Were Russian T34 the best tanks during WW2?

Question

But how about Germans Tiger and Panther?

Answer 1

When Germany invaded the Soviet Union in 1941, the T-34 was the best tank in the world, by a very wide margin, and it sent the Germans scrambling for something that could stop it. Eventually, they came up with the Tiger and the Panther, but while each of these was superior to the T-34 in a 1 on 1 tank duel, that doesn't necessarily make them better tanks, in my opinion.
Comparing the T-34 to the Tiger which first saw action in the Fall of 1942, you first have to consider that the Tiger I weighed 56.9 tons, compared to the T-34 which weighed 26.5 tons. So, over 1 year after first encountering the T-34, the only way the Germans could come up with a tank to stop it was to build one that was over twice as big, and this meant completely sacrificing mobilty. The Tiger was slow, too heavy to cross most bridges, mechanically unreliable, and the range (distance it could go before refueling)
was about a third of the T-34's. Since the whole point of armored warfare is that tanks be able to strike deep behind enemy lines after a breakthrough, I think the T-34 was, overall, a better tank design than the Tiger even before you factor in the cost and ease of production.
The Panther, which first appeared in July of 1943, was a much better tank than the Tiger, and you could really make an argument that it was a better tank than the T-34. By copying the T-34's sloped armor, the Panther was protected as well as the Tiger but weighed over 10 tons less (but was still almost 20 tons heavier than the T-34). It could cross most bridges, and its speed and range were vast improvements over the Tiger. In fact, the earliest versions of the Panther were as fast as the T-34, but that caused serious transmission problems, so after a few months the Germans had to add governors to limit their top speed to 46 Km/h (compared to 53 for the T-34 and 38 for the Tiger).
The Panther maintained the advantages the Tiger had over the T-34 in firepower and protection, and had respectable mobility. It was an excellent tank, but I still would argue that the T-34 was better for the following reasons:
First, The T-34 was smaller, far easier to produce, and far more mechanically reliable than the Panther.
Second, the T-34 was around for two years before the Panther. The Panther was rushed into combat in July of 1943 for the battle of Kursk, and was rendered ineffective by mechanical problems. It wasn't a successful design until September of 1943, after the outcome of the war had been decided. The way I look at it, if you are going to say that a tank was the best of WWII, it should be a tank that appeared in the battles that decided the outcome of the war. The T-34 helped save Moscow in 1941, led the 1942 counteroffensive that surrounded and destroyed the 6th army at Stalingrad, and stopped the Germans at Kursk. The Panther was in the early design stage during the Battle of Moscow, was almost ready to go into production when the 6th army was encircled at Stalingrad, and a few finally appeared for the Battle of Kursk, only to have their engines catch fire in the first few days of the battle.
So the Tiger, while better than the T-34 in a 1 on 1 battle, wasn't a very good tank overall due to its extremely limited mobility. The Panther could be considered better than the T-34, but it was built as a direct response to the T-34, was heavily influenced by the design of the T-34, was far more difficult to produce than the T-34, far less mechanically reliable than the T-34, and most importantly to me, arrived at the front after the T-34 had already won the battles that determined the outcome of the war.

Answer 2

The T-34 was a excellent tank in many ways. But it isn't considered the best. It had good, sloped armor and a decent gun. But it was crude and unrefined in some ways. The German Panther was built as a direct response to the T-34, and the Panther is often considered the best over all tank of the war.

The Tiger was a good heavy tank, but it was a bit slow, and the thick armor was at least partially overcome with better guns. The King Tiger was an improvement, but it suffered from some reliability issues.

So, over all the Panther is the best, with the T-34 being second. After that the field gets a bit muddled because of the particular traits of the tanks. I'd say third would be a tie between the King Tiger and the Sherman, for completely different reasons of course.

Answer 3

The T-34 on display was I believe supplied to Britain on reverse Leand-Lease around 1942 or 43 and extensively tested in both the U.K. and later in America. The KV I don't know about offhand. Sloped armor was no secret at the dawn of WWII. Ship designers had been using it for decades. The T-34 tends to get mythologized as the first tank to really employ sloped armor but that isn't at all true. Remember from an earlier discussion that sloped armor was hardly the distinguishing feature of the T-34. Rather it was the sum of its parts - the first Main Battle Tank if you will. Dual-purpose main gun, mobility of a medium tank (and better than many lights) and protection superior to many "heavy" tanks of the period. The latter was accomplished by sloping the armor all the way around instead of just on the front and/or sides like some other tanks of the period. Also keep in mind that it wasn't until the late 1930's before anyone really started thinking about armoring tanks against anything more than rifle and machine gun bullets. Up until about 1934-35 bullets and artillery fire were the main threat to the tank and it didn't require anything particularly special to deal with those threats. Only with the widespread deployment from the mid-1930's on of dedicated anti-tank guns, typified by the German 3.7cm PAK 36 did protection assume a new importance. You will also note that around this same time the machine gun stopped being the tanks primary armament. Machine guns had inadequate range and lethality to deal with dug-in AT guns, and the other guy was up-armoring his tanks to protect from such weapons so tanks had to respond with larger caliber, often high-velocity guns and better protection. American tanks very much developed on their own lines quite apart from whatever the Russian's were doing. The M3 came about as a way to get the 75mm gun into a tank quickly - by using components of the existing M2 Medium tank - the only medium tank the American's had on the eve of war. The M4 Medium was in turn fundamentally just an improved M3 with the gun in a proper turret, again as a wartime expediency. The T-34 was also very much a wartime expedient. It was designed as a Cavalry Tank to replace the BT, for the breakthrough role. The smaller T-50 was supposed to be the mass-production Infantry Tank. the T-34's replacement was already in hand in June of 1941 and had the German's not invaded when they did few people today would probably know what a T-34 was. I'm on holiday for the next 6 days so cheers.

Answer 4

One point is the T34 used diesel, so didn't ignite immediately after being hit. It's fuel consumption was far less than the Tiger, which ran on petrol and used lots of it.

In the latter stages of the war, Germany simply couldn't produce enough fuel. They used to mix low grade petrol with purple coloured alcohol (nicknamed 'Moselle petrol'), which clogged carburettors.If they captured petrol supplies from the Allies, the engine ran fine.

However, the gearbox had teeth sheared off the gears, as the gearbox wasn't meant for an engine of that power.

Answer 5

when the russian t34's appeared on the battle scene, german engineers worked quickly to make a tank similar but better than the t34's. they copied the t34's sloped armor. the german counterpart to the t34 were the tigers and panthers.

Answer 6

I think overall they were.
The effectiveness of a tank is not measured only in firepower and strength of armour, but also in facility of production and repair. The Tiger and Panther were superb jobs but difficult to produce and prone to mechanical failure.
I would never propose Shermans as the best tanks, but there were ten Shermans for every Tiger, and you could often fix a malfunctioning Sherman with a Spanner and a hammer.

Answer 7

Ww2 T34

Answer 8

No, only at the time they appeared. You have German Panthers, Tigers, King Tigers and Soviet JS-2 as the best tanks.

http://www.geocities.com/Pentagon/3120/tanks.html

Answer 9

In a "one on one" the German Panzer was overwhelming. In any one battle there may have been differences like maneuverability and better leadership between the commanders between each battle but, on the whole the tank itself was the issue.

Answer 10

it was due to the fact that it was simple not over engineered and easily mass produced , unlike the German tiger which was so over complicated.