| rdfs:comment | - Like the ships of the same name, cruiser tanks were intended to be fast and mobile, and operate independently. In this case, the independence was not from other ships in a fleet, but independence from the slow-moving infantry, their heavier infantry tanks, and artillery.
|
| abstract | - Like the ships of the same name, cruiser tanks were intended to be fast and mobile, and operate independently. In this case, the independence was not from other ships in a fleet, but independence from the slow-moving infantry, their heavier infantry tanks, and artillery. Once gaps had been punched in the enemy front by the infantry tanks, the cruisers were intended to penetrate to the rear, attacking lines of supply and communication in accordance with the theories of J.F.C. Fuller, P.C.S. Hobart, and B.H. Liddell-Hart. The cruiser tank was designed to be used in way similar to cavalry in its heyday and thus speed was a critical factor, and to achieve this the early cruiser designs were lightly armoured and armed. This emphasis on speed unbalanced the British designs; insufficient attention was paid to armour protection. At the time, the concept of "speed is armor" was considered the overriding concept in the British tank corps (unsurprising considering its birth in the Landships Committee of the Royal Navy, which also applied the concept to the ill-fated HMS Hood)[citation needed]. It was not understood at the time that this principle of mobility over all else meshed poorly with the corresponding German policy of trading speed for superior armor and armament, ensuring that even a single round from a German medium tank could easily destroy a cruiser. German infantry were also widely equipped with handheld anti-tank weapons at a rate far exceeding the expectations of the British, further exacerbating the cruiser's survivability problems while pursuing breakthroughs against infantry forces. An even bigger problem for most cruiser tanks was the small calibre of their main gun. Most cruisers were armed with the QF two-pounder (40 mm) gun. This gun had adequate armour penetration against early war tanks, but was never issued high explosive ammunition. This made the cruisers highly vulnerable to towed anti-tank guns. However, as fighting enemy tanks was part of the projected role of the cruiser tanks, they were the first to be upgraded to the heavier 6 pounder (57 mm) gun when it became available, and a great deal of effort was put into developing cruiser tanks armed with the powerful 17 pounder QF (76 mm) gun when it became available. The Cromwell itself had too small a turret ring and it was the following tank design in the British cruiser line the Comet tank with a shortened 17 pdr that entered service late in the war. As the UK had large numbers of US M4 Sherman tanks, the conversion of the Sherman to take a 17 pdr (as the Sherman Firefly) proved effective in providing more 17pdr gun tanks. Ironically, despite the emphasis on high mobility, most cruisers were plagued by mechanical unreliability, most noticeably the Crusader tank in the hot and gritty desert of the North Africa Campaign. This problem was usually caused by insufficient development as most of the early cruiser tank designs were ordered "off the drawing board" and was not fully solved until the debut of the Cromwell tank in 1944, with its powerful, reliable Rolls-Royce Meteor engine.
|
