Talk:Infantry tank

Discrepancy

• Tank classification The idea for this tank was developed during World War I by the British and French
• Infantry tank The Infantry tank was a concept developed by the British in the years leading up to World War II.

Someone please fix that.
David Latapie (✒ | @) 09:17, 4 August 2006 (UTC)

Several Inaccuracies

On the whole a very nice article, but there are a couple of assertions regarding the nature of British infantry tanks which are inaccurate. For example, the article states that Infantry tanks were usually larger than Cruisers, whereas in actual fact the opposite is the case. With the exception of the Churchill tank, Infantry tanks were universally smaller than the contempory cruisers and even the Churchill was dimensionally about the same as the Cromwell tank. Also, again with the exception of the Churchill, the Infantry tanks were not notably heavier than their Cruiser tank equivalents. Additionally, the implication that Cruiser tanks were not capable of fighting enemy tanks is incorrect. Cruiser tanks were actually expected to engage enemy tank formations and were armed accordingly. The trade off between Cruisers and Infantry tanks was exclsively one of armour vs mobility. The two types almost invariably had equivalent firepower. Also the equating of Cruisers and Infantry tanks to Medium and heavy tanks is misleading. I shall be making some edits to address these points shortly. Cheers, Getztashida 10:05, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Think to the start of the devlopment of the idea not the middle of the war, the Cruiser II and III were lighter than the Matilda II. And having read it I see no implication that cruisers wer enot suspised to engage other tanks. GraemeLeggett 10:32, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Your point on the Cruiser II and III overlooks that the contempory Infantry tanks was actually the Matilda I. The Matilda II was actually contempary to the Cruiser IV and only slightly ahead of the Crusader, both of which were larger and in the same weight class. As to the Implication that Cruisers were incapable of combatiing enemy tanks, the phrase I would like to edit is as follows;

"the cruisers ended up meeting enemy tanks in combat, while the infantry tanks were the only ones present when a breakthrough was accomplished."

While the sentence does not explicitly state that Cruisers were not intended to combat enemy tanks I feel that it does imply that that was the case, which is, of course, incorrect.

Basically, what I'm concerned about is that the author has tried to equate the Cruiser and Infantry tank to other nation's Medium and Heavy tanks. To do so is to misrepresent the idea behind British WWII armoured doctrine, that being to have differnet tanks of approximately equivalent weight and size, optimised for either Infantry Support or Exploitation. I'm at work at the moment and don't have any reference books handy, but I'm happy to get back later with some facts and figures covering introduction dates, dimensions and weights which will back up my assertion that Infantry tanks were generally not larger than the equvalent crusiers. Getztashida 16:23, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

I think you are correct in this. For other nations it was basically the same: a T-26 wasn't larger than a BT-7, nor was a R 35 larger than an AMC 35.--MWAK 17:11, 23 January 2007 (UTC)

Soviet infantry tanks

The Soviets had two different roles for infantry and heavy tanks, the latter for “breakthrough”. In the 1930s–40s the former was represented by the T-26 and T-50 tank project, the latter by the T-35 and KV-1—the KV was not the successor to the T-26 as is stated in the article. (There were also “artillery tanks”, the T-26A, BT-5A, BT-7A, and KV-2.)

The successor to the BT fast tank “cruiser”, the T-34, was put forward by its designer as a “universal tank”—its adoption was delayed by political pressure for the T-50, but the design and production of that tank was badly botched, so the T-34 had to be mass-produced when Germany invaded the USSR. It stepped into the void as a medium tank and precursor to the MBT.

I can help with references for some of this, if anyone wants to introduce it into the article. —Michael Z. 2008-10-22 18:40 z

That's right - I modified the text, which was left over from a much older edit (not mine but I should have cleaned it up earlier today). I did put a mention of the KV in simply to make the point that infantry tanks are not the same concept as heavy tanks. Regards, DMorpheus (talk) 20:53, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

KV vs. Matilda

I find the comparison technically wrong. Although better armed than the Matilda, the KV-1 was not better armed than the T-34, a medium tank. In fact, the KV-1 could be said to be underarmed, much like the Matilda and Churchill were, especially later on. AllStarZ (talk) 18:14, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

US Army Nor Permitted Tanks?

The following passage is not correct:

"For political reasons, the US Army was not permitted "tanks" in the years before WWII and so the tracked AFVs that it did develop were termed "Combat Cars" instead."

In fact the National Defense Act of 1920 placed the Tank Corps under control of the Infantry, and the Infantry remained responsible for tanks and did work to develop infantry support tanks between the wars until the creation of the Armored Force. For example, the tanks provided for the experimental mechanized force in 1928 came from the Infantry.

In fact, the 2nd Armored Division was created from the Provisional Tank Brigade (which had been created at Fort Benning from the various pre-existing Infantry tank units). The M1 Light Tank, M2 Light Tank and M2 Medium Tank were all 'tracked AFVs' developed for the infantry.

'Combat cars' was the term used for cavalry-developed AVFs (often just variations of infantry tanks), but the idea that these were the only 'tracked AVFs' developed by the Army is just wrong. As is the idea that the Army was not permitted tanks.

67.181.62.193 (talk) 07:13, 1 January 2011 (UTC)

Looks more like a case of a missing qualifier - modify the sentence as "..US Army cavalry was not permitted..." and it makes sense.GraemeLeggett (talk) 08:57, 1 January 2011 (UTC)

Edit March 24th, 2015.

I am grateful for the explanation, but my reading skills are highly developed, and I am able to make that association unaided. No, the thing is this:

Is an "infantry tank-supported attack" an attack supported by infantry tanks or an infantry attack supported by tanks? It's the clumsiness and slight ambiguity of the phrase that concerns me, and a small grammatical adjustment removes that ambiguity and makes the sentence clearer. I cannot see that any reasonable person would object to an increase in Wikipedia's clarity, especially one who considers himself an authority on English and other modern European languages, and who frequently makes pronouncements on these and many other things. Of course, if it is felt that this alteration harms the project, then by all means let it be reverted and let warnings be issued and complaints lodged, as is customary. On the other hand, as your optician might perhaps say, "Is that better, worse, or about the same?" Then again, we could wait and see if there is consensus on whether this change should stand, something that Wikipedia strongly recommends.

The paragraph that precedes it also seems rather cumbersome and ungrammatical. I shall submit some suggested improvements when time permits. Apologies for the delay, but one is not able to devote unlimited amounts of time to Wikipedia. Hengistmate (talk) 09:34, 24 March 2015 (UTC)

Except that your change was, "No. "Infantry tank-supported attack" ambiguous; "tank-supported infantry attack" clearer. " which is giving the wrong interpretation to this sentence. Andy Dingley (talk) 00:08, 25 March 2015 (UTC)

Infantry

It seems as though the British I tank concept and tanks for infantry are being discussed in the same article. Keith-264 (talk) 20:06, 13 October 2016 (UTC)

In any case a clear distinction should be made between tanks for infantry support and tanks part of the organisation of the Infantry arm.--MWAK (talk) 07:57, 14 October 2016 (UTC)

I think they're separate and the distinction should be separate articles.Keith-264 (talk) 08:00, 14 October 2016 (UTC)

Hmmm, I've put some in from Harris but I think that the article needs to be structured by the I tank concept, its history and consequences as well as descriptions of the four I tank versions (and the Grant). Harris is helpful but not enough. Keith-264 (talk) 10:16, 14 October 2016 (UTC)

Citations

Andy, please don't make retrograde edits, find the page numbers! Keith-264 (talk) 21:47, 27 October 2016 (UTC)

These citations have never had any page numbers. Andy Dingley (talk) 21:58, 27 October 2016 (UTC)

Then we need to find the rest of them; why is this so provocative? Keith-264 (talk) 22:17, 27 October 2016 (UTC)

Article progress

At the moment the article seems to be about the British I tank concept and a comparative study of equivalent infantry support tanks of other countries. I'm not sure that this will work, despite it being inherently interesting, because of the amount of sources necessary. To avoid disruption, I've copied sections into a sandbox while I've been doing a literature search, J. P. Harris turning out to be a disappointment as well as the second most boring milhist writer in the world. T. H. Place is much more helpful. Keith-264 (talk) 08:09, 28 October 2016 (UTC)

@Graham, what copyright infringing? Regards Keith-264 (talk) 20:20, 29 December 2016 (UTC)

Mooted replacement article

I'm maturing an article here User:Keith-264/sandbox3 called Infantry tank which is specific to Britain and wonder if it should replace the one already here or be separate. It lacks the comparative aspect of the existing article but delves deeper. I'd be grateful if interested editors would venture an opinion as to where the new one should go. Regards Keith-264 (talk) 10:45, 9 September 2017 (UTC)

i'd merge and edit in bits at a time rather than a wholesale swap out. The training manual section looks extremely dense and should be teaser or folded into an overview of doctrinal changes. Equally focus the individual tank sections to where they fit in timeframe and how they were introduced and then replaced. GraemeLeggett (talk) 12:08, 9 September 2017 (UTC)

That section needs pruning because much of the detail is generic. As you suggest, the tanks might be better in the Operations section rather than separate so I'm keeping my options open. Regards Keith-264 (talk) 12:37, 9 September 2017 (UTC)

I'm leaning towards a separate article now, something like The British Infantry tank, 1936–1945.Keith-264 (talk) 07:48, 12 September 2017 (UTC)

Nice name for a book, terrible name for an article. GraemeLeggett (talk) 09:32, 12 September 2017 (UTC)

Thanks for the encouragement; care to suggest an alternative?Keith-264 (talk) 09:58, 12 September 2017 (UTC)

"Infantry tank". It meets all the usual rules for naming: common usage and simplicity. We explain names in the articles, not by the titles. Titles are there to be just as unambiguous as they need to be, and to be easily linkable. Andy Dingley (talk) 10:20, 12 September 2017 (UTC)

I can't use that title for a separate article, it's taken, here....Keith-264 (talk) 10:25, 12 September 2017 (UTC)

Then still use Infantry tank, as the UK invented the term. Disambiguate the others first. Andy Dingley (talk) 10:31, 12 September 2017 (UTC)

No, that would be an unnecessary complication. I might try Infantry tank (Britain) though. Keith-264 (talk) 10:55, 12 September 2017 (UTC)

Then it would be Infantry tanks of the United Kingdom. And content about how they came about would still need to be in the Infantry tank article. And also in the cruiser tank article. GraemeLeggett (talk) 11:46, 12 September 2017 (UTC)

Too long and this one's about theory and practice as well as the technicalities. If anyone wants to borrow material they're welcome but the existing I tank article is too generic for what I'm doing.

ITs are essentially British, with other nations sometimes following along for a tank or two. If British ITs become the main feature of a different article, then this article won't have enough content to justify its existence, unless we duplicate most of the info here as well. I see no benefit in splitting. --A D Monroe III (talk) 16:42, 13 September 2017 (UTC)

I'm not adding a comparison with other countries' tanks; are the writers on this one willing to lose the one here? Keith-264 (talk) 16:59, 13 September 2017 (UTC)

The section on non-British tanks isn't cited so I suppose it can go.Keith-264 (talk) 17:01, 13 September 2017 (UTC)

Recent edits

@A D Monroe III: Sorry about that, I thought I was annotating the revamp in my sandbox. Regards Keith-264 (talk) 23:17, 25 November 2017 (UTC)

Better now? Keith-264 (talk) 23:31, 25 November 2017 (UTC)

Much. I wasn't even sure what the original version was really trying to say -- clear now. Thanks. --A D Monroe III^(talk) 02:47, 26 November 2017 (UTC)