Soviet T-34s advance on German forces during World War II. Rommel’s Afrika Korps and other commands were predominantly equipped with comparatively light Panzers Patton’s Third Army with medium-weight M4 Shermans and Montgomery’s Eighth Army with the well-armored but underarmed Matilda, a series of “cruiser” tanks, and U.S.-built medium M3 Grants/Lees and Shermans. Patton and British Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery earned permanent places in military history for their World War II use of massive tank forces – not only in tank-on-tank encounters, but to overrun infantry, crush enemy defenses and capture cities. Nazi Germany held the technological advantage, but the British, Russians, Japanese and Americans were not far behind. By World War II, however, tank technology had advanced at a level similar to the evolution of military aircraft between the two wars. The first serious use of tanks came during World War I, but the vehicles were cumbersome, limited in battlefield mobility and often more dangerous than protective to their crews.

The assortment of road wheels, lengths of track, sandbags and wooden planks often piled on the exteriors of M4s reflects the degree of the crews’ confidence in their armor protection. The Firefly was a British attempt to give the Sherman a better chance against German Panthers and Tigers by upgunning it with a 17-pounder instead of the typical 75 mm low velocity gun.

A British Sherman Firefly patrolling the Meuse at Namur in 1944.

German panzer tanks modern war