Small Scale Military Headquarters

I'm sure most on this board have seen the Band of Brothers HBO series about Easy Company of the 506, 101st airborne in Normandy. I was watching it on DVD and noticed that during the battle for Carentan, when Easy Company defends their hedgerow against the German counterattack, they face a couple of tank destroyers, looks like a Jagdpanther and a Stug III. Anyway, the tanks look like they are pretty well done, do any of you know if they still exist somewhere? Some of them were built for the movie, according to the BOB website and they evidently rented some too...I didn't find any info on the jadgpanther. Here's a link to a short video about making some of the tanks for BOB...kind of interesting.

http://www.hbo.com/band/recreating_the_ ... entan.html

easy8

Good link, thanks!

Here's another link to an interesting site that discusses the Tiger tanks (modified T-34's) made for 'Saving Private Ryan' and also appeared in BoB:

http://www.sproe.com/t/tiger-tank.html

The Saving Private Ryan Online Encyclopedia

Thanks Football, interesting article about the "Pvt. Ryan" Tigers! I wonder what it cost to modify those bad boys!

easy8

The 3 Tigers in "Kelly's Heroes" (1970) are also modified T-34s, so I don't think that the 2 Tigers in SPR (1998) were that difficult to modify from an engineering standpoint.
With regards to the BOB "German counterattack" scene, I had a real problem with the German Jagdpanther retreating upon the arrival of the column of M4A1 Shermans from the 3rd Armoured Division. I mean, I'm glad that Easy Company was rescued and all, but wouldn't the Jagdpanther have knocked out a few Shermans before it "turned tail".
Stryker

I'm sure the Jagdpanther could have knocked out the Shermans, but it would be at a certain disadvantage because it doesn't have a turret, and there is always the risk that the Shermans (especially if there are a number of them) can knock off the tracks or damage the gun, effectively disabling the Jagdpanther and rendering its services for the Germans useless. A withdrawl would be a practical move in that situation.

Yeah, the Jagdpanther did turn tail and run pretty quickly...maybe the tank commander realized his supporting infantry was getting riddled...that would make me "put it in reverse" . Plus, the Stug was taken out earlier so being heavily outnumbered by the Shermans didn't help either!

They engaged ridiculously close too. But, hey that's a movie...and lord knows that German armor wasn't quite invincible.

Hate to defend the Germans again, but did anyone else think that having two American paratroopers out in the open with a bazooka only 50 meters from a Stug with infantry support for a duration of over 30 seconds is kinda unrealistic?
I love the BOB series, but that one battle scene is like "Audie Murphy's To Hell and Back" meets "Lee Marvin's The Big Red One".

I had no problem with the Jagdpanther retreating. In combat, it doesn't take long for a crew to decide it's getting to hot to stay. If I remember, the Shermans were doing quite the job of taking out the infantry support for the tanks. If that happens, tank commanders won't usually stick around. I don't remember if the Jagd PZ V was buttoned up or not, but if it was, any ricochet will force the crew to bug out. Any tank that isn't hull-down will continually attempt to find some sort of cover........ I would of backed out if I knew I had 3 or 4 Shermans taking out everything around me, a Jager or not, hehehe...........

-Ski

Sgt. Stryker wrote:Hate to defend the Germans again, but did anyone else think that having two American paratroopers out in the open with a bazooka only 50 meters from a Stug with infantry support for a duration of over 30 seconds is kinda unrealistic?
I love the BOB series, but that one battle scene is like "Audie Murphy's To Hell and Back" meets "Lee Marvin's The Big Red One".

It happened in the book. Now how true the event is, who knows. I could see it happening simply to keep the bazooka blast from hitting other soldiers. In combat, anything can happen...... How long did Audie Murphy stand on the burning Sherman in face of German armor and infantry until he had to jump off?

-Ski

The Jagdpanther leaving or not would also depend on the nerve of the commander and crew. Case in point: The first Tiger I ever captured was in N. Africa. A british anti tank shell glanced off the underside of the Tiger's gun barrel and wedged at the base of the turret, jamming it.

The Tiger was otherwise undamaged and fully functional but the jammed turret so unnerved the crew that they abandoned the tank and a nearly mint example of a Tiger fell into allied hands as a result.

So in light of that, a heavily outnumbered Jagdpanther tank destroyer may well see fit to make a strategic withdrawal. As said, it was out in the open and one advantage of Shermans is that they were pretty quick and would be able to outmanouever a Jagdpanther trying to skew to get a shot at them. Tank destoyers were more ambush type vehicles rather than out in the open toe to toe fighters.

Sgt. Stryker, as crazy as it sounds, that bazooka scene was real. That and another crazy scene, Ron Speirs run through town, really occurred. As much as I have a problem with some of the "Hollywood" aspects of BoB, they did get some parts right and some parts really wrong. For instance, Brecourt looked nothing like the real Brecourt and not including Forrest Guth is inexcusable, as he was and is a key member of E/506.

Ok! Ok! The BOB battle scene makes more sense now, eventhough with all the crap coming out from Dragon Models, you'd think that all German Panzer commanders in WWII were clones of either Michael Wittman (SS) or Otto Carius (Wehrmact).
As enemies, the Germans were wimps compared to the Japanese.

The STUG III in BOB was based on a British APC, an FV-432. They were built in England, and there were 2 of them made. One usually shows up at Beltring every year for the big War and Peace show there.

The JagdPanther was built on a Soviet T-55 chassis. It looks very good from the front, but not so good from the side.

The German halftrack in the Arnhem/Market Garden episode is a post-war Czech Tatra OT-810. It is a common OT-810 to 251 conversion that many reenactor groups do.

I wouldn't worry about it too much guys, the Gotz Von Birlichten, the unit that counter attaccked Carentan didn't even have Jagdpanthers, only stug IIIs and IVs. I was super impressed with how well they made those stugs though. And that scene that was refered to where Audie Murphy stood on the Sherman and let loose with Ma duece, also not quite accurate, in the real event he stood on an M8 Greyhound.

Kevin

PanzerArm wrote:I wouldn't worry about it too much guys, the Gotz Von Birlichten, the unit that counter attaccked Carentan didn't even have Jagdpanthers, only stug IIIs and IVs. I was super impressed with how well they made those stugs though. And that scene that was refered to where Audie Murphy stood on the Sherman and let loose with Ma duece, also not quite accurate, in the real event he stood on an M8 Greyhound.

Kevin

?? Here it says a tank destroyer:

http://www.jrotc.org/audie_murphy.htm

-Ski

Ah, I stand corrected. I told you I needed a refresher course. I dug around my library for the WWII Magazine where I remember reading the story, and yes I see that it was an M10 he stood atop whilst earning his medal(s).

kevin

PanzerArm wrote:Ah, I stand corrected. I told you I needed a refresher course. I dug around my library for the WWII Magazine where I remember reading the story, and yes I see that it was an M10 he stood atop whilst earning his medal(s).

kevin

.........hell, I thought it was Sherman!

-Ski

Ski:
A M-10 is a Sherman with a redesigned turret to accomodate the 90mm gun in an open turret.

On Audie Murphy, in his book and a subsequent book "No Name on the Bullet" about his entire life, written by his best friend, it is mentioned that in his MOH action that he kept firing the .50 from the burning M-10, until the tanks ammo started to explode and he was actually blown off the tank and "came too" in a ditch nearby.

A remarkable man, credited with killing 240 of the enemy, most with his M-1 and a M-1 Carbine. He tried a Thompson but he was such a little guy, he didn't like the weight of the gun and multiple magazines taped togethor. He suffered from Post Tramatic Stress before it had a name. He slept with a .45 under his pillow for the rest of his life.

We will not see his like again.

TTT

A M10 is a tank Destoyer with a 3 in gun mounted in Sherman chassis. It shares the hull design with the TD M36 with had a 90mm gun, but is a totally diferent turret.

1) according to reports that I read Audie Murphy was one either an M10 or M36 TD during his Medal of Honor action. THere was one story about a writer accompanying Murphy to the Holzwihr area in the 60's. During Murphy's description of the incident they uncovered a burned out M36 in the underbrush.

2) As to the retreat of the JagdPanther. First the German army of 1944 sure wasn't the well-oiled victory machine that went into Russia and Africa in 1941. Second, that TD commander was surrounded by noise, smoke and incoming fire. He would have responded to what he THOUGHT was happening around him. Lastly remember that the bulk of the JagdPanther's protection was up front. Quite vulnerable from the sides and rear. All of the above adds up to moving to the rear rapidly.