Tiger Heat: German Panzers on the Eastern Front

This time they managed to disable the King Tiger without it going up in flames. The rounds bouncing off but causing chunks of armour to come off and fly around the inside cutting the crew to shreds. Three of the crew were killed by the shrapnel and the final crew member managed to escape slightly injured. He was captured and taken as a POW by the SMG platoon. It was an outstanding of tank tactics, from a tank that whilst faster and more manoeuvrable was outgunned unless it got up close to the King Tiger.

It was an appalling loss of Germany’s new super tank and caused a review of tactics and doctrine. Twelve tank crew members had been lost with one now a Soviet POW. The immobilised Tiger was captured by the Soviets and repaired before being moved to testing grounds at Kubinka for the Soviets to evaluate. This was one of two King Tigers captured in August 1944.

During the evaluation, the Soviets found out quickly that the King Tiger had a tendency to breakdown. During the transfer to their testing grounds and getting to suitable rail transport the cooling system was found to be insufficient for the excessively hot climatic conditions of the Russian summer. The engine tended to overheat and cause a consequential failure of the gearbox. The right suspension of one of the tanks had to be completely replaced, and its full functionality could not be re-established. The tank down again around every 10 miles. The 8.8 cm KwK 43 in terms of penetration and accuracy was found to be on par with the 122 mm D-25T. It proved capable of passing a round straight through and out of the other captured King Tiger’s turret at a range of at 430 yards. The armour of one vehicle was tested by firing at it with shells between 100 and 152 mm calibre. The welding of the King Tiger even with the usual careful workmanship, was significantly worse than on similar designs even the Tiger I.

This meant that when shells were unable to penetrate the Tigers armour they caused the plates to break into smaller pieces, which would have caused injury or death to the crew sitting inside. These metal fragments also damaged the sensitive transmission and rendered the King Tiger inoperable. The armour plate was found to not be as strong as that on the Tiger I or the Panther. Further analysis found that the armour plate was lacking in molybdenum due to a loss of supply and replaced with vanadium which lowered the malleability making the metal more prone to shattering. Although to this day it has not been recorded if the frontal armour of a King Tiger was ever penetrated in battle. The Red Army also learnt to best way to take out King Tiger was to do it in stages. The first stage was to use HE rounds and destroy part of the running gear. With the tank immobilized the next stage was to at close range firing into the rear and sides to destroy it. T-34s with their good manoeuvrability stood a good chance of being able to out manoeuvre the traversing turret. An attack manoeuvre made more deadly if the T-34s attacked in numbers.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN – Village Liberation

The group of King Tigers raced down the rough track with the forest flashing by to the left. Behind the column of King Tigers was German Infantry who all looked very war weary and bedraggled. The King Tigers suspension struggled to take in all the undulations – these vibrations went straight into the hull, causing the crew to bob up and down and sway left and right in their seats. Smoke belched out from the twin exhausts as King Tigers engines roared in unison on full bore. The Red Army had begun an attack on a village and the attacking infantry was now pinned down and in desperate need of backup. As the King Tigers crew drew near, they ran into an artillery bombardment. Stalin’s Organs could be heard playing their deadly tune not too far away. The artillery bombardment was effective with rounds impacting close by followed by bits of shrapnel and stone flying off in all directions. The shrapnel and stones could be heard bouncing off the King Tigers armour.

The infantry soldier’s following the tanks sought cover in the forest as the King Tiger’s continued to push ahead. The crews hoped they could drive away from the bombardment as they continued to race forward. Artillery shells fell to the left and the right uprooting and shattering trees in the process. The infantry decided to flank left and continue into the woods towards the village under siege. As the Tigers came to the top of a hill overlooking the village, they slowed down to a stop and began to scan the horizon for any potential targets. The village was just to their left and just under a mile away; the shattered roofs of houses could clearly be seen. Smoke poured out of shell damage buildings, almost creating a smoke screen obscuring the fighting going on in the streets. Abandoned T-34s, Panthers and Tigers could be seen around the village.