Somewhere on the Siegfried Line. |Photo: livejournal.com.
After the Nazis came to power in Germany, the experience of the First World War was analyzed in the most serious way. Although the Germans from the very beginning planned to wage an aggressive war on all fronts in order to conquer the much-desired "Lebensraum" for the German nation, the Wehrmacht command was preparing, including the need to conduct defensive military actions. For this purpose, as early as 1936, the construction of the Western Wall, a system of long-term fortifications, better known as the "Siegfried Line", began. The defensive shaft with a length of 630 kilometers was ready by 1940. First of all, the Western Wall covered Germany from France. However, in 1940 it also separated Belgium from French territory.
A new gun was created. |Photo: forum.wotlabs.net.
When organizing a second front in Europe, the Western Allies of the USSR very quickly came to a not very pleasant conclusion for themselves. It will not work to capture German ports and organize a convenient bridgehead. You will have to land on bare beaches. The best place for such an operation was French Normandy. The problem was that the Allied troops, even in the event of a successful landing, risked being locked in France, including thanks to the Siegfried Line erected in advance. Nobody wanted a repeat of the First World War. The Allies were afraid of getting bogged down in the German system of fortifications in Belgium.
American monster. |Photo: amp.topwar.ru.
To overcome this very line, special weapons were required. In particular, the army wanted to get some powerful means against the long-term fortifications of the enemy. It was then in the bright minds of American weapons designers that the idea of creating a super-heavy self-propelled artillery mount was born, which later received the T28 index. It was assumed that the super-self-propelled guns could simultaneously help in overcoming well-fortified areas and would fight heavy German tanks. By this time, heavy tanks "Tiger" had long appeared on the Eastern Front. The first time square "kotans" appeared in August 1942. Moreover, since July 1943, heavy (according to the German classification, medium) Panther tanks have been actively used in the German army. At the same time, the latter became more and more.
And yet, first of all, the T28 was supposed to be a “concrete-breaking” machine. It was proposed to put on a reckless tank (as self-propelled guns were classified in the USA) an experimental 105-mm tank rifled gun T5E1. It is important to emphasize that for the times of the Second World War, the caliber of 105 mm was truly gigantic. 76 and 85 mm guns were installed on Soviet T-34s, 75 mm on German Panzer IVs, and 75 and 76 mm on American Shermans. The development of the T28 began in 1943. The American command had no illusions and hoped to receive at least 25 highly specialized self-propelled guns by the time the landing operation began in France. However, the work did not go well. The project was redone several times, as a result, the documentation for the T28 was agreed only in March 1945.
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Against the backdrop of success in Europe, as well as a decrease in the intensity of hostilities in the Pacific, the interest of the command in the project was falling more and more. In fairness, the work of the designers was not in vain. For example, the developments on the 500-horsepower Ford-GAF engine were later used during the creation of the M26 Pershing tank. The Paccar company was engaged in the implementation of the super-heavy self-propelled guns project. By this point, it was decided that the company would make two test samples. But what happened in the end? According to the command of the US Army, Paccar got an unnecessary Frankenstein. The end result did not match what the US military wanted. Moreover, the positioning of the combat vehicle turned out to be frankly incomprehensible.
If the T28 was called a tank, then it was absolutely not clear why it did not have a rotating turret. If the T28 was still a tank hunter (SPG), then why does the car need such heavy armor. Steel homogeneous frontal armor had a thickness of 305 mm at an angle of inclination of 0 degrees. For comparison, the Sherman's frontal armor was 51 mm at an angle of inclination of 56 degrees. All this, not to mention the fact that the novelty turned out to be extremely heavy and clumsy. With dimensions of 7.4x4.5x2.8 meters and a clearance of 495 mm, the "tank" weighed 86 tons. For comparison, the combat weight of the Sherman packed with everything necessary was 30 tons.
It all ended for the T28 with the closure of the project in 1946. Although the experience gained was not in vain, it was ultimately decided to send both experimental machines to the only place of service where they could bring at least some benefit - to the museum. It is there, in the Patton Museum at Fort Knox, Kentucky, that the last of the T28s is still on public display.
If you want to know even more interesting things, then you should read about why did the Americans attach wooden boards to Sherman tanks and sheets of plywood.
Source: https://novate.ru/blogs/280422/62847/