The 'inevitability' argument about German defeat in WWII is rather common, and rather wrong. It is easy enough to point up that Nazi Germany lacked resources, and massively under performed the Allies in terms of production. Both those points are true. Where the argument breaks down is in the reality on the ground at various points in time. I've covered this in an article Allied and Axis GDP which addresses Mark Harrison's contention (in Economics of World War II) that Allied victory was inevitable based on the GDP. It was not. Prior to the invasion of the USSR, the Axis had a huge advantage and it was 1:1 at the start of Barbarrosa. In other words, there was a window during which the Germans were positioned for victory.

Now, with respect to the secondary issue of tank quality, the Germans certainly produced some impressive designs in the later war period. However, it really needs to be remembered that their victories were based on tanks that were (at the time) considered technologically more-or-less on par with those of their opponents. If you scour the data (Tanks of World War II), you'll find that what really distinguishes the early German (Panzer III and IV) vehicles are the standard inclusion of a radio and a three-man turret. It really doesn't take much to realize the German advantage during the 'Blitkrieg' phases was mostly about the superior command and control (of a relatively small part -- the armored/mobile forces -- of their army). Most of their army marched on foot with horse-drawn support.

Hi there,

In James Holland’s trilogy “The war in the west” (of which 2 out of 3 parts are out now) he dives a lot into the logistic and supply situation of all sides.

He talks about the fact that Germany, apart from a little coal, didn’t have any resources itself. Most of Germany’s iron ore came from Sweden and Italy, while oil came from Romania. These were the 2 most vital resources for a modern war and Nazi Germany’s tactic of the bewegungskrieg or what we now call blitzkrieg.

On the part of the tanks, yes and no, the German Panzer Mk3 used for the invasion of the west in 1940 was actually on par with a French Renault R40 and only slightly better then the R35 in terms of gun (almost all came with 37mm and only later Mk3 tanks had a 50mm gun) and armour for example.

Let’s take a look at 2 iconic tanks, the Tiger I tank. Was this tank better then de the American M4 Sherman in a one on one shooting contest? Yes, a German 88mm against an American high velocity 76mm in the later models. The tiger had a minimum of 100mm front armor and the M4 75mm.

But that’s about it, there were over 49000 Sherman’s built versus 1352 Tigers, and yes this is as you say, A. because of a lack of recources and B. because of the overengineering of the Tiger.

Some examples, the tiger used an hydraulically-controlled pre-selector gearbox and semi-automatic transmission, which sounds difficult and it is very difficult when you have a breakdown while manoeuvring or under fire or whatever, the Sherman had a simple 5 speed manual transmission. The Tiger weighed 55 tons and had a range of 100km. If you are a country short on oil, that is not something you need if your oppononents main tank can do double the range on a fuel tank of the same size. Or when you look at the suspension of the Sherman, you can see it right there in the tracks, which leaves it vulnerable yes, but very easy to access in case of repairs. When you look at a tigers suspension, you can’t see it because it’s behind these giant wheels in the tracks.

So yes, a semi automatic gearbox, neatly folded away suspension is all very advanced stuff, but it is expensive, hard to maintain, build or fix, heavy, and just not what you need while driving into combat.

I highly recommend picking up James Holland: the war in the west, Germany Ascendant 1939-1941. This book breaks down the status of Germany’s supplies, motor pool, logistics and the beginning of the war and carries you in with it.

PS. I understand the Panzer MK4 is more on level with the M4 Sherman but there are only just over 8000 build of those vs the 49000 Sherman’s and 84000 Soviet T34s. Just by looking at these numbers you can see that Germany was desperately short of recources.