The Germans developed the " tank destroyer " because of insufficient production capacity. The front-line armored troops requires the destroyer to act as the tank to use. After all, the production hours of the fighter without turrets are much lower than that of the tank, which is an ideal equipment to quickly expand the scale of the armored troops.
Cheetah II
When the development of the Black Panther medium tank was making some progress, the tank destroyer based on its chassis also began to be brewed. Unlike the widely known Cheetah I tank destroyer, the first one proposed was a self-propelled armored vehicle with 88mm guns. Of course, it was not Cheetah II at this time. It was called the 88mm Sturmgeschützauf Fahrgestell Panther. It literally means the Black Panther chassis self-propelled artillery equipped with 88mm guns.
However, this preliminary plan did not continue to develop. Instead, it followed another design model it proposed to bear fruit quickly, which is the Cheetah I tank destroyer.
Originally, the 88mm Sturmgeschützauf Fahrgestell Panther was shelved in mid-1943. However, in 1944, the PaK 80 128mm heavy artillery had become the development trend of heavy armored vehicles in the future. Therefore, the original Cheetah Tank Destroyer was mentioned again. In the introduction of a certain game official website, it was said that this was a design plan proposed by the Krupp factory in May 1944 and obtained the official name of Cheetah II.
Cheetah II tank destroyer
Although there are few detailed information about Cheetah II in 1943, it can be seen from the German army's choice of Cheetah I that the designs of the two should be very different. In terms of the selection of artillery , the early Cheetah II planned to install an 88mm KwK 43 tank gun, and then planned to install a 105mm gun. Perhaps because the ideas and ideas are not mature enough, or the chassis and other changes are too big, the design work of Cheetah II will soon stop.
1944, facing the increasingly powerful armored army of the Allied forces, even the 88 guns of Tiger type were difficult to gain an absolute advantage. At least they could no longer easily kill Allied tanks from a long distance. At this time, Tiger Hunting had upgraded its main gun to the 128mm level, and Cheetah II naturally could not follow the old path.
The chassis of the original Black Panther tank remained basically unchanged. The difference is that the combat room adopts a rear-mounted solution, which is similar to the Elephant Tank Destroyer . The combat room armor is arranged with an inclined angle, and the front inclination is larger than that of Cheetah I.
main gun of course is the PaK 80 type gun, the same as the main gun of the tiger hunting. There is no muzzle retractor installed. The front of the vehicle body retains the Black Panther's heading machine gun; it has learned practical experience, and the Cheetah II also has a commander's command tower to improve battlefield flexibility. The preliminary design of
Cheetah II is very realistic from a technical point of view. It uses mature parts designs, which are in line with the German production technology at that time. However, some people still believe that Cheetah II is not suitable. The main reason is that after installing heavier artillery and improving armor protection, Cheetah II is expected to weigh about 51 tons, which is 5 or 6 tons heavier than Cheetah I, so there will be some reductions in maneuvering.
Despite this, Cheetah II is still 20 tons lighter than the 70-ton tiger hunting tiger. However, there is definitely a gap in armor protection, but it is enough to deal with most threats, which is comparable or slightly stronger than the Black Panther medium tank. As for mobility, the chassis of the Black Panther medium tank in 1944 has matured, and the failure rate is within the control range. I believe that the original 45-ton tank has increased by about 5 tons, and is still within the bearing range of the chassis. In general, it is better to settle for the second best to develop a steel giant such as tiger hunting. The latter's chassis and artillery are all ready-made and meet the production conditions of Germany at that time. The efficiency of use is much higher than that of tiger hunting that is often lying on the ground. It consumes less materials and man-hours, and the fuel consumption is relatively less.
Unfortunately, the tiger hunting design was submitted to the head of state at the end of 1943. This giant beast-level armored weapon was very in line with the wishes of the head of state. On the other hand, Cheetah II, the new design was initially released in mid-1944. At this time, not only was the head of state crazy about "doomsday weapons", but the design departments also turned to related fields to cater to the head of state, and it was even more difficult to separate resources in production.
For the German generals in late 1944, I believe everyone knows that Germany can no longer win the war, and what they have to fight for is just how to end the war decently. As for Cheetah II, German generals in late of World War II are no longer willing to interfere with the design and production of equipment, but consider how to obtain more resources for their troops from the pot where there is not much food. Even Guderian , which was once very keen to "guid" armored weapon design, also created the No. 4 tank destroyer to compete for armor resources. It can be seen that the German state machine was running abnormally at that time, and Cheetah II did not go to the battlefield after all.
