Chapter 517 Tanks

When the news that the United States had declared war on Germany came out on the radio, the whole of Europe was in an uproar.

While people in other countries were discussing what the United States was going to do, the German people had already been furious and stood up. Germany had endured humiliation for 20 years, and now it had finally swept across Europe, even kicking down its former enemy, the British Empire, and was about to live a good life with its head held high. These Americans couldn't bear to see others live well, right? !

This is really unreasonable and can't be tolerated!

Large-scale protests and marches broke out in various places. The American Embassy in Berlin and consulates in various places were surrounded by angry people, throwing stones and eggs at the embassy. The embassy staff could only hide in the house and tremble. They were also quite confused. They were fine yesterday, so why did they declare war today?

At this time, Yannick, who had just finished dinner, was leisurely flipping through the British weapons report compiled by German engineers. He was not in a hurry to fight against the United States. After all, even if war was declared, it would not be fought in a day or two. They couldn't get through, and the Americans couldn't get through, so they could only stare at each other across the Atlantic.

There are four main tanks being developed in the British weapons department. Because the British side did not officially name them, German engineers gave them numbers such as No. 1, No. 2, No. 3, and No. 4.

There are several semi-finished prototypes of No. 1 and No. 2 tanks. Yannick saw at a glance that one of the No. 1 tanks was the "Churchill" infantry tank.

The Churchill tank was the last infantry tank produced by Britain in World War II, and it was also the most produced infantry tank in Britain during World War II, with a total production of 5,640 vehicles. The Churchill tank models are very complicated, with a total of 18 models. The most important ones are the models 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8. Like all British infantry tanks, the biggest weakness of the Churchill tank is insufficient firepower and poor mobility. It is not only unable to confront the German Tiger and Panther tanks head-on. Moreover, its maximum speed is only 20-25km/h, even slower than the German Tiger King tank, which is truly the same speed as infantry.

The Type 2 tank is the "Crusader" cruiser tank.

The Crusader tank, also known as the Type VI cruiser tank, is a famous British tank in the early stage of World War II that was developed from the Covenanter cruiser tank. More than 5,300 were produced. There are three types of Crusader cruiser tanks, of which the Type 2 cruiser tank is the most famous. It was mainly used in the North African battlefield as the main tank of the British Army's 7th Armored Brigade, the "Desert Rats". But by the time of the Battle of El Alamein in late 1942, the British tanks had been replaced by the M3 Lee tank and the M4 Sherman tank. Therefore, the Crusader tank began to retreat to the second line, and only the modified 76mm self-propelled howitzer was still active in the first line. The Crusader tank also had many types of transformed vehicles in World War II, mainly artillery command vehicles, command tanks, anti-aircraft tanks, tank recovery vehicles, artillery tractors, minesweepers with bulldozers, etc., but the number was extremely limited.

As for the No. 3 and No. 4, let alone the prototype, even the design drawings were not perfect; Yannick looked at it for a long time and could not tell that the No. 3 was the design drawing of that tank, but he saw that the No. 4 tank was the "Centurion" heavy tank.

The Centurion tank was a heavy tank developed by the United Kingdom at the end of World War II. Although 6 prototypes were sent to the European battlefield before the end of the war, they did not catch up with any battles. After the war, the Centurion tank continued to be produced and continued to serve in the British Army. Due to its excellent design, it has also been favored by many countries and has become the most serving tank in the West after World War II.

"A pile of garbage." Yannick threw the document aside.

As an important part of the Allied forces in World War II, the British tanks can be said to be unique. But it is worth mentioning that the British Army's idea of ​​subdividing tanks into cruiser tanks and infantry tanks in the early days of the war can be said to be seriously behind the times. Because both cruiser tanks and infantry tanks have certain inherent disadvantages and cannot be compared with German tanks or even Soviet tanks of the same level.

It was not until the middle and late stages of the war that the British gradually realized this mistake and built a classic tank like the Centurion.

In Yannick's view, the "Crusader" cruiser tank, the "Churchill" infantry tank, etc. were just a pile of garbage and there was no need to produce them at all.

He decided to let the British weapons factory produce the Jackal tank chassis.

Although the British "Torpedo Operation" shipped most of the stocks and bonds to Canada, if they did not return them obediently, Yannick would order them to be invalidated and new stocks and bonds to be issued. But even so, without revitalizing the sluggish British economy, these things are still a pile of meaningless waste paper. He decided to start with the military industry. Once there are military orders, it will drive a large number of jobs; coupled with the blood transfusion of the colonies, the British economy can also gradually recover.

As for the confidentiality issue, German factories have begun to produce more powerful medium tanks, so it doesn't matter whether they are leaked or not. These newly produced Jackal tank chassis will cause assault guns, anti-aircraft guns, mortars and other self-propelled artillery.

This medium tank is named "Leopard Tank", and its performance far exceeds that of the original Leopard. In addition to thicker armor and greater horsepower, this tank will be equipped with an 88mm KWK 36L/56 tank gun.

Although the 75mm KwK 42 L/70 tank gun is more powerful and has higher performance than the 88mm KWK 36L/56 tank gun, its cost and process difficulty are also far higher than the latter. The 75mm caliber gun barrel is lengthened to 70 times the diameter, and a taper from large to small is added inside this slender barrel. A special deep hole drilling machine must be used, and the production difficulty can be imagined.

The Panther grew to 40 tons and weighed a lot. This main gun contributed greatly. I don’t know what the Germans were thinking. If L48 doesn’t work, they use L70. If L70 doesn’t work, they use L100. Or the Soviets are more practical. If 75mm doesn’t work, they use 7. If 85mm doesn’t work, they use 122mm. It is always more convenient to expand the caliber than to lengthen the barrel.

Similarly, Yannick had no plans to equip the 71-caliber long-barreled 88mm tank gun. When the 88mm short-barreled gun was not enough (this situation would hardly occur, as the short 88 gun was enough to deal with almost all tanks during World War II. When using 40 armor-piercing shells, the armor penetration depth could reach 178mm at a distance of 1000 meters. It was just that the German army during World War II favored long-range killing tactics. They always wanted to use their own advantages in artillery accuracy and fire control to kill as many enemy armored forces as possible at long distances, so they were obsessed with long-caliber tank guns), it was time to use a 105mm rifled gun, which is the famous L7 105mm rifled tank gun.