Maus: What Were They Thinking?

[Loopycrank]

I think it's generally agreed here that the Maus was one of the most shockingly wrong-headed AFV designs ever conceived, much less prototyped.

 

What's never been clear to me is what the thinking behind it was. Why did anyone think a 180+ tonne tank was a good idea? Faulty analogy to naval warships?

 

I've always found it surprising how little the Maus actually delivered for being that heavy. The 128mm was a pretty serious cannon, but on a tank that heavy I would expect rather more. Maybe a monster building demolition gun like the sturmtiger/T30 were envisioned to carry, or maybe have it bristle with secondary armament like a proper land battleship so it could be a one-vehicle breakthrough spearhead. But a single 128mm and a secondary 75mm? Seeing as they crammed that same cannon into a jagdtiger, surely the maus looked rather poor in the weight/armament area.

 

Was there any particular logic behind this monster, or did Hitler just say to Porsche "I want a tank that goes to 11!" ?

[thekirk]

Has anyone ever found the documentation that explains the "why" of that entire program? I understand the "E-tanks", but Maus? Where did that even come from, step-by-step? One rather gets the impression that by the time they were working on that one, the German engineers were just playing practical jokes on the guys up at the front. I can't recall ever being able to find anything that laid out even a skeletal roadmap of the reasoning that led to that concept even being considered, let alone built.

[DougRichards]

the E-100 was another such monster, but was 40 tonnes lighter, had better armour and was to be armed with a 150mm gun with 75mm co-ax. Final armament was to be a 170mm gun. It should be remembered thought that sanity came fairly early in October 1943 when both projects were cancelled.

 

It could be considered that the 80cm Gustav Gerat, the Morser Karl and the 24cm FlaK Gerat 80 were also example of size over sensibity.

Edited November 4, 2012 by DougRichards

[rmgill]

"Make the syphilitic troll happy"?

[Exel]

I think it's generally agreed here that the Maus was one of the most shockingly wrong-headed AFV designs ever conceived, much less prototyped.

 

Well Ratte was even worse, though at least it wasn't prototyped like the Maus. Both seem like a 13-year-old Hitlerjugend's wet fantasy.

 

One is suspicious that the engineers who proposed the designs might have even been conducting intentional sabotage to the German war effort by seeking to divert scarce resources into something us useless as those two projects.

[Marcello]

Has anyone ever found the documentation that explains the "why" of that entire program? I understand the "E-tanks", but Maus? Where did that even come from, step-by-step? One rather gets the impression that by the time they were working on that one, the German engineers were just playing practical jokes on the guys up at the front. I can't recall ever being able to find anything that laid out even a skeletal roadmap of the reasoning that led to that concept even being considered, let alone built.

 

Presumably the same sort of mindset that produced this. Though the Maus was worse, for a number of reasons.

I would regard it as combination "must have a counter in case the other side comes up with it" (but the Jagdtiger should have sufficed as insurance policy in that regards), bureaucracy/politics and perhaps propaganda considerations. You can also look at the background of tanks like the Char 2C (though not the worst offender and with some modern features) and its planned 140 tons monster replacement to get and idea of the forces shaping such programs.

[Gavin-Phillips]

It could just be confusion with the E-100 program, but wasn't there an upgrade envisioned for the Maus to accept a larger 174mm gun? I do vaguely recall reading about this, as well as with a turret with twin 88mm cannon installed for air defence (!).

 

The thing that must surprised me by the whole project is they managed to get the tank moving at all, even to spin on its own axis! Especially considering the sheer size and weight of the vehicle, plus the width of its tracks, this is quite an achievement really. There are also pictures of the Maus in Schiffer Publishing's "Maus Tank" of it becoming deeply mired at a proving ground. Despite this fact, it was still able to free itself under its own power! I've seen modern-day diesel tractors in fields that couldn't manage that, it took all sorts of assistance to recover those. So the mobility of the Maus is fairly incredible given the size of the vehicle.

 

But yes, they could have spent the time, effort and indeed the production facilities churning out more later model Panzer IV's and Panthers. Perhaps Tigers too.

 

I'm not so sure that the E-100 was all that much better as far as its size and bulk were concerned. I have heard of at least one rumour that it may have been more like an ultra-large Jagdtiger with 150mm gun rather than a "real" tank so to speak. Is there any truth in that?

[Mobius]

What's never been clear to me is what the thinking behind it was. Why did anyone think a 180+ tonne tank was a good idea? Faulty analogy to naval warships?

Stimulus? Or, just keep a bunch of unemployeed design engineers from being sent to the Eastern Front?

[Colin]

Caius (spelling?) description of the 128mm effect on target showed that it had significant ability. But even the JT could barely survive it's weight and most were lost to driver error. A lighter tank with that gun may have been a better choice.

[Guest Jason L]

Giant armoured mostrocities captured the imagination of pretty much everyone as soon as it became evident you could build giant metal things that could move under their own power. Given the relative success of Tiger it's not all that surprising they'd try something more, ahem, "ambitious".

 

Guderian talks about Maus in his book, and it seems like super-heavy tank development went down something like how you'd imagine a bunch of people with actual power would collectively wank about something on the cover of Popular Mechanics.

[Max H]

Given the relative success of Tiger it's not all that surprising they'd try something more, ahem, "ambitious".

 

Or the B1, or the matilda. Germans had spent half the war watching weapons bounce off the wondertank of the day, unfortunately the technology was not ready to create a wondertank proof against the bigger guns coming into service then

 

Final armament was to be a 170mm gun

It could just be confusion with the E-100 program, but wasn't there an upgrade envisioned for the Maus to accept a larger 174mm gun? I do vaguely recall reading about this, as well as with a turret with twin 88mm cannon installed for air defence (!).... I have heard of at least one rumour that it may have been more like an ultra-large Jagdtiger with 150mm gun rather than a "real" tank so to speak. Is there any truth in that?

 

A jagd version of the E-100 and maus were both considered, to mount either a long 15cm gun or a 17cm - the E-100 based version was preferred due to the lower profile. E-100 itself was planned to mount a turret, which was going to be an improved mausturm, and AFAIK the flakmaus and 17cm turreted E-100 are fantasy, although the short 15cm that was to be fitted to the E-100 was planned to fit in the maus

[bojan]

BTW, Wargaming did a book on Maus by Pasholok and Zheltov, two quite good authors. Among other things in book is a note that about 20-30 armor sets for Maus were actually produced.

[Mobius]

Maus are vulnerable to the Zerg rush. You need at least two of them close by to hold a position.

[Loopycrank]

The thing that must surprised me by the whole project is they managed to get the tank moving at all, even to spin on its own axis! Especially considering the sheer size and weight of the vehicle, plus the width of its tracks, this is quite an achievement really. There are also pictures of the Maus in Schiffer Publishing's "Maus Tank" of it becoming deeply mired at a proving ground. Despite this fact, it was still able to free itself under its own power! I've seen modern-day diesel tractors in fields that couldn't manage that, it took all sorts of assistance to recover those. So the mobility of the Maus is fairly incredible given the size of the vehicle.

 

 

Right, that's part of what amazes me about this program. People have been imagining huge, impractical machines for centuries. To actually make one is rare, and doubly so considering that they were fighting a war at the time!

 

The fact that it more or less worked is icing on the cake.

 

It's not like they were just entertaining musings of bad ideas, they were acting on bad ideas.

 

And yes, everything Guderian has to say about going to see the Maus prototypes with Hitler and his entourage is gold. You can just imagine the general facepalming.

[Mikel2]

Given the relative success of Tiger it's not all that surprising they'd try something more, ahem, "ambitious".

 

It appears that the Germans actually spent some time trying to design the Tiger II for ease of production (being quite a bit cheaper than the Tiger I)... Was the whole Tiger II program worth the effort?

[Wobbly Head]

To be fair to the Germans they wern't the only ones going for tanks too big for their own good. The Russians had the T-35 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T-35 and the french had the FCM F1 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FCM_F1 . But I am going more for rmgill reasoning to keep the syphilitic troll happy.

[pikachu]

To be fair to the Germans they wern't the only ones going for tanks too big for their own good. The Russians had the T-35 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T-35 and the french had the FCM F1 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FCM_F1 . But I am going more for rmgill reasoning to keep the syphilitic troll happy.

 

Cornre durgs.

[Wobbly Head]

They may have had a point if the were using WW1 tactics the very first tanks were more of large slow moving pill boxes designed to break through no mans land and fortifications even the German first tank the AV7 had a crew of 17. Guderian's Blitzkreg completley put paid to that idea smaller more monovrable tanks with combined arms beat the numericaly superior, better armoured and gunned Allied tanks in France 1940. Telling Hitler you are wrong was never good for your promotion prospects or life expectancy so they spent millions on this to keep him happy.

[Archie Pellagio]

Yet nobody mentions Char2 which was actually in service?

[istvan47]

Any info about II GM german 'gundam'?

 

after all, germans even projected a 150,000 t battleship and a space shuttle bomber

Edited November 5, 2012 by istvan47

[bojan]

Yet nobody mentions Char2 which was actually in service?

 

http://208.84.116.223/forums/index.php?showtopic=36791&view=findpost&p=975009

[Marcello]

The Char 2C size was driven by ditch crossing requirements. It was still of dubious practical value and its production was due to some shady deals IIRC.

That said it had thick (for then) armor, a sensible armament arrangement (long 75mm in roomy turret with commander cupola) and its weight did not exceed that of some modern MBTs.

I wonder how well railways would cope with Maus weight.

[Wobbly Head]

 

I wonder how well railways would cope with Maus weight.

 

Probably not very well even mordern tank size are determined by the rail road carrying capacity and they are maxed out at around 70-80 tonnes. The rail system of the 1940's were probably less than that. There is no doubt that if the Maus could get to the battle feild without being bombed, without a breakdown, had enough bridges that could take it's weight on the way to the battle and had enough of a supply train to keep enough feul,parts and ammo it would cause problems to the Allies.

[thekirk]

About the only doctrinal sense I could ever make out of the Maus and Ratte programs was that the Germans intended them as mobile pillboxes to be emplaced somewhere hidden on the frontier, probably actually built on site, and that they'd lay in wait for an invader...

 

Past that? I'm overdrawn at First National WTF, right now...

[Colin]

The river crossing plan involved 2 Maus’s with an electric cable going from the tank on the bank to the one crossing the river, submerged and then repeat with the other.