1Author's preface for this chapter:
As I said in my endnotes for Chapter 1, I try to avoid falling into what I call the "Herman Melville Syndrome" of going into technical details that bore the reader. That said, I started my military career in the Air Force as an F-4 Phantom Weapons Systems Officer (backseater) before defecting to the Army, and I adopted as my philosophy, regarding writing about military subjects in my fiction, the written version the artistic philosophy of aviation artist Keith Ferris (paraphrasing): "I paint my pictures so that any fighter pilot can look at each and immediately understand what's going on."
To illustrate, if you google "keith ferris mig sweep", you should get links to a painting by Ferris of an F-4 Phantom above a Russian-built MiG-21 off in the distant background above a solid undercast. Someone who has never been a fighter aviator will see it and say, "Oh, it's a pretty picture of an F-4 Phantom, with another plane in the background above some clouds." An experienced fighter aircrew will see the picture and, especially if the painting is oriented with the Phantom pointing nose up instead of Ferris's own preference of pointing to the right, say "That's an F-4 executing a high-yoyo/quarter plane maneuver to stay inside the turning circle of a MiG-21, and is pulling back downward to close in behind him and fire a 'Fox Two' shot with a heat-seeking AIM-9 Sidewinder missile."
Likewise, I don't expect anyone who has never been a tanker to be able to follow exactly what's going on in this chapter, even those virtual online tank warfare aficionados and wannabes. But any real tanker should be able to know exactly what's going on, and this is for their benefit. If you can't follow exactly, don't worry too much and just skim through this chapter and try to glean what's going on, and hopefully enjoy the pretty picture.
Chapter 2
The Meanest Sonofabitch
Austin waited for the cheer to subside and then turned to the two men behind him. "I'm going to turn this over to Captain White and to Mr. Pulliam. Mr. Pulliam is a civilian employee and an expert on the 90 millimeter M3 gun, both are from the Army Ordnance Department."
"Good morning, gentlemen," Captain White said. "As Colonel Austin pointed out, the rest of the 2nd AD have their new Pershings and have been sent forward. The rest of Mr. Pulliam's and my team have likewise gone on to deliver more Pershings to the 3rd Army and train their crews and mechanics. The other units in 2nd AD got an extremely short block of instruction- just a couple of hours worth- without even test-firing their main guns. Since you're only the second all-Pershing platoon and part of an experiment, Colonel Austin had us called back after awaiting Division approval of the plan. We didn't want to contaminate the experiment by sending you to the front with insufficient training on the new tank. What you're getting is still an abbreviated version of what the 3rd and 9th ADs got, but we've also incorporated lessons learned from them. Now, let's get a closer look at this baby. Follow me."
He led them forward to the nearest Pershing, with the marking "L-1-2" painted on the rear of the turret, and stopped alongside the left track. The men started noticing that there were a few wooden targets and several burned out German tanks, half-tracks and other vehicles scattered several hundred yards beyond the line of Pershings on the open field and in other adjoining fields.
"Now," White continued, "Mr. Pulliam will be instructing you in depth on the main gun. Before we get to that, a little bit about the automotive aspects and the tank in general. First thing you should notice: no big hump on the hull like the Sherman and the Stuart. Next thing: Notice the final drives and sprockets aren't up front like the older tanks. They're on the ass-end with the engine. No drive shafts needed to run the length of the underside of the vehicle. No drive shafts, no hump, lower silhouette. It has the same Ford V-8 engine as the A3 versions of the Sherman. It also has much thicker armor. The front slope is four inches thick with the slope angle giving it six inches effectiveness. Gun mantlet four and a half inches. Sides and rear of both the turret and the hull two to three inches. The bad news is, that armor and the bigger main gun make it 46 tons, eight tons more than an Easy Eight. You may have heard that having the same engine makes it a lot slower than a Sherman. But the good news is, we've cheated a little, getting more power by removing the mufflers, so that doesn't make it that much slower. Plus the wider tracks give it lower ground pressure and makes it more effective off-road. As for tracks, most of the earlier Pershings that went to 3rd and 9th Armored had all-metal tracks with single pins, really complicated to break and reassemble. These are a newer type of tracks. If you notice, these newer tracks look a lot like the Sherman's. Rubber padded and coated track blocks, double pin end connectors and center guides. You break track, replace track blocks and reassemble them the same way you do on a Sherman, so we can skip that whole block of instruction. Each pair of road wheels on each side is on its own torsion bar. A lot easier to replace instead of waiting for the recovery vehicle to replace a whole bogey. On to gunnery. Mr. Pulliam."
"Show of hands," Pulliam began. "How many of you have seen an M36 Jackson tank destroyer in action?"
Staff Sergeant Homan, one of the tank commanders, raised his hand. "I saw one take out a King Tiger with a flank shot, back in the Ardennes in December."
"And your thoughts on that, Sergeant?" Pulliam asked him.
"My first thought was, 'Now, why can't we have a main gun like that?', sir."
Pulliam smiled. "Well you do now!" He gestured to the gun tube on the Pershing. "This is the ninety millimeter gun, M3, exact same gun as on the M36, only we added a muzzle brake for reasons you'll see in a bit. As a matter of fact, we didn't have any spare M3 guns for the first few weeks, so in the one case of one of our Pershings having its main gun destroyed, we had to bum a spare off of an M36 battalion."
He paused thoughtfully, then continued, "While we're talking about that particular tank, let me get the bad news out of the way. So far we've had three Pershings knocked out in combat. The first was the one that lost its gun. It was a night engagement, a Tiger was sitting in ambush and the Pershing was silhouetted against a fire. Range was about a hundred yards, the Tiger got a lucky hit that actually went in the co-ax gun port. The gunner and loader were killed. Another shot damaged the main gun. If it's any consolation, the dumbshits in the Tiger backed up into a building that collapsed around it, got trapped in the rubble and were all taken prisoner. We don't know whether or not the eighty-eight from the Tiger would've penetrated if it hadn't gone into the co-ax port. The important thing is that no tank is invulnerable. Later that same day in the same action, one Pershing from the same battalion took out another Tiger with a shot through its gun shield. Not through any co-ax or gunsight opening, just a random spot on the lower front part of the Tiger's gun shield which is over four inches thick, from a range of about nine hundred to a thousand yards. Fired it right up. Same tank also killed two Panzer Mark Fours at twelve hundred yards in the same engagement."
Several of the men whistled or grunted approvingly.
"The other two other Pershings knocked out, one took a hit from a long eighty eight from a Nashorn tank destroyer- same gun as on a King Tiger- right at the bottom of the lower front armor between the driver's legs. Started a fire inside, but the whole crew bailed out unhurt before the ammo cooked off. The third Pershing knocked out was by Kraut one-fifty millimeter indirect artillery fire. Killed the TC, who was dismounted near the tank, blew the TC's cupola off its mounts and damaged several track components, road wheels and sponsons." He paused again.
"That's the bad news. The good news is, those three men killed are the only casualties among Pershing crewmen to date, with the Pershing having been in action since February 25th. Those three tanks are also the only Pershings to sustain battle damage not repairable at crew, company or battalion maintenance level, and only the one hit by the Nashorn has been written off to be cannibalized. The other two have been repaired and are back in action. On the other side of the ledger, as of today we have a second Tiger killed for a 2 to 1 kill ratio, and we're not counting the dumbshit Krauts who backed their Tiger into the building. We've got four Panthers and seven Mark Fours killed with no losses to either type, plus several tank destroyers, SPGs and other thinner-skinned vehicles I won't bore you about. This M3 ninety millimeter gun is more lethal than the eighty-eight on the Tiger One. And it's much more accurate if it is properly boresighted. These four have already been, and after we're done practice firing, we're going to walk each crew through the procedures. Gunners, your primary sight is now a six-power periscopic sight, and we want you to get used to the idea of aiming at specific parts of a target instead of just center of mass. Aim small, miss small! Gentlemen, come around to the front, please."
They followed him around the front of the track to where a wooden pallet was set in front of the front slope, with five main gun rounds standing on their flat butt ends. Norman noted how much larger they were than the 76 millimeter rounds on Fury.
"Ammunition: same color code as on all tank main guns," Pulliam continued. "Green for High Explosive, white for Willie Pete, black for Armor Piercing. Loaders especially, note that we have three types of AP that look similar, especially when not standing next to each other, so pay attention to the yellow or red stencil on the warhead and keep track of where you put them on the Ready Rack and try not to put 'em next to each other! The firing tables and aiming data chart are in the manual and the data charts are also posted on laminated cards at the Gunner's Stations." He placed his hand on each as he discussed it. "The M82. Hard penetrating projectile also filled with explosives, so it has both kinetic and explosive energy. Will kill any Kraut tank at any angle within two thousand yards, except for frontal shots on King Tigers, or the gun shield on the Panther, beyond five hundred yards. The T33 has a reheat-treated steel penetrator core, harder than the M82. We recommend that this is what you battle-carry in any high tank threat situation. It's a little more expensive and it's issued at a lower count than the M82 in most combat loads. The difference between the two is that the penetration of the M82 is a little deeper inside two thousand yards because of the explosive charge, but its velocity falls off and so does its penetration after two thousand, while the T33 maintains its velocity and kinetic energy better beyond two thousand.
"This last one is the T30. Loaders will especially note that it's a little lighter than the other two AP rounds. It has a tungsten penetrator core, which is lighter and much harder than reheated steel. That also gives it a muzzle velocity of thirty-three hundred and fifty feet per second, as opposed to twenty-eight hundred feet per second for the other two AP rounds. It will penetrate anything the Krauts have within two thousand yards. Here's the catch: tungsten is what the government calls a 'critical strategic material', meaning it's very rare. You will normally get only a small handful of these in your basic combat load unless your S2 confirms that there is a King Tiger threat in the area, and we recommend you save these, for if you're forced tactically to engage a King Tiger frontally at outside five hundred yards. Since 'T33' and 'T30' sound similar and the full designation of the T30 is 'T-thirty-E-sixteen, and we don't expect anybody to remember that, let alone shout it as part of a fire command, for crew communication purposes, just call it Hypershot, like the equivalent M93 on the 76 millimeter Sherman."
Pulliam looked over to Captain White and exchanged head nods. "Okay, we're ready to break out into individual crews. Sergeant MacQueen's crew stay here with me on Love One-Two, Lieutenant Hofferber's crew go with Captain White next door to Love One-One. Sergeant Nahf's crew to Love One-Three and Sergeant Homan's crew to Love One-Four where you'll meet your crew instructors." The grouping separated accordingly, all of them walking quickly with excitement.
Captain White led Hofferber's crew to the front of the next tank. "One more point on automotive stuff before we start popping caps. Bow gunner, climb up the front slope, look in your hatch and tell me what you notice that's different from the bow gunner's station on a Sherman."
Gronewold raised his hand. "I wouldn't be much help on that, sir. I've never been in any tank yet! Norm?"
"I'll do it, sir," Norman nodded. He quickly climbed up the front slope which, as advertised, was a much lower climb than on a Sherman, then looked down the open hatch and announced. "The thirty cal and what looks to be a full set of controls, sir!"
"That's right, Private," White replied. "Now the bow gunner-slash-assistant driver doesn't have to swap places with the primary driver to do the second half of his duty position. You can stay up on the slope if you like, Private." Norman did so, sitting between the two drivers' hatches with his head to the right of the gun tube.
White continued, "Some of you may have heard that General Rose, the Commanding General of the 3rd AD, was KIA last week. I imagine, since he was previously with the 2nd AD, at least some of you knew him and served under him. As a sign of respect for his memory, we've decided not to initiate you into the world of the M26 Pershing the way we initiated him and his first Pershing crewmen. One of the problems with the M3 gun that we're still working on is the enormous back blast inside the turret. It's not a problem with the M36 because tank destroyers are basically convertibles with removable canvas roofs and plenty of ventilation for the back blast. On the Pershing, when the gunner yells 'On the way!' and hits that trigger, you're going to get a nasty burst of hot air coming out of the chamber along with the spent brass. Poor unsuspecting crewmen get their eyebrows and lashes and mustaches singed. Gunner, just keep your face up to the gunsight and you'll be okay. Loader, once you release the safety and yell 'Up!', turn your face away from the breech block. TC, lean as far to the right in the cupola and turn your head as far to the right as the tactical situation allows you to keep spotting the round. The little hump at the top of the front slope where the private is sitting, that's the housing for the biggest ventilation blower we could fit in this tank. We're experimenting with ways to vent the tube so that there's suction from the blast that keeps it flowing one way, and as soon as we've got something reliable, we'll modify the gun accordingly. Okay, Gunner, TC and Loader, mount up to your crew positions. Driver and Bow Gunner, get on top on either side of the loader's hatch and look in as best as you can."
As they climbed up the front slope, Anglim turned to White and said, "Sir, I'm the driver and I'm fresh out of Fort Knox. I trained on the Pershing."
"Excellent," White nodded. "You can hang back and give the bow gunner more room if you like. Don't go away, though. I may need your help with a few things. What's your name?"
"Anglim, sir."
Norman dropped down the open loader's hatch on the left of the turret roof as Haddock came down the tank commander's cupola hatch on the right side and into the gunner's seat, then Norman stood alongside the gun breech as White dropped in behind him and Hofferber followed Haddock down the cupola and sat in the commander's seat. Even with the bigger gun breech and a fourth person in the turret, it was much less cramped than a Sherman.
"Doesn't smell quite like a new car," Haddock mused, "but close!"
"Does anyone really remember the smell of a new car?" Hofferber laughed. "It's been what? Three years since Detroit stopped making new cars?"
White started with showing Haddock the controls and features of the gunner's station, pointing out the differences between those and the Sherman's. Next he did the same with Hofferber and the tank commander's station. When finished, he showed Norman the lever to open the main gun breech block, and the safety knob. "Are you one of the new guys just starting out as a loader?"
"Yes, sir," Norman nodded.
"Go ahead and drop the block, then move the lever back."
Norman pulled down the lever, locking the heavy block in the open position and then pulled the lever back up past the detent.
"See this little protrusion at the bottom of the chamber?" White pointed. "That's the breech block retainer that's holding the block down. When you load a round, the flange at the base of the cartridge case will push it in and the block will spring back up in place. See that little two by four next to the Ready Rack? Pick it up." Norman found the two foot long piece of lumber and picked it up.
"Now, if you want to close the chamber while it's empty, that's what it's for. Just jab at the retainer with the two by four, then pull it up out of the way fast or the block may whack the two by four and knock it into your face. Go ahead."
Norman did as instructed and the breech block slid back up with a resounding CLANG!
"Okay, Loader," White continued. "Note that the Ready Rack has a ten round capacity, right now it's all M82s. The M26 Pershing has a capacity for seventy ninety millimeter rounds, and this tank is at full capacity. So where are the other sixty rounds?"
Norman looked around the inside of the turret and into the drivers' compartment before glancing down. "Under the floor, sir?"
"Good guess. If you notice the floor, there are several lid handles and hinges. Open up a couple and you'll see how the rounds are laid out. Six ammo compartments, two side-by-side stacks of five in each." After Norman squatted down and did so, White continued, "Before you leave for the front, get a good look at which types of rounds are in which compartments. That's one of your biggest jobs. The tricky part is that the floor doesn't rotate with the turret, so as you're sitting in your seat and the turret's traversing around left and right, try to maintain awareness of the turret orientation. The best way is to look to where the driver's compartment is and go from there as to which ammo compartment is which. That's also why we numbered them." He paused again. "Thirty cal co-ax gun is the same as the hull machine gun, it's wired to a trigger at the gunner's station. That trigger is always hot any time the power is on, even without the engine running. The mechanical safety is the only safety and that's another important job along with clearing stoppages and keeping it loaded. The gray gloves sitting on the Ready Rack are made of asbestos, they're specially made to wear when you throw out the empty main gun casings if you need to throw them out while still hot. But you can use your regular-issue leather gloves in a crunch. If the floor gets too cluttered with empty casings, just toss them out your hatch, or if you're buttoned up, they'll fit through the pistol port on the side wall above the Ready Rack."
White stood up and turned to face the other crewmen, including Gronewold and Anglim who were leaning over the loader's hatch. "Okay, we're ready to pop caps. What we're going to do is use the ten rounds in the Ready Rack. The gunner gets six, one to confirm the boresight on the boresight panel and five to practice on hard targets. The remaining four rounds, each of the other crew members gets one familiarization shot for two purposes: one, to give you confidence in the gun and the boresighting process, and two, in case the gunner is down, any one of you can keep shooting.
Gentlemen, go ahead and put on your crew helmets and make sure you're plugged in to the intercom. Driver and Bow Gunner, man your crew positions."
Norman found his crew helmet on the gun breech and slipped it on as he heard Anglim and Gronewold walk along the side fenders and into their seats, and White climbed out and knelt on the roof between the commander's cupola and the loader's hatch. Norman noticed White putting on a crew helmet, the cord of which was plugged into a splitter with Hofferber's that connected both to the Tank Commander's intercom box.
"Crew report!" Hofferber called out on the intercom.
"Gunner ready!" Haddock called.
"Driver ready!" Anglim called.
"Loader ready!" Norman called.
"Bow gunner ready!" Gronewold called.
"Driver, crank her up!" Hofferber called.
"Fire in the hole!" Anglim called. There was a drumroll from the engine compartment and then the engine steadied into a hum. Norman noted that it wasn't much louder than in a Sherman even though Captain White had mentioned that it was the same engine but the mufflers had been removed.
"Firing line, this is Love Six," they heard Captain Rapetti's voice over the radio. "TCs give me a thumbs up when ready to fire."
"Loader," Hofferber said to Norman, "Drop the breech block then pull one M82 out of the Ready Rack."
Norman swung the breech block lever down then reseated it, then pulled the first cartridge out of the Ready Rack and held it in his arms as Hofferber stuck his left arm out of the cupola hatch.
"Love Six to firing line" Rapetti called. "Fire one round each at the orange cross on the boresight panel with your crew number on it."
"Gunner!" Hofferber yelled loudly enough for the whole crew to hear even without the intercom. "M82! Orange cross on Boresight Panel! Two thousand!"
Norman slammed the round into the breech, with the block springing up and slamming shut, then he clicked off the safety knob. "Up!"
"Identified!" Haddock yelled.
"Fire!" Hofferber called.
Haddock gave the gun tube elevation wheel a slight adjustment as Norman turned his head left away from the breech and shielded the right side of his face with his hand as warned. "On the wa-a-a-y!" Haddock yelled.
BLAMMP! The whole tank shook and the front end lifted two or three inches off the ground and dropped back down. In rapid succession three somewhat lesser blasts shook the ground again as the other three Pershings fired. Their shot was considerably louder than that of the 76 millimeter of Fury and had rocked back the tank much more. And this tank is eight tons heaver? Norman thought. He saw the shimmering hot air and thin white smoke waft upward from the gun breech and out through the two open hatches. The spent casing rolled gently from side to side on the floor, wafting more smoke.
"Yeah, Baby!" Hofferber yelled gleefully. "Target! Cease fire!"
Haddock was still looking through the gunsight. "Dead center on the orange cross! You've made a believer out of me, Captain!"
"TCs," Rapetti called, "give me a thumbs down if your gunner is not satisfied with the boresighting." He paused for about twenty seconds. "Looks like we have four satisfied customers! Love One Two, One Three and One Four, you are cleared to engage hard targets, five rounds each, between your boresight panel and the next boresight panel to the right. Love One One, engage targets from the right of your boresight panel to the tree line.
"Okay, Gunner," Captain White said. "In keeping with the new doctrine of 'aim small, miss small,' just for these practice shots, after the TC lays you on the target, you pick out a specific point on the target and call out that part before calling 'On the way.' Got it?"
"Got it, Captain," Haddock nodded.
"Okay, TC," White said, "Engage."
Norman pulled the next round from the ready rack. Hofferber grabbed the Tank Commander's power traverse handle and swung the turret a few degrees to the right. "Gunner! M82! Half-track, sixteen hundred!"
Norman slammed the round home and released the safety. "Up!"
"Identified!"
"Fire!"
Haddock fine-tuned the manual traverse and elevation wheels. "Drive sprocket! On the wa-a-a-y!"
BLAMMP!
"Target, drive sprocket," Hofferber confirmed. Norman grabbed a third round and slammed it home as Hofferber traversed several more degrees to the right and called, "Gunner! M82! Tank! Eighteen hundred!"
"Up!"
"Identified! Bow gun port!"
"Fire!"
"On the wa-a-a-y!"
BLAMMP!
"Target! Bow gun port!" Hofferber traversed the turret toward the left and stopped. "Gunner! M82! Tank! One thousand!"
"Up!"
"Identified! Driver's vision port!"
"Fire!"
"On the wa-a-a-y!"
BLAMMP!
"Target! Driver's vision port!" Hofferber traversed the turret further to the left. "Gunner! M82! S-P-G! Fourteen hundred!"
"Up!"
"Identified! Co-ax gun port!"
"Fire!"
"On the wa-a-a-y!"
BLAMMP!
"Target! Co-ax gun port!" Hofferber called as he traversed back to the right. "Gunner! M82! Tank! Eighteen hundred!"
"Up!"
"Identified! Final drive on our left!"
"Fire!"
"On the wa-a-a-y!"
BLAMMP!
"Target! Cease fire! Loader, that means don't load, and leave the breech open. Gunner, you hit the final drive, our left."
Norman did as told. Two of the other Pershings each fired one more round and then the area silenced.
"Good job, Loader!" Haddock turned to him with a smile. "TC, I think this one's a keeper."
"I concur," Hofferber replied. "Good job, Lazarus."
"Thank you, sir," Norman replied. "I learn fast. Remember, three days ago I was a clerk."
"So I was told," Hofferber said. "Wouldn't have guessed it."
After confirming that all gunners had fired their six rounds, Captain Rapetti directed the crews to shut down their engines, turn on their auxiliary power units and have the other crewmen take turns firing their one round for familiarization. Anglim and Gronewold climbed out of their hatches and climbed on to either side of the loader's hatch, after which Norman handed the six spent brass casings out the left side of the hatch to Anglim who tossed them over the left fender.
"Okay," Hofferber said, "I'll take my shot first, then Anglim, then Gronewold and then Ellison. Fishy, you and I switch for my shot." He moved his own lower body against the right turret wall so Haddock could slide out of his seat and behind the gun breech next to Norman. Hofferber slid down into the gunner's seat and Haddock climbed up into the commander's station, taking care not the entangle their helmet cords.
"Okay," Hofferber continued, "Fishy, traverse the turret off the target then put me back on and give me the fire command. I'll call out my aim point. The binoculars are on the roof right in front of you for you to spot for me. We're just waiting for the CO to clear us hot."
A minute or so later, Captain Rapetti called a readiness check and then announced, "Cleared to engage."
Haddock traversed the turret and gave the fire command for the tank at 1800 yards.
"Identified! Driver's vision port!"" Hofferber yelled simultaneous with Norman slamming the round into the breech, releasing the safety and calling "Up!"
"Fire!"
"On the wa-a-a-y!"
BLAMMP!
"Target! Cease fire! Driver's vision port!"
"Okay," Hofferber said, "Lazarus, get out on the back deck with Captain White. Fishy, take over as loader and coach these guys. Anglim, get in the gunner's station and show us what they taught you at Knox."
"Yes, sir!" Anglim said as Norman climbed out the hatch and moved aside for him to get in. The fresh air he'd taken for granted before climbing in the turret was much sweeter after firing seven rounds than he'd realized. At least he'd gotten used to the smell of cordite smoke.
"We're going to swap helmet cords," Haddock said over the intercom. "Lazarus, I'm unplugging you."
"Okay," Norman said before his headphones went silent. He stood on the engine compartment behind the turret next to Captain White while Gronewold remained prone on the turret roof and moved back to observe inside the loader's hatch.
Off to the left, Staff Sergeant MacQueen's tank fired another round. The report was louder outside fifty feet away than the report from their own actual gun from inside the turret. The smoke momentarily drifted in front of them.
Hofferber, his head and shoulders out of the cupola hatch, traversed the turret to the left, paused to put a pair of binoculars to his eyes with his left hand, then yelled, "Gunner! M82! Tank! Eighteen hundred!" as he traversed the turret back to the right. Norman looked down the length of the gun tube and saw the muzzle brake pass slightly below a German tank facing them about a mile away and stop as Haddock yelled "Up!" loud enough for Norman to hear with his helmet unplugged.
"Identified!" Anglim yelled. "Final drive, our right!" The turret and gun tube moved almost imperceptibly both in traverse and vertically.
"Fire!" Hofferber yelled, and Norman braced himself against the turret rear.
"On the wa-a-a-y!"
BLAMMP! The report was the loudest he'd heard it. The gun tube recoiled as billows of smoke blew out the vents on both sides of the muzzle brake, but left a relatively clear gap above the gun tube through which Norman saw the glowing red tracer of the round take a nearly flat trajectory at the target tank and in less than two seconds shrink almost to invisibility before turning into a yellowish-white flash in the lower right corner of the hull front.
"Target! Cease fire!" Hofferber said. "You hit your aim point! Good work, Anglim!"
"Thank you, sir."
The other tanks continued their intermittent fire. Hofferber turned to Gronewold and said, "You're up. Let Anglim out first."
Anglim and Gronewold switched positions and Norman could hear Haddock reviewing the periscope sight and the elevation and traverse controls with Gronewold. The turret traversed a few degrees both under power and manually and in both directions and the gun tube elevated and lowered. Then Hofferber said over the intercom with his upper body still in the open hatch, "The TC's fire command comes in four parts, in case you haven't figured it out yet. 'Gunner!' is an alert to both the gunner and the loader they're about to shoot. The next call is the type of ammo. The third call is what the target is that the gunner's looking for in the sight. The fourth call is the estimated range to the target in yards. When the target comes in the field of view of the gunsight, the gunner calls 'Identified!' and the TC releases his override handle and the gunner fine-tunes the traverse and elevation. Don't fire until the loader yells 'Up!' and the TC says 'Fire!'. Since this is familiarization only, and the target's not shooting back, we're not timing you and we're telling you in advance that the range is eighteen hundred meters. So with the M82 round, you're looking at an elevation of twelve point six, a hair below the twelve mil lines on the reticle. You want to aim at the upper front of the hull. You should see the bow gunner's mount on our left, round like your new station, and the driver's vision port, a narrow slit on our right. Put the vertical center line right between the two and the twelve mil lines should just be even with the top of the slit. Don't worry about calling out the specific part, just say 'Identified'. Ready?" He paused and then traversed the turret back toward the same tank. "Gunner! M82! Tank! Eighteen hundred!"
"Up!"
"Identified!"
"Fire!"
There was a very short hesitation and movement of the gun tube. "On the wa-a-a-y!"
BLAMMP!
In the gap between the two billows of smoke, Norman watched the tracer of the round go straight at the hull of the target tank with the tracer shrinking and turning into a yellow-white flash slightly below dead center.
"Target! Ceasefire! Good shot, Gronewold!" Hofferber paused. "You're up, Lazarus."
Norman waited for Gronewold to emerge from the loader's hatch, then climbed back in and slid around the gun breech and into the gunner's seat and plugged his helmet into the intercom box. Haddock reviewed the manual traverse and elevation cranks, the power traverse handle with the primary trigger, and the backup pedal trigger.
"Now, look in the periscope sight," Haddock told him. Norman did so and saw a matrix of several evenly spaced rows of horizontal lines with a single column of vertical lines down the center and a small cross at the top. It was superimposed on a closer view of the low hill at the far end of the field.
"The cross at the top is the boresight point," Haddock said. "If you look at the numbers, you'll see the rows of horizontal lines are spaced four mils apart. Did you hear what the lieutenant told Gronewold about range to the target?"
"Yes, Corporal."
"Just call me Fishy. When the target's in your field of view, yell, 'Identified' and take over the traverse and elevation. So you want to line up the vertical line with your aiming point with the bottom of the twelve mil horizontal line just a hair above the aiming point. Then yell 'On the way' and squeeze the trigger. Any questions?"
"No, Fishy."
"Okay, Lazarus," Hofferber said, "Your aim point is the right half of the gun shield on the front of the turret, our right side of the gun tube. Aim for the center point of that space, just below the gunner's telescope port if you can make it out. Don't bother calling it out, just aim for it. Remember: Aim small, miss small. Ready?"
"Ready, sir," Norman said.
"Gunner! M82! Tank! Eighteen hundred!" Hofferber traversed the turret back to the right.
Haddock slammed a round into the breech. "Up!"
What he assumed to be the same tank Anglim and Gronewold had shot at slid into view. "Identified!" Norman yelled. With the six-power telescope within the periscope, it was much larger than with the naked eye but still about the size of a thumbnail at arm's length. He could make out the separation between the hull and turret, the gun tube, and just barely make out a square to the right of the gun tube. For an instant, there was a visceral knot in his guts and a chill down his spine, a combination of fear and hate that he couldn't explain, but he didn't let it interfere with the task at hand.
"Fire!" Hofferber called. Norman cranked the manual traverse so the vertical line of the reticle rested on the tiny square and then turned the elevation wheel slightly upward so the horizontal lines marking twelve mils were just even with the bottom of the square.
"On the wa-a-a-y!" Norman yelled, then squeezed the trigger on the power traverse handle.
BLAMMP! There was a flash that for an instant blanked out his view and then he saw the tracer make a barely perceptible rise upward and then down before striking and creating a flash on the turret front of the target exactly where he'd aimed, just below the square. Norman took a second to reflect on the fact that, with the propellant gases going mostly out the muzzle and the rest out the open breech behind him, the gunner had the quietest seat of the crew positions when firing the main gun.
"Target! Ceasefire! You hit your aim point, Lazarus," Hofferber announced. The unexplained fear and anger in Norman's gut and spine dissolved.
Another tank fired a shot, and then a few seconds later, Captain Rapetti called on the radio, "Firing line, this is Love Six. TCs give me a thumbs up when you're finished firing and all weapons are safed."
"Main gun and co-ax safe, TC," Haddock said.
"Bow gun safe, sir," Gronewold said from outside the turret. "I never loaded or armed it." Hofferber raised his arm out of the cupola and gave a thumbs up to Captain Rapetti who was in his jeep to the rear of the firing line.
"The Range is cold," Rapetti called. "Crew instructors go ahead with re-checking boresight. After you're finished, you're cleared to go down range and inspect your targets. When finished, assemble on Love One-One at his last target."
Captain White told Hofferber to traverse the turret to point the gun toward the boresight panel, then told Norman, still in the gunner's seat, to lay the boresight cross on the periscope reticle onto the intersection of a horizontal and a vertical line, both orange, on the large white plywood panel. Then White told the whole crew to dismount and meet him in front of the tank. After the crew climbed out, White climbed back in through the cupola. After a minute, he climbed back out, slid down the front slope and took an elongated metal case that had been on the left fender, opened it and took out a black L-shaped instrument with what appeared to be an eyepiece on the shorter leg.
"Boresighting procedure is the same as on the 75 or 76 millimeter guns on the Shermans, using this device for the 90. But we can't emphasize enough how critical the standards are for boresighting accuracy because without it, you're taking one of the advantages we finally worked on over the German tanks and flushing it down the toilet." White stepped over to a pile of sandbags under the gun muzzle and inserted the longer leg of the instrument through the muzzle brake and down the tube as far as it would go, with the eyepiece to the right of the tube. "Private Ellison!"
"Yes, sir," Norman said.
White pointed to the eyepiece. "Look in here and tell me if that's the same sight picture you have on the periscope."
Norman looked into the eyepiece. The crosshairs were centered over the center of the orange cross. "Yes, sir, it is."
"Lieutenant Hofferber, Corporal Haddock, both of you take a look at the sight picture, then get in the turret and tell me if you've got the same boresight alignment on both the periscopic sight and the co-axial telescope."
Both men did. After a minute in the turret, Hofferber stuck his head up out of the cupola and said to White, "We concur with Private Ellison, sir."
"Okay," White nodded. "Looks like the boresighting held up through ten rounds. That accuracy of the boresight crosses on the sights with respect to the crosshairs on this boresight device is the standard we're looking for. If there had been a significant change in alignment, we would've adjusted accordingly. When we did this with the first crews with 3rd and 9th ADs, we initially let them do their own boresighting and nineteen out of twenty crews were out of standard. If we had the time, we would've let you do your own boresighting and correct your own mistakes before firing, but we're short on time. You know what to do with the elevation and windage knobs on both sights when you do your next boresighting. When in doubt, check the Tech Manual. Your copy should be behind the TC's seat next to the radio. What we're going to do now is mount up and each tank will go down its own shooting lane and the other crew instructors and I will inspect the hard targets and critique the shots."
White pulled the boresighting instrument from the muzzle, placed it in the foam rubber lining of its case and handed the case to Norman, telling him to stow it in the turret rear behind his own loader's seat. Then he told Haddock to ride outside, either on the turret roof or standing on the back deck next to himself.
After everyone was aboard, Hofferber called an intercom check-in and then told Anglim to start the engine. After the engine drumrolled and then settled into its rumble, Hofferber said, "Driver, move out! Head for the closest target in our lane."
The Pershing kicked into gear and rolled forward across the field. Norman stood on his loader's seat, his upper body out of the hatch as he looked ahead. There was a burned-out German tank just over half a mile away with both the hull and turret pointed at them. Behind them, the other Pershings one by one moved out as well. As they pulled up so their own gun tube was about fifteen feet away from the German tank, Hofferber said, "Driver, stop."
"Okay," White said. "This tank is about a thousand yards from the firing line. Corporal Haddock picked the driver's vision port as his aim point. For you new guys, German Panzer turret layout is a mirror image of American tank layout. TC and gunner on their left, loader on their right. But the driver and bow gunner for some reason are the same as ours. So take a look at the hull front, specifically the driver's vision port."
They all looked. The port was a rectangle about ten inches wide and four inches high. There was a rounded groove about an inch deep on the bottom edge and close to the center. "The groove on the bottom was the hit. This tank is a Panzer Mark Four. Maximum armor is three inches, right there on the hull front. Any hit anywhere in that area with an M82 would punch through and detonate the explosive core inside the hull. In this tank, the vision port has two inch thick bulletproof glass. If it had been manned, the round would likely have punched through the glass and ripped the driver's head off before detonating, or would have just detonated in his face." Norman immediately flashed back to his having to clean out the pieces of his predecessor bow gunner's head on Fury.
"This was an excellent shot, Corporal Haddock," White added.
"Thank you, sir."
"Any questions?"
"Excuse me, sir," Hofferber said after a few seconds of silence. "Teaching point for the new guys. How do you tell from a front view like this the difference between a Mark Four and a Tiger?"
"The size?" Anglim asked.
"Well, with no other comparison references, it's hard to tell exact size," Hofferber said. "Especially the farther away you get. The teaching point being you can't really tell the difference from a front view. Okay, Driver, back up about three tank lengths, then swing around to the right and pull up even with this tank."
Anglim threw the gears in reverse and did as instructed. The German tank was now about fifty feet to their left. "New guys, take a good look," Hofferber said. "This is a Panzer Four. Eight relatively small road wheels all aligned, four support rollers up top. Sometimes you'll see them with a side skirt covering the support rollers and most of the track area, similar to how our tank has a partial side skirt that covers the top part of our support rollers. But you'll still see the eight road wheels. Remember that." He turned around to Captain White. "Sir?"
"Driver, move out and on to the next target," White said.
They went about two football field lengths further downrange and stopped in front of a tracked but turretless vehicle with a cannon mounted in the fixed superstructure. There was a large round hole in the gun shield to their left of the main gun tube. "This is a StuG Three self-propelled gun, range twelve hundred yards. Aim point was the co-ax gun port which is actually mounted in a ball mounting like the bow guns on both their tanks and ours. Corporal Haddock, lookes like you poked out an eyeball. Max armor on this vehicle is just over three inches, any hit anywhere on it inside forty-four hundred yards range is lethal. Any questions?" He paused, then said, "Driver, move out, next target."
They moved about 400 yards and came up on a German half-track parked broadside to the firing line, pointing to the left.
"Hanomag 251 half-track, sixteen hundred yards from the firing line," White said. "Like our half-tracks, the maximum armor thickness is about a half inch, so in an actual combat situation we wouldn't waste an AP round and just hit it with an HE round. Depending on range, an M82 has a good chance of going in one side and out the other without the charge detonating, the other two types would definitely go through both sides. But we didn't have enough wrecked Kraut tanks and SPGs to play with. Corporal Haddock's aim point was the drive sprocket. Take a look."
The drive sprocket at the front of the track had a neat 90 millimeter hole that just touched the sprocket hub at the eight o'clock position. "I'm sure Corporal Haddock was going for the hub itself, but he did hit the sprocket. This is what we mean by 'Aim small, miss small'. Any questions?... Driver, move out. Go past the last tank and continue to the boresight panel."
They drove on about four football field lengths up to the white plywood panel, about ten feet square, with a vertical and a horizontal orange stripe both two feet wide, each bisecting the two axes. A 90 millimeter circle was neatly punched exactly down the middle of the vertical stripe. The top of the circle was just about at the center line of the horizontal stripe. "This is the boresight panel," White said."Two thousand yards. Just wanted you to get a closer look at the validation shot. Any questions?... And last but not least, the next and last target. Driver, move out."
Anglim backed up several feet then put the Pershing in a sharp right turn to clear the panel, then headed toward the tank that had been to their right and two hundred yards closer to the firing line. They approached it from its right rear, and Norman saw that the entire rear half of it was blackened by fire and that there were two round three inch holes in the rear armor plate. He felt the knot in his gut and chill down his spine returning and began to realize why.
Hofferber told Anglim to circle around the front and park on the far side of the German tank pointing in the opposite direction from it, leaving room for the rest of the platoon to park facing it from the front, then shut down the engine. "Okay," he said after the engine silenced, "while we're waiting for the rest of the platoon, everyone dismount and gather in front of our front slope." After the crew had done so, he nodded toward the German tank and said, "New guys: to continue our earlier teaching point, this tank looks a lot like the other one back there."
"Except bigger," Gronewold noted.
"Yeah," Hofferber said, "but as I was saying, when you're a couple of thousand, or even a few hundred yards away, it's not as easy to gauge size. So what's the biggest difference you can see?"
"Bigger road wheels." Gronewold said.
"Much bigger. The Mark Four has eight small road wheels and four support rollers above them. This sucker's also got eight sets of road wheels on each side, but they're so big they overlap, and they did away with the support rollers so they have what's called dead track, where the track on top just runs on top of the road wheels. So the road wheels and the track are the quickest way to tell the difference between a Mark Four and a Tiger. This design is one of its Achilles heels, by the way. When they churn up enough mud, it gets inside the wheel overlap, especially when the heat builds up during normal running operations. Once they stop, it bakes like pottery and hardens into cement. In the winter, same with snow and slush that refreezes."
"We'll get into the tactical implications when the rest of the platoon gets here," White said. "There's a reason this is the final downrange stop for everyone." Just as he said it, Captain Rapetti and his driver pulled up in their jeep and the other three Pershings began pulling up and parking in one rank to the left of theirs, facing the German tank. Rapetti, White, Pulliam and the two technical sergeants who were the other crew instructors stood in front of the hull front of the German tank as the four tank crews formed a semicircle between them and the parked Pershings.
"Okay," White said. "Every gunner should have fired one boresight validation shot and five target shots. Everyone else should've fired one. Any questions or problems about boresighting or shooting?"
"Yes, sir!" a corporal from one of the other crews raised his hand. "Where ya been hiding these tanks the last three years?"
White waited for the burst of laughter to die down. "All these are fresh out of the factory. There were twelve different kinds of prototypes that were tested before the final version began production last November. Any concerns or complaints?"
There was a murmured "No, sir!" from the tankers. White continued, "As I was explaining to Lieutenant Hofferber's crew, there's a reason we made this the last stop downrange for everyone. Captain Rapetti?"
Rapetti looked over to Norman. "Private Ellison!"
"Yes, sir?"
"Does this particular tank look familiar to you?"
"Uh... Yes, sir. I just realized as we got here... that this is the same Tiger that... uh, that wiped out most of the original First Platoon!"
"That's right, Private Ellison," Rapetti nodded. "Colonel Austin had it towed here. Not to beat a dead horse, or a dead tank. Not even necessarily for morale reasons." He glanced around to the others. "But to make it clear that we're never going to have another day like we did three days ago. We're still trying to sort out exactly what happened based on Battalion's and my debrief of Private Ellison and what we found on the field. What we've figured so far based on where this tank was and our three wrecked tanks were, and their tracks and those of the platoon sergeant's tank: one of them was knocked out on the road by the first shot from the Tiger. The others turned off the road and backed away, then laid down a smokescreen to force him out of the tree line. When it did, they went at it line-abreast, and two more were knocked out less than sixty yards apart. The last tank, the platoon sergeant's tank- for which Private Ellison was the bow gunner- then circled around for a rear shot. Shot it twice in the engine compartment, by which time they were pretty much at point-blank range, within fifteen yards."
Rapetti drew a deep breath, his eyes revealing anger and appearing misty, before continuing. "Now, we're not here to posthumously Monday Morning Quarterback the platoon sergeant and the other TCs. We're coming up on almost seventy years since Custer's Last Stand, and there are some eggheaded instructors at West Point and Command and Staff College who are still Monday Morning Quarterbacking Custer. Maybe these TCs had a sound reason for going in all balls, dick and no forehead, instead of fanning out wider and going for different aspect shots. None of us except Private Ellison were there and that was his first day ever in a tank. What's important here is the lessons learned. When they recovered the platoon sergeant's tank and relieved Private Ellison a few miles down the road the next morning, the repair depot found two unused Hypershot rounds in the turret. All of you had 76 millimeter guns on your previous tanks, and Hypershot is the 76 millimeter equivalent of the T30. Same tungsten core and about the same muzzle velocity, not quite the same penetration because of the weight of the projectile. This is a Tiger One model. The thickest armor on it is less than four and a half inches," he gestured with his hand, "on the gun shield. Captain White?"
White pulled out a notepad from his jacket pocket and flipped it open. "As Mr. Pulliam pointed out, this morning we fired M82 rounds which don't even have the same penetrating ability as the T30 or even the 76 millimeter hypershot. This tank is eighteen hundred yards from the firing line. That's about twice the range at which the first Tiger was killed by a Pershing in late February. It's the only Tiger we had available to use as a hard target and we put it in the platoon leader's shooting lane." Pulliam handed him a rubber-tipped wooden pointer stick about a yard long that he had been holding. "Corporal Haddock, the gunner, fired two shots. The first aiming point was the bow gunner's port." He tapped the outer portion of the gun port, a circular cover around a rectangular opening. "There was an MG34 on a ball mounting, similar to our own bow gun ports, when we set up this hard target." He inserted the pointer in further and ran it around the inside of the blackened opening. "Completely knocked in. The gunner's second shot was at the final drive on the target's right side." He leaned toward the front of the track and pointed at the ragged hole in the rounded housing for the drive sprocket axle and the broken and partly severed track blocks that had been peeled back to expose the sprocket teeth. "That would definitely be a mobility kill," he said dryly. "Lieutenant Hofferber then took his turn in the gunner's seat and aimed for the driver's vision port. When we set up, we left the visors partly open at about two inches."
The two armored visors on the port functioned like upper and lower eyelids. They both had telltale round grooves, on the bottom of the upper and the top of the lower edge as had the vision port of the Mark Four. White inserted the pointer over a foot deep and ran it around the opening. "This vision port had six inches of bulletproof glass. At this range, the M82 round would still have enough velocity to punch through the glass and, if he were there, the driver's skull before hitting something hard enough to detonate the explosive charge."
He glanced at his notepad. "Next shot was by the driver, Private Anglim. Fresh out of Fort Knox, but trained on the Pershing. He aimed for the final drive on the other side." He pointed to the drive sprocket that was completely sheared from its axle and the cleanly severed track blocks that had been at the front of the sprocket, the upper ones dangling and the lower ones collapsed on the ground. "Similar results, a mobility kill. Now, the last two crewmen have never aimed and fired any main gun before now. Private Gronewold had never even seen the inside of any tank before now. He was told to aim at the upper front plate between the bow gun and the driver's vision port." He put the pointer at the round hole slightly to their left of the centerline of the Tiger's hull and slightly above the opening in the vision port. "Four inch armor plate..." he stuck the pointer in almost all the way, "...clean through. Damned good for a first try, Private Gronewold. Lastly, Private Ellison was told to aim at the gun shield just below the gunsight opening." He pointed at the hole about two inches below the rectangular frame of the gunsight, then leaned up against the front plate and stuck in the pointer, then stood back upright. "Again, clean through. Another damned good shot for the first try, Private Ellison. This is, incidentally, just about where the round hit with the first Tiger kill by a Pershing back in February. It was a T30 Hypershot round from nine hundred yards. Half the range of this shot. As you see, the M82 did the job at twice the range. Any of these shots would have been at least a mobility kill. The shots to the hull or gun shield would've been a complete knockout. The point is, Hypershot rounds are in limited supply, but you don't need them to kill Tiger Ones, even facing them head-on. Don't turn tail just because you don't have Hypershot. We're not saying to save the Hypershot rounds just for the King Tigers, these are just considerations in managing your ammo."
"Sir?" Hofferber said.
"Go ahead, Lieutenant."
Hofferber addressed the whole platoon. "I was just about to discuss this with the new guys on my crew. It's hard to tell a Mark Four from a Tiger One unless you have a side view. Same with a Panther and a King Tiger. They both have sloped armor, they both have overlapping road wheels. The King Tiger turret is a lot longer that the Panther's. But if you're facing head-on to a Kraut tank with sloped armor and you can't tell if it's a King Tiger or a Panther, I'd rather you assume it's a King Tiger and fired Hypershot until you've killed it and then worry about what type it is."
"Any other questions?" Captain White said. After waiting for a reply, he smiled and said, "Gentlemen, stand at attention and raise your right hands."
The platoon members did so along with him.
"Now repeat after me: Yea though I walk through the valley..."
"Yea, though I walk through the valley..." they chorused.
"...of the shadow of death,..."
"...of the shadow of death,..."
"I shall fear no evil..."
"I shall fear no evil..."
"... for I am now the meanest sonofabitch in the valley!"
"... for I am now the meanest sonofabitch in the valley!" they concluded with a laugh and a grunting cheer.
White dropped his hand. "Now go forth and kick ass!"
Author's notes:
Also as mentioned in my notes on Chapter 1, I would be addressing the flaws in the original movie. The more I rewatch the movie to get the details right, the more I realize that, as much as writer-director David Ayer's heart was in the right place, either he ignored his technical advisors (particularly the museum curators and/or private owners of the tanks used in the filming) or those advisors were rather uninformed about their own vehicles and areas of supposed expertise. For example, not just the Pershing but the Sherman had powered turret traverse which the Tank Commander could control and could override the gunner's input. I'd like to know WTF Don Collier was doing wasting precious seconds- each one an eternity in a firefight- yelling at gunner Bible Swan to "traverse left" or "traverse right" when he could just traverse the turret himself and tell Bible what to shoot at with a standard fire command (and this was for the whole movie, and long before they mention the power traverse getting knocked out of commission after the fight with the Tiger).
The initial deployment of M26 Pershings to the ETO and training of crews and maintenance personnel from January to April of 1945 was codenamed the Zebra Mission. Part of the reason I have the characters referring to the tank more as the "Pershing" than as the "M26" is that when the first 20 tanks were shipped and delivered to the 3rd and 9th Armored Divisions, they were still designated "T26E3", the T-prefix indicating a test prototype; the transition designating them with the M-prefix designating them as an official operational model took place just before the time setting in the movie and this fanfic. The designations M82, T33 and T30E16 for the armor piercing ammunition rounds reflects the same status of "test" versus "operational".
After the Korean War, US Main Battle Tanks were equipped with what's called a coincidence rangefinder, which was two periscopes, one on each side of the turret viewed through a single viewfinder at the gunner's station to calculate range and automatically adjust gun elevation, so the estimated range to target was dropped from the fire command. By the 1980s, those with coincidence rangefinders were replaced with a laser beam rangefinder to the target and a much more sophisticated aiming computer.
The gunnery doctrine of aiming at specific points on enemy tanks rather than just at the target in general was an actual part of the Zebra Mission. But I just couldn't resist throwing in the phrase "Aim small, miss small!" which was a catchphrase for the family of actor Logan Lerman's character in his first movie, The Patriot.