​8 II West German Corps 137–​8 III West German Corps 137–​8 I Belgian Corps 137–​8 I British Corps 137–​8 I Dutch Corps 137–​8 V US Corps 137–​8 VII US Corps 137–​8

265

Index NATO, forward defence 149 NATO layer-​cake 137 NATO, tank fleet 134–​5 Neame, Lt.-​Gen. Sir Philip 95 Negba 154 Nehring, Gen.d.Pz.Tr. Walter 38, 65 Neuvy Paillox (Allied tank factory) 32 Nevada Proving Ground 137 Nidal, Abu 167 Nitzanin 154 Nivelle Offensive (April–​May 1917) 19 Nomonhan/​Khalkin Gol, Battle of (May–​September 1939) 51 Normandy landings (June 1944) 101, 106 Northwest European Campaign (1944) 100–​6 North African Campaign 93–​7 North Vietnamese Army 10 North Vietnamese Army, armour units 202nd Armoured Regiment 127 203rd Armoured Regiment 127 North Vietnamese Easter Offensive (1972) 128 North Vietnamese Offensive (1975) 129–​30 Norton, Capt. David 182 Nuremberg 149 O’Connor, Gen. Sir Richard 94–​5 Okinawa, Battle of (April–​June 1945) 109 Operational Manoeuvre Group 137, 143 Palestinian Liberation Organisation 167–​8 Pallmach, Jan 204 Palmach, infantry forces 155 Panzer Division 55–​6, 62–​3, 66–​7 Patton, Gen. George S. 102, 104 Peace for Galilee, Operation (June–​September 1982) 167 People’s Liberation Army 211 Persian Gulf War (1990/​91) 10, 177–​84, 190, 199 Peshmerga (Kurdish military units) 190–​2, 215 Pétain, Marshal Philippe 21, 43 Peters, Lt.-​Col. Ralph 213 Pickett, Lt.-​Col. G.B. 113 ‘Plan 1919’, memorandum (May 1918) 30–​2 Polisario 201 Polish Army, units 18th Lancers 54 Wolynian Cavalry Brigade 53–​4 Polish Campaign (1939) 53–​6, 68 Popov, Maj.-​Gen. M. M. 77 Prague 55, 193 Prague Spring (1968) 203 Prokhorovka, Battle of (July 1943) 79, 198 Prostejov 90 Punch (satirical magazine) 195

Pusan 117 Putin, Vladimir 201 Qasre Shirin, Battle of (April–​July 1988) 176 Rafah 156 Rangoon 109 Raudzens, George 68 Rawlinson, Gen. Sir Henry 31 Reagan, Ronald 137 Red Army 10 Red Army, armoured forces Armoured Car and Tank Troops 44 Motorised and Mechanised Troops 44 Tank and Motor Transport Detachment 44 Red Army, formations of, fronts 1st Ukranian Front 89–​90 1st Belorussia Front 89–​90 2nd Belorussian Front 89–​90 3rd Belorussian Front 89 Kalinin Front 76 Southwest Front 76 Western Front 76 Red Army, formations of, armies Eighth Army 90 Tenth Army 76 Sixtieth Army 90 Sixty-​Second Army 77 2nd Guards Tank Army 90 3rd Guards Tank Army 90 4th Tank Army 77 5th Guards Tank Army 79 Red Army, formations of, corps, divisions and brigades 31st Tank Corps 90 135th Rifle Corps 89 5th Tank Brigade 90 42nd Tank Brigade 90 Red Army, invasion of Poland (1939) 56 Red Army, tank corps, composition of 86–​7 Reichenau, Field-​Marshal Walter von 58 Rif Rebellion (1921–​27) 49 Riga 88 Rogers, Gen. Bernard W. 147 Romanian Army, formations of 1st Armoured Division 74, 77 Third Army 77 Fourth Army 77 Rommel, Field-​Marshal Erwin 60, 69, 94–​6, 100 Rostov 77–​8 Royal Naval Air Service 15 Rumsfeld, Donald 187 Rundstedt, Field-​Marshal Gerd von 60, 100 Russian Civil War (1918–​21) 48–​9, 197 Rydz-​Smigly, Marshal Edward 53

265

266

Index Sadat, Anwar 164 Saigon 123, 130 Salerno, Allied landing at (September 1943) 98 Salonika 65 Sarajevo 65 Sassoon, Sir Phillip 197 Schneider Company 18 Schwarzkopf, Gen. Norman H. 178, 182–​3, 191 Schweppenburg, Gen.d.Pz.Tr. Leo Geyr von 69, 100 Schwerin, Gen.d.Pz.Tr. Gerhard von 69 Sedan 58 Seelow Heights 90 self-​propelled artillery, American M8 SP howitzer 118 M7 SP howitzer 157 M107 SP howitzer 161, 207 self-​propelled artillery, French M50 SP howitzer 157 self-​propelled artillery, Russian/​Warsaw Pact 2S1 Gvozdika SP artillery 201 M-​77 152mm SP howitzer 175 Senger und Etterlin, Gen.d.Pz.Tr. Frido von 78 Sharon, Gen. Ariel 158, 164 Shat’sk 56 Shatt-​al-​Arab 174 Sialkot 12, 199 Sidi Barrani, Battle of (December 1940) 94 Sidi Bou Zid 97 Sidon 168 Sidorenko, Col. A. A. 141 Sinai Desert 156 Six-​Day War (1967) 156–​61, 212 Slim River, Battle of (1942) 106 Smith, Maj.-​Gen. Rupert 181 Smolensk 67 Soissons, Battle of (July 1918) 29 Somme, Battle of (September 1916) 3, 16 Soviet Army, formations of Second Guards Army 135 Third Shock Army 135 Third Guards Army 150 Eighth Guards Army 135 Twentieth Guards Army 135, 150 103rd Airborne Division 149 Soviet-​Polish War (1920) 54 Spanish Civil War (1936–​39) 49–​51, 57, 69 Speidel, Gen. Hans 100 Spring, Operation (July 1944) 101 St. Lô 101 Stalin, Josef 42, 45, 76–​7, 198, 200 Stalingrad, Battle of (August 1942–​February 1943) 77–​8 Starry, Gen. Donn A. 123–​4 Stettin 89 Stuttgart 150 Sueter, Rear-​Admiral Murray 15–​16

266

Suez Canal 155–​7, 162, 16–​5 Suez City 164 Sultan al-​Saud, Field-​Marshal Prince Khalid Bin 178 support and specialist vehicles, American LVT 108, 119 LVT4A Alligator 118, 121 M29C Cargo Carrier 119 M50A1 Ontos 122, 126 M74 armoured recovery vehicle 145 M109 155mm howitzers 206 Sherman flamethrower tank 6, 109 support vehicles, British Churchill Mark VII ‘Crocodile’ 6 Centurion AVRE bulldozer tank 204 FV4202 Armoured Recovery Vehicle 145 FV4205 Armoured Vehicle-​Launched Bridge 145 SP-​70 155mm SP gun 145, 205 Warrior command vehicle 184 Warrior recovery and repair AFV 184 support vehicles, German Sturmpanzer IV 6 Sturmtiger 6 Gepard anti-​aircraft AFV 145 Beaver bridge-​layer 145 support vehicles, Russian ASU-​85 air-​portable AT AFV 142 BMOP vehicle 214 MTLB, multi-​purpose vehicle 191 ZSU-​23-​4 142, 214 surface-​to-​air missile SA-​2 162 SA-​3 162 SA-​6 162 Syrian Army, formations of 7th Syrian Infantry Division 163 1st Armoured Division 168 3rd Armoured Division 167–​8 9th Tank Division 183 47th Armoured Brigade 167 Syrian Civil War (2011–​) 212, 214–​15 Swinton, Maj.-​Gen. Sir Ernest 15–​17, 19, 32 Ta May 127 tactical nuclear weapons 138–​41, 150 Taganrog 48 Tal, Maj.-​Gen. Israel 156, 158, 161, 169 Tank Bank 196, 202 tank, definition of 3–​4 tank destroyers, see assault guns tank, first use of term 3 tank, losses (WWII) 210 tank, political symbolism of 193–​5 tank production American (WWII) 106 British (WWI) 33

267

Index British (WWII) 106 French (WWI) 33 German (WWII) 106 Russian (WWII) 85 tank, symbolism of 195–​205 tank technology, future trends 213 tanks, American Christie tank (prototype) 47 M1 Abrams 144, 147, 178–​81, 183, 187–​9, 192, 199, 204–​6 M1A3 Abrams 213 M2 light tank 109 M3 Stuart 80, 85–​6, 107, 109 M3 Grant 80, 85–​6, 95–​6 M4 Sherman 9, 85, 98–​9, 102–​4, 107–​10, 114–​15, 153–​7, 198 M4 Sherman DD 101 M4 Sherman flamethrower 109 M5 Stuart 118 M22 Locust 154 M24 Chaffee 114, 119–​21, 130–​1, 198 M26 Pershing 114–​15, 117, 131 M39 145 M41 Walker Bulldog 131, 145, 207 M46 Patton 115 M47 143, 145, 174 M48 122–​3, 125–​6, 131, 143–​5, 147, 157, 159–​61, 166, 174–​5, 207 M48A2 144, 157 M60 144, 169–​70, 175, 178, 191, 206–​7 M60A1 144, 174 M60A3 144, 206 Sheridan M551 tank 125, 178 tanks, British and Commonwealth A9 94 A10 94 A13 Cruiser 94 Centurion 117, 127, 131, 144, 157, 159–​61, 163, 166, 169, 207 Challenger 147, 178–​9, 181, 184–​5, 187–​9 Churchill 85–​6, 99, 102, 117, 205 Conqueror 144 Cromwell 117, 154, 198 Cruiser Mark IV 154 FV4201 Chieftain 144–​5, 174–​5, 178 Mark I 9, 16–​18, 20, 25–​6, 33, 193 Mark II 20, 25–​6, 193 Mark III 20, 193 Mark IV 18, 20, 28–​9, 45, 193, 195 Mark V 26, 28–​9, 33, 45, 48, 196, 202 Mark V* 26, 28–​9, 33, 196–​7, 202 Matilda Mark I 46, 60, 86 Matilda Mark II 46, 60, 94, 109, 154 Medium A Whippet 26–​8, 30, 48, 196 Medium C 202

Medium D (prototype) 32 Medium Mark II 46 Medium Mark III 46 Mark VI light tank 94 Scorpion light tank 174, 181, 211 Scimitar light tank 181, 184, 211 Sherman Firefly 102 Valentine 85–​6, 95, 98 Vickers A12 46 Vickers Type A/​B 49 tanks, Chinese T-​59 129, 141, 175 T-​69 175, 211 tanks, Czech 35(t) 61, 64, 70, 74 38(t) 61, 64, 70, 77, 83 tanks, French AMX-​13 154–​7, 199 AMX-​30 181 Char B1 46, 61–​2 Hotchkiss H35/​39 58, 154 Renault FT-​17 26, 28–​9, 33, 40, 45, 48–​50, 61, 64, 118, 195, 197, 200 Renault R-​35 46, 74, 154 Renault R-​39 154 Schneider CA1 19, 21, 29, 49–​50 Somua S-​35 46, 58 St Chamond 21, 29 tanks, German A7V 27–​8, 206 Leopard I 144–​5, 206 Leopard II 147 Leopard IIA6 213 Panzer I 50, 55, 58, 64, 66, 200 Panzer II 46, 55, 58, 64, 66, 200 Panzer III 46–​7, 55, 58, 61, 64, 83, 95 Panzer IV 47, 55, 58, 61, 64, 82–​3, 85, 91, 95, 99, 101–​3, 157, 159–​60, 197, 200 Panzer V Panther 9, 79, 82, 90–​1, 99, 101–​5 Panzer VI Tiger I 9, 82, 90–​1, 97, 99, 101–​2 Panzer VI Tiger II 82–​3 tanks, Israeli M48 Patton 166 Merkava 168–​71 Merkava IVm 213 Super-​Sherman 156 Sho’t Centurion 169, 172 tanks, Italian CV-​35 49, 94, 154 M11/​39 94 M11/​40 94 tanks, Japanese Type-94 TK 106 Type-​95 Ha-​Go 106 Type-​97 Chi-​Ha 106

267

268

Index tanks, Poland PL-​01 ‘concept tank’ 213 tanks, Russian BT-​2 47 BT-​5 50–​1 BT-​7 51, 56, 66, 85 BT-​26B 49–​50, 56, 66, 85–​6 Freedom Fighter V. I. Lenin 49 Josef Stalin II 87, 193, 204 Josef Stalin III 160, 198 KV-​1 66, 73–​4, 76–​7, 85–​6, 91, 198 KV-​2 66, 73–​4, 77 T-​34 66–​7, 73–​4, 76–​7, 85–​6, 90–​1, 114–​16, 130, 155–​6, 168, 197–​8 T-​38 56 T-​10 heavy tank 141 T-​54/​55 128, 130–​1, 141, 144, 146, 160–​1, 166–​7, 170, 174–​5, 178–​9, 181, 184–​5, 190, 201, 207 T-​60/​70 76–​7, 80 T-​62 141–​2, 161, 166–​7, 169–​70, 174–​5, 178, 180, 190, 199, 201, 207 T-​62A 142 T-​64 141–​3, 184, 190, 207 T-​72 141–​2, 168–​70, 174–​6, 178–​81, 190, 199, 201 T-​80 143, 213 T-​90 213 tanks, Spanish Barbastro 50 tanks, Swedish S-​Tank 4 tanks, first use in action 3, 8, 209 tanks, precursors of battle car (Valturio) 2 Motorgeschütz (Burstyn) 2 war cars (Chinese) 1 war cart (Scottish) 2 war elephants 2 Tarawa, Battle of (November 1943) 108–​9 Tartu 200 Tawfiq, Maj.-​Gen. Adin 177 Tbilisi, liberation of (February 1921) 48 Tet Offensive (January–​September 1968) 122, 125–​6 Third Ypres Offensive (July–​November 1917) 24 Tikrit 190, 201 Timoshenko, Marshal S. K. 64, 76 Tobruk 93, 95–​6 Totalize, Operation (August 1944) 101–​2 Tout, Corporal Ken 9 tracked vehicles, unmanned AvantGuard Unmanned Ground Combat Vehicle 214 IDF Guardium system 214 Talon light robot 213–​14 Uran-​6 214 Uran-​9 214 Uran-​14 214

268

Tractable, Operation (August 1944) 101 Triandafillov, Brigade-​Cmdr. V. K. 38–​9 Tuguntz 49 Tukhachevskii, Marshal M. N. 38–​9 Typhoon, Operation (September–​December 1941) 74 Tyre 168 UN counter-​offensive (January–​April 1951) 116 US Army, formations of, armies and corps Seventh Army 97 V Corps 136–​7, 185 VII Corps 136–​7, 178–​82 XV Corps 103 XVIII Corps 179 US Army, formations of, divisions 1st Armored Division 97, 197 3rd Armored Division 179 4th Armored Division 102–​4 6th Armored Division 102, 104 1st Cavalry Division 188 1st Infantry Division 188 3rd Infantry Division 179 1st Mechanized Infantry Division 179 24th Mechanized Infantry Division 179 US Army, formations of, regiments, brigades and battalions 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment 180 82nd Airborne Division 178–​9 101st Airborne Division 179 1st Cavalry Regiment (Mechanized) 45 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment 124 7th Cavalry Brigade (Mechanized) 45 173rd US Airborne Brigade 126 194th Tank Battalion 107 US Army, First Army manoeuvres (1939) 45 US Army, Louisiana manoeuvres (1940) 45 US Army, Historical Division (German Section) 148 US Army, Second Army manoeuvres (1936) 45 US Marine Corps, formations of 108–​9, 179 1st Marine Expeditionary Force 179 1st Marine Division 184–​5 2nd Marine Division 184–​5 4th Marine Expeditionary Brigade 179 US Marine Corps, use of armour in WWII 108–​9 US Marine Expeditionary Force 184–​5 US Defense Nuclear Agency 209 Uvdah, Operation (March 1949) 154 Valturio 2 Versailles, Treaty of 69 Vietcong 10 Vietminh, formations of Vietminh Regiment 95, 119 Vietnam War (1962–​75) 120–​31, 145, 199

269

Index Villers-​Bretonneux, Battle of (April 1918) 27–​8 Vimy Ridge, Battle of (April 1917) 19 Vistula-​Oder Operation (January–​February 1945) 90 Volckheim, Col. Ernst 37 Volgograd 198 Voronov, Marshal N. N. 83 Voroshilov, Marshal Kliment 198 Vuono, Gen. Carl 178 Vyasma-​Bryansk 67 Wadi al-​Salulei 170 Waffen-​SS, Totenkopf Division 60 Wakde Islands 107–​8 War of Attrition (1967–​70) 161 War Office, Committee on the Abolition of Tanks 3 ‘War of the Cities’ (March–​June 1985) 174 ‘War over the Waters’ (1964–​67) 157 Warsaw 53, 88–​9 Warsaw Pact, doctrine 171 Warsaw Pact, GFSG 135, 143 Warsaw Pact, tank fleet 134–​5 Washington DC 199 Wavell, Field-​Marshal Archibald 200 Wells, H.G. 1 West, Maj.-​Gen. A. L. 124 West Bank 159–​60

Western Desert, war in, see North African Campaign Western Sahara, war in (1976–​91) 201 Westmoreland, Gen. William 121 Wilson, Field-​Marshal Sir Henry 31 Wingate, Maj.-​Gen. Orde 155 Winter War, Finnish–​Soviet (1939–​40) 64, 71, 200 Wochenschau (German newsreel) 197 Wood, Maj.-​Gen. John S. 104 Yad Mordechai 154 Yazov, Marshal Dmitri T. 183, 204 Yegorov, Marshal A. I. 42 Yelnia 73 Yeltsin, Boris 204 Yoav, Operation (October 1948) 154 Yoffe, Gen. Avraham 158 Yom Kippur War (1973) 12, 145, 161–​7 YPG 190–​2, 215 Yudenich, Gen. Nikolai 48 Yugoslavia, invasion of (1941) 65–​6 Zafarwal (Sialkot region) 12 Zagreb 65 Zaloga, Steven 91 Zimmermann, Maj.-​Gen. Bodo 148–​9 Ziyabki, Battle of (July 1920) 48 Zhukov, Marshal Georgii 51, 73, 76–​7, 89–​90

269

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