use of 8,8 cm Flak against tanks

[Carl Schwamberger]

I'm always a bit suprised over the facination over the use of the German '88' vas tanks and ground targets. Folks act like it was something special, unique, or whatever. The whole concept of a multipurpose medium artillery weapon had been around for a couple decades

One early proposal for such a weapon was from the former Austrian artillery officer General Ludwig Eimannsberger. In the early 1920s Eimannsberger proposed a 'Tank und Flieger' "TuF" artillery weapon for the Austrian army. Specifically a 75mm gun mounted on a cruciform platform/carriage, equipped with fire control equipment for indirect fire, AT fire, and anti aircraft fires. Eimannsberger provided detailed specifications for weight, range, projectiles, elevation, ect.. Gudmundsson has a couple pages on Eimannsbergers proposals in 'On Artillery' (pages 116 - 118)

This was certainly not the only emergence of the concept. In the early 1920s the 'Westerveldt Board' recommended pursuit of a multipurpose artillery weapon for the US Army. One of the reusults of this was a 75mm cannon on a T3 mount. This was intended for use as a field artillery, antiaircraft, and antitank weapon.

Found several pages of text on this weapon in the 1930 issue of the US Field Artillery Journal. Vol XX May-June 1930 #3. The specific article concerns the future division artillery and describes the several cannon of gun and howitzer types being designed for the US Army. Starts on page 239 if my notes are correct.

http://sill-www.army.mil/firesbullet...ves/index.html

There are eight photographs of the cannon/carriage and two scale drawings. The text identifies it as 75mm cannon on mount T3. The dozen odd pages of text concerning it discuss its multipurpose role as a indirect fire, anti tank, and antiaircraft artillery weapon. Fire control equipment designed and tested for this weapon included 'long tube' style range finders, a mechanical or analog moving target computational machine, a electrical transmission system of firing data (range/elevation, direction, fuze settings) from the battery computations section to the individual guns. One photo shows the repeater device for range/elevation on the cannon.

Development seems to have been initiated in the early 1920s and testing occuring circa 1928-1930. Within the US Army development was ended with the fiscal constriants of of the US government of the 1920s and the subsequent Depression years. While 75mm & 3" guns went into production as tank & AT weapons from 1940 the T3 carriage and universal cannon concept disappeared from the US Army, other than training of the antiaircraft artillery for use against ground targets.

I did not have time to do more than skim the article, so if there was anything about ammunition I missed it.

For miscl sources similar weapons seem to have been proposed within the British, French, German, & possiblly Dutch armies. I'd not be suprised if the same general idea was not considered by others, or even tested.

[Latze]

The quest for the 'universal gun' went on after the Second World War... I have an article somewhere in an Austrian military journal that argues that the 88 was a step in the right direction. If anybody insists I will look for a proper citation. That these guns never saw the light of day strongly points to the fact that the concept was not really feasible...

My question starting this thread was no fascination with the use of the 88 against tanks but the question if the 'common story' (which to me seems to be improbable - even if the gun was used against tanks occasionally I fail to see a real impact on German PAK development or anti-tank doctrine at this point in time) was true.

Naturally now one would have to ask where the story of the 'Spanish guns' originated?

[Ironmachine]

My question starting this thread was no fascination with the use of the 88 against tanks but the question if the 'common story' (which to me seems to be improbable - even if the gun was used against tanks occasionally I fail to see a real impact on German PAK development or anti-tank doctrine at this point in time) was true.
Naturally now one would have to ask where the story of the 'Spanish guns' originated?

The problem is that there are two different questions involved here.
The first one would be: was the 8,8 cm Flak employed against tanks in the SCW? My answer would be: quite probable, though not in a wide scale (and it was in no way an official doctrine)
The second question is whether this "paved the way for the anti-tank role of German ant-aircraft guns and led ultimately to the development of Pak 43"? IMHO, no. I don't think the Germans paid much attention to those unusual occurrences that might have happened during the SCW, much more so as the involved German troops would have been from the Luftwaffe.

[John T]

In 1937 the Swedish "Journal of artillery"(artilleritidskrift)
contained an essay on "Artillery as a tank destroyer"

It contains a litterature study of different sources.

The French solution contains a mathematical model to find the number of direct hits when firing indirect fire.
(really ammo consuming)

Sweden had tested 75mm fieldgun m/02 (One of the universal 3" / 75mm field guns designed around 1900) with AP ammo and found the biggest problem where to follow the target. Armour penetration with standard ammo where good enough against light tanks (16mm at 1500 meters) while the AP round did penetrate 25mm at the same range but the additional cost and logistical problems didn't really warrant it's inclusion in the inventory. As hit probability where too low.
But normal HE ammo could be use for self defence.
The advice where to go for a 20mm combined AA AT gun (what later became Bofors 20mm m/40)

Soviet sources claims that direct fire is the only usable method.

A bit later superheavy tanks are discussed, with up to 50 mm armour and "a German writer" (no more specific reference) notes that only direct hist from 10 centimeters guns and 8,8 AA-guns are effective against "Grosstanks".
And he reasons for rearming german light field artillery with "long 10 cm gun howitzers" (I think it means 105mm m/18)

Cheers
/John T.