StuG III Thread (and also other German vehicles I guess)

[Beer]

48 minutes ago, delete013 said:

"The bottomline is that the credited claims do indeed match soviet losses on this day in general and 5th SA and 2nd GTA losses in particular."

 

@Beer You might want to read it too. It is basically how most panzer ace myths came about. Wrongly attributed kill claims and missing reports on Allied losses. The improbable story is blamed on the soldier, instead of on book writers. The same goes to Wittmann, perhaps the most slandered soldier of ww2.

 

 

Are you really comparing that with total losses of two entire armies? Get real. Tens of thousands of German soldiers contributed to those soviet losses. 

[Sturgeon]

3 hours ago, delete013 said:

I'm not sure you know what you posted. This is one of those articles, where in comments, critical mass dismantles tankarchives. He provides a good answer to Körner's mistery. The latter only claimed 11 tanks and 39 possible. Secondary sources then misinterpreted it. But in the words of critical mass:

 

"The bottomline is that the credited claims do indeed match soviet losses on this day in general and 5th SA and 2nd GTA losses in particular."

 

@Beer You might want to read it too. It is basically how most panzer ace myths came about. Wrongly attributed kill claims and missing reports on Allied losses. The improbable story is blamed on the soldier, instead of on book writers. The same goes to Wittmann, perhaps the most slandered soldier of ww2.

 

 

Truly your retardation knows no bounds.

[Sturgeon]

Karl Korner using the cosmic power of the universe to claim all 200+ kills on the front for the day, 19 April, 1945 (colourised):

 

[TokyoMorose]

10 hours ago, delete013 said:

The key to that report is that artillery can damage drive train and that recovery was usually impossible. Allied tanks featured similar problems if hit by artilley, only that German artillery wasn't much present in the west.

 

Or is it because Körner was in a tiger B?

 

I apologize for reading the Tiger B as JT (I was very, very tired) - not that the Tiger B was known for having really any better mobility. And if he, good boy that he is, was following orders by this point in the war - his Tiger B wouldn't be carrying much more ammo than a JT. With the turret stowage verboten, he gets only 48 rounds per tank.

 

And since this is a *tank* unit and not a *TD* unit, it means that a good chunk of his ammo is gonna be HE which is not going to do much to the IS-2s frontally to say the least. And even with 48 rounds of AP, with every shot a killing hit, *you still don't have enough ammo for all of the kills he claimed*. This is far and away the logically hardest argument in favor of him talking shit - it is physically impossible for them to have knocked out more tanks than they had ammo for.

 

And yes, Artillery can cause immense problems - often of the 'oh god the front plate caved in' sort the ML-20 was famous for. But you'll note he didn't claim artillery knocked out the tanks, just that somehow it only broke track links and final drives. Track links are somewhat understandable as pressure and shrapnel from near bursts can blow off links - but the final drive is such a tiny target that is covered from most angles that nobody else in the war recalls final drives being destroyed by arty to be an issue. You don't even see other Panther/JgPanther units trying to blame arty for their final drives exploding.

[delete013]

10 hours ago, TokyoMorose said:

 

I apologize for reading the Tiger B as JT (I was very, very tired) - not that the Tiger B was known for having really any better mobility. And if he, good boy that he is, was following orders by this point in the war - his Tiger B wouldn't be carrying much more ammo than a JT. With the turret stowage verboten, he gets only 48 rounds per tank.

Full capacity of the production model was 84. Without rear turret stock, 68. Plus what they can store elsewhere. Plus what others can give him. Better go back to sleep.

 

10 hours ago, TokyoMorose said:

And since this is a *tank* unit and not a *TD* unit, it means that a good chunk of his ammo is gonna be HE which is not going to do much to the IS-2s frontally to say the least. And even with 48 rounds of AP, with every shot a killing hit, *you still don't have enough ammo for all of the kills he claimed*. This is far and away the logically hardest argument in favor of him talking shit - it is physically impossible for them to have knocked out more tanks than they had ammo for.

Considering the treat, they likely put more AP shells that HE. But unless we have some testimony, I can't say for sure.

 

10 hours ago, TokyoMorose said:

And yes, Artillery can cause immense problems - often of the 'oh god the front plate caved in' sort the ML-20 was famous for. But you'll note he didn't claim artillery knocked out the tanks, just that somehow it only broke track links and final drives. Track links are somewhat understandable as pressure and shrapnel from near bursts can blow off links - but the final drive is such a tiny target that is covered from most angles that nobody else in the war recalls final drives being destroyed by arty to be an issue. You don't even see other Panther/JgPanther units trying to blame arty for their final drives exploding.

The report doesn't say that there were no other causes. But enough to get mentioned. Smth which very likely happened considering the availability and reliance of WAllies on artillery. This artillery was mostly indirect l that rarely hit the vehicle directly. Hence, k.o. is a matter of interpretation. Mobility kill, I guess.

Almost all failed German armoured attacks that Americans casually attribute to their skill and tanks were stopped this way. With many many many artillery shells (or by CAS). This usually had two important effects, destruction or retreat of German infantry and damaging of tanks. After the artillery finished, US tanks and infantry shot up what was left on the field. This includes a lot of immobilised and abandoned vehicles then appearing as kill claims, which is understandable. The only direct fire unit that likely did destroy many manned German tanks were TDs, because they were a dedicated defensive weapon with a single task of waiting in the back for panzer breakthroughs and placed on potential venues of attacks.

[delete013]

12 hours ago, Sturgeon said:

Karl Korner using the cosmic power of the universe to claim all 200+ kills on the front for the day, 19 April, 1945 (colourised):

 

And apparently, it is all true! Ahaha, this backfired spectacularly.

[delete013]

15 hours ago, Beer said:

 

Are you really comparing that with total losses of two entire armies? Get real. Tens of thousands of German soldiers contributed to those soviet losses. 

You never read the whole thing, eh?

[delete013]

16 hours ago, Toxn said:

You're ignoring the part where critical mass founds his argument on the Soviet losses of that entire part of the front for that day, then elides his way into the two numbers being similar and that therefore Korner's account is somehow legit.

 

Peter goes into this at length.

No, critical mass specifically states that Körner hadn'tdestroyed all 100 T-34s, nor did he claim them. Claims and losses are for the entire Heeresgruppe Weichsel and mostly 1st Belorussian front of which most (not all) can be attiributed to Panzerabteilung 503, considering the location of units. Critical mass also mentions that Soviet reports indicate mostly "projectile hits", hence the long 8,8 the most probable candidate. Unless he messed up primary sources is this a very solid explanation of the situation. 

[Sturgeon]

2 hours ago, delete013 said:

And apparently, it is all true! Ahaha, this backfired spectacularly.

 

At this point, you're so retarded that you're taking the idea of a teleporting anime death tank seriously.

[Sturgeon]

1 hour ago, delete013 said:

No, critical mass specifically states that Körner hadn'tdestroyed all 100 T-34s, nor did he claim them. Claims and losses are for the entire Heeresgruppe Weichsel and mostly 1st Belorussian front of which most (not all) can be attiributed to Panzerabteilung 503, considering the location of units. Critical mass also mentions that Soviet reports indicate mostly "projectile hits", hence the long 8,8 the most probable candidate. Unless he messed up primary sources is this a very solid explanation of the situation. 

 

When you die, please donate your brain to science.

[Bronezhilet]

2 hours ago, delete013 said:

No, critical mass specifically states that Körner hadn'tdestroyed all 100 T-34s, nor did he claim them. Claims and losses are for the entire Heeresgruppe Weichsel and mostly 1st Belorussian front of which most (not all) can be attiributed to Panzerabteilung 503, considering the location of units. Critical mass also mentions that Soviet reports indicate mostly "projectile hits", hence the long 8,8 the most probable candidate. Unless he messed up primary sources is this a very solid explanation of the situation. 

Ah yes, "hit by projectile" a surefire way to determine the cause of destruction to be the 'long 8,8' since that thing is unique in the sense that it's the only thing on the battlefield that fires projectiles!

 

The rest of the guns fire... what exactly?

[Toxn]

2 hours ago, delete013 said:

No, critical mass specifically states that Körner hadn'tdestroyed all 100 T-34s, nor did he claim them. Claims and losses are for the entire Heeresgruppe Weichsel and mostly 1st Belorussian front of which most (not all) can be attiributed to Panzerabteilung 503, considering the location of units. Critical mass also mentions that Soviet reports indicate mostly "projectile hits", hence the long 8,8 the most probable candidate. Unless he messed up primary sources is this a very solid explanation of the situation. 

Which is of course why Soviet forces in the area overran the position that that unit was based at and then complained about anti-tank guns and panzerfausts.

 

It all makes perfect sense so long as you ascribe every single lost vehicle to tigers that can magically shift position by 100km.

[delete013]

56 minutes ago, Bronezhilet said:

Ah yes, "hit by projectile" a surefire way to determine the cause of destruction to be the 'long 8,8' since that thing is unique in the sense that it's the only thing on the battlefield that fires projectiles!

 

The rest of the guns fire... what exactly?

The point of that classification is to exclude Panzerfausts. Sure, there were other cannons too. Let's ask here, what are the best AT tools at hand? I believe they are Tiger Bs. This on its own wouldn't be enough, but critical mass matched their location with those of the affected Soviet units and that is a credible motive.

[Jeeps_Guns_Tanks]

You have to wonder why it's so important to Delete, that these Nazi Propaganda victories be true, it's weird.  Who white knights for the Nazis these days? 

[Jeeps_Guns_Tanks]

2 hours ago, Sturgeon said:

 

When you die, please donate your brain to science.

 

 

As if they would have anything to look at!

 

 

[Beer]

I wonder what's the point of this obsession with propaganda-driven made-up stats of several individuals leaving the other millions of common German soldiers looking like a useless inept crowd. That applies twice more if those individuals are hardcore nazi from SS. That's not only weird but also rather sick fetish. 

 

[delete013]

47 minutes ago, Toxn said:

Which is of course why Soviet forces in the area overran the position that that unit was based at and then complained about anti-tank guns and panzerfausts.

Error in secondary sources.

Quote

Though this article went so far in claiming that nothing happened on 19th of April in the area and that´s not any better than what secondary accounts made out of the events,...

...

Yet they [Germans] made one local counter attack and significantly delayed the main progress.

...

This is important because the regulations required losses to be notified within two days. The revised document can therefore be considered as reliable for information of the reporting period.

...

It appears that the 5th Shock Army recorded 175 tanks/SPG knocked out until apr. 20th, of which 84 were IS-2 Heavy tanks. Total write offs for IS-2 were 32 with 24 more heavy tanks send to medium time repair. Considering that on the evening of the 18th, the two units reported 48 and 50 operational IS-2, it´s possible to reasonably deduce that at least 31 of these heavy tank knock outs occured before the 19th and consequently up to 53 IS-2 heavy tank knock outs may have occuring on 19th and 20th, alone (presuming no double knock outs are present, which may be too simplistic).

Quote

The only assets east of Strausberg were the 103./503. PzAbt. (9 operational Tiger Ausf. B and 7 operational Flakpanzer with 20mm guns) reinforced by 5 StuG, some remnants of the 9th Para. infantery Div. and PzGr.Reg NORGE in reserve (some APC, mortars). It´s possible that the latter had a few 37mm or 50mm ATG.

 

47 minutes ago, Toxn said:

It all makes perfect sense so long as you ascribe every single lost vehicle to tigers that can magically shift position by 100km.

Quote

Finally, Köerner doesn´t need to be cloned to be everywhere. Prädikow, Grunow and Bollerdorf are all closeby. If You take the road it´s less than 7km from Prädikow in the north via Grunow to Bollersdorf in the south. From the platoons prepared position at the eastern edge of the Schwarzberge it´s approx. 2km to Prädikow (to the NNE) and Grunow (to the E), a bit more than 3km to Bollersdorf (to the SE). Even with detour that requires a march less than 6km for Körners group to regroup and join "NORGE"s local counterattack.

 

[Sturgeon]

21 hours ago, delete013 said:

I'm not sure you know what you posted. This is one of those articles, where in comments, critical mass dismantles tankarchives. He provides a good answer to Körner's mistery. The latter only claimed 11 tanks and 39 possible. Secondary sources then misinterpreted it. But in the words of critical mass:

 

"The bottomline is that the credited claims do indeed match soviet losses on this day in general and 5th SA and 2nd GTA losses in particular."

 

@Beer You might want to read it too. It is basically how most panzer ace myths came about. Wrongly attributed kill claims and missing reports on Allied losses. The improbable story is blamed on the soldier, instead of on book writers. The same goes to Wittmann, perhaps the most slandered soldier of ww2.

 

 

You didn't read all of that guy's comments, even:

 

"The whole story was blown out of proportion in subsequent german tertiary reception of the action, most likely due to inaccurate descriptions and lack of access to source documents. Someone started putting the whole units claim incorrectly to Körners credit and then kept on adding whatever Harrer, Diers, Schäfer, Turk, Müller et al. claimed on their own on top to arrive with a new unit claim. And instead of "for no losses", I have hard evidence to confirm that four TIGER Ausf. B were total write offs on this day (two caught by artillery or Katyusha barrage, one to side penetration and another one abandoned and not recovered) and two further tanks received sufficient damage to forcing their pre-emptive retreat."

 

So in other words, it's fiction.

[delete013]

4 minutes ago, Sturgeon said:

 

You didn't read all of that guy's comments, even:

 

"The whole story was blown out of proportion in subsequent german tertiary reception of the action, most likely due to inaccurate descriptions and lack of access to source documents. Someone started putting the whole units claim incorrectly to Körners credit and then kept on adding whatever Harrer, Diers, Schäfer, Turk, Müller et al. claimed on their own on top to arrive with a new unit claim. And instead of "for no losses", I have hard evidence to confirm that four TIGER Ausf. B were total write offs on this day (two caught by artillery or Katyusha barrage, one to side penetration and another one abandoned and not recovered) and two further tanks received sufficient damage to forcing their pre-emptive retreat."

 

So in other words, it's fiction

What is fiction is Körner alone and 100 kills. That is also what I deemed unbelievable, if you recall. German army never claimed that and the point of that article and Beer's post was to prove that it did, is therefore untrustworthy. I don't care what propaganda or post-war writers said. You can call them biased, but not the German army. Facts were wrongly interpreted but the core of the story is real = extraordinary damage dealt by a few tigers and that the actual claims are credible.

[Lord_James]

4 hours ago, delete013 said:

Soviet reports indicate mostly "projectile hits", hence the long 8,8 the most probable candidate.

Yes, because the kraut’s had only 88mm guns in their arsenal... 

 

No 

Other 

Common

AT guns

[delete013]

10 minutes ago, Lord_James said:

Yes, because the kraut’s had only 88mm guns in their arsenal... 

 

No 

Other 

Common

AT guns

The man went so far to check the composition and equipment of the units involved:

Quote

Notice that there was no Panzerjäger platoon employed. Towed ATG (75mm up) were further south near Buckow and north in direction Eberswalde.
The only assets east of Strausberg were the 103./503. PzAbt. (9 operational Tiger Ausf. B and 7 operational Flakpanzer with 20mm guns) reinforced by 5 StuG, some remnants of the 9th Para. infantery Div. and PzGr.Reg NORGE in reserve (some APC, mortars). It´s possible that the latter had a few 37mm or 50mm ATG.

Brilliant work.

[delete013]

5 minutes ago, Jeeps_Guns_Tanks said:

You have to wonder why it's so important to Delete, that these Nazi Propaganda victories be true, it's weird.  Who white knights for the Nazis these days? 

My primary goal in such historical analysis is the truth. This case is especially interesting because a proper analysis is new to me and because it appears to be one of those beleaguered "myths".

It is exciting to know that certain people of the past were capable of such performance against impossible odds, in times, where individuals became but insignificant gears in the machinery of industrial warfare. It is very unfortunate that they gave their best for a perfide regime, but those are some of the finest feats in the recorded military history.

[Lord_James]

1 hour ago, delete013 said:

but those are some of the finest feats in the recorded military history.

 

wait a fucking second... 

 

1 hour ago, delete013 said:

What is fiction is Körner alone and 100 kills. That is also what I deemed unbelievable

 

 

what the fuck are you arguing then?!

[Sturgeon]

2 hours ago, delete013 said:

What is fiction is Körner alone and 100 kills. That is also what I deemed unbelievable, if you recall. German army never claimed that and the point of that article and Beer's post was to prove that it did, is therefore untrustworthy. I don't care what propaganda or post-war writers said. You can call them biased, but not the German army. Facts were wrongly interpreted but the core of the story is real = extraordinary damage dealt by a few tigers and that the actual claims are credible.

 

Wriggling out of it only works if the fisher doesn't have a fork, you spineless agnathan.

[Sturgeon]

On 4/20/2021 at 9:31 AM, delete013 said:

I also think these numbers are extreme. I'm not sure historians are clear on what happened there. To my info Körner encountered dozens of tanks rearming and refueling in a counter attack. There he could have begged many. I would never choose such unclear case to prove some point.

 

First, it's "unclear" whether Korner's tank could have teleported behind the enemy bagging hundreds of them, now you're saying it's "fiction" - which was Beer's whole point you were attempting to refute!