Could a .50 M2 machine gun penetrate a WW1 tank's armor?

[muldoonthief]

@asterion

I’m not sure that many players really think that it’s anywhere near realistic. The thousands of rounds of ammo, lack of weight and storage issues, instant reloading without loss of rounds, and so on just make it a game. I wouldn’t be surprised if there was a really realistic FPS out there (my money would be on something with Tom Clancy’s name stuck on it) that actually took all that into account. And, of course, traditionally most vehicle combat simulators, whether it’s aircraft, tanks, or other vehicles do have realistic ammo limits.

Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six had ammo limits - 4 mags per weapon (long arm and sidearm) at the beginning of the mission, you could reload mid-mag but if you did, the old mag went to the end of your inventory, and you couldn’t combine them to get back to a full mag. And that’s all you had for the entire mission. That game also worked fatigue into gameplay - you had a group of soldiers with various skills to pick from for each mission, but if you used anyone too often their competence started to drop.

Most FPS games actually have “limited” ammo (until you pick up the magic unlimited ammo weapon), it’s just that you’re constantly scavenging more ammo on the battlefield.

[DrDeth]

You dont need special .50 ammo to penetrate 8mm of armor with little sloping. It should go thru , maybe take a couple hits.

[Weisshund]

For the original question

Can Ma-Deuce ventilate a WWI tank.
Using the British MKI through MKX heavy tank for an example.
Armour 6–12 mm across all varients

Yes, Definitely Yes, Absolutely yes, Unfortunately Yes.

Per ammo type
Ball - M33 (most likely noone is using this in combat vs armored vehicles)
500 meters: 0.32 in (8 mm)
1,200 meters: 0.16 in (4 mm)

Armor Piercing Incendiary - M8
500 meters: 0.63 in (16 mm)
1,200 meters: 0.32 in (8 mm)

Incendiary-Tracer M20
500 meters: 0.83 in (21 mm)
1,200 meters: 0.43 in (11 mm)

Armor Piercing - M2
500 meters: 0.75 in (19 mm)
1,200 meters: 0.39 in (10 mm)

SLAP - M903
500 meters: 1.34 in (34 mm)
1,200 meters: 0.91 in (23 mm)

Also keep in mind this.

30-06 AP M2 (the ammo not the gun)
100 Yards 0.42 inch minimum penetration
200 Yards 0.3 inches
600 yards 0.2

That is fired from a standard M1 Garand, or M3 Springfield or BAR.
WWI tanks would find themselves dead in short order to small arms fire in WWII

For the other part of the question
And M1 Abrams biggest issue on a WWI battle field would be finding enough fuel to operate.

It would not even have to shoot enemy tanks of the era, it could just ram them, i mean the thing goes 60Mph, the crew could drive around in a circle waving at the enemy and laughing.

I suppose an enemy aircraft, doing the kamikazi thing might lob a crankshaft or other hardened engine part through a hatch, but i really think i am giving too much credit to kinetic energy in even entertaining the idea.

The fuel? not enough fuel onboard the plane to be a worry.
Just nothing on the plane potentially damaging except perhaps the big chunk of radial in the node

Bombs? of this era?
A joke to a modern battle tank, for a few reasons.

Now artillery on the other hand, there you may have a threat, if they zero’d in and let loose hell with the large bore guns, they would need to have good accuracy, but nothing can simply sit and be pounded by arty indefinitely.

[Corry_El]

@Alessan

True, there would be obstacles, but too many people here are assuming that the tank would just sit there, spinning its turret ineffectually and waiting for someone to crack it open. In fact, any decent tank crew in this kind of situation would be doing whatever it could to get *off *the battlefield as quickly as possible, and wouldn’t stay still for a second. It would drive in any direction that looked clear and passable, faster than anything pursuing it, until it found possible breach in the line where it could make a break for a proper road, and freedom. Tanks are a maneuvering force; it’s their nature to take the initiative.

I think it’s somewhat the opposite. Those believing tanks of any kind would necessarily have a transformative effect are thinking in terms of desert or other open terrain warfare, or computer games, and not the reality of WWI Western front (the only place in that war tanks were used in large numbers) between densely arrayed forces in terrain that’s a mixture of not armor-friendly (forests, high ground) and completely torn up by previous battles and/or thoroughly prepared for the defense with obstacles. There wasn’t necessarily anywhere to maneuver, on a significant scale.

Modern tanks have the physical potential to be used in deep maneuver, because a large % of them won’t break down within a relatively few hours or miles of intense use like WWI tanks. But WWII tanks had a lot more mechanical potential than WWI tanks but only in certain circumstances of density of forces and armor-friendliness of terrain would that result in real armor-lead maneuver warfare. The German 1940 offensive was an example in the same general area…OTOH the Germans attained deep penetrations in their 1914 and spring 1918 advances without and almost without tanks respectively. The presence of tanks, of any capability, was only one factor.

Modern tanks would be much more capable in the actual role of tanks on the Western front in WWI, supporting infantry breakthroughs, at infantry speed, of strong defensive lines. But they would still be subject to losses in dense defensive zones there just wasn’t any way around, which was characteristic of that front. They would not necessarily be able to create a situation of generalized mobile warfare just because they can go fast on good terrain. And they would be hampered if they had to leave their infantry behind, as tanks are except in the most favorable circumstances.

[Weisshund]

@Corry El

It could definitely be an interesting 24 hours or so.

The M1 would definitely hold the shock and awe factor and could hold ground forces at bay, for a time.

It’s novelty would wear off fast though, there would be 155mm artillery batteries hunting it pretty soon, and lovely as the M1 is, even it can not just sit there and take that.

So it has to keep moving, which means it is using fuel, lots of it.
Perhaps not lots in modern thinking, but a lot in a largely unmotorized world of combat.
So the fuel it would find would be of low quality and low quantity.

Ammo would be of concern as well, as there is no source of 120mm smooth bore ammo in WWI, and the M2 we have to wait like 14 years to re-arm?
Also i am not sure ont he standard load out for an M1, but toting a majority of sabot type ammo wont be terribly helpful in WWI, we dont need that kind of penetration, we need a lot of exploding.
isn’t much to penetrate in WWI, at least in a vehicle combat sense, we could probably drive through or over most of the armored vehicles of 1914 to 1919.

For as wonderful as the M1 is, you let a couple little flesh bags from 1914 near enough to you, all that wonderful tech is going to wind up disabled and then someone is going to cut you out with a gas torch or something, or they can simply sit outside eating cans of beans and drinking tea and laughing while you suffer from dehydration locked in your future tech armored coffin

[DeptfordX]

@Banksiaman

Okay, they’ve been shooting at this squat metal ‘thing’ for some time now with no evident effect. It has shot back from the long trunk like gun, killing anyone who got close, but as night falls … what?

Perhaps one small but grotty soldier suggests a cunning plan. Could they sneak up on the iron elephant under cover of darkness with a few Bangalore torpedoes? Would one under the track and one straight up the jacksie do it?

“Everytime we try it, it shoots us to pieces. It’s like it can somehow see in the dark!”

[LSLGuy]

@DeptfordX

“Everytime we try it, it shoots us to pieces. It’s like it can somehow see in the dark!”

More like:

*"The first 3 times we tried it, it shot us to pieces. It was like it could somehow see in the dark!

The fourth time it acted like it was out of ammo so we blew off a track then set it on fire."*

[Weisshund]

@DeptfordX

“Everytime we try it, it shoots us to pieces. It’s like it can somehow see in the dark!”

If it is out of fuel and can not move anymore, it wont be seeing in the dark for very long.
Lack of electricity makes the thermal and night visioning systems cranky.
Also makes moving the turret around real slow and clunky.

Also if it isnt moving, they wont give it 3 rounds of infantry to chew up.
There will be an interesting dicussion with a battery or two of 155mm howitzers, and when the words fire for effect are given, things would get really sucky inside the M1.

We ,are after all, putting this poor M1 into the scenario entirely devoid of it’s normal support and operational structure, and nifty as it is, we are putting it at a fatal disadvantage.

We are pitting it against 1914 man, not cro-magnon man, 1914 man figures out how to go to the moon