French and Polish defeat, what happened to all the weopons

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e.polis
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French and Polish defeat, what happened to all the weopons

#1

Post by e.polis » 08 Sep 2004, 09:42

After the capitulation of France and Poland and I suppose all the other occupied countries what happened to all the rifles, MGs, pistols, mortars etc. I know some tanks and artillery was impressed in to German service.
Further to the above what happened to all the captured British stuff from Dunkirk and the Dieppe raid. After all there were many thousands of personal weopons lost.

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Fredd
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#2

Post by Fredd » 08 Sep 2004, 15:18

Germans used what was useable - for example they used some quatities Poilsh anti - tank rifles Ur but renamed it to PzB 35(p) ewentually Germans upraged slightly the construction and started own production and captured Urs (PzB 35(p)) sold to Italy where received name "fucile controcarro 35(P)" and were used till the end of war.

Some tankiettes captured in Poland were used in Norway by gendermerie (TKS and TK-3) and in 1942 almost all of this vehicle were handed over to Croatian.
Image

a TKS vehicle


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Andy H
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#3

Post by Andy H » 08 Sep 2004, 18:37

Practicality would dictate the fate of most of the captured arms. Those that were dated and expensive to maintain (be that physically or through ammunition) would be scrapped/melted down. Those that were of low maintenence were used to arm various second rate units or militia's, or farmed out to other Axis countries.

Andy H

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Fredd
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#4

Post by Fredd » 08 Sep 2004, 19:20

Allow me to add a few remarks:

Czechoslovakia - Germans used PzKpfw 35(t) i 38(t) which were quite modern in 1939 but some obsolete tankette and tanks LT 34 were handed over to Slovakia.

As for captured Polish vehicles - I wrote before
- one battialion consisted of Polish light tanks TP-7 served and saw action in France (Pas de Calais) and all Vickers tanks were scraped.

France - here Germans menaged to size large amount of various vehicles.

Renault R-35, R-39 and R-40 called Panzerkampfwagen 35R 731(f)

Hotchkiss H-35, H-38 and H-39 called PzKpfw 38H 735(f)

Somua S-35 called PzKpfw 35S 739(f)

Renault AMR called AMR 35(f)

and medium tanks Char B-2 called PzKpfw B-2 740(f) and older D-2 which were used for training purposed only.

Vehicles were frequentely rebuilt as self-propeled guns. For example Char B-2 were equiped with flamethrower and called Flammwagen auf PzKpfw B-2(f).

In Dunkirk Germans seized some Matildas in Africa Germans were lucky as well. They seized Mk. II A12 "Matilda II" and Mk. III "Valentine

Soviets

Within first month of Barbarossa German sized many of T-27, T-26 i BT-28, T-38, T-40, T-28, T-34 KW i T-35. But in order to avoid confussion in firts line were used inly the most valuable T -34 and some KV.

Western Allies after D-Day

Here germans were mostly in retreat so they managed to seize only a few M4 "Sherman", "Stuarts"and M8 "Greyhound". Sufficient to say when Skorzenny needed in Ardenes to establish a unit pretending to been an Allied he were offered only TWO Shermans.

So let's see how it looked, shall we?

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Observe large 'swastika' on top of captured T-34 (for German aviators).

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