Talk:T-34

"Revolutionary design"

Really? The title itself is not neutral, and what was revolutionary about the T-34? Everything about the tank had been done before. It should be renamed "History" —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.181.114.227 (talk) 02:58, 14 November 2010 (UTC)

It is revolutionary as 45mm is equal to 1.8 inches and the 7.62mm is equal to three inches. Paul, in Saudi (talk) 09:34, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

Agree that "Revolutionary Design" is highly inaccurate. This subheading title does not reflect the content of what is written in this article, which clearly shows that the T-34 was an Evolutionary Design influenced by the experience with previous Soviet tanks. Just look at that photo lineup in the article of the BT and A-20 tanks which preceded the T-34. The Christie suspension and sloping armor, etc., key characteristics of the T-34 were already in place before the T-34 came into being.

So there, I made the change. DarthRad (talk)

As for putting Mellenthin's quote right next to a subheading of "Revolutionary Design", the juxtaposition creates an incredibly false and misleading conclusion. There were several reasons that Germany had nothing comparable to the T-34, and none of those reasons had anything to do with the T-34 being a "Revolutionary Design". Germany had only slowly started up its tank industry, secretly breaking the Treaty of Versailles in the early 1930's (aircraft production violations of the Treaty started earlier). The German Army recognized a need for better tanks, as the early versions of the Tiger I design were already underway in 1937-1938, well before the invasion of Russia. Most of all, it is a well known historical fact that Hitler was so encouraged by Chamberlain's appeasement policy that he jumped the gun and started WWII before his armed forces were completely ready and fully armed with all the best weapons on the drawing boards. Also, German military intelligence during WWII was abysmal (helped no doubt by the fact that many Abwehr were anti-Nazis, including Canaris, the head of the Abwehr) and had absolutely no advanced knowledge of the state of Soviet tank development. The German Panzer III and Panzer IV were adequate to deal with the Soviet BT and T-26 tanks that were known to the Germans from the Spanish Civil War and the Soviet-Finland Winter War. Information about the approaching arrival of the Soviet T-34 and the KV-1 tanks undoubtedly would have accelerated German tank design/production efforts. In any case, WWII was a constant arms race in which each side tried to leapfrog the other side with new designs and all armies would end up at one time or another with outclassed tanks on the battlefield. This would later happen to the T-34 vs. the Panther and Tiger tanks. DarthRad (talk)

The revolutionary thing about the T-34 was that it was the first tank to achieve the fine balance of armour, mobility and firepower for its time. All other tanks before it were deficient in at least one area (The British Matildas, the early German Panzers, most of the French tanks (excepting the SOMUA S35). Many of the ideas used on the T-34 may have been thought of before, but the T-34 was the first to combine all of them together into one package, much like how many of the elements of the AK had been done before, but the AK was one of the first to put them all together. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 142.151.138.146 (talk) 15:51, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

Arg. Too much Soviet propaganda again. The AK47 was NOT the first assault rifle, the Germans came up with the Sturmgewehr 44 first (indeed that is how the term originated - Sturmgewehr = "assault rifle" in German), i.e, a light infantry rifle that could fire full automatic using a smaller rifle cartridge, so that it had longer range than the existing submachine guns of the time (which fired pistol bullets) but was easier to handle than full sized battle rifles or machine guns. The Stg44 was introduced in 1944, the AK47 in 1947.

The balance of armor, mobility, and firepower for tanks that you mention was constantly shifting before, during, and after WWII. Virtually every new tank that was introduced during that time period was an improvement in that balance for a short period of time before being overtaken. What is truly missing from all this breathless praise for the "revolutionary" nature of the T-34 is any insight as to how rapidly the tank arms race in WWII made the T-34 into first an ordinary tank, and then into outdated target practice for the German gunners. The T-34 sat on top of the heap of that balance for only about one and a half years - June 1941 until late 1942. By late 1942, the long barrel 75mm Kwk40 had easily made the Panzer IV superior in firepower to the 76mm T-34s (yes indeed, look up the range penetration data - the 75mm Kwk40 was way better than the Soviet 76mm F-34 gun). And of course then the Tiger I came on the scene and re-defined the whole concept of where the balance of armor, mobility, and firepower should be. By the time the T-34-85 arrived in early 1944, it was at best only equal to the later model Panzer IV and the 76mm M4 Sherman in terms of armor and firepower. DarthRad (talk)

I never said the AK was -the- first assault rifle, but if you want to go into that debate, technically the Federov Avtomat would be the world's first assault rifle. But I digress. My point still stands.

The Federov Avtomat was the Australopithecus of assault rifles - it somewhat resembled an assault rifle, but none of its mechanical design carried over into modern assault rifles, thus it was a dead end offshoot on the evolutionary tree. The M1 Garand, with its rotating bolt and gas piston, was far more influential to the design of all modern combat rifles. Kalashnikov copied these features from the M1 for the AK47. What most people don't realize is that the AK47 is really just an upside down M1 Garand firing a shorter rifle cartridge on full automatic. DarthRad (talk)

Granted, it was a race, but the same could be said of any tank, past or present. The T-34 just happened to get it right at the right time. Again, all other tanks were deficient in 1 or another of these 'hard' factors, whereas the T-34 managed to get it 'right' when it came out. One other thing 'revolutionary' about the T-34 was the ease with which it could be made, which was unprecedented for any other tank before it.

The fact that all post war tanks were influenced by the T-34 (or by the Panther, which was itself influenced by the T-34) does speak volumes as to what a benchmark it was in tank design.

Frankly, if the M4 had arrived around the same time as the T-34, it would have been remembered along with the T-34 as a revolutionary design, but it came a year later, as it happened. It's a little unfair, but that's how things turned out.

The Tiger I had terrible mobility strategically, and adequate tactical mobility at best. And of course, it was terribly expensive to produce. Sure, it had firepower and armour, but to stem the tide of T-34s and Shermans, it would have had to destroy at least 10 T-34s/Shermans for every Tiger lost (which it certainly didn't).

The T-34-85 was far superior to the Panzer IV (slightly better armour, far more mobility, equal in firepower, far easier to produce) and was the equal of the M4A3 E8. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.53.186.209 (talk) 15:29, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

Well, you've gone off on a tangent here into a comparison of tanks with an aside on the industrial production failures of Nazi Germany. The original debate was about why the T-34 was not a revolutionary design. My point about the tank arms race during WWII was that each army was constantly trying to leapfrog the other with new tank designs that would give it a temporary advantage on the battlefield. The T-34 was just another in a series of such tanks during WWII that threw a brief scare into its enemies. If each new tank that temporarily threw a scare into the enemy can be considered "revolutionary", then the Pz III and IVs were revolutionary in their own time period (1940) as their mobility and excellent infantry support capabilities were integral to the success of the Nazi blitzkrieg in France and Poland. The T-34 forced the Germans to uparmor and increase the firepower of its own tanks. The Tiger I also forced all combatants to re-calibrate the size and power of their anti-tank guns and so in this sense it too was "revolutionary". The British Firefly was "revolutionary" because its 17-pounder could easily knock out a Tiger I and yet it was a far more mobile tank. The Germans were worried enough about it to specifically target the Fireflies during combat.

The Tiger I certainly had severe mobility and production issues. However, it was truly a tank killer with kill ratios of over 12:1 in many units (I think the overall figure for all Tiger units was around 5:1). The problem was that less than 2,000 Tiger Is and IIs were built versus nearly 100,000 T-34s and M4 Shermans. So the kill ratio would have had to be closer to 50:1, not 10:1, for the Tiger to win the war by itself. Hitler's insistence on tank superiority was a doctrinal and strategic mistake - tanks were fundamentally expendable weapons during WWII, and the Tigers were not built to be expendable. The T-34 was built to be expendable with lots of short cuts in quality taken to speed up production.

The T-34 was at the peak of the firepower and armor balance only during the period of mid-1941 to 1942. The Pz IV hull was later up-armored and yes, its turret and side armor remained weak, but the T-34 hull was never up-armored and the tank was EASILY knocked out by German guns after 1942. One on one, except in inclement weather (the T-34 was more mobile than the Pz IV only in the mud and snow), the later uparmored Pz IVs could more than hold their own against the T-34 (read "Panzer Gunner: A Canadian in the German 7th Panzer Division, 1944-45" by Bruno Friesen to get an idea of what fighting in a Pz IV was like).

The historical record is quite clear about this fact. After 1942, the only problem that the Germans had with the T-34 was that the Soviets could produce them faster than the Germans could knock them out. One needs only to read a post-Soviet account of the Battle of Kursk (Healy's "Kursk 1943") or Drabkin and Sheremet's "T-34 in Action" to realize the horrendous casualties suffered by the T-34 tank crews, and to understand how easily these tanks were knocked out by the Germans. Accounts of T-34 crews in action in the 1941 time frame describe isolated T-34s fighting off the Germans, with the crew buttoned up, taking shot after shot, until the Germans were finally able to bring a heavy gun in to knock out the tank. Accounts of later actions, once the Germans figured out how to knock out the T-34s, describe T-34 tank crews leaping out of their tanks as soon as it received the first hit, which usually penetrated the tank. T-34 crew went into combat with their hatches open to facilitate a quick exit. "T-34 in Action" even has a rating as to which crew member was most likely to survive based on how quickly they could exit the tank. Morale appears to have been terrible as the Soviet Army imposed a rule that tankers would be sent to punishment battalions if they abandoned their tank for any reason (including losing a track) other than if their tank had burned up.

As for the T-34 being the progenitor of the modern tank, PLEASE let's put that myth to rest also. Just what exactly from the T-34 is in use today in modern tanks? Sloped armor? We have already established that sloped armor was being used in many tanks before the T-34, so the T34 did not originate this idea. Christie suspension? NOT. See excellent explanation by DMorpheus above about the downsides of the Christie suspension - thus all modern tanks use a torsion bar suspension. What about the T-34's classic slack track treads? Well, this too has been abandoned in favor of smaller wheels and tensioned return rollers since the slack track was highly prone to de-track off the wheels. Low silhouette and cramped crew space requiring short tank crewmen? Still a feature of modern Russian tanks but definitely not for Western tanks. Side sponsons over the track? Not. No modern tank has side sponsons. In fact, if you had to pick one tank that was the prototype for modern American tanks, it would be the M26 Pershing, since nearly all the major features of modern American tanks are found in this tank (except of course, the Chobham armor). If you had to pick one tank that looks most like modern Soviet tanks, it would be the IS-3, with its hemispherical turret, ultra-low silhouette, large amount of frontal armor and very thin top and side armor. The competing line of Soviet KV and IS series of tanks had the return rollers instead of "slack track" and the torsion bar suspension, and it was the design features of this line of Soviet tanks that lived on in the post WWII Soviet tanks, not the T-34. No matter how "revolutionary" the T-34 proved to be for 1-1/2 years during WWII, its mechanical features were largely evolutionary dead ends, just like the Federov Avtomat and just like all but one of the subspecies of Australopithecus.

This T-34 article desperately needs a "Mythbuster" section. DarthRad (talk)

This is not a forum. This is a place to discuss how to improve the article using reliable sources. (Hohum ^@) 19:17, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Combat history

More shuld probably be added? Syria used T-34 tanks in the israeli-arab war of 1967. What about the T-34's perfomance in this conflict? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.110.193.21 (talk) 10:45, 6 April 2011 (UTC)

A whole bunch of information, including references on the T-34's ww2 combat performance was added in July 2012. Admittedly, some parts of the writing is not encyclopaedic or perhaps contains too much opinion. But instead of re-writing, editing or updating the newly added content, certain posters keep deleting ALL OF IT, including all the properly referenced data and reverting to a previous version. This, IMO, is unacceptable as it does not allow the subject topic to be altered or new contributions to be made. Instead it would behove contributers to read through and edit out the conjecture and un-reference opinions! And yes wikipedia is a synergistic effort, and no the current article is not perfect and not without bias/conjecture! 142.162.25.82 (talk) 14:10, 6 July 2012 (UTC)

Alternatively, you could only add the properly sourced, properly written elements. (Hohum ^@) 17:37, 6 July 2012 (UTC)

Did you read what was posted, most of the quotes were sourced, as was the data, and some of the opnions as well, from generally respected authors. Yes there seems to have been some conjecture and opnion or interpretation of said data, but like most articles on wiki it is a synthesis of a number of sources. Additional, the pre-existing content was not always properly source and does contain some opinion and un-source content. The additional info was also re-formatted, which IMO, adds to the quality of the article. But certainly all extreme conjecture and unfounded opinions or correlations should be removed.142.162.107.79 (talk) 18:53, 6 July 2012 (UTC)

Due to popular demand I have been going back through what I initially posted to try and clarify the references and remove extraneous conjecture and or biased/unreferenced opinion. Some of the conclusions that I added do follow directly from the data that is refereced....although I am certain parts would be open to debate!Tempsperdue (talk) 20:13, 6 July 2012 (UTC)

I think that the following section or a version thereof should be included as it speaks to the soviet war winning mass production philosophy and the help they received from the Allies "These conclusions also give the lie to the fact that the Soviets (largely due to the huge number of T-34s produced) could have won WWII on their own, without the aid of the US or Commonwealth forces. If the 11,900 AFVs contributed by the Allies to the Soviets via Lend Lease were not available, and all German WWII fully tracked AFVs produced had been allocated to the East Front then the Germans would have required a kill ratio of only 2.45 to 1far less than the 2.94 to 1 actually achieved, in order to have destroyed all Soviet fully tracked AFVs that existed on 22nd June 1941, 23,300, and those that were produced during the war, 99,150(for a total of 122,450 soviet fully tracked AFVs). This is before we even consider the cumulative effects of increased German production (of all weapon types) due to the absence of the Allied strategic bombing campaign, the direct effects of German air superiority on the East Front from 1943 onwards, as well as the effects of the Red Army loosing over half its motorised transport (which had been received from the Allies due to lend lease), and the effects of 9-10 000 additional (and fully supplied) heavy 88mm flak guns on the East Front from 1941 onwards."Tempsperdue (talk) 01:34, 7 July 2012 (UTC)

As to this: "The inclined plates incorporated in the design along with a minimisation of shot-traps did provide an equivalently greater armour thickness for a given plate thickness and potentially lead to more shot deflections. However, shell penetration mechanics is a complex affair and inclination is not always more effective for a given weight ratio, as one needs more volume and more plate to cover a given area, as opposed to flat plate. The underlying structure supporting and joining the plates is also more complex to weld and assemble with inclined pieces.[citation needed] Many T-34s suffered, not from inherent design flaws, but rather from poor workmanship and quality control during the rushed assembly of the armoured plate, resulting on many occasions in gaps and misaligned armoured plate; this was especially noticeable on those T-34s built hastily at certain factories under harsh conditions during the German advance after 1941"...I have seen photos of some of the T-34s built in ww2 where the plates didn't meet or were mismatched. Also inclined plate is not necessarily more effective that vertical plate as one requires more inclinedplate to cover the same volume...so one can make the vertical plate thicker for a a given weight! But perhaps a discussion for the penetration mechanics article, although it does give lie to the supposed effectiveness of the T-34s inclined armour! Finally "Quality control and proper manufacturing and finishing techniques were dropped in favour of rushed production by a less than skilled workforce (the retreating soviet army had a habit of pressing every able bodied man into the army regardless of skill set)." I have read about the consequences to skilled soviet workers during the retreat but cannot remember where!Tempsperdue (talk) 01:25, 7 July 2012 (UTC)

I have found a photo of misaligned plates here on the T-34: http://worldoftanks.com/news/1031-chieftains-hatch-devils-due/, but am not sure that this is not copyrighted. The info on the image says 'the website does not supply ownership info'...too bad, as it is a great photo and would allow us to add information on the workmanship of the T-34!Tempsperdue (talk) 02:15, 7 July 2012 (UTC)

I have removed entirely unsourced speculation (again, I think). Instead of firing a shotgun of information into the article and seeing what sticks, try only adding reliably sourced information without speculative commentary, or your own conclusions. Also, adding a table and then both using it as something to draw conclusions from, and also adding a note undermining its accuracy means it isn't worth including it at all. The article should only reflect what reliable sources say.

Images of things as sources can be problematic. For instance, an image of misaligned plates on a tank isn't necessarily good by itself without a reliable source describing it as a typical example.

Also, I see no mallets in the other image provided. Unless this is backed up by reliable sources the caption and main body text should go.

Please stop using "ibid", it is basically useless in a wikipedia article as they become broken as the article changes. Take a look at WP:NAMEDREFS.

On the other hand, I don't want to be too discouraging, some of what you have added is fine. (Hohum ^@) 15:02, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

I see you have re-added a section without discussion or consensus.

There is little doubt that on average German tank crews in 1942 were probably still the best trained and most experienced in the world

This is self contradictory and unreferenced.

You then go onto use a table to use as a reference for your own conclusions, yet call the table accuracy into question anyway. For each reason, the entire section is unusable on wikipedia. (Hohum ^@) 16:27, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

Additionally, the table itself is not suitably referenced. (Hohum ^@) 16:32, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

Hohum, I do see your point. The accuracy of the table has more to do with confusion between 75mm and 50mm paks, at least as far as I can currently remember. As to the German tank crews, I guess it is an un-citable statement, but at least in my opinion it is an opinion that is widely held; but I guess removing it is fine...

Czarnkowski czołg

Can somebody make a photo of Czarnkowski czołg T-34 for Commons? Thank you.--95.129.137.176 (talk) 13:28, 23 April 2011 (UTC)

"The best tank of the war"?

How is it possible to make such a general, vague, and sweeping assessments by calling 'x' tank "the best tank of world war 2"? The sheer number of factors are overwhelming and extremely situational. Many times during this article have such references been made, taking a non-neutral point of view and citing less than fair sources with seemingly no external reasoning other than invoking nationalistic pride. Instead of saying "x" tank is "better" than "b" tank, we should present the specifications in a non-POV way and let the reader come to his/her own conclusion.

I move to remove all mentioning of such cases, and replace them with side by side statistical breakdowns, or perhaps a new comparison article instead. This way the reader can draw their own conclusions based of the specifications of the tanks.

76.181.103.83 (talk) 21:26, 22 June 2011 (UTC) Jade rat

Raw specifications don't tell the whole story. (They never do, or, on the specs, France would have won in May '40.) In the case of the T-34, my impression has always been, it didn't have excellence in all areas, but its features combined produced an excellence. In short, the Sov designers got the combination right better than anybody else: gun power, armor, weight, hp, reliability, & production. Others had an edge in some areas; none had a better combined package. Nor AFAIK is that in doubt among even German or American historiographers, who may have reason to lie about it. TREKphiler ^{any time you're ready, Uhura} 22:11, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

I am all in favor of removing all of these excessive "enthusiast" superlatives about the T-34, and in fact believe this phenomenon of T-34 worship deserves its own section in this article - e.g., "The T-34 as Myth". There are very simple reasons as to how this T-34 worship got started after all, mainly in the memoirs of the defeated German generals who had all sorts of motives to inflate the reputation of this Soviet tank. Unfortunately the main sources that currently help to debunk this myth are from Soviet or former Soviet-bloc countries, and so have been slow to make it into acceptance among the moderators of this article. But sooner or later, one of the major Western tank historians will write a terrific and updated book about the T-34 based on this new post-Soviet information and thoroughly debunk this myth. The truth is out there already.

Meanwhile, it's very frustrating, and I find these designations of the T-34 as finest this or greatest that or "progenitor of the modern tank" to be every bit as annoying as all the references on Wikipedia that, three years ago, quoted Belton Cooper (author of "Death Traps") as saying Gen. Patton was the person responsible for stunting the development of the M4 Sherman and M26 Pershing. This falsehood was widely repeated across the Internet. In a single book, Zaloga's "Armored Thunderbolt" provided the documentation that completely crushed that falsehood into oblivion once and for all. Zaloga's recent book "T-34-85 vs. M26 Pershing" had a nice section describing how in the Korean War, the M26 Pershings greatly over-matched the T-34-85 whereas the M4A3E8 Shermans were equal to the T-34-85. Since Zaloga is readily accepted on these Wikipedia articles, as fast as one of his books come out, I have entered his stuff in and it never ever gets challenged. So, here's an appeal to Steven Zaloga, if you're reading this, I'm sure you've seen some of this new post-Soviet stuff out now about the T-34. Your 1988, 1994, and 1996 books about the T-34 are getting to be a bit long in the tooth. Write something new, Please! DarthRad (talk)

Just a little note. Whatever is editor's POV (and it seems that here everyone has one) please please please stick to the WP:NPOV and WP:MOS policies and do not add text to the article (or a whole section) that would turn the article into a conversation or an argument. Quote from the former: "Article sections devoted solely to criticism, and "pro and con" sections within articles, are two commonly cited examples. There are varying views on whether and to what extent such structures are appropriate; see Wikipedia:Avoid thread mode, Wikipedia:Criticism, Wikipedia:Pro and con lists, and Template:Criticism-section. [...] Commonly cited examples include articles that read too much like a "debate" [...]." Self-consistency first. If there is something biased, just be WP:BOLD and adjust the (presumably) biased text, do not just insert your counter-argument. --Kubanczyk (talk) 12:06, 6 July 2011 (UTC)

FAR

An editor has nominated this article for FAR. However, as the first step (of notifying interested editors on the talk page to see if work can be completed without a FAR) was not completed, the FAR has been placed on hold so that this notification can be placed. Here is the text of the FAR nomination, as a starting place for work. Nikkimaria (talk) 12:21, 15 July 2011 (UTC)

Copied text:

Looking at the article, and comparing it to the criteria:

It is—

• (b) comprehensive: it neglects no major facts or details and places the subject in context;
• The information on the tank's design is severely lacking, totalling as it does four completely broken up paragraphs.
• (c) well-researched: it is a thorough and representative survey of the relevant literature. Claims are verifiable against high-quality reliable sources and are supported by inline citations where appropriate;
• Several chunks are completely unreferenced, including the last line of the "Background" section, an entire paragraph of "establishing initial production" and almost the entirety of "Design (T-34 Model 1941)".

It follows the style guidelines, including the provision of—

• (c) consistent citations: where required by criterion 1c, consistently formatted inline citations using either footnotes (<ref>Smith 2007, p. 1.</ref>) or Harvard referencing (Smith 2007, p. 1)—see citing sources for suggestions on formatting references; for articles with footnotes, the meta:cite format is recommended. The use of citation templates is not required.
• Citations are completely and utterly inconsistent, ranging from the Harvard style to a divided bibliography-and-citations type. Many facts appear in the lead, but not in the text of the article proper.

Media. It has images and other media where appropriate, with succinct captions, and acceptable copyright status. Images included follow the image use policy. Non-free images or media must satisfy the criteria for inclusion of non-free content and be labeled accordingly.

• Images, rather than alternating, go down almost unbroken in a gallery on the right-hand side of the page. Ironholds (talk) 05:52, 15 July 2011 (UTC)

There is an FA criteria for images to be on alternate sides of the page? (Hohum ^@) 17:48, 15 July 2011 (UTC)

There is MOS:Images that should be read and followed. Overall there are 23 photos in the article. This is a gallery posing as an article. A good rule to follow is only allowing one pic per section unless that section is unusually lengthy and the photo/s used must have relevancy to the section they're placed in. Brad (talk) 23:23, 16 July 2011 (UTC)

There are many versions and many details to be shown, hence so many pictures. Is it OK to have three separate galleries? One for T-34-76 kind, second for T-34-85 kind, and the bottom gallery for all the other variants (and the monuments)? --Kubanczyk (talk) 14:22, 19 July 2011 (UTC)

Just bumped into this FAR by chance, and thought I'd give a few thoughts about this article, since I happen to have a bit of knowledge on the subject.

• First for comprehensive coverage, in which the article now is sorely lacking. Just to give short examples:
  • The development history is very short, and there's almost no information on T-34's genesis, which is important to the overall picture. To mention, the history of T-34's development presented quite some detective story, although it has been mostly resolved in recent (Russian) sources.
  • Also, not even a short technical description (compare T-26 article).
  • Rather little coverage on T-34 design and combat history analysis, and comparatively, even fewer sources. There's a vast amount of data on this topic, only a (small) part of which is presented here.
  • Only a small amount of information about T-34 postwar history, with Korean War section blown out of any proportion. Foreign use section is no better.

• As for "well-researched" claims, there's a pityful amount of sources for such a subject in this article.
  • Which seems to rely mostly on Zaloga, ahem, a bit dubious "high-quality reliable source" and, all the more, the main source to write article from. For example, there's a blunder already in the preamble. Referencing Zaloga, well-known for substituting for gaps in knowledge with his vivid imagination, it tells us that T-34 was intended to replace both T-26 and BT series. While in fact, T-26 was planned to be replaced with infantry's T-50 tank (the article of which is also a nice piece of Zaloga's historical fiction), and T-34 was only intended as (less numerous) replacement for "fast" (maneuver, cavalry, however translation you prefer) BT tanks. Only the war, and the failure to mass-produce T-50 forced T-34 into the role of "universal" tank. And the article is strewn with other small mistakes and unreliable (or highly approximate) data from obsolete sources.
  • Small amount of sources also leads to inevitable bias, with only some of the wide spectre of points of view (not of them equally significant, of course) presented as established truth.
  • I understand that Russian sources represent a linguistic challenge, but their coverage on the subject is incomparable to western ones, which in regards to T-34 saw little development since Cold War end. And as for bias, many of them are comparable to Michulec's piece of writing in terms of harsh criticism (actually, Michulec may seem fresh for english speakers, but in comparsion to Russian sources his only contribution is his POV, from which you have to salvage any bits of useful information) — but attempting to be objective instead of being Pole. I could recommend a few books, if someone would be willing to use them to improve this article. --Saə (talk) 09:46, 20 July 2011 (UTC)

Agree basic factual information leaves much to be desired. (And the heavy load of opinions, or even speculations, is not needed for now.) --Kubanczyk (talk) 11:28, 20 July 2011 (UTC)

Can you point us to something authoritative which challenges Zalogas reliability? (Hohum ^@) 18:49, 20 July 2011 (UTC)

This discussion is not about Zaloga or about "challenging his reliability". That's not the point. We should simply use the most reliable sources that we have on hand, preferably many of them. If an author happens to have a historical book that is sourced better than Zaloga's, as long as we should obviously include it, it does not mean we need to ban Zaloga. Wikipedia has a clear policy (WP:NPOV) regarding controversy/debate among editors (and inconsistency between reliable sources) and there are much much more controversial topics that are handled with success. --Kubanczyk (talk) 07:41, 21 July 2011 (UTC)

Since Zaloga is heavily used, and his reliability was just strongly questioned, it clearly is a relevant point for the article FAR. Personally, I think he is reliable, and Saə was using more hyperbole than is justified. NPOV and reliability are (mostly) separate matters, unreliable sources should never be used, while a well balanced (NPOV) combination of reliable ones should be. (Hohum ^@) 17:52, 21 July 2011 (UTC)

I don't care about his POV here. Zaloga is about reliable when you have nothing better, but the amount of small (and not-so small) factual mistakes he makes, especially in older works, makes him inadequate as a main source for FA now. Imagine someone's book on M4 Sherman that would've claimed that it was created to 1936 requirement for a heavy tank to counter new japanese armour, but its inadequate combat perfomance later led to a hybrid of M36 tank destroyer and up-armoured Sherman made into M26? (yes, here I'm using hyperbole, but only slightly) Even though, compared to vast majority of English-language authors working in a field of Soviet WWII armour, that I've seen so far, he's rather good. --Saə (talk) 19:14, 22 July 2011 (UTC)

Your own personal assertion about the quality of particular works isn't relevant. To say one source is better than another, you'll need to show peer review showing that it is better, which can also be implied by how much other respectable historians reference their work. (Hohum ^@) 18:25, 29 July 2011 (UTC)

Ok, feel free to consider Zaloga, or whoever else — I personally recommend the renowned AFV historian George Forty. His 2005 book where he confuses ASU-57 and ZSU-57 is still unrivalled — a reliable source. Not that how silly yet another en-wiki article looks (roughly the above description, only without any hyperbole) concerns me enough to continue this discussion. --Saə (talk) 23:42, 30 July 2011 (UTC)

Zaloga's more recent works are better documented, and thus more reliable, than some of his earlier books, most of which were relatively short monographs with some of the information based on what can best be described as dubious sources. Some of these older short books do not contain thorough notes about his original sources. In the article on the M26 Pershing, which I extensively revised, I point out that Zaloga completely changed his story about Patton being the cause of the delay of the M26 in his 2000 book "M26/M46 Pershing Tank" (matching/parroting Belton Cooper's version) to the more thoroughly researched version that laid the blame squarely upon Gen. Lesley McNair in his 2008 "Armored Thunderbolt". Quoting the letter that McNair wrote to Gen. Devers where McNair slams the latter's desire for the M26 is pretty definitive. Where Zaloga got the original version about Patton is anybody's guess, since he does not provide detailed sourcing in the 2000 book (my guess is that he heard this from Belton Cooper). The current Panther Tank article still contains a Soviet claim that the IS-2's 122mm gun could penetrate the Panther from front to back, a fairly dubious claim which is not corroborated by any other source and doesn't even make sense on a physical basis, given the Panther's well known superb frontal armor and other sources that rate the Soviet 122mm gun roughly equal to the British 17-pounder. It's been difficult to get rid of that bit of trivia from the Panther article because the source is one of Zaloga's older books about Soviet tanks, which he wrote, I believe, at a time when he was one of the first Western authors allowed into the Soviet Union. My guess is that the Soviets fed him some propaganda. So, in summary, I have found Zaloga to be a useful reference, but his more recent work is much, much better than some of his earlier work, where he seems to have been a bit careless about passing on poorly documented information, and some of that information was not true. Give him credit, though, for being willing to revise his own works. That's why he seriously needs to re-write some of his earlier works about the Soviet tanks of WWII. DarthRad (talk)

As for IS-2's gun performance, it seems to be a confusion on Zaloga's part. During one of the tests of 122-mm gun's M1944 APC shells, it indeed penetrated a tank from front to back, but a Pz.IV, for which this result is rather unsurprising. Still, frontal armour of Panther and Tiger, also present in shooting, was penetrated without much difficulty, and Panther's turret side was pierced all the way through (all shots made from 1400…1500 m range) See for example: Zheltov I., Pavlov I., Pavlov M., Sergeev A. Танки ИС в боях (IS tanks in action), Moscow: Tekhnika Molodezhi, 2002. Panther's high-hardness armour indeed made its glacis plate a very difficult target for guns in 75…90mm range, but 122-mm's 25 kg shell was a different matter and during comparative evaluation outperformed even the 100-mm gun, despite latter's significantly higher penetration in normal conditions. Contributing to this was also the decline in late-war German armour quality, owing to the critical alloyage shortages. Substitutes for these made steel plate very brittle, which didn't make much difference for 17-pounder, but proved fatal against heavy shells. Also, just for a short but, it seems, necessary note: Soviet penetration tables data is not directly comparable to British, US, Japanese or Papuan one, and the penetration values obtained by different methods usually differ wildly for the same gun. Judging by his progress, I hope Zaloga would also learn of this, somewhere around 2030. --Saə (talk) 07:48, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

That is all still your personal opinion, and starting to wander into WP:NOTAFORUM, instead of a FAR. (Hohum ^@) 14:31, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

Yes, this is not the A-19 122mm gun forum, but a discussion about reliability of sources. I consider Thomas Jentz to be absolutely meticulous in his writing, documenting where he obtained every scrap of information, and setting down no more than what his sources state. As such the range-penetration data which Jentz set down in his two books - "Germany's Panther Tank" and "Germany's Tiger Tanks: Tiger I & Tiger II: Combat Tactics" are about as definitive as it gets for the gun vs. armor debates. And in those books, you'll find that neither the 122mm Soviet gun nor the British 17-pounder could penetrate the front glacis plate of the Panther at any range. You'll find that the T-34's 85mm gun was slightly WORSE than the much maligned 76mm gun of the even more maligned M4 Sherman. So much for the "best tank in the world" label - how could that be if the German Army tests say the T-34's 85mm gun was not as good as the M4 Sherman's 76mm gun? This same data show that the much maligned armor of the M4 Sherman was roughly equivalent to the T-34-85 as far as resisting puncture by the Panther's 75m Kwk 42 - neither tank's armor was any good, but they were about equal. "Best tank in the world"? Or just a myth, perhaps only momentarily true for the 1941 time period? Jentz's data show that the firepower and armor of the 76mm M4 Sherman and the T-34-85 were very, very close to each other.

Jentz's data are all from tests done by the German and British Armies on captured tanks, and these are about as reliable as it gets. I have no idea where the Soviet data comes from. Perhaps they were testing precision manufactured versions of their guns instead of what actually came out from their factories. Yes, theoretically a 122mm gun should do a lot better than a 75mm gun, and an 85mm gun should do better than a 76mm gun, but not if the barrel and gunpowder are so shoddily manufactured that the factory gun could not generate the required high pressures and velocities. The Soviet 122mm had significantly lower velocities when tested by others than the Soviets. DarthRad (talk)

Soviet penetration data is calculated theoretically usually. Bear in mind that Soviet penetration data assumes 80% probability of penetration, whereas German data assumes 50% though. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 142.151.138.92 (talk) 04:30, 24 December 2011 (UTC)

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