The R35 was Renault's entry into the "Replace the FT" race, alongside Hotchkiss and FCM, and is the first in the early-war series of videos I'll be doing.
The French are usually at the forefront of military innovation. Like the Lebel, with it's 8 round, smokeless powder charge & the FT with it's small size & rotating turret. However they tend to stand by these early developments while others observe and refine them, that's the disadvantage of innovating & adopting the earliest generations of weaponry, that everybody learns from your mistakes.
French tank development was greatly hampered by inter-branch rivalries. The Infantry wanted Infantry support tanks and didn't think the Cavalry should even exist any more while the Cavalry said only they deserved tanks and that only artillery should be available to support the infantry. This was the state of things right up to the surrender of France. And even though both the Cavalry and Infantry got tanks, they did not have a national armor doctrine. Cavalry had their doctrine and training and the Infantry had their doctrine and training and they were mutually exclusive.
"disadvantage of innovating & adopting the earliest generations of weaponry, that everybody learns from your mistakes." Except the french themselves. They never learned from their own mistakes. Or if they did, their bureaucracy completely stifled innovation. For example the lebel you mentioned, that gun wasn't innovative in the slightest, the gun itself was "created" in six months and all they did was convert a kropatchek, and the cartridge was literally 11mm gras, they necked down to 8mm because they just wanted a round NOW. These penny pinching choices absolutely hurt the french. It took about 2 years for everyone to have their own smokeless powder rifles and everyone had a better gun than the french. The lebel was practically a single shot because it was a tube loader, meanwhile everyone adopted clips. The french even until ww2 seem to have the philosophy of "it's cheap and good enough." While everyone else tried to improve themselves sometimes to a fault like Germany. It also seems like the french sorta upper echelon didn't care for the actual fighting men, like the 2 man turrets because "wow, less manpower per tank so we can have more tanks" while most other countries considered things like crew comfort and usability. Or things like they chose not to use welded armor not because they didn't know it was better, but because welders are paid more so each tank would cost more. Look at chieftains review of the panzer 3. The pz isn't that well armored, nor is it packing a huge gun. But Chieftain comments on it's relative comfort and amazing visibility comparing it to modern tanks.
In the words of jermey clarcson (paraphrasing a bit i think) "the french like to be first. Its like that face transplant thing we dont know what we are doing we'll take the baxkside of a baboon and call it a face, there we are first!"
God bless you for even getting in it. When I visited Saumur they offered to let my climb in it and my middle aged 6'4" self said thanks but dear God no thanks! The ARL44 was much better suited to my frame!
American usage of the R-35. In the "The United States Army in World War II" series (the official history of the American army), volume "Operation Torch", an American rifle squad was tasked with investigating the French Foreign Legion barracks in Safi, Morocco. They come across an R-35 driving down the road. They had no bazooka, but they did have some rifle grenades. They fired one, which hit the front right quarter, penetrated and spauling killed the driver. The tank lurched to the left and hit a tree, which threw the commander forward and he broke his neck hitting the edge of the turret. The squad discussed what to do for a minute and decided to take the tank. They removed the bodies of the two dead Frenchmen. Then while one rifleman figured out how to drive it, another figured out how to load and fire the cannon and machine gun. The rest of the squad followed behind. When they arrived at the French Foreign Legion barracks, they saw two unmanned 25mm anti-tank guns outside and a stucco building with all the legionaries inside. One of the American troops spoke French and threatened to shell the building, if the French did not surrender. The garrison surrendered. The captured R-35 and rifle squad then marched all 125 French prisoners down to the beach.
@@druisteen Okay. You tell me, what French units were stationed at Safi, Morocco, December 1942? And, what unit surrendered to an American squad sent to investigate the French Foreign Legion barracks?
People get a sick pleasure out of watching you get in and out of tiny tiny spaces. That should be a compilation unto itself. 'Chieftain, the in and out of it.' ...
Slow, poorly armed, and cramped for its crew it may be, but by tank standards it's cute. Granted, 'cute' is not an adjective that one would consider desirable on most military equipment. An enjoyable tour all the same.
Judging by the existence of the ELC and all those adorable armored cars produced by France I'd presume that cute AFV:s are an official part of the French military doctrine.
Keep in mind, at the time, the majority of the axis tanks would be of PZI and PZII design While the R35 could not catch those cause it does not have the speed, It was capable of playing Gandalf vs Balrog in You can not pass, and casting flaws aside it would be fairly impervious, but of course it was not really designed as a tank vs tank vehicle but instead to be a heavy robo soldier to support the infantry up close and personal, but to various reason's that situation kinda never presented itself cause the guys in charge were planning on a re-eun of WWI for some reason and that's how they put all their pieces on the playfield. But that is pretty much how the entire blitzkrieg goes. It's a lovely story of We have everything we need to stop an invasion, now lets put it all everyplace we can so that it cant be used to stop anything :( In hindsight, it is hard to imagine when the hell those in charge were thinking exactly
TotalRookie_LV the physical contact by booting the driver with "nice" kicks was more common than you think because the intercom system, if available, failed quite often during the war so as the driver can't see what the commander wants he just received a series of well aimed kicks that leaves no doubt what the commander wants! That he will have a very sore back at the end of the day is another story..
Well, once again I was _mostly_ just joking, but only found out, there is something to it. Someone needs to spraypaint this on the back of the drivers seat or at least attach a paper with the message: "In case driver hangs up, reBOOT it!
The plugs for the vision slits remind me of the Peril Sensitive Sunglasses in Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy: When peril is detected, blind yourself so that you don't get scared.
Strange. They remind me of an attempt to keep out bullet splash when the tank comes under sustained rifle and machine gun fire. When a bullet hits a hard target it can break up. The fragments go all over, and some can come through a vision slit. Eye damage and other crew injuries are possible results. So your statement is the opposite of correct. The point of stopping bullet splash is to prevent yourself from being blinded. Being able to block the vision ports was a wise precaution.
@@elpresidente5767 yeah no the different French resistance groups fought amongst each other then when France was liberated French generals were proped up in Paris as heros to prevent the then widely accepted as inevitable post-war French Civil War. That's why the allies rapidly shut down the indiscriminate armament of resistance groups and limited resources to specified missions like in D-day
Given the fact I'm 6 foot 2 and I know the Chieftain is also a tall person, my first thought was "oh boy I can't wait to see how he squeezes into that one man turret..." Drivers station was surprisingly roomy though
The H35 is even worse with that. Angle just right and you wreck anything. The only problem is the 25 is low damage high pen. And the 37 is high damage low pen.
All of those complaints about the driver's position and not a single mention of the lovely, tucked and rolled, hand crafted upholstery in the most delightful of designer colors. >:-(
Amazing to see the company that Renault has become. They've come a long way. Easily my favorite Highway-Tractor manufacturer. The Renault Magnum and T-series are both pretty great.
Thanks Mr. Moran and all camera helpers, elves, nymphs and their families etc, for covering this poor vehicle; that had poorer feeling crews no doubt. I wonder if it is likely that apart from the armour and possible radio, they still preferred the FT's, being posted to a Char 1 B, or being demoted to 'The Line'?
Woo More chieftain! Im sure you guys have tanks lined up to visit still and other footage we dont know about ;) but I would LOVE to see the inside of Germany's more common vehicles like the stug and a panzer 4 :D
Thanks for showing the details that made this tank poor for taking on other tanks. Advanced Squad Leader showed the effect to me, you showed the cause to me.
Excellent episode! Reminds me of another episode by another excellent host, regarding French predreadnoughts, "When Hotels go to War." Like U said, "I got nothing..."" LOL :)
He already did one on the TKS :D ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-LNLxDP0omKs.html&ab_channel=The_Chieftain Edit: I just now noticed your comment is 4 years old, same with the vid...oops...
My dad has one of those R35 tank engines. He made it as the power plant for an arc welder. Direct belt drive off the crankshaft to a B-17 generator with a B-17 heated flight suit controller to adjust the amperage. All on a hand built wheeled frame. Will you be doing the Ducky?
That drivers hatch doesn't seem too bad. Plus the sudden burst of speed and strength granted by the fear of an imminent death would make all the difference.
I've decided that my FT tank running full scale model is going to have a one man crew. No point in being totally cramped and miserable in peacetime. Mine is made of wood and utterly claustrophobic, imagine being in these things and having to fight all buttoned down among all that metal.
Great video, as always, I was laughing at your comments about the tank all the way through the video. I saw a video by Lindybeige talking about one man turrets and using this tank as an example and actually seeing what it's really like inside made me realize that the R35 is actually much worse than he made it out to be.
As always, thanks for the great episode and insight. Looking forward to you checkig out that Char B1 in the background next ;) Also, on a scale from Panther to T-34, where would you rate the crew-ergonomics of this tank? *snickers* But seriously now, it's easy to see why the french tanks were so inferior to the german tanks on a technological level. 3-man turrets and radios on every tank was clearly the way forward and it will forever baffle me, how the other nations didn't see that one coming from a mile away.
But also the German tanks had way more thought and time put into them. Making sure every single cubic centimeter of space is being used, that the crew fits correctly into it with enough room to not feel claustrophobic or get in each other's way and that they have enough visibility.
Извиняюсь за Гуглпереводчик :) Wonderful that you continue to shoot such a video. WG freezes now many of their activity, it is good that you are not affected. PS the video is Planned for Tortoise?
Idk why but that loud ass noise when he closed the coolant cap around the 4:45 mark is hilarious because you know that scared the piss out of the regular museum guests
Given some of the strange buttoning up -- to what extent did inter-war tanks, or indeed WW2 tanks, consider gas protection? Given its impact in WW1 - I do wonder if there was some limiting in place in terms of openness? Or at least consideration given?
Most didn't bother with it. Gas protection means you would need to make perfectly fitted plates and welt them together super cleanly in addition to an overpressure system that requires a lot of power as well as a large and bulky filtration system.
I haven't seen one, but a look at the AMC 35 would be interesting. I have conflicting data about its size. Some say that it's the same length as an R35, others that it's longer. And wider.
Saumur? I sense a Königstiger video in the near future! I hope you have spent a lot of time filming there... lots of cool and unique tanks those frenchies have there!
Love how a tank that was driven by cost saving has jaeger dails. If you haven't heard of jaeger (lecoultre), they make watches with prices that start at Rolex level, and only goes up from there... got to love the french
Obscure question: does the AMX ELC Bis prototype have enough of a interior to do a Inside the Chieftain's Hatch on? Or is the tank sitting in the museum have an empty interior?
French military doctine dictates that if you camoflage your vehicle, you must include exterior lighting so the vehicle can be spotted. Also you must paint a large bullseye on the weakest part of the turret, so that the gunner can be easily killed, rendering the tank useless.
The Slits on the turret were not that simple. There were installed episcopes PPL160 with 68º horizontal FOV and 24º vertical FOV .French tanks used "episcopes" to provide the crew with views outside the tank with a large FOV through a very tiny viewslit and provide protection by having what is in effect a small armored, vertically rotating "periscope" view (vision area is offset from the opening in the armor plate) . The cupola inludes a PPL180 with 30º vertical fov (and guess 68º horizontal fov) that would be used by default and a estienne 114mm slit.....
I almost killed an entire enemy team in this by my self in WoT Blitz.... My entire team was dead... I killed 6 out of the 7, the 7th enemy was an R35, wasn't even close to destroying him until I ran out of AP and was left with HE then ended up shooting him with HE for no reason at the cap, that time I loaded 50 AP 50 HE. This battle happened in copperfield
budmeister maybe idk how big they made the HE round for this gun but they could still have fit more explosive filler on the tank mounted one think of it as .357 magnum vs 30-06 yeah it's a bigger bullet diameter but the rifle bullet still has a similar weight range for it's rounds just depends on how they wanted to make them (the tank gun rounds)
M71 90mm HE had about 2 pounds of explosive in it. If you think 2 pounds of HE is weak then idk what you've been smoking. And, heads up, no one uses minengeschoss except in a select few aircraft guns from the Cold War, which are rarely used anymore. Mine shells are weaker structurally, and have to be fired at lower velocities, making them ineffective for hitting fast moving and maneuverable targets.
Not only is the 40mm grenade from the M-19 more powerful, but has better range and is more accurate. Go, go DEPD out to 900m... What many people don't understand is that the explosive fillers used by WWII tanks was more powerful that the equivalent mass of TNT, but today's fillers are significantly more powerful that the fillers used during WWII.
Everyone makes mistakes somewhere, you do your bit in the moment & hope life doesn't bite. Unfortunately for WW2 France, this tank was not enough, amongst a myriad of leadership failures, most of those an accumulation of less than militarily optimal & habitual - TheCheiftain has discussed the battle failures leading to Dunkirk (unsure if that is classified as a campaign or not) in other videos.
