My take on tank battles

I hope I can add to the topic with some numbers, if you got more acurate ones please link me to them, Im genuinely interessted.

Here is a list of all Soviet IS-2 aces I was able to track down:
followed by a list of some other soviet and german tank aces. Its ofcourse not a complete list.
I picked the overall best for the soviets, and the top commanders for the germans sorted by the vehicles they commanded. Because the clear majority of soviet aces were t-34 commanders, and on german side it seems to be more spread out, if you dont count the tigers.

__________________


1st lt. Lukanin Veniamin Grigorievich - 19 kills
- he commanded both an IS and a KV, I dont know how many kills he actually achieved commanding his IS -

Lyahov Pyotr T. - 9 kills

Reznikov Mihail - 8 kills
- actually a gunner not a tank commander -

1st lt. Galpyorn Vladimir I. - 6 kills
- + 14 guns -

lt. Hitzenko Ivan I. - 5 kills

lt. Boyko Alexandra L. - 5 kills
- fun fact: a woman -

_______


The most successful overall tank ace on soviet side:


1st lt. Lavrinenko Dmitriy Fyodorovich - 52 kills
- commanded a T-34(-76)-

After him come

lt. Kuchenkov M - 32,
Moiseyev N. - 31,
cap. Dyachenko N. - 31,
cap. Samohin Konstantin Mihaylovich - 30,
subcol. Burda Alexander Fyodorovich - 30 and
1st lt. Bochkovsky Vladimir Alexeyevich - 36

all commanded T-34s, for the most part atleast

________


Those guys as far as I know where the most successful soviet, even allied tank aces.

________


Overview of german tank aces:

In Panzer IVs
Strippel, Hans – 70
Riedel, Franz - 40
Kändler, Willi - 24
Kretzschmar, Willi/Willy - 15

In T-34s^^
Seibold, Emil – 69

In Panthers
Barkmann, Ernst - 82
Giese, Hans / Horst - 58
Malkomes, Hans - 24

StuGs
Spranz, Bodo - 76
Primozic, Hugo – 68
Brandner, Josef ("Sepp") - 66
Sauer, Konrad - 65


Jagdpanzer IV
Roy, Rudolf - 36

Nashorn
Ernst, Albert - 55

Ferdinand
Teriete, Heinrich – 22
Kretschmer, Franz – 21

Hetzer
Dallmeier, Josef - 50


Now the "fun" part,
Panzer VI Tiger
Knispel, Kurt – 168
Carius, Otto – 150
Bölter, Johannes (Hans) - 139
Wittmann, Michael - 138
Egger, Paul - 113
Rondorf, Heinrich - 106
Gärtner, Heinz – 103
Körner, Karl - 100
Kerscher, Albert – 100
Woll, Balthasar ("Bobby") - 100
[...]

I hope I can add to the topic with some numbers, if you got more acurate ones please link me to them, Im genuinely interessted.

Here is a list of all Soviet IS-2 aces I was able to track down:
followed by a list of some other soviet and german tank aces. Its ofcourse not a complete list.
I picked the overall best for the soviets, and the top commanders for the germans sorted by the vehicles they commanded. Because the clear majority of soviet aces were t-34 commanders, and on german side it seems to be more spread out, if you dont count the tigers.

__________________


1st lt. Lukanin Veniamin Grigorievich - 19 kills
- he commanded both an IS and a KV, I dont know how many kills he actually achieved commanding his IS -

Lyahov Pyotr T. - 9 kills

Reznikov Mihail - 8 kills
- actually a gunner not a tank commander -

1st lt. Galpyorn Vladimir I. - 6 kills
- + 14 guns -

lt. Hitzenko Ivan I. - 5 kills

lt. Boyko Alexandra L. - 5 kills
- fun fact: a woman -

_______


The most successful overall tank ace on soviet side:


1st lt. Lavrinenko Dmitriy Fyodorovich - 52 kills
- commanded a T-34(-76)-

After him come

lt. Kuchenkov M - 32,
Moiseyev N. - 31,
cap. Dyachenko N. - 31,
cap. Samohin Konstantin Mihaylovich - 30,
subcol. Burda Alexander Fyodorovich - 30 and
1st lt. Bochkovsky Vladimir Alexeyevich - 36

all commanded T-34s, for the most part atleast

________


Those guys as far as I know where the most successful soviet, even allied tank aces.

________


Overview of german tank aces:

In Panzer IVs
Strippel, Hans – 70
Riedel, Franz - 40
Kändler, Willi - 24
Kretzschmar, Willi/Willy - 15

In T-34s^^
Seibold, Emil – 69

In Panthers
Barkmann, Ernst - 82
Giese, Hans / Horst - 58
Malkomes, Hans - 24

StuGs
Spranz, Bodo - 76
Primozic, Hugo – 68
Brandner, Josef ("Sepp") - 66
Sauer, Konrad - 65


Jagdpanzer IV
Roy, Rudolf - 36

Nashorn
Ernst, Albert - 55

Ferdinand
Teriete, Heinrich – 22
Kretschmer, Franz – 21

Hetzer
Dallmeier, Josef - 50


Now the "fun" part,
Panzer VI Tiger
Knispel, Kurt – 168
Carius, Otto – 150
Bölter, Johannes (Hans) - 139
Wittmann, Michael - 138
Egger, Paul - 113
Rondorf, Heinrich - 106
Gärtner, Heinz – 103
Körner, Karl - 100
Kerscher, Albert – 100
Woll, Balthasar ("Bobby") - 100
[...]

Here is the list:
http://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%A1%D0%BF%D0%B8%D1%81%D0%BE%D0%BA_%D1%82%D0%B0%D0%BD%D0%BA%D0%B8%D1%81%D1%82%D0%BE%D0%B2-%D0%B0%D1%81%D0%BE%D0%B2_%D0%92%D1%82%D0%BE%D1%80%D0%BE%D0%B9_%D0%BC%D0%B8%D1%80%D0%BE%D0%B2%D0%BE%D0%B9_%D0%B2%D0%BE%D0%B9%D0%BD%D1%8B

Many of the Tiger aces are more a mix of Tiger I and King Tiger.They were driving a Tiger I mid in the war and later a King Tiger.

IS-2 aces:
place 20: 23 kills
place 27: 21 kills
place 39: 19 kills
place 96: 9 kills

On the Tiger ace list there is missing:
Martin Schroif: 161 kills.

some Little detail in the german list a wrong.
there is even one of the rare Jagdpanther aces who fought on the eastern front:

Jagdpanther:
Hermann Bix: 75 kills(eastern front)
http://tommymartin.info/?p=808

Upon returning to the front, Bix was assigned to command a JadgPanther with the 88 L/71 gun. In his most significant action, Bix with his two section mates were defending against a Soviet push. When his two mates ran low on armor piercing ammunition (AP), he sent them back about a mile to establish a final defensive line and took up position to blunt the Soviet attack. He was ordered to hole the village, while the German infantry withdrew, he had 20 AP rounds remaining. Two crews without tanks came up to help him. They would act as infantry and guard against the Soviet infantry or pioneers getting with range to attack the lone tank destroyer.

The Soviets sent forward some T-34s to scout the village, Bix destroyed these immediately. Then the Soviets attacked in strength. Bix ordered his gunner to make every shot count, then started to identify targets. He picked off the lead tank, then selected one near the rear, this caused a traffic jam among the attacking Soviets and Bix’s gunner started picking them off as they appeared. While moving to various different firing positions and allowing his gunner to have access to the Soviets, Bix was able to destroy 16 Soviet tanks and allow the German infantry the opportunity to withdraw.

Next day, he was helping the German infantry in the counter attack. He aided the infantry, destroying many machine gun and anti-tank gun emplacements. A few days later his section was dispatched to assist a Grenadier battalion that was surrounded on an estate near Warsaw. He contacted the commander to determine how to be most effective. He then took his 3 JgPanthers to a small hill and positioned to defend as the sun was rising. Bix assigned his mates to positions on the hill and took the prominent position himself. As the sun rose, the Soviet tanks could be seen moving in the village, Bix positioned himself and ordered his team mates to open fire. During the battle that ensued 19 Soviet T-34 and KV-1 tanks were destroyed, with Bix accounting for 11. The Grenadier Commander offered Bix his personal Iron Cross First Class in appreciation.

In less that 3 weeks, Bix had destroyed 75 Soviet tanks, for these actions he was awarded the Knight’s Cross in March 1945.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hermann_Bix

What's the word on exaggerated German kill claims? I hear about them a bit but nothing too verified. I'd imagine it'd be easier for the Germans to exaggerate their kills later in the war thanks to them being constantly being in retreat and simply not being able to have a team go in and check the number of T-34 wrecks that were claimed...

honestly, this could be a bit unreliable. The problem with counting kills was that, often, when someone destroyed a tank, the entire tank platoon claimed the kill.

The same thing also plagued dog fighting/planes

I only know from an interview with a german veteran, that they would only record a target as killed/destroyed if it was actually burning or exploding.
Otherwhise they werent allowed to claim it as a kill.

___


Several of the examples I posted actually list two numbers, a "confirmed" one and a another "asumed" or "claimed" one.
I decided to go with the lowest listed numbers just to be sure.

Also I didnt list destroyed (AntiTank) Guns, which were counted seperately.

I'm sure there are cases of exaggeration by tank commanders or for propaganda reason, but I so far didnt find any sources indicating that it was any worse than on allied side
( But I once read the Americans were counting cars/trucks as kills ^^)

What's the word on exaggerated German kill claims? I hear about them a bit but nothing too verified. I'd imagine it'd be easier for the Germans to exaggerate their kills later in the war thanks to them being constantly being in retreat and simply not being able to have a team go in and check the number of T-34 wrecks that were claimed...

German tank kill claims are inaccurate, and always too high. In my experience, they are often double or more the actual.

The same thing applies for Allies in fact. US tank destroyer battalions (mostly m10, 18)claimed 3:1 kill ratio during WW2 and 500 kills alone in the battle of the bulge. This is obviously too high of a claim.

Soviet tank claims are similarly large.

In any event, 'panzer aces' was a Nazi propaganda phenomenon. They lose every battle, but they can still manufacture a 'win' by claiming 'high tank kills'..

Tank kills may have been inflated, but much effort was placed in getting accurate accounts.

The propaganda played up the destruction of Russian tanks, as if it mattered, but Germans were frequent winners of battles. They were unable to change the overall strategic battle but local battles were frequently won by the Germans up until the very end of the war.

In addition, the kills on the German side add up. A single tank had to kill literally tens of Russian tanks to even the numbers back out. Looking at the overall number of destroyed tanks you would expect a few tanks to have numerous kills on the German side. Many of Germans fought the entire war, and were in heavy action almost constantly. Luft ace kills are similarly astoundingly large.

Wittmann, Michael - 138

Woll, Balthasar ("Bobby") - 100
[...]

Ain´t that a doubling of those 100 kills - or a huge chunk of them? Woll was - for a large part of the war - Wittmanns gunner. How was decided who got the kill?

German tank kill claims are inaccurate, and always too high. In my experience, they are often double or more the actual.

The same thing applies for Allies in fact. US tank destroyer battalions (mostly m10, 18)claimed 3:1 kill ratio and 500 kills alone in the battle of the bulge. This is obviously too high of a claim.

Soviet tank claims are similarly large.

In any event, 'panzer aces' was a Nazi propaganda phenomenon. They lose every battle, but they can still manufacture a 'win' by claiming 'high tank kills'..

Hmm...

From the accounts I've read of Soviet tankists, there were cash prizes and incentives for enemy tanks destroyed. However, the guys meant to actually decide this were legendarily lazy...

Tank kills were shoddily recorded by all sides, and usually inflated due to dynamic circumstances, double and triple claiming (2 or 3 crews claiming the same kill). The Germans were losing all the time after 1942 and not retaking territory so many damaged tanks were recovered by the allies and Soviets.

What was much more accurate was the unit's recording of their own losses & combat readiness rather than their kill claims.

So you can't trust Nazi kill claims due to the obvious propaganda effect. \

If I still had my link to Otto Carius' (#2 Panzer Ace) interview I would provide it. But in the interview he said that his kill score was inflated by something like 40-50 vehicles by the Nazi propagandists..

Another famous one: Wittmann. His kill claim was also inflated by propaganda and is more than double the actual number of losses that the British suffered at Villers bocage.

This makes all the 'Panzer Aces' suspect.

In any event, 'panzer aces' was a Nazi propaganda phenomenon. They lose every battle, but they can still manufacture a 'win' by claiming 'high tank kills'..

Its not so unrealistic.If this all about Tank-Aces were just nazi-Propaganda then it was a bad Propaganda.You should take note that there were about 1400 Tiger I and 500 Tiger II in Service and only a handfull of them had this high killrates.

From This 1900 Tiger I/II tanks only about 20 had more then 100 kills.Its not so unrealistic if many of These aces fought for many years in there Tiger tanks. Many german aces reached this high kills in about 3 Years in Service(1943-1945).They had a high survival rate.

If all this were just nazi-Propaganda then the relatively low numbers of about 20 Tiger tanks with 100+ kills german tank aces were small compared to the total 1900 Tigers in Service.

Here is one of Otto Carius' interviews:

- According to some historians, according to press and Nazi propaganda, you destroyed around to 150-160 enemy tanks. Is it real that figure?

Otto Carius: These figures are exaggerated. As much came to destroy 100-110 tanks, and my numbers were inflated by the German Ministry of Propaganda. Do Knispel figures? Pure propaganda. I had the opportunity to meet members of his crew in Russia and they both recognized me not destroyed more than 60 or 70 tank.

http://heroesdeguerra.blogspot.fr/2012/05/avande-de-entrevista.html

So Carius claims to have destroyed 110-100 tanks and the #1 Panzer Ace, Knispel destroyed only 70-60.

Here is one of Otto Carius' interviews:

- According to some historians, according to press and Nazi propaganda, you destroyed around to 150-160 enemy tanks. Is it real that figure?

Otto Carius: These figures are exaggerated. As much came to destroy 100-110 tanks, and my numbers were inflated by the German Ministry of Propaganda. Do Knispel figures? Pure propaganda. I had the opportunity to meet members of his crew in Russia and they both recognized me not destroyed more than 60 or 70 tank.

http://heroesdeguerra.blogspot.fr/2012/05/avande-de-entrevista.html

So Carius claims to have destroyed 110-100 tanks and the #1 Panzer Ace, Knispel destroyed only 70-60.

About Knispel: if he asked Knispel in early 1944 it could be 60-70 kills UNTIL THEN. Knispel and his Crew fought until 28. April 1945 were they all died.Knispel and Carius didn t meet each other in 1944-1945 because they both fought on different fronts.At the end knispel still fought on the east while carius were fihtning in the west.

And Knispel fought on different tanks with different Crews.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurt_Knispel

With 168 confirmed (possibly as high as 195) kills,[1] Knispel was by far the most successful tanker of the Second World War[1] and is even credited with knocking out a T-34 at 3000 meters, as well as the destruction of over 70 enemy Pak (anti-tank guns), and countless bunkers and field works.}. He fought in virtually every type of German tank as loader, gunner and commander.

He had different tank Crews.

I figure that Carius already factored in Knispel's history when he answered that question. Carius was heavily sought out and involved in the military book business and in documentaries about tiger tanks.

The numbers are definitely goosed up as 'Oak Leaves' holder Carius states. Even the German claim is goosed up (from 150+ down to 100+).

If one can get their hands on the Soviet and Allied unit combat records, the actual real world number of totally destroyed Allied tanks (not recovered from the battlefield, repaired, and redeployed) by Carius is likely only half this number or less.

It is known that during the Second World War in the Wehrmacht and SS troops fought more productive tank aces . The total number of tanks destroyed and wrecked Lavrynenko small compared , for example , with indicators such masters tank battle as Michael Wittmann (138 tanks and self-propelled ) , Otto Carius (150) and others.

However, almost all German tank aces went through the war from beginning to end , and therefore the overall results so significant. In this Lavrynenko destroyed his tank 52 in just 2.5 months of fierce fighting in 1941, the most critical and tragic period for the Red Army , as she retreated .

As Crecer said went through the war from beginning to end, the war on the eastern fornt alone was fougth for something like 1400 days, which means thats pretty much possible to destroying 168 tanks is possible. The Western allies send their best aces to use them as instruktors, Germans not.

As German tanks were known for their accurate and powerfull guns, Tigers had no problems to knock out any of the allied tanks at long ranges besides IS-2 and Pershings. So overall its same with the Soviet snipes that had high kill counts because they could stay at save distance and take out the opponents without getting into much danger themself.

I have been interested in this subject for 10 years. There are few reasons why the German side had higher kill claims with their tank crews. This makes the German 'aces' more human and less Nazi super soldier.

1. Inflation through Nazi Propaganda. Use of fake kill numbers and 'super soldier' of the week was the Nazi version of celebrity. By emphasizing Luftwaffe Aces, Panzer Aces, and Infanterie aces they could convince their people that Germany had a chance of winning ww2.

2. The soviet way of using tanks was more like artillery ammunition. They had lots of tanks compared to the Germans and could afford to use them this way. The high losses has more due to Soviet aggressiveness rather than German skill or quality of their equipment. They exchanged tank losses for victory.

3. Defensive stances. Tanks in the defense typically could inflict high tank losses on attackers in WW2 provided that their defense didn't collapse. The Panzers spent most of their time defending.

4. Target rich environment and the defensive use of the Tiger Tank. The Tiger Tank simply had armor and gun advantages in the USSR that made it more survivable than other tanks.

Overall, German tank crews as a whole weren't particularly skilled compared to veteran Soviet, US or British by 1944.

Overall, German tank crews as a whole weren't particularly skilled compared to veteran Soviet, US or British by 1944.

Of course they were more skilled then US, Brits or Soviet aces.
Many german tank aces had an intense tank Training and fought since 1939 in a tank. Soviets fought since 1941 and USA even later.They had more experience and a higher survival rate.When US tanks entered in normandy they were mostly "Greenhorns" with no experience.

1. Inflation through Nazi Propaganda. Use of fake kill numbers and 'super soldier' of the week was the Nazi version of celebrity. By emphasizing Luftwaffe Aces, Panzer Aces, and Infanterie aces they could convince their people that Germany had a chance of winning ww2.

There weren t many "soldiers of the week" compared to the Overall tank numbers.German tank aces with more then 100 kills were a small minority.Most german tank aces were never mentioned in the german Propaganda Newsweek.There is no Video footage of Knispel, Bölter and all the others.

^

German tank units by 1944 were not that efficient. Their talent base was heavily damaged after years of war. A veteran PzD like 2nd PzD or 1st SSLAH could have 300% turnover within their combat troops by 1944. There were a few experienced old hares but the bulk of the panzer divisions were 'greenhorn'..and not only that, but less trained, reinforced & equipped than the AD's of the US and British Army.

The high losses taken by the ground forces ensured that the combat troops of the divisions would remain manned mostly by inexperienced conscripts. They were generally killed off before the division could really become skilled & professional.

For the most part, if you look at allied histories of their ADs they generally write about beating the Germans and inflicting heavier losses than they took.

The Nazi media tended to do hero worship more than the Allies. Newsreels and Newspaper articles would publicize heroes (knight's cross holders) and their stories. The aces were an important part of Nazi propaganda.

The German super soldier is largely a myth. The German Army peaked in 1939-1941. It was still good in 1942 but after that it became more and more incompetent.