Did Lend Lease Tanks Save Moscow?

[@terraflow__bryanburdo4547]

I recall an account where M3 tanks, both light and medium (i.e. Stuart and Grant) showed up early in Stalingrad. Moscow was way too early.

[@TankArchives]

The show up a bit earlier than that, there were a few brigades that used them in action by June 1942. Still nowhere close to Moscow.

[@scotty101ire]

More lies the only allied tanks in stalingrad were British they attacked the 3 MD of the Wehrmacht from the west in operation ring 90% knocked out on the first day

[@Mishn0]

@@TankArchivesBut the fact that the Russians knew that they were on the way allowed them to commit equipment which would otherwise be held in reserve. From what I have read, the first convoy of lend/lease material departed the US in early August of '41.

[@TankArchives]

@@Mishn0 yes, I heard that theory before, but never any documents to back it up. I'm not sure what news of tanks somewhere far away (remember, American tanks didn't arrive on the front until the spring-summer of 1942) would have changed absolutely anything in August of 1941.

[@MAP1-234]

@@TankArchivesBy the end of 1941, 177 tanks were sent from the USA, but by December 31, 35 had arrived. " Census of foreign trade activities for the period June 22, 1941 - January 1945 " of April 23, 1945

[@IronWarhorses]

About the extreme cold breaking stuff. Most European and western steam locomotives would literally explode in the Russian winter because the water would turn to ice in their pipes and burst. The nazis literally had to design a new locomotive to cope with the Russian winter.

[@michaelguerin56]

Thank you Peter. That Moscow claim was new to me. Nice to hear the detail about the Southern front. I had heard/read of the Iranian supply route and it is good to be aware of a specific wartime benefit attached thereto. Keep up the good work. Cheers from NZ🇳🇿.

[@exharkhun5605]

I think people look at these things too superficially: A tank here at this time means an effect here tomorrow. But we see a version of lend-lease (rewritten to be performed by mentally challenged people) happening right now in real-time and it doesn't look anything like that. It works more like: Tanks promised today may not arrive for months and in smaller numbers, but free up tanks we have to hold in reserve right now. I you're looking for direct war winning effects of lend lease for the Russians it's not the tanks, radio's or even the much vaunted trucks. It's the refining capacity that didn't have to be built and the aluminum smelters and the associated electricity plants that weren't necessary because of getting high octane aviation fuel and rich aluminum alloys delivered directly.

[@Ailasher]

Not quite, but close. Vehicles played its role, of course: the Red Army was able to man more mechanized units, but yes, a bigger role than all the equipment was played by strategic materials and the kind of equipment that is rarely mentioned: like a railroad cars and steam locomotives. The thing is that the whole Soviet industry was military, I read, for example, that some dude who designed in the 30's part of the Soviet must be civilian factories was surprised by the strange demands of the Soviets: a stronger gantry crane for excessive load capacity here, a more robust structure there.... It was weird, but this American plant designer did what the client asked. Turns out these tractor factories were designed to make tanks. And also railroad car factories too. Which is actually quite slick and clever. So, back to the Lend Lease. Third place - aluminum and the high-octane gas you mentioned, as well as copper and other ores. Second place: trucks, planes, off-road vehicles, railroad cars and locomotives. This allowed not only to equip some mech/motorized units (smaller than the typical "Murrica saved Europe" thinking) but more importantly: to free up the lines of these factories to produce more armored vehicles like tanks and others. Even car factories: for example, the SU-76 SPG was powered by a combination of two truck engines, which means minus two trucks for each such SPG in produce. But the winner here is gun/shell powders, explosives and everything related to them. Only in relative numbers of the Soviet industry's output it's half - with the same TNT and related materials. But it was not limited to these. And what is more important: part of the lost capacities, the restoration of which was in question due to the too rapid German's capture of Kiev, concerned this chemical production.

[@exharkhun5605]

@@Ailasher Thank you for your great and LARGE answer. 😁 I've read about Albert Kahn too. It's one of those lovely peaks behind all the loud communist/capitalist rhetoric that makes up History. I forgot about the explosives, thanks. About the American trains, did they do well? I know the German trains did kind of bad. The Germans build great trains but they just weren't designed for the long distances. They needed more than twice the coaling and watering stops and for ever kilometer travelled they just wore out so much faster than they did in Western Europe. I pretty much agree with you and I didn't mean to be dismissive of any of the other parts of lend-lease. I just wanted to point to something that out-scales any other individual part in my eyes. The commitment in manpower and time to create high quality ore and fuel processing capacity is on a completely different scale than the other industrial "miracles" they performed. It's hard to see where they could have found the capacity in the 41, 42, 43 part of the war where every battle, defeat or victory, was a near run thing. Again, thanks for your reply and have a great weekend.

[@Ailasher]

@@exharkhun5605 "About the American trains, did they do well?" It's not a simple question. The truth is that the Communists, despite the famine and all other cases, such as repressions, saved Russia: for example, before 1914, the beginning of WWI, Russian imperial gymnasiums (analogous to high schools) only graduated about 100 thousand students a year. That's for about 175 million people. These are future applicants to humanities and technical universities: future teachers, doctors, engineers, and all sorts of other professions that require specialization beyond the simple wage job. Can you imagine the gap? In the Russian Empire was quite common such a thing, characteristic in many European countries of the middle or even early 19th century: as "reverse literacy". That is, a person in childhood for about three years attends a school at the local church parish (and this was not available to everyone), where he or she (but most likely a "he") is taught the most basic skills of reading, writing arithmetical counting. In fact: the worst analog of a modern elementary school. And then, over the years he loses that skill - because that skill is no longer needed in his everyday life, except, for example, the ability to read signs over stores. How does this relate to WWII? Directly. In order to catch up with the industrialized countries, still agrarian Russia was rapidly reducing this gap. But it was simply monstrous. Despite the fact that even at the very beginning of the Russian Civil War, the Bolsheviks were doing everything possible to open hundreds and thousands of new institutions of higher education. And after the war - to open all sorts of free literacy and advanced training courses for adults. In Germany, public schooling was deployed at the end of the 19th century. In Russia, thanks to the communists, about 40-50 years later, depending on how you count. As a result, the Red Army was losing to the Wehrmacht in terms of the number of fully trained personnel capable of operating complex and precise equipment such as radios and other mechanical systems. Or simply more Wehrmacht soldiers were trained to drive a car. And if the young conscripted ages were fine trained, thanks to the wide social base of various courses for the young. For example, the most productive female sniper in the history of mankind, who was born in 1916, was trained in shooting courses while she was at university. The older "mobilization" age of 30 and older are often quite poorly educated.

[@Ailasher]

@@exharkhun5605 The same problem plagued the industry: everyone knows the rather famous German engineering achievements, such as rockets and jet fighters, as well as night vision devices. But in the late 30s, the USSR also invented a lot of things, such as night vision devices for tankers. But they could not produce them, 4/5 of Soviet industry appeared just 10 years ago. In fact, when it comes to the scale of the problem, I don't even know what to compare it to. Well, it's like something like if an alien starship capable of traveling between stars was copied in just 10 years. Even more tremendous: because a single prototype is always easier than a giant structure of thousands of production teams and the infrastructure on which those production teams rely. I don't think there has been an example of anything like this in human history. But anyway, the flip side of this situation is that the Allies' equipment was of course aimed to "mass user", but not quite the "mass user of an agrarian society". Therefore, despite the fact that the Soviet government was well aware of such features of its side, their requests were extremely simple: the simplest and most robust equipment. Therefore, such soldiers often had a disdainful attitude towards Lend-Lease equipment ("Does the tank have a gasoline engine? Well. it's fire-prone, unreliable" - a typical example of such technical illiteracy), in contrast to the widespread myth in the West that Red Army soldiers were simply in love with Lend-Lease equipment. But an important clarification: not for all. In general, it is for this reason that the rather excellent mass-produced semi-automatic rifle SVT-40 was a bad reputation in Red Army. Unlike the Germans and Finns, for example. Or the Soviet Marines, who were literally selected from the sailors - the crews of ships, that is, by definition, technically educated people. This rifle was their favorite.

[@Ailasher]

@@exharkhun5605 Coming specifically to the topic of steam locomotives. Here again, everything is very difficult: on the one hand, railway supplies for the USSR were of the same strategic importance as sea supplies for Great Britain. Therefore, if not the best, then sufficiently qualified personnel were sent there. But. During the war years, when both sides literally tried to destroy the railway track when retreating, it would not be an exaggeration to write: that Soviet engineering units literally replaced most of the railway tracks of the European part of Russia. Therefore, as the main such hastily restored railways, mainly some kind of temporary solutions were used - the railway tracks were laid on a light earthen base, more typical for the load capacity of the very beginning of the 20th century. And for this the best was the Soviet light steam locomotive of the "E" series (10 853 were used). This type of locomotive is also known for its simplicity and reliability, for obvious reasons. And, as I understand it, Lend-Lease locomotives were used mainly on the rear mainline communications, where there was no particular problem with qualified personnel and repair facilities.

[@sparrowsbewertungen6930]

BM 6 was the soviet name for the M3 medium tank... wich stood for "Bratskaya Magila dlya shesterikh" "Brotherly Grave for 6"

[@Mishn0]

At least according to the politically approved messaging.

[@parkerlong2658]

​@@Mishn0eh the m3 is a pretty rancid tank even by the standards of interwar designs.

Very interesting. Thank you for this Video :)

[@Ralphieboy]

Lend-Lease provided Moscow with 225,000 Studebaker trucks, another 1,000 locomotives and 7,000 railway cars. This helped them out with their logistics and allowed them to practice their doctrine of Deep Battle. In addition, that freed up a great deal of their heavy industry and allowed them to concentrate on building more tanks and other heavy weapons.

[@MAP1-234]

Not 225,000 Studebakers, but 114,200 .D.Porter "Armored Vehicles of the Red Army"

[@Ralphieboy]

@@MAP1-234 Since we're wuoting sourcers, mine came from Eddie Bauer's History of WW2

[@KrGsMrNKusinagi0]

LEND-lease saved russia from losing its basic fact

[@MAP1-234]

@@KrGsMrNKusinagi0 Who proved it? You are confusing fact with thesis

[@Ralphieboy]

@@KrGsMrNKusinagi0 It aided Russia greatly. The rest is conjecture.

[@Bidimus1]

I agree that Soviet units were the majority, as aways context matters. Tank encyclopedia "The Soviet Army had formed six tank battalions by late November 1941 out of 20 Matildas and 97 Valentines, or the “British Mk.3” as they called it. These battalions were deployed on the Western Front for the defense of Moscow. The 146th Tank Brigade (146-ya tankovaya brigada) of the 16th Army fought here. This brigade consisted of two tank battalions with a total of 40 Valentines and two Matildas. The first unit to be equipped with the Matilda was the 136th Separate Tank Battalion (136-y otdelniy tankoviy batal’on). The tanks played an extremely important frontline role in the defense of Moscow as the Soviet’s own tank supply was running thin due to the heavy losses in the summer of 1941. Put in perspective, there were between 607 and 670 tanks at the Soviet’s disposal for the defense of the city and only 205 of these were indigenous T-34 Medium Tanks and KV-1 Heavy Tanks. The rest were a mix of light tanks and Lend\Lease vehicles."

[@TankArchives]

As I state in the video, there's a very big difference between receiving tanks and having them on the front lines.

[@MAP1-234]

M.Kolomyjec and I.Moszczanski in "Lend-Lease vol.1" state that the 146th Tank Brigade that took part in the battles near Moscow as part of the Western Front of Zhukov had the 4th Valentine, the 23rd Tank Brigade the 5th Valentine, and the 20th .brigade 2 Valentine's Day. In addition, the 126th Panzer Division of the 50th Army also included 6 Valentines

[@cristitanase6130]

40 Valentines played a "crucial role"... lool Do you know how obsolete a Valentine tank was by that time? It was so obsolete that UK used for home defense units, aka like cement trucks!

[@CarlGGHamilton]

Thank you Peter for another great video, are you aware of the paper by Alexander Hill on the battle of Moscow? Do you have an opinion on it?

[@TankArchives]

Nope, haven't read it.

[@exharkhun5605]

@@TankArchives Please note that this is the internet so not having read it is not an acceptable excuse not to have an opinion.

[@rp-hr1qs]

​​@@TankArchivesthe 2006 paper that asserts that british supplied heavy and medium tanks comprised 30-40% of heavy and medium tanks before moscow at the beginning december 1941

[@TankArchives]

@@rp-hr1qs an interesting claim considering that the British didn't classify their tanks as heavy or medium. Churchill tanks (I assume what Hill means by heavy) were nowhere near the front line in any country by December of 1941. If the paper was written in 2006 then Hill would have published it just before the 2007 declassification law was passed. Based on that and the figure being as vague as "30-40%", I assume he was working off of estimates rather than concrete numbers.

[@rp-hr1qs]

@@TankArchives "....the armor of the matilda and valentine tanks put them firmly in the heavy and medium categories, respectively" This is what he mentions as heavy and medium tanks in "British "Lend-Lease" Tanks and the Battle for Moscow, November-December 1941". He prefaces this by saying that the main armaments were too small and needed to be modified by the Soviets.

[@minus7621]

Have you ever considered openning a discord server?

[@TankArchives]

Not at all, I think I already spend enough time on Discord.

[@electrolytics]

I never heard that claim that Lend-Lease Tanks saved Moscow. I've been following this theater for a long time, even back when you had to read books. Lend Lease in general aided the USSR in WWII. All lend lease, not just tanks. 70 locomotives. Million pair of boots. 70,000 trucks. Millions of pounds of food. The list goes on and on..... Historians are divided whether Lend Lease saved the USSR in WWII. A second front and Lend Lease definitely saved the USSR. Second Front being Africa/Italy, then France. Not to mention Strategic Bombing.

[@Ek_Ekvil]

The USSR's second front against Japan saved the United States from defeat! Like you, I have been following the topic for a long time, and I agree with you that the supply of resources from the USSR to the USA saved the Americans from defeat, these are hundreds of thousands of tons of resources, a huge amount of rare metals, without which half of the US ships would not have been built, and 90% of all electronics on resources from the USSR for which there was no replacement, these are almost all radars for ships! Without supplies, the United States would have lost to Japan. Well, the second front in northern China and on the island of Sakhalin literally saved the United States and played an important role no less than the Americans in Africa and Italy.

[@electrolytics]

@@Ek_Ekvil Where'd you get all that knowledge from, " The Little Red Pioneer's Pocket History Book of The Red Army." Written by Stalin's wife or some commie hack?

[@hetzer7366]

@@Ek_Ekvil your such a troll your misinformation is spot on. Literally sound like the Pravda mouthpiece with your posts

[@fitycalibre7555]

I’m almost positive it was more around 400,000 trucks and jeeps and other mechanized equipment? Maybe I’m incorrect but I’ve seen that number cited many times.

[@Glumbus1]

i had no idea that the allies sent tanks to the soviets i always thought of lend lease as like trucks, boots, food and rubber it's so based to think cromwell, shermans and t34 could have been fighting together

[@TankArchives]

Not the Cromwell, unfortunately. Only six were sent for evaluation purposes and it was found to be inferior to both the T-34 and the Sherman. The British tank of choice was the Valentine. This was the most common foreign tank in the Red Army until the last year of the war, when it was overtaken by the Sherman.

[@jamesthomas4841]

You do need to take account of the fact that the arrival of British and American tanks allowed the Soviets to use the resources they had with more conviction. Knowing that more supplies of weaponry were coming would have allowed the greater commitment of existing weapons.

[@TankArchives]

One can equally claim that the Soviet victory at Moscow allowed the British and Americans to use *their* resources with more conviction, whatever that entails.

[@jamesthomas4841]

I am not sure of the relevance of that. For the Soviet Union placed in a position of extremis in 1941 simply the knowledge that fresh supplies of weapons were arriving allowed them to be less concerned about reserves and could commit more of the resources they did have to the immediate struggle. That allowed more tank units to be sent to the front in November and December 1941. .@@TankArchives

[@marchuvfulz]

I suspect all questions about Allied aid to the Soviet war effort have to be addressed in the frame of the difference made at the margin, i.e., what would the outcome have looked like had the aid been absent? Would the Soviets have won anyway? You can point to the Battle of Moscow and say the British tanks were 7 or 8 percent of the tanks involved--but was that 7 or 8 percent the margin that made the difference between defeat and victory? A much harder question to answer, because the battle was a near-run thing. Even if the Allied contribution was minor, it might still have been critical. To point this out, it should be noted, takes nothing away from the Soviets, as without their determination to stand against the Nazis the Allied aid would have been irrelevant.

[@capnstewy55]

Lend lease's most important impact was logistics. Check out Tic's video for the truly staggering number of trucks supplied. Also, I would rather be in a Matilda then any early Soviet tank other than a KV-2, the stronkest tenk.

[@TankArchives]

How many Lend Lease trucks does this Tic say were at Moscow in December of 1941?

[@capnstewy55]

@TankArchives as you yourself said lend lease was American and hadn't really started up yet, so not many.

[@MAP1-234]

How many trucks did the USSR receive from the USA?

[@MAP1-234]

@@TankArchives As of January 1, 1942, LL cars constituted 0% of the car fleet of the Red Army. On January 1, 1943, 5.4%, on January 1, 1944, 19%, on January 1, 1945, 30.4% Source: Secret report of the Head of the US GAVTU KA, Colonel Golberg of September 28, 1945

[@Lancasterlaw1175]

Fair points, I would add though that the tanks packaged for the Arctic convoys were par the course for experiences in North Africa (where thousands of man-hours were spent fixing tanks which had been near destroyed by the voyage) Secondly, that British tanks made up a larger proportion of Medium and Heavy tanks, as most of the Russian tanks at Moscow were light tanks Finally, that while the British aid might have not changed the outcome of the battle of Moscow, it did have big effects on Crusader and the Far East. Even two of those Matilda battalions could have had a massive impact on those campaigns.

[@TankArchives]

There was already a discussion about tank types. The Matilda barely could be considered a medium tank and the Valentine was on part with the T-50, a light tank. The heavy Churchill II, III, and IV did not start coming until 1942.

[@MAP1-234]

A.Hill in "British Lend-Lease Tanks and the Battle of Moscow, November-December 1941 - Revisited" wrote: "According to the British Military Mission in Moscow by 9 December 1941 about 90 British tanks had been in action with Soviet forces." This is consistent with the data from a top secret report addressed to Stalin on December 2, 1941, which shows that the Western Front commanded by Zhukov had 912 tanks (including 112 KW, 243 T-34), including 8 Matildas and 24 Valentins. . And this gives only 3.5% of the total, and not counting the KW and T-34, 5.7%. Taking into account the tanks under renovation, a total of 153, including 5 Matildas and 2 Valentinas, these percentages are even smaller. 3.3% and 5.3% respectively, M. Kolomyjec wrote in "Moskwa 1941" that "British tanks delivered under L-L also took part in the fighting near Moscow. Their number was small for now - 50 pieces." He probably meant period until the launch of the counteroffensive near Moscow. Bogdan Musiał in "Stalin's War" states that approximately 30% of British tanks delivered by the end of 1941 could not be used for technical reasons. Moreover, when the counteroffensive near Moscow began on December 5, the ACz numbered more than 607 tanks

[@Lancasterlaw1175]

@@MAP1-234 Thanks for the input- is the article free to read anywhere? What does ACz stand for (armour reserve?)? What was the rest of the makeup?

[@Lancasterlaw1175]

@@TankArchives I feel that because nobody actually really got a production heavy tank going in the '30's and 1940 (Bar the T-35 and KV-1/2) the 25 ton Matilda was really the de facto heavy tank. It was a quintuple the weight of the lights which made up of most of the UK's inventory and was a clear step up from the 12 to 15 ton Cruisers. I've always found it interesting that the "light" M3 Stuart was about the same weight as the Cruiser IV. If the KV tanks did not exist I'd say they'd be an argument that the 26 ton T-34 was a heavy too- it was way bigger than the 10 ton T-26 and BT tanks it replaced.

[@MAP1-234]

@@Lancasterlaw1175 ACz is an abbreviation in Polish for Red Army. I used this shortcut by mistake. Hill's article can be found on the Internet, and the works by Kolomyjc and Musiał are books that I have in my library

[@seegurke93]

Very informative! Thanks :) Good to know for my dioramas. BTW your tanks look lit! Is it the Tamiya Matilda? ;)

[@TankArchives]

Yes, this is the very very old Matilda. I have yet to buy their new one, but I already have a full closet full of unbuilt models.

[@seegurke93]

@@TankArchives Lol I can feel you. I have a whole Hobbyroom with 3000+ unbuild models but collecting makes so much fun. I am only 30 so I have a lot of time to build :) Have fun building models! Grüße

[@SMGJohn]

I think most westerners speaking about Eastern Front in any form or shape are wholly misinformed and ignorant on the matter, in western historical documents the Eastern Front is barely a footnote. Yet the war was titanic in size and the largest part of WW2 by a long shot, almost all major battles happened on the east, I often hear that lend lease is what made the Soviet win the war, which is just another reason why westerners have no idea what they are talking about. The lend lease were certainly helpful but without, the war might taken 1 year longer at best.

[@sebbonxxsebbon6824]

Why wouldn't westerners be ignorant about what happened when all information was buried.

[@SMGJohn]

@@sebbonxxsebbon6824 In the day and age of the internet its no longer an argument to make, I mean USSR even made a TV documentary that was in fact released in america and Britain called ""The Unknown War" which portrays very accurately the war in the East, however was ultimately banned in USA during the later parts of the 80s, the entire series can be found on KZbin, there even modern Russian documentaries about the war, there no excuses anymore.

[@SnorkelSquad]

​@@SMGJohnthere are several errors and inconsistencies in USSR and Russian accounts. That's why no one uses them.

[@SMGJohn]

@@SnorkelSquad Your source for this I assume is "Trust me Bro"

[@ChucksSEADnDEAD]

​​@@SMGJohn The internet isn't an argument. Soviet archives were opened after the cold war but closed in the 2010s. This gave Western historians very little time to analyse the sources. Documentaries are not primary sources. "The Internet" can't materialize information that hasn't been transcribed.

[@sparrowsbewertungen6930]

Most likely not... in general , the soviet union would have won the war, with or without the lend lease... but especially moscow, i dont think that lend lease was there as a main fighting vehicle thing

[@rp-hr1qs]

Spicy topic

[@MildyHistorical]

I’ve heard before that Lend Lease tanks tended to get deployed close to where they entered the USSR, i.e. Murmansk arrivals being on the Leningrad front, and Iranian arrivals joining the fight in the Caucuses or South Ukraine. Is there any truth to this?

[@TankArchives]

Not at all, the tanks fighting in the Caucasus were the exception. There were not very many foreign tanks around Leningrad, off the top of my head I can think of only a single Churchill regiment.

[@stewartmillen7708]

It's sad you have to put that disclaimer in about "Soviet propaganda" towards the end. What you're seeing in the results of decades of Western propaganda and/or just plain inaccurate information we were fed for decades.

[@IronWarhorses]

Remember we did Operation paperclip.

[@stewartmillen7708]

@@IronWarhorses Yep, and with that, came a lot of German prejudice and misinformation. In another KZbin thread, I'm trying to convince someone to distrust, or at least not unquestionably accept, German paperwork on aircraft losses fighting the USAAF strategic bomber offensive as some sort of gold standard of truth. Following Peter's blog ("Cheating at Statistics" entries) helped hone my BS detector about both German claims and losses on all fronts.

[@IronWarhorses]

@@stewartmillen7708 it will be the same pack of lies after Ukraine. in cannot wait for the Ukrainian "memoirs" blaming all their failures on other people.

[@kiennguyenanh8498]

@@stewartmillen7708 Aircraft losses of US or German?

[@stewartmillen7708]

@@kiennguyenanh8498 German losses. US losses are pretty much bulletproof, there's no question on them. German loss reports would lead you to conclude that Germany had possibly tens of thousands of aircraft available on V-E day when they had only about 3,000 in reality.

[@Lasstpak]

When did the first Sherman arrived on Eastern Front combat lines?

[@TankArchives]

May 1943, on the Black Sea coast. This was just a handful of tanks too, not even a full brigade.

[@Lasstpak]

Thank you.

[@cwjian90]

Which Lend Lease tank do you think had the greatest impact on the Eastern Front?

[@TankArchives]

Sherman, no doubt.

[@avengercannon]

Yes

[@paradisdescieux]

In 1940 the french tank was zéro,,the russian too.

[@mousumimishra4741]

From the perspective of actual weapons like planes, tanks, artillery etc? definitely not but by providing food to the soviet soldiers? Yes that was very important for the soviet troops (although USSR probably would've found a way to fix this problem too if lend lease didnt happen), these are my thoughts before watching the video.

[@rileyernst9086]

I am not surprised by the state of the British tanks arriving in the soviet union. I am personally interested in the Mediterranean campaign, a d its fairly often that tanks will have NOT TO BE STOWED ON DECK printed on them somewhere. Kinda implies to me that someone thought it was a good idea to stow tanks on deck spoiler is, is that it wasn't. And the Mediterranean is a lot more forgivable than the North Sea!

[@TankArchives]

That's why I included a chapter on Shermans in British service in my Sherman book. The M4A2 in Italy suffered from more or less the same technical issues as the ones in the USSR, and in both cases the Americans denied that the manufacturer was responsible and blamed it on the end user.

[@rileyernst9086]

I suspect this far yet another reason why the British preferred the Mk V shermans (Chrysler multi-banks). In 'The business of tanks' General McLeod Ross (who was in the US during the duration of the war procuring tanks for the British army) indicates that Chrysler was eager to do the best they could for the end user. Their armour plate was also higher quality as Chrysler had a dedicated tank factory and experience making it.

[@TankArchives]

@@rileyernst9086 I don't know about the British, but I know the Canadians were very skeptical about the Multibank at first. These concerns were alleviated in time as it turned out that these engines were quite reliable, if odd.

[@rileyernst9086]

Yeah, the multibanks were unreliable at first but when they got them figured out they were quite reliable. But i think one of the main reasons why the tank came to be favoured was that Chrysler was not going to pass the buck on, they worked on the tank and engine to get it to the point that it was consistently reliable. McLeod Ross also indicates they also had no problems, with taking tanks off ships and refitting them if they were not up to scratch, or even pressuring the US authorities and other plants to do the same. For instance the first shipment of shermans bound for Egypt nearly departed without modifications for desert warfare, Chrysler pulled their tanks off the ships and modified them and the other plants followed suit.

[@MikeHunt-rw4gf]

Algorithm.

[@Error-5478]

Considering half of the Soviets war effort came from lend lease. I'd say yes, fhe tanks certainly helped.

[@TankArchives]

You should probably watch the video.

[@GreenBlueWalkthrough]

By the end of the war though lendlease did save the soviets as with out it they would have have out of units, supply to fight with... Like for exemple the T-34 was almostkilled to a man by the end of the war... and many modner Russian soclars fdo say the effects of lend lease was covered up... "That sudibaker carring Katusa was made my little old lady in garage"... But yeah I never heard when the soviets were fresh them having supply issues it was only mid and late in the war when it really became clear.

[@stewartmillen7708]

Uh, which modern scholars? You do realize that 60 % of Lend-Lease aid arrived after mid-1944, when the war in the Eastern front had already clearly turned in favor of the Soviets? And the T-34 was almost 'killed to the man'? Do you mean crew losses? With the Soviet tank park having grown to some 35,000 vehicles by wars' end, they're certainly not losing more tanks than they're producing, so they're definitely not running out of T-34s. Nor any other tanks, as Zaloga credits them (unsourced) with nearly 6,000 heavy tanks and 2,700 heavy ISU assault gun by war's end as well.

[@scotty101ire]

No and anybody who says so is either uninformed or a liar , It was the Siberian ski troops along with t34 and kv1,s that broke into the advanced german positions and started the formation of the the actual winter line , Pushing army group center backwards on the northern and southern fronts even your tag line is wrong as there were nearly 2,000,000 red army soldiers 1,000s and 1,000,s of machines around Moscow

[@stewartmillen7708]

Actually, the Germans outnumbered the Red Army in weapons at this point in the war, and the Red Army was just beginning to achieve parity in manpower. The Germans weren't beaten by 'hordes' and in fact the shortage of equipment, especially tanks, is what limited the effectiveness of the Soviet winter 1941-42 counterattack which kept AG Center from buckling.

[@Ek_Ekvil]

​@@stewartmillen7708 that’s right. Historical fact that the West will not like: 1) At the time of the defensive operation near Moscow, when the USSR was defending itself, the number of Wehrmacht troops in Army Group Center was almost 2 times greater than the number of the USSR army. Despite the quantitative superiority of the Germans... Soviet troops were still able to defeat the hordes of Germans with skill and courage, yes, yes, it is precisely what “hordes” are historically correct to use in relation to the Germans and not the Soviets. 2) At the time of the offensive operation near Moscow, when the USSR was advancing, the number of Wehrmacht (German) troops in the center army group still exceeded the number of troops in the USSR army opposing them. That is, the USSR troops attacked without numerical superiority, in essence and in fact of history, it was something like this: 8 USSR soldiers attacked 10 German soldiers and SUDDENLY won and these 10 German soldiers fled. The number of sides at the front was equal and was approximately 1 to 1 achieved only at the end of 1942 or the beginning of 1943, all the time until that moment... The USSR fought as a minority against the German majority.

[@moutan100]

But you know the attacker should have 3 times the defender's troop number​s at least to win @@Ek_Ekvil

[@Ek_Ekvil]

​@@moutan100 Do you know that this is just a theory? You need to fight with skill and not with numbers, in general, just on June 22, 1941, the German troops on the border with the USSR were approximately 3 times larger in number than all the troops of the USSR army from the border to the Ural Mountains. Perhaps the Germans were just acting according to the template you wrote - have a numerical advantage of 3 times. But nevertheless, knowing history, we can perfectly remember that the Germans, attacking France (and partly Britain), had approximately equal numbers relative to the enemy, moreover! There were more French and British than Germans, not 2 or 3 times, but more. In general, a historical fact: - outnumbered in 1940, the Germans defeated the French and British - being in the minority in 1941, the Soviets defeated the Germans ...the reasons for the victory of the minority over the majority in these two cases are completely different, but the fact of the event is undeniable.

[@Ek_Ekvil]

​@@moutan100 By the way, the record for winning by skill and not by quantity belongs to Japan. Japanese troops numbering 8,000 attacked British and US troops in Singapore. There were a little more than 100,000 US and British troops, they defended themselves in the city! Moreover, the defenders were protected on three sides by the sea, and on the only side from which the Japanese were coming, they were protected by a river (an artificial water barrier). The Japanese, having no options other than to attack through the only bridge, stupidly launched an assault across it. The picture is quite incredible, 8,000 Japanese attacking 100,000 Americans and British across one single bridge in a narrow area and .......... AND 8,000 Japanese WIN!!!! 100,000 enemies.