SdKfz 101 Panzer I

History of SdKfz 101 Panzer I

Few people know what the Panzer 1 entered the German Army's stockpile in the mid-1930s, stockpiling for Europe's future. Although the Panzer 1 was a failure as a combat vehicle, it started a long and successful family of tanks in the German army throughout World War II. Each system is progressively larger and more powerful (and equally deadly). ) than its predecessor, but all thanks to the Panzer I. This small tank served during the first major invasion of Europe, was modified to fit other forms required on the battlefield, and continued to fight until 1944.

According to reports, some 2,800 Panzer I tanks of various types were eventually produced.

NOTE: To help readers, it is important to follow the naming conventions for German military vehicles. Abbreviation Pz. Kpf. W. stands for "Panzerkampfwagen", which means "armored fighting vehicle". Same abbreviation Sd. Vehicle covers "special motor vehicle" which means "special motor vehicle". Ausf is a generic term used to cover "model" or "manufacture" to present significant variation.

With all of this in mind, the Panzer III might also be called the Pz. KpfW. Me and Sd. Vehicle 101, while all model variants fall under the Ausf convention. A, version B, version C, etc. "Export." is an abbreviated form of the word "execute," which simply means "model" or "design."

Background

Although Britain was the first army in the world to use tanks in combat during World War I, it was surprising that the German army did not quite embrace the concept at first. The 28-ton British Mark I was a typical diamond-shaped twin-tracked tank with 2 x 57mm guns on the broadside and five machine guns scattered throughout the design, used at the crux of the Battle of the Somme - the Allied attempt to break through 1916 On September 15, stubborn German defenses.

While the results of subsequent operations were mixed, the modern battlefield was forever changed.

The Germans finally understood this change of wind. Development started with the A7V, a boxy, monstrous 30-ton construct that could fit up to 18 people, a 57mm gun, six machine guns, and 2 x Daimler Benz engines, smelly and noisy inside (British tanks were not much better in terms of the internal operating environment of their crews) and released the Iron Beast on March 21, 1918. Although it was incorporated into the German Army's arsenal at the time, the A7V was only intended to take part in Germany's last offensive in World War I.

Tie the German war machine to the pig

When the German Empire finally fell into Allied hands, the victors demanded severe restrictions on the country's combat capabilities. When the Ottoman Empire collapsed in the East, Germany bore the brunt of its debt to the West and was forced to sign the Treaty of Versailles in June 1919. The Army's limits include 100,000 infantry units, absolutely no tanks of any kind, and very few armored vehicles on the ground.

The interwar German army was a shell in itself, a far cry from the Leviathan that emerged in the 1930s.

Dismantled but not completely out of the game, some in the German army were already trying to circumvent the rules of the Treaty of Versailles. One of them became Commander-in-Chief Hans von Sickert.

Keeping the lessons of the First World War in mind, Sickert set out to rewrite the establishment of the German army. He recognized early on the value of armored warfare, which would inevitably replace the cavalry of past wars, and envisioned a future where a motorized mechanized army would be the order of the day to provide a proportionate and overwhelming guarantee of victory.

By 1926, German Army doctrine was completely rewritten to realize this vision. Since the Treaty of Versailles prohibited Germany from developing or purchasing tanks of any kind, canvas-covered vehicles were used in large-scale training exercises to test the idea of ??mechanized warfare. One can only marvel at the chaos experienced by the "tank" crews trained there, driving cars disguised as tanks. Ultimately it was agreed that the era of cavalry was over and that the tank was the new king of the battlefield. Infantry remains the heart and soul of any planned attack, but tanks become the vanguard of the action, shattering enemy defenses with speed, power and firepower.

Tactics include dividing enemy formations and countermeasures using pincer maneuvers to surround and ultimately destroy the entire enemy. With this kind of radical thinking, WWII has actually arrived - the stage just needs its main cast and setting.

Many of Germany's military developments that led to the official start of World War II were carried out in secrecy. In the early 1930s, the German Army asked some German companies to assemble some funded light and medium tank prototypes.

At this point, the Army has no formal operational plan to meet its actual needs. Light tanks can be provided in large quantities at relatively low cost, while medium tanks provide firepower at a cost.

In any case, Germany's industrial infrastructure - the constraints of the postwar period and the economic blow of the 1929 crash - made the reputation of the German army easy - to pursue the development of light tanks (at least for this moment).

Official request for a new light tank with a weight limit of less than 5 tons that can serve as a qualified crew trainer. Five German companies submitted prototypes and the Krupp design was chosen. Krupp was inspired by the British Vickers "tank" but fell behind in delivering something noteworthy in the summer of 1932.

Under some pressure from the German army, Krupp supplied the rest of the world with La. S or "agriculture" (roughly translated as "agricultural tractor", "industrial tractor" or "agricultural tractor") under the name of farm implements. The Krupp tank has a Daimler-Benz body and turret. Testing of the tank continued in 1934, when the German Army assigned the designation "Krupp Tractor".

This was more formally changed to Pz, the name of the German Army. KpfW. My ex April 1936 A (Sd. Kfz. 101).

Adolf Hitler came to power in 1933 and saw the Panzer 1 he liked in 1934. His vision for a new strong German now includes an army of fast-moving armored vehicles using tactics the world has never seen before. After witnessing the Panzer One, he ordered his men to prepare for war in just eight years. In 1935, Hitler declared that the Treaty of Versailles was dead in the eyes of Germany and no longer bound by it.

Appearing under the all-encompassing name of the Wehrmacht, the German army advanced its militaristic goals. Decades ago, governments around the world were tired of war and tried to slowly recover from the collapse of 1929, with little response.

Panzer I Ausf. A and the Reconstruction of the German Army

Panzer I Ausf. A was the first German tank development in the postwar world. The tiny system consists of a crew of just two people - a driver and a commander, who also acts as the gunner. The driver sits on the front hull of the tank (offset to the left), while the commander sits on the turret (offset to the right).

The turrets are equipped with fairly simple 2 x 7.92mm machine guns (each firing at 650 rounds per minute, simultaneously or individually, providing a total of 1,5252,250 rounds of ammunition) and can only be manually traversed by the commander. Entry and exit of the commander It was through a semi-circular hatch mounted on top of the turret, while the driver entered and exited through a rectangular hinged door near the left side of the superstructure.

Armor protection can at best withstand a direct hit from small arms fire, nothing more. The armor thickness was just over half an inch deep at her peak. The Ausf. A has five wheels on one side of the track, each wrapped in rubber. The drive sprockets are located at the front of each track.

Three casters are attached to the underside of the upper rung. With an operating weight of 5.9 tonnes, power comes from a single Krupp M 305 air-cooled four-cylinder petrol engine producing up to 60 hp. The Ausf.

A has a top speed of 23 mph, an off-road range of 85 miles and a road range of 125 miles.

First attempt, given the constraints of the times and financial/industrial, Krupp produced a very solid design. The turret provides some flexibility for available firepower when traversing, and the overall layout is quite refined. Steel plate armor sloped on the hull, forward plate, superstructure and turret to improve crew survivability. The speed is impressive enough to create a useful reconnaissance platform or troop support system, and the relatively small size means that small machines can make the system a difficult target to zero in, while still maintaining a simple system.

Statistics encourage production and Manufacturing it was quantitatively affordable for the German army. However, it should be noted that not all German generals were sold on the Panzer I. Some see it as a rather limited thing with little real combat value for modern militaries.

In many ways, these people will be proven right.

With the design finalized and approved, activities have now begun to fully meet the light tank requirements. Production was liberalized andin order to maintain the production levels demanded by the resurgent German armyother German companies (including Henschel, MAN, and Daimler-Benz) were brought in to help Krupp with production.

Henschel received the first order for the production of 150 armored tanks. In 1935, the first three armored divisions of the "new" German army were also formed.

Panzer I Ausf B: Bigger engine and longer body

The Panzer I Ausf. B was introduced in August 1935 with a 100 hp liquid-cooled engine. The original Ausf. A had a fairly lean 60-horsepower air-cooled engine, but the power delivery wasn't great. Therefore, the appearance of Ausf.

B helps to overcome the shortcomings of the original production model. Pz. KpfW. My ex-B has a crew of 2 and weighs 13,230 lbs. The system is powered by a 100-horsepower Maybach NL 38 TR liquid-cooled six-cylinder gasoline engine.

The engine was more powerful than the original 60 hp, so the fuselage of the Ausf. A was lengthened to accommodate the new powerplant (the fuselage is now 14 feet, 6 inches). This also required adding a road wheel on each side of the track to accommodate the new length and weight. Performance specs include a top speed of 25 mph, a maximum range of 87 miles, a fording capability of up to 1 ft. 11 in., a slope capability of up to 60 percent, a vertical obstacle capability of 1 ft.

2 in., and a digging capacity of up to 4 ft. 7 in. 399 Ausf. B prototypes were to be delivered by the end of 1937, with production ending in June of that year.

In 1936, Panzer I conducted a large-scale exercise with Army infantry and Luftwaffe air units. Also in 1936, Hitler sent "voluntary" German troops, planes and tanks into the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939) - a battlefield that was literally a "testing ground" for all Germans. The Panzer I and its crew were one such device that was sent to the region. There, my armored car received almost no positive legacy. The tank proved inferior to the steel-armored Soviet T26 and B5 light tanks, as these tanks were equipped with high-speed artillery that outperformed the Panzer I's two 7.92mm machine gun offerings.

In many cases, German tanks were destroyed long before they got into range of their own useless machine guns. While some of these armored vehicles are thought to be able to mount 20mm guns, the system still has little combat value on the modern battlefield. Essentially, the Out Party was a complete failure, although the value of the tank as a reconnaissance platform, infantry support system, and crew trainer still held some weight. More importantly, the foundations of the "Blitzkrieg" are being perfected under the eyes of the world.

By September 1939, a full 6 armored divisions were available, and by then, at least Poland would have noticed.

On September 1, 1939, part of the Wehrmacht - including Panzer Is - flooded the Polish border. The Germans retained about 1,400 armored vehicles during the invasion. The defenses were quickly overwhelmed by combined land and air forces unleashed by the Germans. During the campaign, the Panzer 1 proved to be adequate, although it did not perform well in the Spanish Civil War.

It's not a front-line vehicle by any means, but its purpose is still evident. Soviet tanks were also not encountered on the Polish border.

Interestingly, later in the war, around 500 armored tanks were deployed during the invasion of the French countryside, although many more were available in Germany and Poland. Perhaps a testament to the changing demands of the modern battlefield, or a lack of confidence in the Panzer 1 system to lead a more prepared French defense.