The first tanks of the First World War and the beginning of the development of armored vehicles

In 1915, the first tanks appeared on the battlefields . No one expected the First World War , they did not prepare for it, and it was all the more difficult to foresee the character of the coming battles.

The task - breakthrough of defense

Already in the fall of 1914, Swinton, an officer of the British army, seconded to France, began to understand that the main problem of advancing infantry would be to overcome the distance between the front edges of the attacking and defending forces. It is difficult to go full-scale on the enemy, sheltered behind the breastworks of trenches full profile and armed with quick-firing machine guns, and by the end of this path from any unit there will be no more than half of the personnel. Something soldier's bodies need to be covered up, and to accomplish this task, he proposed the simplest solution. We need to take an ordinary farm machine, a Holt tractor manufactured in the USA, and trim it with armor. It is interesting that such first tanks of the First World War were compelled to be reproduced in 1941 under the defense of Odessa, they were called "NO" ("for fear").

The idea was not very successful, since the requirements for the running gear in the design of agricultural machinery did not match the complexity of the rough terrain, which was to move during the offensives. But the task did not lose its relevance, it just had to be solved differently.

The first - the British

The main thing that designers Nesfield and Mackey took into account when designing a fundamentally new model of combat equipment is the ability to overcome wide ditches and trenches. Known in the films about the Civil War, the diamond-shaped silhouette of armored monsters just became a manifestation of the originality of engineering thinking of English inventors. The first tanks of the First World War were called "Big Willy" and "Mark", their distinctive feature, apart from the characteristic trapezoidal form of the armored hull, was the location of weapons on the sides, in special protrusions. At the same time, the name of a new type of armored vehicles ("Tank" English) arose, meaning "tank" or "chan".

France does not give up!

French tanks of the First World War were designed with a wide variety of technical solutions and fantasies. Initially they were going to be built as slow-moving mobile artillery mini-batteries, which in their silhouette protect the infantry and provide it with fire support. However, soon the designers came to the conclusion that it was necessary to build relatively light machines capable of rapid maneuvers. "Renault - FT17" is most consistent with modern ideas about this class of weapons, if only because it has a rotary artillery tower, located above the armored hull. Similar cars of the royal Romanian army participated in the attack on the USSR in 1941, when two FT-17, preserved since the Civil War, have long been exhibits of Soviet museums.

The Germans are pressing

As for the combat qualities that the German tanks of the First World War possessed, their characteristic difference was the powerful artillery armament, which later became the visiting card of German armored vehicles. The main sample, the A7V, was huge, it was necessary to enter it as an armored train car, through the door. The work of engines was constantly monitored by two mechanics, except for them inside the case was an artillery calculation. The commander, the machine-gunners and the driver were together with them a crowded crew. The car was slow and slow.

Common defects of different designs

All the first tanks of the First World War had a serious drawback: they were almost impossible to remain long due to the high gas content and the high temperature created by the work of the engine in the same space as the crew. Powerful motors were not yet created, and assembly technologies did not involve other ways of articulating parts, except riveting. Reservations withstood the hit of a bullet, sometimes a light projectile, but the action of any field artillery of caliber over three inches had a disastrous effect on equipment and personnel.

In Russia, tanks began to build later than in other industrialized countries, but they achieved very serious success in this business. But that is another story…