Yet more stupid weapons....
The Super Tank!!!
Yes, I'm poking fun at the super tanks of WWII, the offspring of those funny guns at the Wehrmacht Design Bureau and thier chief kook, A. Hitler! Now I'm not going to poke fun at the Panther/Tiger/King Tiger tanks, which actually were decent (fairly) tanks. But consider these gems from the design floor.
In his effort to have them deployed for the Kursk Offensive, our favorite mad hatter rushed the Ferdinand heavy assault gun, deploying 90 of them. It was the first vehicle to mount the awesome PaK32/2 88mm L71 cannon, perhaps the best antitank weapon of the war. But so rushed was the Ferdinands, that their electric drive was, not fully tested. And when the engine goes, the cannon can only point in one direction. And so rushed was the design team, that they neglected to mount something...co-axial armament. That's right! The Ferdinand mounted no machineguns and when the Russian infantry realized this, they simply advoided the cannons, and amused themselves with Molotov Cocktails and satchel charges. The 48 remaining Ferndinands were brought back for rebuilding, to include having a bow machine gun mounted and were deployed to Italy, where more were lost due to the miserable engine.
Next up is the Jagdpanzer VI, built on a stretched King Tiger chassis, this heavy tank destroyer mounted the PaK44 128mm L55 cannon. One of the most heavily armored vehicles of the entire war (max of 250mm), only 77 were built, serving in the Battle of the Bulge and the fighting for the Remagen Bridgehead. Crippled by poor engine design the "Jagdtiger" was prone to breakdowns, which allowed Shermans to outflank them...While their front armor was thick, the sides only had armor of up to 80mm thickness, vulnerable to the 76mm gun.
Third in the wacky designs is the "Maus". This 188 ton tank mounted the same Pak44 128mm L55 cannon, as well as a co-axially mounted PaK44 75mm L36.5 cannon!?! Fitted with a newer version of the Ferndinards electric drive (2 of them) and capable of a blistering top speed of 20km per hour! Armor would be a maximum of 240mm with the gun mantlet fitted with another 240mm of armor. It was just too heavy for existing bridges, and had manuverability that was truely in a class by itself. Never saw combat and only two prototypes were built. For many years it was assumed, based on German records that both were destroyed, turns out that one was captured by the Russians and is currently in a armor museum.
The last entry in the "A. Hitler Super Tank Race" is the E-100 which existed as a single prototype. The turret was never built and the 140-ton hull was captured by the British, carefully examined and then melted down. Like the Maus, the E-100 had two electric drives and was going to be mounted with the Pak44 150mm L38 cannon and a co-axial Pak44 75mm L36.5 cannon. Armor protection was on the same scale as the Maus.
There is one intresting story on why the E-100 was developed. It seems that Herr Hitler saw one of the prototype Maus and complained that the 128mm cannon "was too small". That's right armor fans, the bigger your tank, the bigger your main gun should be!!!!
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