Terran empire

* scratches his head...* oh, oh i see. a cop For a second i was thinking Zoo keeper.

It was foolish to drop the M8 AGS. and the Stryker is not a substitute. nor is any version of the m113.

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"Finger never touches Trigger unless some one is going too need a grave digger" (Me)[

Tinkertoys

To be quite honest, I was considering becoming a zoo keeper before law enforcement.

-Tink

Wraith601

The M8 was very similar to the WWII tank destroyer concept, the Stryker is a family of combat vehicles for medium forces. They have completely different roles and capabilities. The M8 is ok if you want to engage masse denemy armor. If you're fighting a unconventional war like Iraq, a Stryker is proably a better bet.

dalem

I'm old fashioned - I say bring back the M4 Sherman and start chucking HE.

-dale

Julie

The Sherman won by numbers, not by quality.

TopHatter

Yeah, and a lot of dead Allied crews

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Anon

"The Sherman won by numbers, not by quality"

The latewar and postwar shermans were actually very good tanks.

Julie

When the US entered world war 2 it did not have a modern tank, even the latest existing designs were obsolete compared to the modern german tanks. So a new medium tank design was quickly developed, and since it was technically simple and very reliable, a decision was made to immediately start mass producing it in enormous numbers and not wait for the slow development process of an advanced heavy tank. The M26 Pershing heavy tank was slowly developed and reached the war front just before the end of the war.

The M4 Sherman Tank had a relatively thin armor, an inferior 75mm or 76mm gun which simply could not penetrate the front armor of the german Tiger tanks even from short range, while they could easily destroy the Sherman from long ranges, and it was very tall, 3.43m, which is taller than the german tigers, and one meter taller than the superb russian T-34, meaning the Sherman could not hide as well as other tanks.

There were 30,000 M4 Shermans vs. 600 Tigers and King Tigers and 1500 Panthers. This is a 14:1 ratio vs. the modern german tanks, and a 50:1 ratio vs. the formidable Tigers, giving a perspective to the immense superiority of the american war industry over its rivals.

So, Sniper, the Sherman won by quantity, not by quality.

My daughter is currently doing extensive research on WWII for her advanced history class, and I've been taking a peekaboo at it. I have never won a debate with this hard-headed 11-year old, but I can put a bug in her ear the next time she's on MSN with you.

Anon

Ask your daughter about the M-4A3E8/76.

TopHatter

I think she is referring to the vast majority of Shermans that actually fought most of WWII. Deathtraps as Belton Cooper said.
The very-late-war and post-war Shermans are an entirely different story as you say....though I'd still rather be in a Panther

Shek

It can also be said that the Germans lost due to quality. Their emphasis on building the perfect tank, truck, motorcycle, plane, etc. caused them to continuously stop production lines to retool for a new variant and resulted in low rate production runs. Their production policies were horrendous and didn't even come close to maxing out their industry until 1944, at which time the RAF and USAAF had established dominion over Germany and prevented Germany from seeing the benefits of their finally centralized production policies (where they decided on only a couple of models and entered into high rate production levels). Also, this low rate production of numerous models and variants of every type of equipment made it almost impossible to repair equipment in the field due to both a lack of spare parts and the uncommonality of repair parts.

dalem

Oh, don't get me started on busting WWII tank myths.

Anyway, my point is that a relatively low-tech HE chucker would be useful to the troops. I just have a soft spot for the M4.

-dale

Julie

Oh Dale, you are such a sweet guy, there is no rattling you is there?