Chapter 1621: Chapter 1538: The Enemy’s Weaknesses
“Ouch!” The Tang Army technician accidentally hit his head inside the tank’s hull. He cried out in pain before finally finding the right direction to crawl out of the tank abandoned by the dwarves.
This tank is a Type 10 tank from the Ice Cold Empire, employing some relatively advanced technologies, making it feel quite like a modern tank.
At least it used sloped armor at the front and employed a relatively mature torsion bar suspension system, making it quite thoroughly a copy of the Tang Army tanks.
Unfortunately, the details of this tank are still a complete mess, just a poor imitation in appearance.
“The ergonomics inside are terrible, it’s a disaster. They… forget it, their stature does somewhat suit this tank’s interior design,” the technician specializing in inspecting enemy tank designs started to complain but then realized the stature of the dwarf troops was indeed quite small.
Apart from the cramped interior space, the other design details of this tank aren’t great either, such as the lack of consideration for subsequent reactions after an explosion.
Or perhaps the other side might have considered it but had no solution: no automatic fire suppression system, no ammunition compartmentalization design. In short, it’s basically a lighter.
Even though the Tang Army’s tanks also do not implement ammunition compartmentalization to install automatic loaders, the Tang Army tanks have a highly sensitive explosion suppression device inside, which reacts in milliseconds.
But the Ice Cold Empire’s tanks clearly lack this advanced equipment. Whether or not the tank will explode depends probably on the crew’s luck.
“The caliber of the tank gun has been increased, but it still uses traditional armor-piercing rounds. This ammunition… forget it, it basically poses no threat to our tanks.” The technician looked at the shells on the ammunition rack inside the tank and shook his head.
The tank lacks any special observation targeting systems, still using traditional optical sights, though the quality has somewhat improved.
Compared to the poor-quality sights used by various countries in the past, the optical lens processing level used in this Type 10 tank’s sight has improved.
At least, this targeting system, operated by a skilled tank gunner, can accurately hit tank-sized targets at a normal engagement distance of 500 meters.
The prerequisite is normal weather conditions and good battlefield visibility. If battlefield visibility decreases, this observation targeting device’s accuracy will drop or even become ineffective.
And the independent observation system for the tank commander, already widely equipped by the Tang Army, even allowing for hunter-killer operations independently of the gunner, is absent in the dwarves’ tank.
Dwarf commanders can only observe battlefield situations through periscopes. Although slightly better than before, it still lacks any fundamental change.
As for the crosswind sensors, ballistic computers, and other electronic devices equipped on the Tang Army tanks, those are entirely absent in the dwarves’ tanks. Dwarves’ hit rates rely entirely on the scale on the sight and the gunner’s experience…
“The armor needs to be analyzed after drilling, but it seems to be specially treated homogeneous steel, even with internal layers, it’s probably equivalent to about 200 millimeters in thickness.” He rubbed his recently bumped forehead and glanced at the front end of the tank hull resembling that of the Type 59 tank.
Clearly, the dwarves must have obtained some photographs of the Type 59 tank from the war between Tang Country and Qin Country, and used these photos to reverse engineer the Type 10 tank hull.
No matter how well it was kept secret, the concept of sloped armor is easily copied: after seeing something similar, one can describe it, experiment a few times, and judge the pros and cons of its ballistic shape.
“There are too few hatches, how do their people escape from inside?” The technician looked at the officer accompanying him to inspect the enemy tank.
The officer shrugged, indicating he didn’t know: “I was informed that the enemy’s tank was captured after the battle had already ended for several hours.”
“Alright then…” The technician jumped out of the tank still parked on the battlefield, pulled a pack of cigarettes from his pocket, lit one up, and exhaled, commenting, “This is not a product of the same era as our Type 96. There’s hardly anything decent inside. This thing is about the same as the Panzer IV we used back then, maybe slightly better.”
After saying this, he took another drag: “To give an objective evaluation, it’s a bit better in overall performance than the Panther Tank, but it shouldn’t pose a threat to the Type 96 tank.”
“So, the weaknesses of this tank…” The accompanying army officer fulfilled his duty by asking a detail that army commanders are most interested in.
“Take a look…” The technician gestured as if to encompass the whole of the dwarf tank.
“Hmm?” The army officer was somewhat perplexed, waiting for the technician to continue.
The technician sighed helplessly, feeling his sense of humor was utterly wasted: “Everything you see is a weakness! The Type 96’s tank gun can penetrate any part of it, as long as there’s no ricochet due to the angle… A soldier’s anti-tank rocket launchers also have a similar effect at effective range. For safety, you might reduce the firing distance marked in the rocket launcher’s manual from 200 meters to 180 meters.”
“After penetration, this tank is likely to explode due to the unscientific placement of its internal ammunition.” The technician shook his head, as if regretting something: “Look at those tanks over there; they’re about the same.”
As he spoke, he pointed to the tank wreckage in the distance, which were several dwarf tanks whose armor was penetrated and exploded by Liu Guozhu’s crew.
The turrets of these tanks had been blown quite far away, the hulls were somewhat deformed, and everything inside had burned to a blackened state, almost unrecognizable.
Due to time, there was still a noticeable burnt smell lingering around the tank wreckage, so Tang Army soldiers often avoided these wrecks—there might be charred bodies inside, and no one would seek out such bad luck without reason.
“Then let’s head back quickly; it’s not very safe here after all.” The accompanying army officer advised, hearing the faint sound of artillery in the distance.
“There’s indeed nothing much left to analyze… If there’s a chance, bring back the front armor to cut and examine; if not, just leave it.” The technician felt a bit disappointed, having hurried to the battlefield upon hearing of a new enemy tank’s appearance… only to find… sigh.