In WWII, the Nazi once dominated the Continent by the victory mainly based on the use of tanks. At the end of the war the power of the Nazi tanks impressed the allies. When it comes to the factors that led to the failure of Nazi, the development of tanks will often be excluded. This article will consider the opinion that all Nazi tanks were such a great success that has nothing to do with the final failure, and point to some of the problems with these views by analyzing the tank performance. It will then put forward reasons for that the Nazi failed because of some types of tanks to some extent.
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From 1930 to 1945, Nazi Germany developed a series of tanks, more than 40 types of tank were manufactured.(Hamming) …show more content…
However, the armor was definitively the weak point of PZ III. If armor was not taken account of, PZ III was very balanced and good at the time it was first manufactured.
PZ IV was the improved version of PZ III. As the scale of war became larger, hundreds of powerful anti-tank weapons were invented, and soon PZ III was behind the times. So Germany decided to take PZ IV as a substitution.
The 80mm front armor of PZ IV made it much more reliable than PZ III in the battlefield. In terms of firepower, the 75mm gun was up to the average. What really made PZ IV excellent was the stable tank condition that it rarely broke down halfway, and if it did it was easy to repair. The good engine performance enabled PZ IV to advance to almost every strategic point in time. That was the reason why the manufacture of PZ IV didi’t stop until the war ended and totally
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8500 PZ IV were made. (Zheng ,2)
In summary, taken account of the invented time, PZ III and IV were not bad.
Generally, PZ III and IV had achieved a balance. They had done their best to serve, so PZ III and PZ IV did not lead to the fall of Nazi.
Development stage three: In the second half of war.(1943-1945)
Model: Pz.Kpfw. V Ausf.D Crew: five
Weight (tons): 43 Engine power (hp): …show more content…
Till the war ended, 59% of the tigers that served in 503th battalion were self-destructed due to either engine failure or lack of fittings.(Zheng, 229) Tank tiger was too elaborate to manufactured also. Only
1353 tigers were manufactured, while for ‘panther’ was 6000, ‘Sherman’ was
50000, T-34 was 80000.(Zheng, 2) It can be concluded that ‘panther’ and ‘tiger’
Yan 9 were strong but lumber, unbalanced fighters.
Back to 1942, perhaps panther and tiger were the best work Germany can do under that limited and urgent circumstance. If the requirement of good battle performance was not that strict, probably a more balanced tank could be invented, and more tanks were manufactured. So PZ V and VI were not great.
One thing is for sure that the fall of Nazi was certain. Given that the problems were solved and Nazi won more key battles like Kursk, the war could last for more years, but the result won’t change. So in conclusion, the Nazi tanks were not perfect, and the problems accelerated the fall. Nazi failed because of some types of tanks to some extent, but tank development was not a