The Ratte - German Mega Tank

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the rata mega tank in the years leading up to world war ii nazi germany conducted a vast number of projects with the aim of developing new types of weapons that would bring them military supremacy over other nations the majority of these designs as true innovations in the field of weapons design were ahead of their time the germans called them wunderwaffen which translates to wonder weapons or miracle weapons some of these were successfully deployed to battlefields while some progressed no further than the drawing board many projects resulted in magnificent machines of war but many others turned out to be complete failures the idea of building the largest tank in the history of warfare belonged to the batch of hitler's wonder weapons hitler's army mainly fought on land and they wanted a tank that would make these land battles easier to win the main feature of this new tank its enormous size surpassed everything made up to that point in comparison even the heaviest of tanks would have seemed like toys like all dictators of his time adolf hitler was in love with weapons that could show off his military strength when hitler was at the peak of his power in 1942 he was presented with an idea to build the largest tank ever devised designed by edward grotta a director of the famous krupp company hitler was thrilled the way he saw it the tank's hair-raising appearance perfectly matched the image of the german army that he wanted to build at the time porsche had started constructing a 188 metric ton heavy tank called the mouse which was supposed to be the mighty bellwether of the german panzers the mouse however was nothing compared to its bigger cousin named the rata or the rat the ratta was part of a land battleships concept that was in research from the 1930s the pioneering nation in this research was the soviet union with a project known as the tg-5 their idea was to build a multi-engine driven tank weighing 1 000 metric tons and armed with a 107 millimeter main gun and four sub-turrets one of the engineers working on the project was edward upon his return to germany grotta brought his own ideas on building a giant tank he started working as a director of the krupp company and in june 1942 he was given the opportunity to present his ideas to hitler himself the fuhrer showed great enthusiasm for the project and ordered further design studies grata responded with a series of drawings as a base for the future project designated the land cruiser p1000 rata or land cruiser p1000 the rat edward grata outlined the weight of the rata tank to be a staggering 1000 metric tons it was an enormous weight compared to any other tank at that time latest german tank coming out of the factories the tiger 1 was only 54 tons dorata's armament set alone weighed 300 tons the armor and frame weighed 200 tons its track and propulsion engines 100 tons and the rest was the weight of its ammunition and other miscellaneous parts the thickness of the armor varied from 5.9 to 14.2 inches or 150 to 360 millimeters the mammoth weight of the tank was followed by its huge dimensions the rata was projected to be 115 feet or 35 meters long and 46 feet or 14 meters wide with its gun facing forward it became 128 feet or 39 meters in length the height of the tank was 36 feet or 11 meters which was proportionate to a three-story building ratha was so huge that it even had its own lavatory system and a vehicle bay to hold two bmw r12 motorcycles while it was projected to have a crew of 41 men the dimensions and weight of the tank necessitated it to have very wide tracks to provide the proper distribution of pressure on the ground the retail was designed to have six tracks each one 3.9 feet or 1.2 meters wide three on each side of the chassis setting a 1 000 ton monster into motion would have been a challenging task as it would have required about 12 000 kilowatts or 16 000 horsepower to move the tank the first choice of propulsion was two man v12 z3244 24 cylinder diesel engines of 6300 kilowatts or 8 400 horsepower which were similar to those already in use by german u-boats the alternative was to use eight daimler benz mb 501 20-cylinder diesel engines of 1500 kilowatts or 2 000 horsepower these engines were used on german e-boats both of these solutions were projected to provide a top speed of 25 miles per hour or 40 kilometers an hour in reality it would have been unlikely for the tank to achieve that speed due to the likely suspension and transmission problems the intended armament of the tank was equally as impressive as its appearance the ratta was equipped with several types of guns two of which were the main 28 centimeter skc 34 naval guns these guns were developed in the 1930s to be used on shawnhorst class battleships needless to say they were extremely powerful at a distance of three miles the guns were capable of penetrating armor up to 17.7 inches thick at a maximum elevation of 40 degrees their range was an incredible 25.6 miles as an extra gun the reta was armed with a kwk-44 l-55 anti-tank gun there are no records indicating whether this gun was planned to be positioned at the front with the main guns or on a separate turret on the opposite side of the tank other armaments included an unknown number of 20 millimeter anti-aircraft guns and 15 millimeter auto cannons normally used on german aircraft the frightening size of the rata was the feature on which the entire project was based paradoxically this was the project's main drawback first of all there was no tank factory in germany large enough to be capable of assembling such a huge vehicle armed with naval guns for that reason a shipbuilding yard would have been required just building a prototype tank would have taken several months using much of the yard's resources in space this was a luxury the germans could not afford at the time even if the tank was built putting it into action would have been a logistical nightmare because of its massive weight of a thousand tons the rata could not have been transferred to battlefields by railway using its own propulsion at a speed lower than 25 miles per hour the rata would have taken an eternity to arrive at the front if it broke down along the way it would have been impossible to tow as it would have taken another tank of the same size to accomplish the task also because of its weight the rata could not have used roads or bridges without destroying them the only favorable characteristic was the tank's high ground clearance of six feet that would have allowed it to simply cross through a river in the end the rata might have been considered a mighty tank but it also would have been a remarkably easy target the reta's thick armor might have been a challenge for the allied tanks but not for the allied bombers despite the heavy armor it could not have withstood bombardments from the air being a gigantic and slow vehicle would have made it a perfect target for aerial attacks the rata was a huge powerful but ultimately impractical weapon the idea of building the tank appeared in 1942 the german industry was already over exerted by the war effort spending valuable time and resources on building the largest tank in the world would have impeded that same effort for no significant results that's why the minister of armaments albert speer canceled the project in early 1943 before it even entered their production phase the rata remained just another of hitler's great fantasies as german general heinz guderian wrote in his autobiography hitler's fantasy led him into the realm of the gigantic you

Channel: Simple History

Views: 356,667

Rating: 4.9421816 out of 5

Keywords: simple history, animated history, educational, education, ratte mega tank, mega tank, german, ww2, mega structure, machine, industry, krupp, General Heinz Guderian, Edward Grotte, metric ton, heavy tank, Maus, land battleships, Bolshevik Tank, tg-v, German Army, Landkreuzer P1000 “Ratte, p1000, 1000 metric tons, Tiger I, huge dimensions, monster, BMW R12, motorcycles, Daimler-Benz, SK C/34 naval gun, tank factory, gigantic, German industry, fantasies, Albert Speer, goliath

Id: D8TvR6pU0J8

Length: 10min 1sec (601 seconds)

Published: Fri Nov 13 2020