After watching Fury, I recalled seeing a documentary about tanks a long while back. What I'm wondering are the pros and cons of the Sherman and Tiger in relation to the time it was being used in Fury. In my perspective the Sherman seemed weaker than the Tiger. But is that true?
Assessing the "value" of a tank is far more complicated than people think. In the case of a tank you have to factor in several different things. Just to name a few.
*Cost ( production, maintenance, milage, deployability et cetera )
*Combat effectivness ( protection, gun, sights, rate of fire, mobility et cetera )
*Usefullness in a strategic sense ( Whats the "job" of the vehicle?)
*Combat readiness rate ( How much percent of the tanks are eventually engaging the enemy when needed.)
In my perspective the Sherman seemed weaker than the Tiger. But is that true?
Certainly. One Tiger would outperform a Sherman in a duel situation. People who will argue otherwise are not studied on this subject. The Tiger was better armed and better protected there is also a case to be made for several other factors like gun sights for example. On top of that the Tiger has likely a far more experienced crew, maybe with dozen prior combat engagements since the Tiger was so well protected in 43/44 that a total crew loss was rare. The Sherman was able to deal with a Tiger in certain favorabler situations especially the upgunned version Firefly but overall the Tiger was superior in duel situations. But the Sherman was overall ( everything included) far cheaper than the Tiger. Combined with a higher readiness rate you had far more Sherman tanks to employ. Since tank on tank engagements are only a minor part of the tank duties and the difference of performance between a Tiger and Sherman in infantry support roles was likely "comparable" the Sherman had more impact on the battlefields than the Tiger for each dollar spent. So to summarize; with the Tiger you had a far superior "tank on tank" vehicle with likely only minor to medium advantages in Infantry support role ( the Tiger armor enabled it to take a beating of anti tank guns and infantry in general ) but for a far higher costs. To make up for this the Tigers which were available had to destroy a lot of enemy tanks to make up for all the Shermans helping the allied infantry.