Tank Warfare on the Eastern Front 1943-1945: Red Steamroller

Certainly the most obvious mistake German tank designers made was to rely upon petrol engines rather than expending the effort to build a high-torque diesel engine, as the Soviets had. Fuel-hogs like the Panther and King Tiger were using 2–4 times as much fuel as earlier designs, just when Germany was running short of fuel. Hitler regarded the diesel engine as the preferred solution, but allowed himself to be dissuaded by technocrats who opined that it would take too long to develop and the war would be over before it was ready. Tied in with the mistaken reliance on fuel-inefficient petrol engines, the Germans became enamoured of mounting bigger and bigger guns on their tanks and Panzerjägers. The problem was that armoured vehicles over 45 tons were difficult to get across rivers, since German pontoon bridges were not intended for heavy tanks, and it was increasingly problematic for recovery vehicles to retrieve them on the battlefield. Thus, by 1943, German heavy tanks had difficulty getting across minor water features, which negatively impacted mission accomplishment on a number of occasions, such as Kursk and the Korsun relief operation. Germany needed a good 30–35-ton tank with a diesel engine and a long 7.5cm gun that could be built in quantity, but instead the Panzer-Divisionen were provided with tanks that increasingly failed to meet the operational requirements of Bewegungskrieg. Interestingly, many of the design features that the Germans found so interesting – such as interweaved road wheels – were abandoned by all post-war tank designers.

Another mistake which cost the Germans dearly was the diversion of so many resources to building Waffen-SS and Luftwaffe Panzer-Divisionen, which was done for political rather than military reasons. By late 1943 Himmler was outfitting more and more Waffen-SS units, many of which were of dubious quality. Guderian failed to stop this diversion of resources and most of the Heer Panzer-Divisionen were starved of resources and allowed to become second-rate formations by late 1944. After Kursk, the German combined arms team was increasingly broken as less infantry, air and artillery support was available.

Soviet leaders stuck with a conservative attitude toward tank design and production throughout the war and it paid off handsomely. By late 1943 the Red Army had six tank armies which contained up to 30 per cent of its available armour and a small cadre of veteran front leaders such as Vatutin, Rokossovsky, Bagramyan and Konev, who learned to employ these armoured fists to achieve operational-level victories. Yet the Red Army could not have smashed German army groups just with superior numbers – that method had failed repeatedly in 1941–42. Instead, the Red Army learned how to mass its artillery to achieve breakthroughs and to employ its engineers in mobility and counter-mobility roles. By the time of Kursk, the Soviets learned that a minefield covered by fire from concealed anti-tank guns was the best answer to the Tiger or Panther, yet the Germans never really improved their mine-clearing skills. The Soviet ability to quickly refit decimated tank armies and redeploy them long distances without being detected was another skill that contributed greatly to the Soviet victory over the Panzer-Divisionen. Soviet expert use of Maskirovka (deception) allowed the Red Army to gain the advantage of surprise again and again over German commanders who could not understand that their opponents were evolving.

The Soviet failure to invest in developing armoured personnel carriers for their infantry, better reconnaissance vehicles and mobile flak guns were serious technical mistakes that proved costly in battle, but Lend-Lease deliveries of US-made halftracks and reconnaissance vehicles helped to partly rectify this deficiency by the last year of the war. Could the Red Army have defeated Germany’s armoured forces without Lend-Lease? This is doubtful for a number of reasons. Although the quality of many Lend-Lease tanks was poor, the quality of the trucks, halftracks and other support vehicles was not and without these vehicles, the Red Army’s ability to conduct Deep Operations would have been severely impaired. Another factor is that the supply of aluminum, machine tools and other key raw materials enabled the Soviet Union to rapidly expand its tank production despite the loss of so much of its own territory and resources; without this assistance, Soviet tank production would likely have been reduced by one-third. It is highly unlikely that the Red Army would have had the mobility and the numbers necessary to conduct the sweeing advances of 1944–45 without Allied Lend-Lease aid.