Explanation: A great deal of popular mythology has grown up around the Nazi Tiger tank in WW2, especially in comparison to the main American tank of the later war, the Sherman tank. Thing is, while the Tiger tank was a massive and dangerous beast, it was also hyperspecialized for tank-on-tank combat, which means accounts of Allied tankers going “Oh God oh fuck it’s a fucking Tiger” are not fully representative of the actual wisdom of the Tiger’s design and deployment. In reality, the Tiger was unreliable and maintenance-heavy, slow, and not particularly survivable - Tiger losses were, as the graph shows, nearly total. And of those losses, German tankers were not particularly likely to survive the loss of their tank - 80%+ of crew of destroyed German tanks were kaput.
By contrast, the Sherman was an excellent multipurpose tank which could support infantry and fight toe-to-toe with enemy armor when necessary. But, in general, we Americans preferred to let specialized, fast-moving tank destroyers and airpower to do the lifting on destroying enemy tanks. Perhaps more importantly to tankers, the survivability of the Sherman was the reverse of German tanks - the Sherman was built with escape of the crew in mind (and repairability of the vehicle, for that matter), meaning 80%+ of the crew of destroyed Sherman tanks survived, and the tank itself was often repaired and returned to combat in a matter of weeks as well.
Lend-Lease tanks are counted as all destroyed just to demonstrate the point - Lend-Lease tanks were largely in the hands of the Soviets, who considered it a comparable tank to the T-34, but didn’t keep exact records on combat losses of the Sherman. Even if 100% of them were destroyed, as the graph shows, the dreaded Tiger still doesn’t come out looking too great in comparison to the comfy compartments of a Sherman!
I don’t have the time to do a full write up with a lot of sourcing, but I wanted to specifically address:
Allied tankers going “Oh God oh fuck it’s a fucking Tiger”
Tiger panic means that that are far more stories and legends of combat against Tigers than likely actually happened. Eye witnesses are terrible, not because they knowingly lie but because people have a tendency to fill in gaps with presumptions and then dig in their heels when questioned because they feel affronted if they feel like they are being called liars. Most soldiers are not technical experts. A big boxy German tank is a Tiger as far as some panicked crew is concerned.
(This is going to be true for many wars. I believe the U.S. “confirmed” more air to ground kills on North Vietnamese vehicles by 2x or 3x than the North Vietnamese actually had total.)
But, in general, we Americans preferred to let specialized, fast-moving tank destroyers
For what it’s worth, the idea of tank destroyers as we knew them in WW2 didn’t really pan out on a doctrinally sustainable level. In the post war dedicated tank destroyers and tanks were largely rolled into one vehicle. The unsung hero of WW2 armored combat was that lowly anti-armor gun. These are not as bombastic as an armor on armor fight, but they were widespread and got the job done.
Edit/add:
Really good video that breaks down American, Russian, and German tank production during WW2. The takeaway is that America started out in the best circumstances for production with experience in mass production, many industries which could be used for sub-assembly, and the country not being under direct attack. The U.S. created a centralized body to considered new or altered vehicles and while this was slower than field commanders would have liked, it meant production of different vehicles was sustainable. U.S. vehicles had priority size, weight, and design considerations because everything they were using was being shipped.
The Soviets had a large population but were not nearly as industrialized. They did see the wisdom of the U.S. production methods and adapted them, though with heavy consideration of train logistics and having to defend the factories. The T-34 (especially wartime production) really a great tank, but it is the best they could have feasibly produced and they stuck to their decision. The Germans famously created an emergency panel after encountering T-34s. Clearly the T-34 was good enough to rattle and serious undermine morale of forces which probably expected nearly no Soviet armor, and then only inter-war designs. A design able to stand up in any way and produced in numbers was quite a shock.
The Germans did not have strong centralized board for designs and there was a lot of direct communication between military leaders and factories. This lead to pet projects and pet design adjusts slowing down the already slow production rates. Features like Zimmerit were added out of some sort of need for perfection, for example. German tank production was more old fashioned craftsmanship than assembly line, making it terribly slow and meaning damage took longer to repair .
That’s impossible to see the tiger data. How can you compare it!?
Not that many tigers were made, lots of other German world war 2 tanks
