Welcome to War and Tactics! War and Tactics Forum is currently undergoing some modifications that might disable features you are used to. This is unabvoidable as we have to update the forum engine to a new structure that is incompatible with many of the features we had used so far. The good news: WaT will be more secure and stable, and most of the features we uninstalled will be a natural part of the new structure anyway. For the rest we will be looking for solutions. (APR 23, 2018)
The 504th was the second Tiger unit to be sent to Tunisia. It was issued 25 PzKpfw III plus two Panzerbefehlswagen Tiger in January, and 18 Tigers, comprising the battalion staff, workshop company, and 1st tank company arrived in Tunisia on 12 March 1943. The 2nd company remained in Sicily. The tank company had four platoons, each with two Tiger I tanks and two Pzkpw III support tanks. All of the sPzAbt 504 Tigers were destroyed or captured. The surviving elements surrendered on 12 May 1943.
On 13 April 1943, the OKH ordered that six Tigers were to be stationed on Sicily and that until transferred to Tunisia, the 2.Kompanie/ schwere Panzer Abteilung 504 was to be attached to PzAbt 215 with a reinforced platoon of six Tigers being immediately shipped to Sicily. Altogether 17 Tigers gathered on Sicily: the original nine from 2.Kompanie of the 504th, two Tigers that had been used as replacements for the 501st in February, and the six Tigers issued in April 1943 for the 215th.
Attached to Panzer Division Herrmann Goering, the 17 Tigers under the 2.Kompanie of the 504th attacked the American landing zone on 11 July 1943, but were neutralized by naval gunfire. Within the first three days ten out of the 17 Tigers were destroyed to prevent capture and a further six Tigers were destroyed later for the same reason. The last Tiger was shipped back across the straits of Messina to Italy.
sPzAbt 504 spent the rest of the war in Italy. The battalion was rebuilt with a full three company organization, with additional personnel from PzAbt. 18. The unit trained in Germany, and when it returned to Italy, was assigned to support 17th SS PzGren. Div. Goetz Von Berlichingen. Its first action in Italy was in support of the 362nd Inf. Div. in the containment of the Allied advance up the Italian coast following the Anzio landing. sPzAbt 504 saw a great deal of action in the Italian campaign, including the Arno river campaign and the defense of northern Italy. In 1944, in the Vienna area, sPzAbt 504 was partly re-equipped with Tiger II Ausf Bs. The battalion surrendered at the end of the war, along with other German units in Italy.
Service in Afrika
Schwere Panzer Abteilung 504 (s.Pz.Abt.504) was the second Tiger Battalion to be assigned to Tunisia. (s.Pz.Abt.501 was already in Tunisia and operating against the allies.)
In February 1943 the s.Pz.Abt.504 was advised that its 1st Company would be going to Tunisia, and their Tigers were equipped for tropical duty. Because of the training time and delays in the delivery of vehicles and equipment, the ill-fated 1st Company did not begin to move until the end of February of 1943. From March 6 to April 16th the s.Pz.Abt.504 was ferried across to Tunisia on motorized lighters, with no losses in transit. Some were unloaded at Bizerta and the rest at Tunis.
25 PzKpfw III, two Panzerbefehlswagen Tigers and 18 Tigers I’s (comprising the battalion staff, workshop company, and 1st tank company together with the commander of the Battalion, Major August Seidensticker) arrived. The tank company had four platoons, each with two Tiger I tanks and two Pzkpfw III support tanks.
Upon arrival the commander of 504 learned that the 501 was without a commander and only 11 of the 501’s Tigers remained serviceable. It was therefore decided to incorporate the 501 Tigers and their remaining PzKpfw.IIIs and PzKpfw.IVs into the 504 since only 3 of the 504 Tigers were ready for action around the time of March 10th. Gen.von Arnim then ordered the merged battalion south to the Maknassy pass area in support of Kampfgruppe Lang.
On March 20 they moved west to intercept American forces attempting to break through to the sea and claimed 44 tanks of 9th Armored Division. These would be some of the last victories for the newly combined 1st Company 504 battalion.
Because of situation in Tunisia getting worse, the 2nd Company s.Pz.Abt.504 was retained in Sicily. All of the 1st Company s.Pz.Abt.504 Tigers were destroyed or captured. The First Tiger to be captured by the allies came from this unit. The surviving elements surrendered on 12 May 1943, only 60 short days from their arrival.
Chiba Tank School 14th Division Tank Unit 2nd Independent Tankette Company 5th Independent Engineer Regiment 3rd Mobile Infantry Regiment 2nd Mobile Artillery Regiment 2nd Tank Division Anti-Tank Gun Unit 2nd Tank Division Engineer Unit 1st Tank Division Air Defense Unit
The marks painted on Japanese armors are mainly unit insignia and personal insignia. Insignia of the nation or the army were seldom painted in IJA armors. (SNLF tanks were painted with anchor mark or naval ensign as the IJN insignia)
The personal insignia are not explained in detail, but they are mostly Japanese words expressing loyalty, courage or place names of Japan.
This site has insignia for:
1st Tank Regiment 4th Tank Regiment 5th Tank Regiment 6th Tank Regiment 7th Tank Regiment 8th Tank Regiment 9th Tank Regiment 10th Tank Regiment 11th Tank Regiment 13th Tank Regiment 14th Tank Regiment 17th Tank Regiment 23rd Tank Regiment 26th Tank Regiment 34th Tank Regiment
There is no question that the US has a different attitude, concerning all things firearms, than the rest of the world.
My Grandfather was a gun smith. I was given my first gun as a Christmas present when I was 10. I was expected to be responsible for all things concerning that weapon.
When I went hunting it was up to me to contact the land owner. It was my responsibility to use good judgement with it. I had access to dozens of weapons from age 10 on. My Grandfather had a large collection of firearms. Many of them military weapons. I've shot several types of WWII firearms from various nations. While in the service I shot more military type of weapons including machine guns.
The issue is that I've yet to kill my first person and no gun I've ever owned has killed a person. Nor did the weapons I was issued in the military ever kill a person while they are assigned to me.
That's why so many Americans are quick to point out that guns don't kill people. People kill people.
There are literally millions of gun owners in the US and only a very small percentage of those every use a fire arm in a fashion that is not responsible.
In the US I would think that gun ownership is broken down into something like this:
80% for hunting. Very few automatic weapons or pistols in that group. Most owned by people in rural areas.
15% for personal defense. Not counting those who own guns primarily for hunting, because those can be used in self defense as well, but just talking about those who own the gun specifically for self defense. Most of these people live in urban areas. These include a lot of hand guns. Some assault weapons and shot guns.
5% for personal freedoms from the government. This group is very heavily armed and has large supplies of ammunition and multiple weapons of large caliber and military style assault weapons.
As I said before the US is a very different society when it comes to gun ownership.
The issue is not the gun ownership. It's what happens when someone that is mentally unstable gets a gun and wants to use it for a violent purpose. I'm not sure what the answer is but making schools something other than defenseless has got to happen. Whatever it takes, we have to make it so dangerous for a shooter that they choose another target. The last 2 shootings have been with guns the shooters didn't buy or own. Tighter restrictions wouldn't have stopped them from happening. The last one was against firemen. They shoot at people that can't shoot back then when police respond they kill themselves.
Not sure what the answer is. It's not a simple problem to solve.
Here is how most people feel about what happened in Connecticut.
I didn't write this but it seems to be the pervasive feeling in the country at the moment.
I've been giving the "gun ban law" some thought, and here it is: this person steals guns, (WHICH IS AGAINST THE LAW), shoots and kills his own mother (WHICH IS AGAINST THE LAW), transports these guns loaded (WHICH IS AGAINST THE LAW), brings guns onto school property (WHICH IS AGAINST THE LAW), breaks into the school (WHICH IS AGAINST THE LAW), discharges the weapons within city limits (WHICH IS AGAINST THE LAW), murders 26 people (WHICH IS AGAINST THE LAW), and commits suicide (WHICH IS AGAINST THE LAW).
And there are people in this country that somehow think passing another ANOTHER LAW banning guns would protect us from someone like this. If you haven't noticed, people like this are not concerned about breaking laws - they only care about fulfilling their own twisted agenda. The only people that a gun ban law would impact are the LAW ABIDING CITIZENS, which will only serve to cripple the ability to protect ourselves.
Petitions mean nothing. All 50 states petitioned to leave the US after Obama was reelected. Means nothing.
That's an example of a peaceful protest. They know he's not going to be expelled for saying what he thinks.
One of the things that concerns me about the US at the moment is how polarized the country is getting. There seems to be no middle ground. No place for compromise any more.
All I'm saying Koen, is your statement was inflammatory. That you could have said the exact same thing, without the rhetoric, and gotten your point across without possibly alienating some people at the same time.
The problem is that this is the United States we are talking about here. Not some other country.
People buy guns for 3 reasons.
1) For hunting. 2) For self protection. 3) For protection against the government.
A large part of the population hunts.
In the United States any citizen is capable of taking the law into their own hands. Anyone can make a citizens arrest. That includes the right to defend one's life, limb and property. Most Americans will take care of an issue on their own property if they can before calling the police.
This is the United States. This country was born out of a revolt against a repressive government. They have never forgotten that and the lessons of an unarmed civilian population continue daily. Egypt, Libya, Syria...all unarmed and having to have somebody else give them weapons so they can defend themselves from their own government.
You will not diminish the right of gun owners in the US. Since you can't do that, then what can you do? That's the question that they still haven't answered.
1) You must take soft targets like schools off the easy access list. However you do it schools must not be first on the list of undefended targets where the people are not armed. Notice that shooters don't go to places where the people are armed and can defend themselves. They go where there are defenseless people or in this case defenseless children.
2) There needs to be more mental health care. If you notice, rarely is the shooter what anyone would call a stable person, that just got upset and started shooting people. No, the shooters are, for the most part, mentally unbalanced.
Since the November elections, individuals from all 50 states have filed petitions to secede from the union. Some of those have reached the 25,000-signature threshold, including petitions from Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, North Carolina, Tennessee and Texas. (Notice a trend?) No word yet from the White House on whether any of these Southern states will be fending for themselves anytime soon.
Petitions were filed in all 50 states. That would obviously include the Southern states....notice a trend?
Yes, Koen identified it correctly. It's not a 251 series half track, those were basically armored personnel carriers, but the SdKfz series with the flak gun mounted on the rear.
The volcano destroyed more of the 340th Bombardment Group's aircraft (estimates vary between 78 and 88) than the devastating German Luftwaffe air raid of the 340th base at Alesani, Corsica on May 13, 1944 (about 75 aircraft). At Pompeii Airfield on March 23, 1944 nearly all of the 340th's B-25 Mitchell medium bombers were covered with hot ash that burned the fabric control surfaces, glazed, melted, or cracked the Plexiglass, and even tipped some B-25s onto their tails from the weight of the ash and tephra.
No lives were lost at Pompeii Airfield and the only casualties in the 340th were a sprained wrist and a few cuts, but the effects of the volcano on the aircraft proved insurmountable despite a major effort by the 12th Air Force to repair and salvage the damaged planes.
In an effort to cut costs the US Navy announced today that it is seeking to sell the Marine Corps to the Army.
Out of Washington D.C. this shocking news was learned from an anonymous source within the Department of the Navy. According to the source, the Navy is faced with a $500-Billion dollar operating budget cost and frankly, “the Navy just can’t afford to have Marines anymore when it comes down to either Marines or no ships to put the Marines on.”
The current deal is calling for all Marines to seemlessly transition from Marine to Soldier during fiscal year 2014. It is not clear if the Marines will be fully integrated or retain their specific qualities and unique skill sets.
Our Navy source says, “it just makes sense to do this at this time; they have much more in common with Soldiers than Sailors – they say Oorah, Soldiers say Hooah; I think they will do just fine together.”
Russia is the first to be switching to a uniform combat platform in three major types of ground vehicles, which will presumably make them easier and cheaper to build and maintain, while their modular design will allow to develop different systems, depending on their purpose. The first platforms of this kind of modular design will be produced in two to three years.
Russia’s Defense Ministry has approved the design of a new heavy crawler platform for the Russian armed forces, says Major General Alexander Shevchenko, Chief of General Tank Automotive Directorate. The development of “perspective technologies” for the Russian military is now going through a major transformation. And what comes out of this can forever change the country’s army.
“Standardization can simplify both the maintenance and combat application of the military hardware, increase modularity in its design, including possible usage of versatile target modules on chassis to meet different objectives. All platforms have the so-called “open architecture” avionics to make it easier to add new systems,” says Viktor Murakhovsky, an expert on armored vehicles. “Different hardware complexes can be built on the basis of a single sighting-system node by adjusting the number of various observation channels to create a system for a combat, reconnaissance or a command vehicle.”
A new versatile armored platform, “Armata,” is expected to “set to rights” the Russian armored forces, plagued by chassis and components of every stripe. The most popular tank, the T-72, and its upgrade, the T-90, will be revamped to stay in the Russian army, except for its first-line units , which are to be equipped with the cutting-edge “Armata” by 2015 to 2025. But the T-90 won’t disappear for good as its recent modification, known as the T-90S, is in fact set to keep its export market. It was announced that the T-90S will make its reappearance at the upcoming Defexpo-2012 show in India.
The Russian armed forces will have as many as four versatile base platforms: the “Armata” crawler platform for heavy tanks, infantry fighting vehicles and other types of motorized infantry brigades weighing up to 65 tons. Among other projects are the “Kurganets-25” medium crawler platform in the 25-ton range and two wheeled platforms – a medium 25-ton and a light 10-ton platform of the “Bumerang” family.
The idea to build modular-design platforms was up in the air for quite a while. The collapse of the Soviet Union crippled the production of already existing hardware and stalled its further development. The West was the next in line to dip its toes in this water, with the American line of the “Stryker” wheeled combat vehicles and a whole family of Medium Tactical Vehicles (FMTV) clearly coming off the charts.
Still, no Western army ever considered bringing all vehicles of all weight classes onto a single, unified platform. The US tried to grapple with this task in its modernization program called Future Combat Systems (FCS), which was cancelled after over-ambitious plans of the US military command to outfit its vesicles with cutting-edge equipment threatened to drain its funds.
Russia had it easier, having had to learn from the FCS example, which proved that any sweeping modernization can only bust the budget. In this sense, Russian armored vehicles, which are capable of employing both the existing equipment and systems that are still under development, have much more chances to come off the blueprints and into reality.
Show Posts
