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'Better' is dependent on the viewpoint. Russian tanks were simpler mechanically, ran on diesel, which made them less flammable and in the early years the T34 wa

'Better' is dependent on the viewpoint. Russian tanks were simpler mechanically, ran on diesel, which made them less flammable and in the early years the T34 was actually better than anything the wehrmacht had. The Panther is almost a direct copy of the T34 design. But you are right, at the end the quantities prevailed, it was a war of economies and Russia, having transferred most of its industry far east and out of reach, was going to win, even without the help from west. Most of the german generals knew they were toast after the initial blitz failed in the winter of '41.

dmix 9y ago
> But you are right, at the end the quantities prevailed, it was a war of economies My point was the German generals knew this well beforehand. Everyone knew they couldn't beat the Russians in a straight up one-on-one war over a long timespan. They only had a short time window to run them over with their tank/aircraft tactics. And that failed because the Nazi's largely underplayed the quality of Russian tanks/technology. It doesn't matter if you have 10 German tanks vs 1 Russian tank if those ten tanks can't penetrate the armour of the Russian one. This is a critical difference. Especially when the Nazi's were already strapped for fuel and armaments. Which is why a small number of KV-1s would grind the invasion to a halt until reinforcements could arrive. As soon as they had to wait for the supply lines and infantry to catch up then the Blitzkrieg tactics are no longer effective and Nazi Germany is now facing Russia on their terms. It's amazing how this is seemingly such a controversial topic when plenty of well researched literature will back me up here...