(July 3, 2016 at 2:49 pm)Gawdzilla Wrote: After the IV's arrived the I's were relegated to lesser roles, some being assigned to occupation forces for policing use.

They were also subject to wild modifications. Such as howitzers mounted to the chassis.

(July 3, 2016 at 2:49 pm)Gawdzilla Wrote: The Pz I's were meant to provide the panzertruppen with experience in the use of tanks while the II's and III's were coming online. After the IV's arrived the I's were relegated to lesser roles, some being assigned to occupation forces for policing use.

Everyone seems to have had an armored machine gun carrier....the Brits had the Mk VI L and the Italians the CV 33.  Seems to have been part of the right of passage to modernity.
I'm sure the French had one, too although I can't think of the name at the moment.

(July 3, 2016 at 3:31 pm)Minimalist Wrote: I'm sure the French had one, too although I can't think of the name at the moment.

I'm not sure, they had. At least early in the war. Their brass was by far the most stubborn when it came to advances. The major reason why they lost within 6 weeks. Their tanks still communicated by flag.

The sort of thing you are talking about is a tankette, which is a tiny, car sized, barely armored tracked vehicle equipped with 1-2 machine guns (although the polish had one with a real machine cannon), and usually has a crew of 2 men, and were often open topped rather than fully enclosed.   Tankette were quite popular in the 1930s.   Most countries experimented with a few.   The reason for its popularity was tankette a were really cheap, and in theory can be built in enormous numbers.  So tankette allowed tacticians to directly convert the traditional individual infantryman into conceptually a motorized equivalent on an almost one to one basis in field maneuvers.

However, experience during the Spanish civil war showed tankette said were worthless when confronted with real tanks armed with real cannons.  Furthermore, although tankette said were somewhat armored, the light weight of the armor means they were not securely proof against rifle caliber ammunition, and were completely vulnerable to heavy supporting machine guns.  So anyone who had the industrial capacity to replace them did so by start of WWII.

The French, AFAIK, never deployed tankettes.  But they did toy with the idea.  Also, they had some vehicles which in design came close, but those vehicle were for a completely different purpose.

Also, one should not be too hard on the French army. The French army had many problems, but they also had many strengths. For example, the French army was more highly mechanized than the German army, even though the French army relied more on static defense.

Also, the German style of armored warfare is not as invincible against the French style of warfare as one might
Think. The main thing that allowed the Germans to achieve the swift victory was still the fact that the Germans found a pass around the French army where the French were confident there was an impenetrable natural barrier. Had the Germans not found the pass, and then gambled everything, literally at the last moment, on using this pass, the attack against the Low Countries and France would likely ended up much like the operation citedel in Ukraine in 1943, with German panzers bashing their own heads in against strong layered defenses, failing to achieve any sort of break through on a scale that can overwhelm French reserves.

(July 3, 2016 at 4:03 pm)Anomalocaris Wrote: The sort of thing you are talking about is a tankette, which is a tiny, car sized, barely armored tracked vehicle equipped with 1-2 machine guns (although the polish had one with a real machine cannon), and has a crew of 2 men.

In German terms this would be fitting of the PZ2, which was armed with a 2cm machine cannon.

(July 3, 2016 at 3:31 pm)Minimalist Wrote:

(July 3, 2016 at 2:49 pm)Gawdzilla Wrote: The Pz I's were meant to provide the panzertruppen with experience in the use of tanks while the II's and III's were coming online. After the IV's arrived the I's were relegated to lesser roles, some being assigned to occupation forces for policing use.

Everyone seems to have had an armored machine gun carrier....the Brits had the Mk VI L and the Italians the CV 33.  Seems to have been part of the right of passage to modernity.
I'm sure the French had one, too although I can't think of the name at the moment.

ARL.

(July 3, 2016 at 3:31 pm)Minimalist Wrote:

(July 3, 2016 at 2:49 pm)Gawdzilla Wrote: The Pz I's were meant to provide the panzertruppen with experience in the use of tanks while the II's and III's were coming online. After the IV's arrived the I's were relegated to lesser roles, some being assigned to occupation forces for policing use.

Everyone seems to have had an armored machine gun carrier....the Brits had the Mk VI L and the Italians the CV 33.  Seems to have been part of the right of passage to modernity.
I'm sure the French had one, too although I can't think of the name at the moment.

You might be thinking of the Renault UE Chenillette. But although it looks like a tankette, it was not really meant as a fighting vehicle like a tankette. It was intended instead to provide the French with a means to move supply up to forward trench positions while the trench position is undergoing WWI style shelling. It's a small armored supply crawler.

(July 3, 2016 at 4:36 pm)Anomalocaris Wrote: You might be thinking of the Renault UE Chenillette.  But although it looks like a tankette, it was not really meant as a fighting vehicle like a tankette.  It was intended instead to provide the French with a means to move supply up to forward trench positions while the trench position is undergoing WWI style shelling.  It's a small armored supply crawler.

Which is yet another pointer to the French staff still thinking in terms of 1918. There are quite many. Such as seemingly minor things like their way of refueling, which made them vulnerable to attack. Thouroghly exploited by the Germans.

(July 3, 2016 at 4:06 pm)abaris Wrote:

(July 3, 2016 at 4:03 pm)Anomalocaris Wrote: The sort of thing you are talking about is a tankette, which is a tiny, car sized, barely armored tracked vehicle equipped with 1-2 machine guns (although the polish had one with a real machine cannon), and has a crew of 2 men.

In German terms this would be fitting of the PZ2, which was armed with a 2cm machine cannon.

Pzkfw II was much larger and heavier than most tankettes. It also had a full revolving turret.  It was much more like a real light tank than a tankette.  The closest German equivalent to tankettes was probably early marks of Pzkfw I.  But panzer I was also more tank than tankette. Although with the Germans, I don't think the tactical concept of tankettes ever took root.  So Pzkfw I was the way it was largely due to German industrial inexperience with mass production of real tanks, and the desire to equip the German army with some substantial number of any tanks German industry can build quickly, rather than because the Germans were really after tankettes.

(July 3, 2016 at 4:41 pm)Anomalocaris Wrote: So Pzkfw I was the way it was largely due to German industrial inexperience with mass production of real tanks, and the desire to equip the German army with some substantial number of any tanks German industry can build quickly, rather than because the Germans were really after tankettes.

Quite possible. Even more so, since it was outdated as early as 1940. But the German strategists, as opposed to every other nation at the time, thought in terms of all arms of service working in close connection to each other. I can't remember what the original thought behind Pzkfw 1 was at the time, but I'm pretty sure it was to provide infantery support.

Edit, I looked up it's history. The original concept was a training panzer, designed to withstand infantery fire. Designed to circumvent the treaty of Versailles. Only 1500 have been built between 1934 and 1937.