Combat Mission: Normandy, continued

[British Tommy]

All are just more reasons to plug every vehicle you come across and murder any and all crews.

That sounds like the only tactic to use from now on. I wonder if this tactic will carry over to CMN??

 

[Elvis]

That sounds like the only tactic to use from now on. I wonder if this tactic will carry over to CMN??

I would think it would be more of a situational tactic. If I'm unsure if a vehicle is abandoned or knocked out I would think about what else I could/should be shooting at and if I have enough ammo to expend on it. Although, I did lose the PBEM I keep referring to so maybe I'm not the best person to give tactical advise.

 

[thewood]

Looking at a couple threads going on in the BFC CMBB forum, it is a pretty realistic tactic.

 

[mOBIUS]

I'm not, and I've never seen any accounts of any crew from any nation, that destroyed their vehicle from the inside. They were always already outside the vehicle when the decision was made.

The idea is not to destroy your vehicle at the first possible sign of trouble but to keep it in the fight as long as possible. You're not in a position to make those kinds of decisions as you bail out.
MR

Really, To destroy an abandoning tank the gunner of a Panzer IV is required to set the 90 second fuse of the 1 kilogram demo charge and get the heck out of the tank.

 

[Mad Russian]

Really, To destroy an abandoning tank the gunner of a Panzer IV is required to set the 90 second fuse of the 1 kilogram demo charge and get the heck out of the tank.

And you would do that on the way out of the vehicle not knowing how badly it was hit or if all your crew got out?

I don't want you in my vehicle crew.

Quote me one written source that says a crewman did that immediately upon getting hit and bailing out. I've never seen one yet.


Good Hunting.

MR

 

[Michael Dorosh]

From Tank Standing Orders, 2nd Canadian Armoured Regiment (Lord Strathcona's Horse (Royal Canadians)) 4th Edition, 5 Feb 1945

12. DRILL FOR ABANDONING TANK. When a tank is abandoned as a flamer the crew commander will be responsible for releasing the emergency fire extinguishers. At all other times the crew commander will ensure that the following drill is carried out -

(a) The gunner will remove the striker case and spare striker case of the 75mm and the bolts of the Browning

(b) The operator will put the set off net and remove the six point connector

(c) The bow gunner will remove the bolt and spare bolt from his Browning

(d) All personnel will take personal weapons with them. Stores removed from the tank will be turned over to the Squadron Quartermaster Sergeant at the first opportunity

14. POLICY CONCERNING DESTRUCTION OF TANKS. The decision to destroy a tank will invariably be made by the Squadron Leader. No tank will be destroyed unless absolutely necessary in order to prevent its falling into enemy hands. The tank can be set on fire by breaking the gas lead from the homolite and setting the petrol on fire or by any other means the crew commander desires.

http://www.canadiansoldiers.com/procedures/tankstandingorders.htm

I'm sure in action, they came up with other "drills" as the situation warranted.

 

[dalem]

Looking at a couple threads going on in the BFC CMBB forum, it is a pretty realistic tactic.

Standard U.S. WWII armored doctrine - fire a shot into every abandoned AFV you get near.

-dale

 

[Mad Russian]

14. POLICY CONCERNING DESTRUCTION OF TANKS. The decision to destroy a tank will invariably be made by the Squadron Leader. No tank will be destroyed unless absolutely necessary in order to prevent its falling into enemy hands. The tank can be set on fire by breaking the gas lead from the homolite and setting the petrol on fire or by any other means the crew commander desires.

That would mean the tank crew wouldn't have authorization to destroy the tank when they bail out.

Good Hunting.

MR

 

[Michael Dorosh]

That would mean the tank crew wouldn't have authorization to destroy the tank when they bail out.

Good Hunting.

MR

Exactly, unless the crew commander felt is was "absolutely necessary" to prevent it "falling into enemy hands", and I presume the burden of proof of this fell on the crew commander (or senior surviving crewman). Do I think there were boards of enquiry for every abandoned tank? Doubtful. Scared private soldiers abandoning their vehicles probably lammed it a lot without giving destruction of the tank a second thought - but I think that is the point. If SOP is to destroy only on the orders of the squadron commander, the 'default setting' would be to leave it in running condition when in doubt rather than destroy when in doubt. How this worked in practice, I don't know. Perhaps other regiments had their own standing orders; this was only one tank regiment among many. More evidence is needed, but it's an interesting document to start with.

I guess the thing I noticed though was that burning the contents of the tank weren't as important as rendering the vehicle "combat components" inoperable by removing the weapons' firing mechanisms and 'unplugging' the radio. Far easier to do, simpler and quicker.

By coincidence I was rereading Firefly vs. Tiger last night, they noted that there were a few captured Firefly tanks on German inventory, but using them in action was a doubtful proposition due to ammunition supply. This would probably hold true for most tank types. The "need" to destroy friendly vehicles by burning it may be exaggerated a bit in this conversation; they were expensive weapons systems and the amount of time they spent on battlefield recovery and repair leads me to think that most armies pretty much preferred that it didn't happen. Making it a squadron (company) commander's decision (to destroy or not destroy) simply reinforces that view.

While a brand new tank type would be an intelligence boon if captured intact, I'd have to think there were only limited opportunities to recover enemy AFVs on the battlefield and then press them into service. I'm aware of the T-34s the Germans used, but not of the circumstances in which they were captured. They also had enormous stocks of 76.2mm ammunition to use; not the case in the west where finding Allied ammunition would have been more difficult - or vice versa.

 

[mOBIUS]

That would mean the tank crew wouldn't have authorization to destroy the tank when they bail out.

The same situation happened to the author of 'Panzer Gunner'. When they appraised his tank as too crippled to continue on with the rest of the company the company commander gave the order to destroy the tank. This was not an emergency bail out.

Now the M60 and M-1 operations manual do have procedure to self destroy those tanks. It involves putting two thermite grenades in the gun breach before bailing out.

 

[Mad Russian]

Now the M60 and M-1 operations manual do have procedure to self destroy those tanks. It involves putting two thermite grenades in the gun breach before bailing out.

Not going to happen on a bailout.

Who is going to sit in a tank that was hit hard enough to make the crew bail and look around, find and set two grenades in the gun breech before they bailed out too?

Nobody I know of.

Getting hit hard enough to make a crew bail requires a decision in probably 2 seconds or MUCH LESS. Not the kind of time to have a debate as to whether we destroy the tank on the way out to supper.

Good Hunting.

MR

 

[Michael Dorosh]

Not going to happen on a bailout.

Who is going to sit in a tank that was hit hard enough to make the crew bail and look around, find and set two grenades in the gun breech before they bailed out too?

Nobody I know of.

Getting hit hard enough to make a crew bail requires a decision in probably 2 seconds or MUCH LESS. Not the kind of time to have a debate as to whether we destroy the tank on the way out to supper.

Good Hunting.

MR

Exactly again. However, once baled out, and the crew is taking cover in a ditch, I think the question at that time becomes - what are their immediate priorities? The Japanese in World War II expected baled crews to continue to fight as infantry. Most everyone else expected that, as trained specialists, they render themselves hors d'combat without shame and make their way back to their unit's B Echelon where I presume they could debrief the intelligence officer on the day's events and go back into the crew replacement system, perhaps even jump right back into a tank immediately if one was available. Before taking the safest route back to friendly lines, though, there may have been an opportunity to organize some sort of destruction of their vehicle if they noticed it was not burning, and that an opportunity to do so presented itself (i.e. the fighting continued around the next street, over the next hill, sun had set, etc.) and if the vehicle was in imminent danger of enemy capture. But of course, the last two conditions seem to preclude each other.

I think the more usual course of events was that part of the debrief to the I.O. or their company commander, etc. would be the map reference/grid co-ordinate of the their vehicle (if known) so that a recovery/destruction party could be sent out - and by this point it would likely be up to the battalion/regiment C.O. as to how to dispose of the vehicle based on the intelligence gathered from all the day's activities.

 

[Elvis]

Not going to happen on a bailout.

Who is going to sit in a tank that was hit hard enough to make the crew bail and look around, find and set two grenades in the gun breech before they bailed out too?

Nobody I know of.

Getting hit hard enough to make a crew bail requires a decision in probably 2 seconds or MUCH LESS. Not the kind of time to have a debate as to whether we destroy the tank on the way out to supper.

Good Hunting.

MR

I agree. I would hope that there was some sort of SOP as shown above so that some decisions could be made almost as a matter of reflex.

I forget whether we were talking about this in general terms or if it is something that someone had wanted modeled in a game. In a game the scale of CM it wouldn't be a good use of resources to code this stuff in. I wouldn't ever destroy a friendly vehicle on purpose in a game, stand alone or campaign, unless captured enemy vehicles and weapons were modeled as well.

 

[mOBIUS]

To destroy Cojone Eh, the M-1 lost during Thunder Run they threw thermite grenades down the hatch from the outside. Not the SOP of shoving them into the gun breech.
http://fhpubforum.warumdarum.de/index.php?topic=2407.1515

 

[Mad Russian]

To destroy Cojone Eh, the M-1 lost during Thunder Run they threw thermite grenades down the hatch from the outside. Not the SOP of shoving them into the gun breech.
http://fhpubforum.warumdarum.de/index.php?topic=2407.1515

That's a much more plausible chain of events to me.

Good Hunting.

MR