WW2 US army anti tank doctrine

Moglwi

Monthly Donor
I know that the US army A/T doctrine was to use tank destryers to kill enmay tanks while the tanks support the infantry and it did not work out as the Germans where not using the large scale tank attacks like in 40-43. I was wondering would the doctrine have been sound if the germas could have launched say a Citadel attack in 1944 in france with with the lueftwaffe allowing limted no CAS?
 

CalBear

Moderator
Donor
Monthly Donor
The American doctrine was basically flawed in that it failed to anticipate the marked improvement in tank design as the war progressed. The best proof of this is that the doctrine was abandoned as soon as equipment changes permitted. This was not so much a matter of the American tanks being inferior (the Sherman was a more than acceptable vehicle, better in many respects than the Heer vehicles, including the fact that it generally ran) but in the fact that it was wasteful. Only the United States had the capacity to deploy two different series of vehicles in huge numbers (the U.S. built just under 15,000 TD over various types) rather than a single vehicle that was capable of doing both tasks.

If the Heer had made the sort of attack under the conditions indicated (an impossibility in reality since the Allies would never have attempted a landing in France without a minimum of air superiority verging on air supremacy or the air supremacy conditions that prevailed IOTL) the result would have been a fairly comprehensive Heer defeat. As noted the U.S. had huge number of TD in its TOE, as well as massive numbers of Shermans and SP guns supplemented by a heavy TOE of towed artilley. It is likely that the Heer would have found itself out numbered around 4-1 between Shermans and the various TD (as well as a stunning number of M3/M5 light tanks, a vehicle that is generally ignored but was capable of defeating the armor on many German assault guns and SP mounts). The Americans also had the capacity to resupply far faster and more effectively than the German forces.
 
I know that the US army A/T doctrine was to use tank destryers to kill enmay tanks while the tanks support the infantry and it did not work out as the Germans where not using the large scale tank attacks like in 40-43. I was wondering would the doctrine have been sound if the germas could have launched say a Citadel attack in 1944 in france with with the lueftwaffe allowing limted no CAS?

How does the Luftwaffe do that?

Mike Turcotte
 

Moglwi

Monthly Donor
How does the Luftwaffe do that?

Mike Turcotte

They could not but I was more intrested in how the US A/T doctronie would have worked if the condions it was desgined for exsisted which in massed tank battles You have to get rid of Allied air supremacy
 
That's the thing: U.S. doctrine recognized the importance of air superiority, and the Luftwaffe never achieved even local air superiority when fighting the U.S. This essential appreciation of the role of aviation was enough to mitigate most of the U.S.'s other shortcomings.

Also, the Sherman wasn't as terrible as the popular mythology makes it out to have been: true it was inferior to the Tiger and Panther, but it was still an all-round good tank, and it was also fast, reliable, and greatly eased the Allies' logistics.
 
US army AT doctrine was based on their observations of the German attack on France in 1940 where they used massed panzers; the problem was that by 1943 the Germans had abandoned those tactics in favor of Kamfgruppen doctrine.

The theory behind US TD's was kind of stupid. They where supposed to stand off at long range and break up German tank battalions; and as such they where fast, had a hardish hitting gun but where thinly armored in favor of speed. In reality few battles were in open fields were you could just engage panzer regiments at 1500 meters without great risk to yourself; combat took place in urban and rough terrain where engagement ranges were of medium and close variety and indeed the TD's could be engaged by infantry with hand held AT weapons and by German AFV's so the weak armor became a massive liability

German TD's where built with the express understanding that they would be engaged at least at medium ranges if not close ranges by enemy anti tank weapons and AFV's so they where built with heavy armor and where thus much more survivable and useful

The M-10 was a fairly pointless diversion (and it caused a number of completely unecessary crew losses due to the above mentioned armor issues)... funds would have been better spent building a few more shermans and shoehorning the larger cannon into the sherman to make it more competitive with the 2nd generation of German tanks
 
Moving away from US anti-tank doctrine as employed by its armored vehicles, from what I know of it US infantry anti-tank doctrine (in which I also include anti-tank guns) was rather ad-hoc but largely resembled a typical 'hedgehog' style. Strongpoints were established which broke-up the attackers, funnelled them in the directions the US wanted, and weakened the attackers by forcing them to commit force too defending against counter-attacks from the strongholds.

The most well known example of this is obviously the defense of Bastogne in the Battle of the Bulge, but I am sure it was repeated numerous times on a smaller scale over the course of 1944-1945.
 
The M-10 was a fairly pointless diversion (and it caused a number of completely unecessary crew losses due to the above mentioned armor issues)... funds would have been better spent building a few more shermans and shoehorning the larger cannon into the sherman to make it more competitive with the 2nd generation of German tanks
The M10 did make for a great self-propelled assault gun, especially in the pacific. Of course, that was the exact opposite role it was ostensibly intended for.
 
And the British version with the 17lbr made a respectable forward-deployable anti-tank gun, although if they'd dropped the idea I suspect a few more Firefly's would have gone in place instead.
 
Also, the Sherman wasn't as terrible as the popular mythology makes it out to have been: true it was inferior to the Tiger and Panther, but it was still an all-round good tank

The fact that variants were still seeing successful front-line service as late as 1973 should be sufficient evidence of that.
 

iddt3

Donor
The Sherman was very good at infantry support, which was much of what it ended up doing and indeed what it was designed to do. Keep in mind the "easy eight" upgrade at least with the 76mm gun was actually less effective in the infantry support role due to the shells having a less powerful bursting charge. The Sherman could have been better yes, and the Tank Destroyers weren't well thought out, but they served their purpose.
 

NothingNow

Banned
The American doctrine was basically flawed in that it failed to anticipate the marked improvement in tank design as the war progressed. The best proof of this is that the doctrine was abandoned as soon as equipment changes permitted. This was not so much a matter of the American tanks being inferior (the Sherman was a more than acceptable vehicle, better in many respects than the Heer vehicles, including the fact that it generally ran) but in the fact that it was wasteful. Only the United States had the capacity to deploy two different series of vehicles in huge numbers (the U.S. built just under 15,000 TD over various types) rather than a single vehicle that was capable of doing both tasks.

Actually, didn't the M10 and M36 share most of their running gear and indeed much of their hulls with the M3 Grant/Lee and the Sherman? Hell, the M36B1s used repurposed M4A3 hulls.
IIRC the odd one out was the M18, which only really shared an Engine and Gun with the Sherman family.

And it's not like the Tank Destroyers had unusually or unacceptably high losses either. The only real issues being the lack of overhead protection and spaced armor, the latter of which the Allies lacked anyway. The M36 even had armor comparable to the Jagdpanther in effectiveness in the hull and Glacis plate, at nearly 2/3rds the weight in a smaller package, with a turret instead of a casemate. Admittedly, a fully enclosed turret would have been nice, but well, you can't have that, and the awesome visibility an open turret affords, and they did introduce a remedy post-war.
 
mechanized infantry origins of TD

Aren't the Tank destroyers a logical result of the advent of mechanized infantry? The US had rifle units on M3 halftracks, so it was logical to give them mobile AT weapons, ergo the M3/75mm Gun combo, wich was the AT equivalent of the M3 mortar combo, etc...
Since the Riflemen were going to operate closely with the tanks, why not put the AT guns on tank chassis? And since said chassis was big, why not use the biggest AT gun avaible at the time, the 3'' that looked so good on paper, until the ammo designed for it proved to be a bit of a letdown?
When the Sherman was introduced, it's 75mm Gun was a perfectly capable tank-killer averywere except Russia, and in a Tank Vs Tank engament the Sherman was better than it's designed opponent, the PzKfw III with the 50 L42 GP gun.
So the idea was not that tanks wouldn't engage in Tank Vs Tank actions, rather than the Infantry would be supported by dedicated antitank units, and wouldn't require Tanks for that job.
The germans in Africa had been using their AT guns (including SPG versions) as their primary Tank Killer. The problem with the US was that they went one step further, and having created a dedicated TD force, regarded the Anti Tank capability of their tanks as secondary, failling to introduce a 90mm armed tank medium tank (The T25 would fit the bill nicely).
 
Top