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From: military@att.att.com (Bill Thacker)
Newsgroups: sci.military
Subject: Superheavy tanks
Message-ID: <27581@amdcad.AMD.COM>
Date: 30 Sep 89 09:20:41 GMT
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From: military@att.att.com (Bill Thacker)

Recently, there's been some speculation about superheavy tanks,
land battleships, Bolos, and other behemoths.   In this topic, there's
a very thin line between speculation and fantasy, and many postings,
IMHO, have crossed it.  I think I picked a good time to go on vacation 8-)

Allow me to outline my recollections of factual material in this
area, which might help future discussion.

Tanks were originally (WWI, that is) seen as a sort of land battleship;
in fact, at least in Britain, there was significant Navy involvement in
their development.  Naval terms still abound; the tank's "hull" is
divided into "compartments," and roofed by "decks."  

Between the wars, this analogy was carried to its logical extreme.
Britain introduced the Vickers Independent (about 1925, I think),
which mounted a large turret gun, with smaller subturrets at the
front and rear carrying machineguns.  The French Char 2C was similarly
armed.   The Soviet Union embraced the Independent, producing first the
T-28, with two forward machinegun turrets in addition to the 75mm main
turret, and then the T-35, with five turrets: a 75mm main, 45mm secondaries
at left front and right rear of the "superstructure", and machinegun
turrets at right front/left rear.  Finally, the rare T-100 carried
3 turrets, all on centerline.   Germany, too, produced some multiturreted
tanks, the "Neubaufahrzeugen."  American tanks of the interwar period,
as exemplified by the M-2 Medium, had only one turret, but a profusion
of machinegun mounts; 10 on the M-2, which had a crew of only half that.

All of these were obsolete by WWII, though the Soviet models saw service in
the Finnish war and near Moscow in '41, and the German tanks, in Norway.
They were flawed in numerous ways, not least of which was that so many
turrets required a complicated fire-control system for the commander to
be able to effectively fight his vehicle.  Moreover, the added volume
made for a huge target, which could not be adequately armored or powered
at the time.

During WWII, as tanks became more heavily armored and better armed, 
weights began to increase, until 70-ton giants were roaming the
battlefield, with 10-inch armor and 5-inch guns.  Every nation involved
in the European war took part in this race for giantism; Russia, with
their JS series, Britain with the Tortoise, America with the T-28 gun motor
carriage, among others.  Okay, Italy didn't prototype a superheavy 8-)

Germany, though, took the crown.  By war's end, they had two functioning
prototypes of their 130-ton Maus, mounting a 128mm gun coaxially with
a 75mm behind 10" armor plate... and capable of skittering across
the battlefield at an astounding 8 mph.   Bridges ?  We don't need no
stinking bridges !  The Maus was submersible, and in teams, could
drive underwater.   (BTW, despite popular folklore, at least one
Maus did see combat, briefly, near Kummersdorf.  One of the prototypes
is apparently stored in Leningrad, and has made appearanes on Soviet TV).

Of course, Maus was still a dinosaur.  While nearly immune to enemy tanks,
it was an easy target for aircraft, and vulnerable to hand-placed mines.
Once immobilized, it was easily bypassed, and track repair was a *major* 
effort.

Further, the Germans had planned an entire line of tanks, the E-series,
ranging from light scout vehicles to land battleships.   The second
heaviest, the E-100, was similar to the Maus in scope; the heaviest
was the E-1000, aka the Land Monitor.  It was to be a 1000-ton beast,
and well armored; rumors abound and facts are few.  One story claims
it was to mount an 80 cm  (31.5 inch) main gun, with 28cm (11 inch)
secondaries... it would bristle with 128mm and 88mm guns to ward off
pesky enemy armor and aircraft.  Power was supplied by four U-boat
diesels.   I think this is bunk, and find more credible a description
of the Land Monitor as carrying a 28cm main with "several" secondary
turrets for antitank/antiaircraft work.   It never progressed past a
few preliminary sketches, to my knowledge.

Eventually, the trend toward giantism disappeared; modern "heavy" tanks
have settled in at around 35-45 tons, in order to improve mobility, now
universally recognized as critical.

Probably the only other attention to track-driven superheavies came
from Keith Laumer's "Bolo" short stories, which I recommend as
fun reading.  He postulates hundred-ton-plus tanks, with advanced
armor and weaponry, which ultimately are controlled by AI cybernetics.
Given his premises (basically, unlimited power), the story is believable;
but we are nowhere nearly capable of producing one in the near future.

Looking from the naval side, though, there are a few documented, though
fantastic, plans.  Many are fictional, some are based on grains of truth.

With sufficient power, an armored hovercraft could be developed; that
is a fact.  From this idea stems a number of fictional concepts, probably
epitomized in David Drake's "Hammer's Slammers" SF (science/speculative
fiction) series.  Hovertanks would avoid numerous problems by eliminating
the tracks (vulnerable to damage) and transmission.  Of course, the power
requirements are fantastic.

Along this same line, and used in the SF story "The Ayes of Texas" (author
forgotten, but fun reading), is the idea of converting a battleship
into a hovercraft.  At first this seems pure fiction, but I've heard
that such was actually considered by the military.   Another story,
in "Analog" magazine, details an interesting bit of dis-information:

The plan was to take a decommissioned battleship, such as the North Carolina,
and construct a building over her for several months.  During this time,
various false rumors would be spread, and a floating, removable
shroud installed over her.  She would then be towed by submarines (!) to
the coast of Australia, where she would be sunk at night, leaving the shroud
floating; the shroud would then be moved ashore and mounted on trucks,
the whole rig fitted with a special device to leave a peculiar "wake."
Over the next few days, the shroud would be driven through the Australian
desert, under plain sight of Soviet spy satellites (which, from overhead,
would have (so the story goes) no way of discerning the fact that the
battleship had been left behind).  Gunfire could be simulated to add to
the illusion.  Finally, the shroud would be driven back to the submerged
battleship, which would be raised beneath it at night, then towed back to
port for viewing by the press.

This illusionary amphibious battleship was intended to cause considerable
confusion to the Soviets, while intimidating Libya.

Finally,  while we're in the stratosphere, I might as well mention
the Japanese cartoon "Starship Yamato", in which the Yamato is raised,
fitted with particle cannon and ion drives, and used as a spaceship
to defend Earth from attacking aliens.  And, of course, the various
animations which formed the basis for the Battletech universe, with
huge, anthropomorphic armored machines.

Fact or fiction ?  How can we tell ?  In an age where we are actually
working toward space-based particle beam weaponry and x-ray lasers,
have "smart" missiles able to track their path across hundreds of miles
of terrain, nuclear-powered ships, and stealth aircraft, how fantastic
is a hovertank ?  It's a tough call.


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Bill Thacker   Moderator, sci.military  military-request@att.att.com
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