How The USSR Shocked The World With The T-34 | Tanks! | War Stories

The T34 medium tank was one of the technological marvels of World War II, designed, built and used in Russia. The T34 surprised the invading German army and prevented it from taking over Moscow. The Third Reich even attempted to clone the T34, but their attempts never challenged supremacy. of the Soviet colossus, but the story of the T-34 is truly remarkable, unlike its Western counterparts, the T34 did not arise from a long tradition of tank development, it was the result of overnight industrialization at a cost tremendous human. The T-34 was Stalin's empire. way to show the

world

that Russia could outgun production and overwhelm the industrial West.

It was a very, very good tank when the Germans faced it, they were surprised. The t34 symbolized the Russian struggle for industrial supremacy with the capitalist West. Not only was the T-34 the best all-terrain tank in 1941, but it maintained this dominance until the end of the war, but the T34 was also the product of a strong army. In 1945, the Red Army was the most effective force in the

world

to perform large-scale armored operations. However, the T-34 and the Red Army could not have emerged from more unlikely beginnings. The First World War had been fought in a rather belated manner, and in fact, Russia lost that war in part because the Civil War that was fought was so belated. between 1917 and 1920 it was even more backward than the First World War;

It was largely a war fought by Cavalry, but it established in Russia a tradition of using Cavalry for independent operations, what could later be called deep operations, Revolution and Civil War. The war convinced the Bolsheviks that they would need a military arm to remain in power, so in 1918 the Red Army was born. The Russian Civil War is fundamental to understanding the creation of the modern Red Army. Obviously, with the B revolution in 1917 there was a continuation. From that, the Russian Civil War that took place between 1919 and really 1921 and Russia was really facing forces from both Japan and also the United States and Great Britain and also the internal opposition of the so-called white forces, now the forces Russian Bolsheviks did not particularly act.

Well, and under pressure in relation to this Leon Trosky, who was a kind of father of the modern Russian army, he brought back 48,000 Tsarist officers and also high-ranking non-commissioned officers to try to resurrect the professionalism of the Russian army, so in In that sense, The Civil War is very important to understand the professionalism that exists within the Russian army. In the early 1920s, the fleeing communist government decided on its priorities for the years ahead, but it had many questions to answer as Russians began to think about how to shape their future. The war could take and what assets they might need to wage war, uh, armor is something they think about because the sheer size of Russia means that if you have something that can move fast, you can move around the country and it can cause death. and destruction. at very long distances from your base, this is obviously something you want in that type of country, but predicting the nature of future war meant studying how the West had fought war in the past, which is why Russian generals analyzed the First War World and used their findings.

To formulate a plan to defeat a capitalist coalition, they called their plan deep battle: the traditional Russian offensive was to advance on a mass front using massed infantry tactics, and the idea of ​​deep battle was, in a sense, trying to marry the whole concept of mechanized warfare. war using armored infantry mobile artillery and is still advancing on a large front, advancing perhaps up to 100, you know, kilometers in terms of the actual width of the advance, perhaps to a depth of 50 km, perhaps even more, sort of almost Yes It's like bringing those two concepts together, this idea of ​​sort of massive infantry assault on a broad, broad front, but combining that now with mechanization, now this really is the Russian equivalent of Blitz Grig.

These are combined weapons, operating together to produce shock. On the battlefield deep in enemy-held territory, the only problem with the deep battle concept was that it required fast, heavy

tanks

in large numbers. Russia's industrial base was not large enough to produce the volume of weapons and vehicles needed to make deep battle a reality. However, that was about to change in 1927, communist leader Stalin launched a ruthless program of industrialization and economic modernization called the Five Year Plan, which proved remarkably successful in establishing heavy industry in just a few years, despite the enormous human cost of fulfilling Stalin's objectives. deadlines in 1931 a massive tank building program was launched Russia was finally on its way to catching up with the industrial West by the early 1930s Russia had undergone a radical transformation determined to shed its rural backwater image by the late 1930s 1920 Stalin had launched a ruthless program of industrialization to bring him on par with the West by 1931 there were enough factories to begin tank production when the Russians began to think about how they could implement a mechanized army, they thought of different types of

tanks

, uh, tanks.

They cooperate closely with infantry tanks that can operate in the general front line type area and tanks that can exploit those that can go deep into the rear of the enemy forces. The British have a similar concept with the idea of ​​infantry infantry tanks and cruiser tanks and the infantry tanks attack the front line the cruiser tanks explode the Russians also do that and develop a kind of family of tanks um there are four of In the course of the 1930s they have a tank that is a British design, they buy a Vicor design available on the market, they have a tank that is the t26, which is another vicer design taken off the market and that is the tank that cooperates with the infantry, but to exploit the advance, they develop this cruiser tank. and that tank is the BT.

The BT began life in 1930 when Russia purchased two Christy tanks from the United States. The BT was a clever piece of Russia that stole Western technology. It was a private company developed in the United States by Christie Corporation. It was actually more of an armored vehicle than a tank, but it was armored, had tracks, and had machine guns. It didn't do very well in American testing and in fact the Americans never accepted the Christy suspension, although other countries did, but the Russian R's were interested in it and the Russians bought two and shipped them to Russia now because The Americans did not recognize the USSR.

This had to be done clandestinely and in fact, they were apparently brought in as tractors and Later developed in Russia, in many respects the BT tank finally gave the Russians what they had been looking for or at least what certain factions within the Russian Armed Forces they had been searching. It was the perfect weapon for the deep type of maneuver. it was F, it was very, very mobile, it could attack deeply, very, very quickly and it could hit hard. This was an excellent weapon for the Russians and they recognized it as such when they saw the design of Christ and they took the design of Christ and instead of over-elaborating it.

Like the British, they remained true to their founding principles. The BT series itself was very little different from Chrisy's design. It deviated in a small aspect and gradually and incrementally became armored and armed and really. It became the basis for the design of all subsequent Soviet tanks in most respects, the designers of the kov locomotive plant worked on the Christy design and created the BT7 tank. It was one of the seminal designs of the 1930s. Discover the past with exclusive military history documentaries and Adree podcasts presented by world-renowned historians, all on History hit, watch on your smart TV or on the go with your mobile device, download app now to see everything from the gripping history of Band of Brothers to Operation Barbarosa and the D-Day immersion.

Immerse yourself in the dramatic

stories

of this remarkable era by signing up via the link in the description. The BT7 was the precursor to the T34. He had a crew of three men. It mounted a 45 mm cannon and two 7.62 mm machine guns. Its armor was maximum. At 22mm thick, it was powered by a V12 shaft engine that was capable of generating 500 brake horsepower, a range of 430 km, and a top road speed of 73 km per hour. In 1937 Russia had undergone an enormous transformation, its huge factories were producing those of the West. The Red Army had the largest armored force in the world, was equipped with the best tank of its generation, and had a sophisticated maneuver doctrine.

War. Stalin had made his point clear. I think the idea of ​​competing with the West and the giant Mania is very important. The idea that we have the biggest, fastest, most powerful type of equipment is very important for the Russian state not only in terms of military equipment but for all other types of manufactured products, as well as in some ways one of the Reasons tanks work better than planes is that you can build very heavy tanks. Heavy aircraft aren't a particularly good idea, while tanks can be built with very heavy armor with their very heavy weapons, uh, and they can make that point. that the government wants to do, so yes, I think it's important for the Russians to make tanks with bigger guns than anyone else, tanks with heavier armor than anyone else, tanks that weigh more than anyone else's tanks, because it's part of This sense of demonstrating "Russia has been socialized and is now catching up with and surpassing the developed economies of the West, but this enormous advantage was turned upside down when Stalin suspected key figures within the army of plotting a coup d'état, unable to tolerate or even a hint of dissent".

The response was swift and brutal in what later became known as the purges. Stalin ordered that anyone suspected of disloyalty be killed or disappeared. Three of the five marshals of the Soviet Union are made to disappear and of the main commanders, these are the lieutenant generals and the generals 75. Of 85 of those senior officers are eliminated in, effectively, between 12 and 18 months, at the division level , more than half of the division commanders are also essentially killed or, in some cases, placed in gulags by eliminating so many commanders at all levels. training standards the professional standards of the Russian army inevitably declined and the willingness of Russian commanders at all levels to use their initiative virtually stopped everyone was afraid to do anything that might upset the party the purges coincided with Soviet involvement in the Spanish Civil War when Stalin sent several T26 and BT tanks to assist the Republicans, the experience of operating tanks in Spain convinced Soviet commanders that they had too thin armor, but that armor was not their only concern, much of of his work revolved around the use of tracks by the BT. and wheels, it had an interesting concept in that they had tracks and wheels, now this sounds strange, but at that stage, when tracked technology had not been fully developed, it made sense to approach the battle on a road on wheels and then In a period of about 30 minutes it could be transferred to the tracks.

The wheel track debates ended abruptly in the winter of 1939, when the Soviet Union invaded Finland in the face of fierce final resistance, it became clear that the current generation of tanks were not sufficiently armored. o o armed, but the designers were confident that the tracked version of the BT could be armored and upgraded without any drop performance. This new improved version of the BT was called t34 to commemorate the 1934 state decree ordering a massive expansion of the Soviet tank forces. They were ready in January 1940, mass production began in June and the first T34 model emerged in September 1944. 40 The T34 was one of the most outstanding tanks of the Second World War.

It was manned by a crew of five. It mounted a cannon. 76.2 mm with two 7.62 mm machine guns, its V2 diesel engine was capable of developing 493 horsepower, a range of 300 km and a maximum road speed of 50 km per hour. Without a doubt, at that time there was nothing like it anywhere in the world that could compare with the Russian t34. It was just that everyone was amazed at how they were able to accomplish something. It was just perfect. If you build a tank, you always have to compromise on weight, speed, armor, one thing interferes with the other, so everything has to be a compromise between everyone.

Those factors the T-34 made its battlefield debut in June 1941, when Hitler broke his non-aggression pact with Stalin and brought the war to Russia in what he receivedcodenamed Operation Barar Rosa. A German army of 3 million men crossed the Soviet border. Army divided into three groups: Army Group North, Army Group Center and army group South. Army Group North was ordered to take Leningrad. Army Group Center was ordered to march on Moscow and Army Group South's task was to conquer Ukraine on paper. Russia's armored resources seemed formidable with 21,000 tanks compared to only 3,300 German ones, but nothing could have prepared the German army for the T34 after a series of victories in Europe.

German soldiers were used to easily crushing opposition tanks. The effect of the t-34 was absolutely devastating. Otto Benser was an infantryman. With Army Group North, German infantry also discovered to their horror that the T34 was virtually shell-proof. The reason for this was a simple but incredibly effective sloped armor. One of the main strengths of the T34 is the sloping armor, something that all nations have now copied. The point about sloped armor is that you get more protection for the same weight. It's a simple concept, but it was the Russians who thought of it first. It had thick armor and a decent 76mm gun and when the Germans found this. for the first time it surpassed everything they had, the 37mm couldn't make any impression on it, just like the new 50mm it had enough problems, it was just an 88 impl that could deal with it and against a gun.

Just like the 76mm gun, the 88mm gun was quite vulnerable in itself, it was large to attack at similar ranges considering the type of field some of the engagements would have taken place on, so it was a combination quite exhausting between the t-34 and the 88, so, yes, it was a huge shock for the Germans and they needed to do something about it very, very quickly, armed with Panza 3 and four horrified German tanks. Crews discovered they simply couldn't drill. The T-34s had sloping armor, but the Soviets faced some serious problems at the beginning of Operation Barbarasa.

They had the excellent T34, but they were very few and not focused on the battle. The strange T34s posed some tactical problems for Hitler's army, but superior German training and doctrine almost overcame this advantage in 1941, the Soviets paying a heavy price for Stalin's purges. The soldiers left in the Red Army had no battlefield experience and lacked proper training. It became standard practice that men going into battle after just 1 hour in a tank needs at least six years of training to do their job properly, but Stalin eliminated hundreds and hundreds of high ranking officers, I think most of them. the generals, the army commanders, Stalin's So-Cal purges in Russia. at that time it claimed the lives of some 35,000 officers and generals, all shot without any kind of judicial process, and of course this interrupted the entire Russian buildup of its own forces which, after all, only began after the Civil War and Russia found itself in a very difficult situation, first of all, there is a lack of crew training.

Minimally trained infantry and cavalry crews have rushed in. Junior officers have also not had sufficient training or courses and therefore, at that level, crews are actually learning on the job. There is also in the initial design of the T34 a sort of very poor vision arrangement in the sense that it is very difficult for the tank crew to see properly and that will affect the operational effectiveness of this particular vehicle. in the turret, communication in the Red Army was appalling, many soldiers were illiterate, and there was a chronic shortage of radios, making command and control almost impossible.

Every German tank had a radio. Every American tank had a radio. In 1941, command tanks in the Red Army. The army had radios and the rest didn't and the way a troop commander told the other tanks what to do was to wave signal flags at them, which is not a very good idea in the middle of a tank battle or just following me around. The other tanks followed the lead tank, so the idea of ​​sophisticated tactics was very difficult if communications were not very good in October. Army Group Center was only 25 km from Moscow, but as the weather deteriorated, the German tank tracks became clogged with mud and later the T34 with its wide-track, low-pressure Cristy suspension fought in the snow. on the ground it remained mobile again Soviet designers used simple designs to great effect they had a terribly simple little idea one of the problems you always have with tanks is the track pins now the track The pin is literally a steel pin that holds them together the different sectors of the track and one of the problems is that sometimes they come off and it is quite difficult in the engineering sense to make the thing stay in place.

What the Russians did was put in a curved plate. the inside of the track, so any track pin was left halfway as the track went around the curved plate, it was simply pushed back into position as winter began to wane. The German army. Russian troops enjoyed the benefits of a tank built to withstand inclement weather. Its V2 engine ran on diesel that froze at a lower temperature than the gasoline used by the Germans. There was no need to light a fire under the T34 for the engine to start. Temperatures dropped to -56°. The Germans were not prepared for any type. from Winter War C, absolutely unaware, their weapons would no longer work because they didn't have any anti-r fluid uh, they didn't have any unforced grease to keep the weapons working, everything just got stuck under the huge layer of ice and snow. coverage you got in Russia before Moscow the t34 was well adapted to winter conditions, particularly the tracks, it had very wide tracks compared to other vehicles of the time, the Germans had to adapt to the snow.

Um enlarged track shoes on the outside of the tracks which weren't a terribly effective way, they broke pretty easily, the t34 as it was could run pretty easily on snow, the Christy suspension didn't build up with snow and ice as much easily as the German multi-wheel bogy and left-hand suspensions did, which was quite vulnerable to this. Additionally, the engine ran extremely well in the cold. It was a very, very good engine from that point of view and the Germans had just had it. many more problems to maintain their tanks in that type of performance, obviously, the t34 had been designed for the terrain in which it operated, it had been designed to operate in Russia, it had been built taking into account the Russian experience, the basic standards of everyday conditions. in Russia they were behind everything they did the Germans also the standards of everyday conditions and uh and the infrastructure in Germany um determined the way the Germans built their tanks and really really you know the Eastern Front was not um it was not Germany, although the harsh winter was slowing down, the German advance time was quickly running out for the Soviets, it began to look like there would be no quick German victory, but rather a long battle of attrition where numbers would count as much as tactics.

Genius after suffering catastrophic losses in 1941, the Red Army was pressured to retrain and reequip in the spring of 1942. The only way the Soviet Union was going to defeat the Axis would be with the help of many, many more T-34, but there was no It was a problem that most of Russian heavy industry was in the path of the German attack. Leningrad was a center of heavy tank production and had already been surrounded by the German army, so in late 1941 Stalin thought the unthinkable and took the unprecedented step of relocating the Soviet Union. The arms industry factories as far east as the Vulga Urals in eastern Siberia and central Asia were reassembled in appalling conditions, similar to those endured during the five-year plan, but the magnitude of the relocation was something that was not known. had seen before this particular industrial plant movement occurred. at least partially successful, it was not entirely successful, but it is a matter of historical record that something like twenty-five hundred factories were moved from somewhere like, in terms of geographical equivalent, the south of England and rebuilt somewhere as far away like Iceland and that was achieved with, you know, really minimal disruption to industrial production in terms of tank production and artillery production.

We see steady increases in Soviet production figures during 1942, '43 and '44, such as T3 for German tanks outnumbered by such a huge magnitude. Margin the Soviets did not have to waste time developing new models and while the Germans struggled to develop a rival to the T34, the Soviets could concentrate on production, until German designers finally came up with an answer. The German high command did not wait long. a protracted struggle when he ordered the invasion of Russia in 1941 he did not believe the Russians were capable of producing a battle-worthy tank and a series of victories in Europe simply strengthened Hitler's belief in the invincibility of the Third Reich when Barbarosa began there was no intention to replace it.

The Panza 4 was the workhorse of the German tank arm; However, the T34 had shattered the myth of Soviet inferiority and the Germans desperately needed a new tank that could match, if not surpass, the T34, although it was not politically acceptable for them to be seen copying the T34. That is, in fact, what the Germans did. His answer was the Panza Mark 5, called Panther, which owed much to the T34. Its excellent 75 mm gun and thick sloped armor made the new tank a particularly dangerous adversary. The Germans waited until the summer of 1943 to do so. They unleashed their new climate between June of '41 and summer of '43, the Germans are doing everything they can to match the Russians in terms of quantity, quality if not quantity, so they are trying to have tanks that are as good as the te 34. then and the KV build a tiger so that it actually has the same type of armor as the KV and with a gun they can penetrate the armor of the t34 or the KV.

It is an 88mm high velocity weapon. It is ideal for taking down. With other tanks, they developed a tank that is not really some kind of clone of the t34, but it is designed to have the same type of attributes as the t34, it has sloping armor, it has a heavy gun, a 75mm gun and that is the panther, so the panther is, if you like, the Russian version, the German version of the t34, it is much heavier, in fact the panther is the same size as the KV, it is actually quite a large tank, but technically it is as good or better than the t34.

After defeating the Germans at Stalingrad during the winter of 1942-43, a huge salient in the line 160 km wide and 110 km deep centered on the town of KK, ignoring the advice of his generals who urged a Temporarily shifting to the defensive, Hitler decided that his army should regain the initiative by crushing the KK salient, but a member of Hitler's entourage had warned the Russians who already suspected that an attack would be launched around KK, so the Red Army he transformed the Bulge into a massive fortress where the German army would be funneled into the Soviet Union. Fields of fire by carefully laid minefields When all preparations were completed, 1,336,000 Russian soldiers and 3,444 tanks, most of them T-34s, were sitting in or behind eight defensive belts stretching 175 km, although the Germans They only deployed 900,000 men and 2,700 armored vehicles.

To get the job done they were confident that their new heavy Tiger and Panther medium tanks would nullify the Soviet numerical advantage, but at KK the German army would be plagued by the same problems that had hampered the Red Army in 1941, the lack of training of the crew, Hitler would do it. He didn't want to wait, um he waited for his new tanks which of course just came off the production line, not even the crews were properly trained and the tanks were tested when they arrived for their big battle, they especially broke down along the way. the new one, the new panel that only shortly after 50 months of work on it had taken the road, broke down left right and center, as seen because it was untied, generally the exhaust systems overheated and set all the fuel of the exhaust system collected there, some put it into operation.

The fire and the tanks burned or exploded so he lost some of his two n tanks and then he also had the tiger of course but the tiger was a little more reliable because it had been before but it was stillan unknown amount, especially for Wen properly trained the crews. The German offensive began on July 5 and was met with remarkably stiff resistance. The depth of the Soviet defenses meant that the Germans did not make the gains they had hoped, but at Kusk the Red Army discovered that the T-34 no longer had the advantage in tank-to-tank combat.

It's funny that there really are better tanks on the German side in Kurk, but because the Russians have the numbers and because they also have a better system, now they can operate tanks in large groups they can communicate they have trained commanders they have trained division and central leaders they can win an important battle in the summer against the vmar that's why the battle is important because in Moscow in 1941 in Stalingrad in 1942 the battle has actually been fought in the winter it's kind of an infantry battle uh it's not really about war of tanks um but K is and in 1943 the Russians actually won that battle because uh in the Battle of Kurk and the Battle of Ariol immediately afterwards they push back the Germans so they fight they turn around they can really fight a tank battle effective in modern conditions and that is the coming of age of the Red Army the main problem lies in the inability of the 76.2 mm t-34 to penetrate the frontal armor of the Panther and Tiger at any distance that was not dangerously short.

Basically, the T-34 needed a larger gun, so work began in August 1943 to make the necessary improvements to keep the T34 a viable combat vehicle after the changes were implemented. made the new tank go into production in January 1944 the tank that emerged was called t3485 had a crew of five got its name from its largest 85 mm cannon it also mounted two 7.62 mm machine guns with armor up to 90 mm thick it was powered by the Trusted V2 engine that was capable of generating 500 braking horsepower and a range of 300 km, it could reach a maximum road speed of 50 km per hour.

The t3485 is essentially the t34 with all its flaws worked out. It has a turret that is much better than the previous one three men can now work perfectly comfortably in the turret it got rid of things like the shell trap it has a better gun and is armored although it is still almost as fast as the t34 when it comes out It is the most powerful Allied tank anywhere and, in fact, it was a shock to the Allies in 1945, the new 885 mm gun was effective to at least 1,000 M and could penetrate the frontal armor of the Tiger and Panther.

One advantage of the t3485 was that it did not involve a long and complicated design process that had dictated the production of the German Panther, another advantage was that it could be produced using the same production line as the T 3476; It was soon being produced in quantities as large as its predecessor in 1944: 11,000. The t34 85s were built 2 and a half times more than its German rival, the Panther. The t3485 entered service with the 1st Guards Tank Army and was welcomed by Crews as a tank that could hold its own between Tigers and Panthers when offensive operations resumed in 1944.

Soviet operational skill improved the better-trained generation of tankers. and powerful new vehicles inflicted a series of crushing blows on the Germans during Operation B in June 1944. Soviet infantry and heavy tanks opened a path through the German lines that was exploited by the more agile and reliable t34 at the end of July. Soviet tanks had reached the Vistula and the gates of war. A BG rally showed how far the Red Army had come in terms of leadership, combat capability and equipment. It was one of the most sustained and sophisticated operations of the war. The summer's efforts stretched the Soviet logistics chain to the limit.

Limit and large-scale operations did not resume until January 1945, but by April 16, 1945 the Red Army had reached the outskirts of Berlin, a mix of German regular troops, old men and Hitler Youth, fighting down every street, house and room in the close combat range. and the limited room for maneuver made the T-34s and other Soviet armored vehicles extremely vulnerable to the Defenders, armed with Panzera anti-tank weapons, mines and Molotov cocktails, more than 800 Soviet tanks were lost in the fierce fighting, but Despite fanatical German resistance, the Red Army captured the rice deer on April 30. Hitler shot himself that same day.

The city surrendered on May 2 and all German forces finally surrendered on the 7th. The Soviets managed to achieve A perfect balance between the need for firepower mobility and protection in the T-34 it was a technological hybrid of the world's most advanced designs for Stalin it was the symbol of mother Russia's iron will to overwhelm the capitalist West both industrially and militarily, but curiously it retained a feature that symbolizes capitalism itself, a rather amusing aspect of the t34's performance that is perhaps visible in the vehicle behind the um and which certainly appealed to the German sense of humor was the fact that the The t34's hatches when opened in 85 um looked like Mickey Mouse's ears, which was quite ironic given Mickey Mouse's iconic status within the capitalist world and the t-34's iconic status in the Comm IST world.

Quite a fun contrast. Stalin knew that the only way to defeat the Third Reich was to continue producing the T34 in large quantities. He also knew that to keep the Russian factories running the tanks had to be designed simply and it was the T-34. Simplicity that drove the Nazi army out of Russia, its design remained practically unchanged throughout the war, could outgun the Most German tanks were quickly well protected and easy to maintain. German designers copied the T-34 but their attempts failed catastrophically. The product of a proud industrial colossus. The T34 was instrumental in crushing the German army and has rightly earned its place.

As one of the best tanks of the 20th century, the T34 is not the best tank of the war in terms of engineering in terms of performance, but it is the best multipurpose tank of the war. It is deliberately designed to be able to be mass produced in large quantities. The Russians produced something like 55,000 T-34s and their wartime variation was easy to operate could essentially be operated by a peasant army had parts that were interchangeable with all sorts of other tanks if you needed a spare engine you could get it from a KV if you needed various other fragments that could be taken from other vehicles, the t34 was not the best tank of the war, but in terms of what it did, in terms of what it achieved, it was the most effective tank in the world and