Thread by @Mother_of_Tanks

How about a Tanks-giving Day thread? I was thinking about the things I am most thankful for and trying to incorporate that into something meaningful that I could share because, let's face it, changing Thanksgiving to Tanks-giving is kind of too perfect not to use it. #TankTwitter

This year what I'm most thankful for are people, so I thought I'd start with a little bit on tank crews and then come back to that.

Before WWII, tank crew sizes and composition varied a lot, with the most being about 18 people and the fewest being 2. (None of these pictures are pre-WWII lol)

The German A7V, which was a bit ridiculous looking, had a crew of 18 people -- the most of all tanks to date. It's a lot. Many of these crew members were responsible for 6 machine guns and a 57mm. @TankMuseum shows off a replica of an A7V in this video

Incidentally, there is only one remaining A7V from WWI warhistoryonline.com/war-articles/g…

The French Renault FT-17 had a crew of 2, and the British Whippet had a crew of 3 -- I believe these are the fewest of all tanks to date. @TankMuseum has a couple of Tank Chats discussing these two as well.

Tank Chat #8 Renault FT-17

And Tank Chat #9 British Whippet

Most tank crews, from WWII up to today, have 4 people -- Driver, Gunner, Loader, and Tank Commander. It's a good way to divide up the responsibilities. But it's important for the crew to have some decent group cohesion since space is limited and they have to depend on each other.

In this documentary, one of the 3rd Armored Division guys explains how they didn't use radios so to give the Driver instructions they'd have different shoulder taps to tell him to drive or back up or turn right and left and a different firmer tap to stop.

While my view is somewhat romantic, the whole "crew" concept has always seemed special to me. You have to make an effort to be able to tolerate this many people, this close, for even short periods of time, especially if you didn't choose them.

This one seems like a decent example to share too

And it's not just a romanticized concept. There's a whole competition to determine the best tank crew. I happen to know a few Australians looking to get in on that lol benning.army.mil/armor/sullivan/

Side note -- the Russians are trying to move a 3-person crew to a smaller compartment in the front, focusing on crew survivability for a change with the T-14 Armata, but we can talk more about that when they can actually afford to mass-produce and field them.

Speaking of Russians lol -- they still like to claim they invented the tank, even though the first tanks in Russia were roughly a few dozen Mark Vs and others they purchased from England and 100 FT-17s they purchased from France.

There's another thread I'd like to do sometime talking about a Russian tank school the Germans used during the years following WWI when Germany wasn't supposed to have or make tanks, let alone train on them, so they made deals with Russia.

But for now, back to people.

That documentary (above) also talks about developments leading to changes in the Sherman (kind of interesting) and about the creation of 3rd Armored Division (Spring 1941). The crews trained for 2 yrs before going to England where they trained another 10 months together.

SPEARHEAD by Adam Makos is not unrelated so let me slip that in here too. (The Pershing happens to be one of my favorites so I liked that aspect of this book too.) amazon.com/dp/B07D6CGMRN/…

Oh! This video from 1943 is about 25 minutes of semi-amusing training that visually reinforces the concepts of advanced preparation, alertness, concealment, dispersion, and firepower using a tank platoon as an example to demonstrate.

I always find it interesting to review the old training videos and old doctrine and manuals and compare to subsequent editions, and consider the needs that facilitated changes. Like this 1942 Tank Platoon manual (which I had open so I'm including it here) cgsc.contentdm.oclc.org/utils/getdownl…

Anyway, tank crews are created but crew members still have to make an effort for their own cohesion and efficacy. By comparison, in our personal lives we have much more control over those we let into our closer circles, so cohesion comes more naturally if we choose friends well.

And for this Tanks-giving, even though I tell them regularly, I would like to make sure that a few of my favorite people know they're valued. They're also very smart & funny so I highly recommend following them if you aren't.
@102ndblackhawk6 @OldCavDude @NCFranklin @MAGTravF