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Ww2 Infantry - Fire Support?


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Did they have two-pounders when the Matilda I was being built?

 

The Matilda I had overhead cover and was a good deal more resistant to AT fire than a carrier. Armament was light, but arguably not much worse than a two-pounder, especially as they didn't have HE ammo for them when the Matilda I was front-line kit.

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Cha!!!!

It would not be a direct replacement, just a better use of funds, the Matilda I was useless. A 2pdr mounted on a lightly armoured chassis would be very useful as part of a light tank regiment, where it could support advances or withdrawals of the light tanks which had at max a Boyes or .5 HMG. having a organic AT troop that could keep up and deploy quickly (something the trailed 2pdr was not known for) would have been far more useful than a heavy tank with exposed running gear and no main gun.

Keep in mind the light tank squadrons had no large gun and would be outgunned vs PzII's or PzIII

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The Matilda I wasn't supposed to support light tanks. It was supposed to support the infantry. It could also be used as a [slow] cruiser, in which case it was not much less well armed than a Pz. I and much better armoured. Note that they didn't make very many of them anyway and replaced them with much better tanks as soon as they were available. I'm also not sure that they were much more expensive, if at all, than carriers. I suspect too that if they had the money to buy more than a handful of vehicles, they'd probably have been able to afford something much better than the 140 A11 Infantry Tanks actually built.

 

Now, an SP 2 pdr in support of the recce regiments might not have been a bad idea. There was an AT troop of portee 2 pounders (later towed 6 pounders) in those units once they had enough to go round. Note, though, that a gun stuck on top of a carrier is an assault gun is not an assault gun. It's not much different from the portee guns in terms of protection and depending on terrain, not much different in mobility.

 

 

 

Edit: missed the word "not" in "is not an assault gun " which rather changes the meaning.

Edited by R011
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It brings to mind a lightly armored tracked portee in my mind as well. With the problem that the gun crew itself don't have any benefit of armor save for the gunshield. Their ride must have been something else unless they were to ride in an accompanying carrier with additional ammo?

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The Australian Army basically answered the availability of the Carrier with a 2pdr by not using them.

 

So if the intended user was not interested, recognising the difficulties and impracticalities, then why would they be of use to anyone else?

 

Actually the vehicle that this most reminds me of is the M6 GMC. The 4X4 3/4 ton truck with the 37mm gun with shield mounted on it, and we all know just how successful that was.

 

The other interesting concept was the mounting of the guns and shields from the M6 GMC on some US half tracks, of similar concept to the Sd.Kfz. 251/10 - Schützenpanzerwagen (3.7 cm PaK).

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Well, there's also the timing. By the time it came round OQF 2 Pounder was rather well beyond useful life as an anti-tank gun. The setup on a stretched 4 road wheel chassis with more space for 2 gun crew and perhaps some side/rear armor that folded down into a deck (like the Mobelwagon) might have been useful if available in '40-41. But later than that...not so much.

Day late and a pound short...

Edited by rmgill
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What annoys me is they experimented with stuff like this before WWII, it was clear the light tanks were undergunned, getting something to help them would a far better use of funds. To be fair I would buy more Matilda II's then these if I could or have Vicker 6 tons built. price was around 4500 UK pounds, not sure of the cost of the Matilda I was.

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It brings to mind a lightly armored tracked portee in my mind as well. With the problem that the gun crew itself don't have any benefit of armor save for the gunshield. Their ride must have been something else unless they were to ride in an accompanying carrier with additional ammo?

That's because that is what it is. It was intended to be a purpose built portee with greater mobility and a better field of fire. It is supposed to carry 14 boxes of 8 rounds each, so 112 rounds in total, and the crew is on board. Either maybe something like this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xk5XDSx7h0s or there are 3 fold-down seats just behind the transverse bulkhead, you can just see one in the video under the gun barrel.

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The Matilda I was sort of a waste but then it was supposed to do a different job. Pretty much the same job that the old French FT 17 did and that the Renault R-35 did.

 

A bigger waste were the almost 1700 Vickers light tank MK VI which sucked up a large part of the tank budget for not much actual combat value, Granted they may have been good for recon (and training) but with only about 600 cruiser tanks built by the end of 1940 ( and only 79 of them before Sept 1939) that is a LOT of recon for very little real striking power.

 

In 1939/40 the 2pdr was one of the better AT guns around as far as ballistics goes, the carriage was over weight and expensive (but offered 360 degree traverse). Only the French 47mm SA 37 was much better.

 

As I have said before the 2pdr was also hobbled by the British tendency to go cheap on the ammo. Few people seem to talk about how bad the German 37mm gun was (notice how quickly it was replaced? Germans were working on replacements well before the war started). The 2pdr could penetrate at 2000yds what the German 37mm did at 1000 meters or more practically, could penetrate at 1000 yds what the 37mm did at 100 meters. It also pretty much matched the German short 50mm gun in the MK III tanks.

The British were just a lot late providing capped shot to deal with the face hardened German armor and HE shells.

 

Better choices in ammunition production would have gone a long way in equalizing things rather than trying to make trick vehicles.

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Well, Mk VIC with BESA was kinda on par with Pz II, but probably worse used.

 

Ammo trouble were real, connected with IIRC pretty slow reaction to German tanks (taking long to find the use of FHA etc.)

 

One thing that is a bit puzzling is why Brits did not go the Hungarian way - when adopting Bofors 40mm, adopting either common projectiles or even common ammunition.

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They adopted the AA gun after the AT gun. Adapting the Bofors to use 2 pounder ammo would have been more trouble than it was worth,

 

What would have been at least as useful, if not more so, would have been developing an 2 pounder HE round earlier. This would not have been difficult or time consuming and easily could have been done by 1940.

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What annoys me is they experimented with stuff like this before WWII, it was clear the light tanks were undergunned, getting something to help them would a far better use of funds. To be fair I would buy more Matilda II's then these if I could or have Vicker 6 tons built. price was around 4500 UK pounds, not sure of the cost of the Matilda I was.

 

Well, no they weren't. The Mark VI was quite adequately armed for a recce vehicle, which is what it were intended for. Note that such vehicles were routinely armed with MG's not only during the war (Dingo, Universal Carrier, de-turretted Stuarts), but as late as the seventies (Ferret, Lynx, M114, BRDM). The problem is that the British re-armed late and did not have enough cruisers or infantry tanks in 1940.

 

Had they seen the need for a sufficient number of better tanks, they'd have spent the money. They had suitable designs by 1939: the Matilda II and the Cruiser Mk.I. They simply needed to have started full-scale production six months to a year earlier. Unfortunately, they were not clairvoyant.

 

As for replacing the Mark VI with a Vickers 6 Ton or a derivative like the Soviet T-26 or Polish 7TP, those vehicles were much slower and thus less suited for recce.

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I understand the 6 tonners are not recce vehicles and the Matilda I is not either. What I am saying is that the 6 tonner or a mounted 2pdr on a carrier would have been a better use of the money tossed down the drain on the Matilda. That equipment could have been used to support light tank units or infantry. No sense having a 2 pdr SPG support the Matilda II units, better off with a mounted mortar battery on the regimental net.

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Six Tonners would have been as obsolete as the Matilda I in 1940 so there's really not much to choose between them. Besides, they only made 140 of them before replacing them with Matilda II's so it isn't as if they were some horrible, continuing drag on the armoured corps of the time. Replacing them with 140 T-26 (or Chally 2's) would have made no difference to the BEF. The few Matilda I's did a fairly good job in France, in fact.

 

As for a portee 2 pounder on a carrier chassis, that's not a tank or even a reasonable substitute for one. It's not even much better than a towed gun. It has virtually no protection and no MG.

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Yet the Germans used AT guns and tanks in close concert to good effect. considering the abundance of light tanks in the BEF, a back up screen of AT guns that were mobile enough to work with the tanks would have helped greatly. Who knows what might have stopped the Germans, there was a lot of nervousness in the German high command, another couple of setbacks might have caused them to stop and consolidate. the British later use of Portee's showed that there was a need for more mobile AT guns, which really was not answered till much later. Also for a 1937-1940 the 6 tonner was not that obsolete and certainly capable of taking on most of the German armour of the time.

 

the Brits were on to the idea in 1933, even if they didn't have the right guns.

http://www.jedsite.info/tanks-sierra/sierra/six-ton_series/dragon4-pom/dragon4pom-intro.html

Edited by Colin
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Given the British shortage of AT guns in 1940, it really doesn't make much difference if the guns you do not have were supposed to be SP or not. At any rate, they needed tanks, even obsolescent ones like the Matilda I, much more than they needed SP guns.

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They adopted the AA gun after the AT gun. Adapting the Bofors to use 2 pounder ammo would have been more trouble than it was worth,

 

What would have been at least as useful, if not more so, would have been developing an 2 pounder HE round earlier. This would not have been difficult or time consuming and easily could have been done by 1940.

 

It was not the development of an HE round for the 2pdr that was the problem, it was its adoption and issue that held things up. It was the Shell HE Mk 2T with base percussion fuze No 243, which was the same HE shell as used by the 40mm 'pompom, of course with a different cartridge.

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It was not the development of an HE round for the 2pdr that was the problem, it was its adoption and issue that held things up. It was the Shell HE Mk 2T with base percussion fuze No 243, which was the same HE shell as used by the 40mm 'pompom, of course with a different cartridge.

 

 

Oh, I quite agree. They could easily have had 2 pounder HE in 1940 if they had wanted it.

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It would, if anything it is 1.5mm narrower. So use 40mm Bofors projectiles, install driving bands and put them to 2pdr cases. FFS, Soviets adopted 37mm AA gun HE projectiles to fit 2pdr cases by installing driving bands on them. Same for Germans and 76mm ATG that used 75mm ammo with additional driving bands.

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They adopted the AA gun after the AT gun. Adapting the Bofors to use 2 pounder ammo would have been more trouble than it was worth,

 

What would have been at least as useful, if not more so, would have been developing an 2 pounder HE round earlier. This would not have been difficult or time consuming and easily could have been done by 1940.

 

It was not the development of an HE round for the 2pdr that was the problem, it was its adoption and issue that held things up. It was the Shell HE Mk 2T with base percussion fuze No 243, which was the same HE shell as used by the 40mm 'pompom, of course with a different cartridge.

 

Wasn't the Royal Artillery rather vehemently opposed to anyone but themselves using HE?

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It would, if anything it is 1.5mm narrower. So use 40mm Bofors projectiles, install driving bands and put them to 2pdr cases. FFS, Soviets adopted 37mm AA gun HE projectiles to fit 2pdr cases by installing driving bands on them. Same for Germans and 76mm ATG that used 75mm ammo with additional driving bands.

 

I take it you mean as a field mod as they did have a shell that would fit with few, if any modification for factory produced rounds.

 

I know the British did something similar to German 75 mm rounds to fit them in the 75 mm guns of American Lee and Grant tanks and I think the Australians did something like this to their two-pounders in the Pacific?

 

I wonder why the British didn't do it for two-pounder rounds in North Africa.

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