Tanks for the Memories

Problems with Multi-Weapon Tanks

Comparison of certain vehicles with their ASL counterparts is a frequent source of conversation at ASL tournaments. Because I play more quickly than most, I am frequently involved in such discussions. I am also an avid reader of technical reviews of vehicles used on the Eastern Front and French tanks. I don't pretend to be an expert, but I can claim to be knowledgeable.

One thing I have observed is that multi-weapon tanks tend to be more vastly more popular in their cardboard versions than they were on the battlefield. I have developed a theory about why that is. Simply, command of the various weapons was such that it created problems for real commanders that don't exist for cardboard commanders. Secondarily, the size of tanks with multiple weapons tended to be large, less strategically mobile and, therefore, failed in a characteristic which does not come into play in ASL.

In development of tanks, there are always trade-offs. Armor vs. Speed. Weight vs. Mobility. Anti-tank vs. High Explosive. Here, our main concern is command vs. autonomy. With command, you have the ability to see threats and assign targets—which is likely crucial to your survival. On the other hand, autonomy allows crew members to make decisions on their own without the commander's imput. This allows them to select their own targets. It would require more training for the crew and, ideally, a great field of vision for those making the decisions. For ASL commanders, you get the best of both worlds. Your gunners are both autonomous and under command.

It seems a simple thing to give gunners free reign in choosing targets, but in reality, that's making several assumptions that simply are not true. One problem is that while the compartment in, for example, a Char B, were large, they simply could not be laid out in such a way that the commander and gunners were set up in a way that made simultaneous fire difficult if not impossible. Second, in order to allow for simultaneous fire you would be allowing gunners of low ranks to identify and prioritize targets. This is unlikely in the French or US armies, much less the Red Army. It is very doubtful you would even want this to be the case, as independent gunners may take on targets that the commander may not designate. Next, you are assuming a lot of knowledge on the part of that secondary (or, in the case of the T-35, tertiary) gunners. Knowledge of penetration, effectiveness, ammo and, a general knowledge of the tactical situation are far beyond what a battlefield commander could hope for.

Communications inside the crowded, noisy and chaotic compartment likewise would prevent effective use of secondary weapons. One can just imagine a tank commander shouting out orders to a gunner, a loader, two secondary gunners, three machine gunners and a driver. Sometimes without an intercom. It's just impossible to assume that all weapons could fire on a single target under are the direction of a centralized command.

Therefore, in game terms we can see that tanks like the Char, T35, T28 and Grant are all likely to be more effective in ASL than they would be in action. The inclusion of a secondary armament, absent any restrictions, provides a serious bias in favor of ASL vehicles so equipped.

T35

I once said that if every T-35 represented in an ASL scenario actually fought, there would have had to be hundreds of them. Three gun turrets (one 76 and 2 45L) make this a formidable ASL opponent. Yes, the secondary turrets are quite restricted, but this tank is impossible to sneak up on and, considering its German contemporaries, quite potent. Any of the guns are capable against the PzII, PzI and Czech model tanks. Now, add in a plethora of MG capable of holding back would be panzerjaegers and you can see that, if it were as good in real life the Soviet Union would have happily produced as many as it could, rather than shooting everyone involved in this tank's design and production.

However, it clearly was not as good a battlefield tank as an ASL tank. Probably the chief reason was strategic mobility. It just could not get to where it needed to go when it needed to go there. However, the T35 was the end of the Soviet Supertank experiment. The tank was not very maneuverable due to its length to width ratio, underpowered engine and strained power train.  Firing while in motion was considered impossible.  Mechanical reliability was so bad that only six of ninety vehicles were knocked out in combat--the rest had some kind of mechanical failure and were destroyed by their crew.  Only one vehicle survived the war--as a training vehicle.  Interestingly, another (captured) vehicle was involved in the defense of Berlin, although it broke down before seeing combat.

This is the one surviving version of  the vehicle, at a museum in Moscow.  There are also a hoard of technical documents available, if you read Russian better than I.

T-35 Reference Manual (Illustrated) in Russian

The commander was supposed to direct fire to five turrets comprising eight crew members plus a driver.   Vision slits for the driver and gunners were very small and doctrine was that gunners were to be directed by the commander.  Certainly, when targets of opportunity presented themselves gunners (especially machine gunners) probably had some leeway, but this would work both ways, possibly leaving vulnerabilities when the differing perceptions of the gunner and commander could not be communicated or reconciled.

Also, depending on the main turret facing, it was impossible to open the escape hatch on the secondary turrets.  While the "crew" was supposedly 11, two actually worked outside the tank, possibly not going on combat missions?  (All of this leads us to surmise possibly the crew survival number is a bit too high.)

It is also important to note that these were parade-ground tanks.  The Red Army knew they were obsolete.  However, they were still impressive looking and were trotted out to Red Square every May and November.  Few saw combat--very possibly none.  However, the most telling that the Soviet Union never produced another multi-turreted AFV and shied away from multi-platform vehicles--except for flamethrower enhanced T-34's and KV's.  They also used Lend Lease Grant tanks without enthusiasm.  They also designed a few more multi-turreted tanks, but these were never produced.

The T-35 was a dead end in tank design, and while it is surely true that lack of strategic mobility was a major factor in the design of multi-turreted land battleships, this is an inadequate explanation.  Speed, reliability and efficiency are technical issues that could eventually have been solved.  The T-35 was also tremendously expensive to build and complex to maintain.  After 1941, Stalin, especially, saw the value of simplicity and mass production.

However, the problem of crew efficiency must have entered into decision making when the T-35 program was terminated halfway into its projected run.  It is noisy, cramped and, while large, features a crew that is not only compartmentalized, but almost completely dependent on direction from a commander who would have been overwhelmed in combat--had many of these vehicles ever reached combat.

Char B1 bis
Unlike the T-35, the Char could be counted as a battlefield success, at least, partially.  In reality, its two platforms, the 47mm turreted anti-tank gun and a 75mm bow mounted howitzer, created problems that were never completely solved.

The Char was spacious and (probably) under-crewed.  The French had adopted the understandable philosophy that machines were taking the place of manpower and did not see reason to stuff their tanks with guys who were probably going to get blown up.  With a crew of only four, a loader on the 75mm gun, a commander (who also acted as a gunner on the 47mm), a radio man, and a driver (who doubled as a gunner for the 75), and better training, the Char did not exhibit problems with command and control of its platforms.  However, the busy crew would not be firing machine guns at the same time as the guns and the 75 would concentrate on one immobile target while the 47 swung from side to side dealing with pests.

The most significant drawback of the Char is a complete lack of ability to train its 75mm gun.  The gun had no means of making even small adjustments without moving the entire tank--which, given its length to width ratio and weight is an enormous task.  It was, therefore, completely worthless at hitting moving targets.  Not only was the 75 locked in a straight-line CA, but attempting to track a target also threw off the turreted 47.

If that were not sufficient to condemn the Char to the scrap-pile, its strategic mobility was also very poor.  While generally reliable for a tank its weight and length to width ratio, it consumed a huge amount of petrol.  Petrol that France simply did not have and, even more importantly, could not adequately supply to formations of Char in the field.  It was also enormously expensive, eating up 1.5 million francs per vehicle--a sum which would have produced 3 SOMUAs.  Not just francs and petrol, however, but the Char devoured a huge amount of armor production.  Its top speed was about 30kph (18mph) and it was frequently forced to find alternate routs because of its size and weight.

However, when it clashed with German vehicles, it usually got the best of the fight.  Again, this accentuates the ASL'ers myopia when it comes to tanks.  It could do a lot of things that no German tank had an answer for--when it made it to the battle.  More likely, however, the Germans would bypass formations of heavy tanks and go after their supply lines.  The massive fuel consumption meant that the Char could never catch up with them while in a shape to fight.  It also meant that combat time (think of time on target for tanks) was fairly limited.  However, from the ASL point of view, it is a fairly awesome vehicle.

Hardly any wonder that the Germans took them and "fixed" them as FT vehicles.  As a FT vehicles, multi-platform tanks are less restricted because the range and  area nature of the fire.  Removal of the 75mm gun and replacement with a FT also meant that the very narrow traverse of the bow weapon could be greatly expanded.  The Germans also exchanged the claustrophobic 47 turret for a massive 105mm howitzer superstructure, but only in a few examples.  The FT equipped German PzKw B2 740f proved very useful after D-Day and in the Balkans.

Again, few of the Char made it to the combat zones and were much more likely to be abandoned by the crew after running out of fuel.  Unlike the Soviets, who disliked the T35 as a battle tank, the Char was considered the safest place on the battlefield by its crew and they loved it.  Each Char was named after a department or French hero and this perhaps a bit more difficult to destroy them.  Hundreds were captured by the Germans.

The Char 1B bis for my department, Doubs #317, was destroyed at Vadenay on June 12, 1940.

Unlike the T35, which was mechanically a catastrophe waiting to happen, the Char, while having strategic mobility problems of its own, was hindered primarily by the amount of resources it consumed.

However, what ASL does not portray is the extreme limitations of its main armament.  The aiming mechanism of the 75, namely, turning the tank, is not at all accurately depicted and it is usually easy to knock out an opponent's tank with the 75.  In reality, this would have been impossible.  The 75 should not be allowed to bounding fire or, indeed, fire in the advancing fire phase, nor should it be allowed to track moving targets.  A really skilled gunner could probably lead a target, but the ammunition for the 75 was designed as anti-personnel.

A word here about resource usage.  Multi-weapon platform vehicles tend to be much more expensive to produce.  They are, generally, larger and frequently this size must be expressed in length, because width is restricted by other factors.

Tanks are limited in their width by requirements of moving them by rail.  The Germans got around this, somewhat, by creating a system of "road" tracks and "combat" tracks.  The road tracks were used to load the tanks (usually the Tiger) onto flatbeds.  The French FCM 2 was kind of attached to its rail wheel stock and became a kind of rail car on its own.  This width restriction has an important effect on development of AFV's.

The main armament of a vehicle is limited by the size of the turret ring.  A long, heavy gun (like that of the King Tiger) shifted the tank's center of gravity and, when on an incline or a slope, it was unable to slew the turret.

As a way to get around this, designers made tanks longer.  This also had the advantage of making them better at crossing trenches.  However, longer tracks made them less reliable (the more sections of track, the more that can fail.)  It also made them difficult to maneuver.  Tanks turn by moving one track faster than the other.  So with the long tracks turns have to be longer, put more stress on the tracks and increase pressure on the clutch and drive train.

Length to width ratio says a great deal about a tank and this is not covered in ASL.  Particularly with the Char 1B, the length of the vehicle, combined with the need to rotate the tank in order to aim the main armament, is really a key factor that remains unaddressed in the game system.

M3 Lee/Grant
The American dual platform AFV is quite a bit like the Char, but shorter and, unfortunately for the crew, taller.  In fact, it looks a bit like a wedding cake.

It was, in reality, a Frankenstein's monster of a tank, entering production with borrowed developments from other designs and intended to be produced only until the M4 Sherman came about.

The T2 it was based on did not have a 75, but by 1940 it was clear that the 37mm gun in the turret was inadequate for dealing with uparmored German tanks.  By moving the turret ring higher, designers created a roomy cabin that was able to accommodate five crewman and the offset 75mm gun.

As they poured off the assembly line, Lend Lease was sending them both to the British and the Soviet Union.  The British disliked them and would much rather have had the US license built Crusader tanks.  The Soviets did not like the M3 either, considering, rightly, that it had far too high a profile.

 Its most famous American use was blowing up the ferris wheel during the battle of LA in the movie 1941.

With a first rate transmission and powerplant, a built in communication system, the Grant represents the possibilities of how multi-platform AFV's could use technical advances to overcome some of the liabilities.  It replaced length with height and so was fairly mobile.

Nevertheless, just like the T-35 and the Char 1B, it proved to be a failure.  (The Red Army dubbed them a "coffin for six.")  Multi-weapon platform AFV's had run their course and played out.  Surprisingly, the Germans would later attempt to revive this idea with the Maus, which was to have a coaxial 75mm with a 128mm main gun.  The turret for the Maus, clearly stretching the limits of armored technology at the time, was never completed.  No doubt it was a bad idea and a waste of time.

Therefore, let me summarize why multi-weapon platform AFV's work well in ASL but were not pursued in national procurements.

1. Resource costs--In order to incorporate more weapons, this inevitably led to larger tanks and more turrets meant higher production and maintenance costs.
2. Strategic mobility--Again, larger tanks had problems moving to critical spots on the battlefield.  Their very size also caused many technical problems with regard to reliability.
3. Command and Communications--Before technical solutions were found, multi-weapon platform AFV's over stressed the tank's command and control.  Sighting and prioritizing targets forced a doctrine of either autonomy or direction.

We can see that ASL reduces several problems of AFV development unconsidered.  ASL commanders don't need to get their tanks to the battlefield and keep them supplied with fuel.  ASL players don't have to make appropriations for their weapon programs.  ASL commanders have near-perfect information about the battlefield and instantly order guns to fire and vehicles to come to a stop.  Our little cardboard guys don't have to shift over to fire a gun after the tank stops, fire the bow machine gun and jump back in to start up and drive off, all in a metal box with spent shell casings, blood and piss all over the floor.

A simple fix for this would be to add a +1 for every gun armament the AFV has already fired.  This would adequately reflect the difficulties tank commanders faced directing all those weapons as well as the driver.