Tank platoons 

"The 75mm is firing, and the 37mm is firing but traversing round the wrong way. The Browning has jammed. I am saying ‘driver advance’ on the A set and the driver, who cannot hear me, is reversing and as I look out of the top of the turret and see 12 enemy tanks 50 yards away someone hands me a cheese sandwich." Lt. Ken Giles, British M3 Grant tank commander

Contrary to current tank simulators, contemporary radio chatter did not include the phrases: "git gud", "cyka blyat" and "goldnoob, uninstall game"

Great video, sir. Now would you kindly upload it again but this time to the B- set.

Any other man wearing a helmet in his disheveled room playing with toy tanks I would be skeptical of. Lindy, genius.

Although I am not au fait with the process for the Brits in WW2, as a tank platoon leader, my transmitter was set to the platoon net, and my platoon sergeant was set to the company net. He would be responsible for the reports to higher, while I was responsible for the control of the platoon, the thinking being that you can't really do both things at the same time. Indeed, inside the tank, I went a stage further: I instructed my driver to listen on one net only, the loader the other net, while the gunner and myself had both on. If traffic was coming over both nets at the same time and the messages could not be made out, I could then inquire of the appropriate crewman the message I had missed.

It's interesting to learn about this know. When I was younger and competed in gaming tournaments, I implemented a similar system of voice-comm discipline without being aware of the precedence. While most teams put everyone on the same channel, I split my team into 3 squads of 3-4 players. Each squad had their own channel, while squad leaders had a separate key to talk to all channels. We set up our team so that individuals would gravitate towards the squad leaders, who could micromanage their own members, while also containing the moments of rage and frustration so that it wouldn't block out the whole team's comms.

That was the past. Now, a tank platoon is made of one tank, one healer and one DPS

Four tanks was usual when I was a tankie during the 70's in the Australian Army. We were able to operate in pairs, one pair moving and the other pair covering their move. Unfortunately, the government of the day decided we were wearing our tanks out too fast and so they mothballed a quarter of them. That left us with only three tanks per troop and the need to develop new tactics to cope with the change. The loader/operator had a third function, at least in the Australian Army, so say the most important of all. He made the brews and cooked or rather heated the crews food. ;)

More vids on military organization!

fun fact : the french high command realised a little bit late that shooting with live shells in the somua s35 (not training shells) would kill the radio system bc it was just under the shell ejection system

Would you make a video about medieval peasent uprisings in films vs reality and/or pitchforks?

Just for the British unit impaired, the 17 pounder was equivalent to the 75mm on the StuG III (In the Antitank role) and the Firefly was an M4 Sherman, with a muzzle adapter (1:20 You can see it in the model) to raise the Velocity for tank killing.

Thank you Lindybeige. My Year 5 class are going to be watching your infantry platoon video next week as part of their 'Home Guard' training in their WWII topic. I am sure they will be interested in this too!

"Okay driver, stop now." "Stop now, driver." "Driver we're are getting too close!" "Driver? Driver for goodness sake, Why don't- driver!" *S T O P N O W !*

Great video, as always. Would you mind doing a video on what European pubs were like throughout history? I always think about it when we have our stereotypical bars/inns when we do role-playing games.

You should do one on the organisation of naval squadrons, how many ships a commodore and various levels of admiral could command, depending on class/speed of ships

3 tank platoons are a thing n World of Tanks too. However, we do not have a commander, all 3 of us just shout "Leroy Jenkins!" and drive forward.

Platoon doesn't seems to work in world of tanks because it increases 99% chance of getting shot by SPG

Tanker: definition: 3-5 crewmembers struggling to become one organism. As a retired tanker, I fully enjoyed this vid. Well done.

Unfinished models? Appallingly unprofessional.Go back and do it again Lloyd.

Lloyd, could you please make a video about all your models and figures? It would be interesting to see what you have in your collection.

French tanks used flags? That explains a lot.

My grandfather was a tank commander as well as a tank platoon commander, he went into battle in an M50 Sherman in Korea and as lindy mentions radios here; one thing my grandpa mentioned when he took me the Museum of the Regiments and pointed to a few names on the wall was that he had heard them burn to death in their tank over the radio. I have never forgot that conversation. As well as the M50 Sherman he commanded a 2 pounder Centurion as well the 105mm Centurion when they were fitted with them. He spoke highly of the Sherman, saying it was easy to work on and fix, as for the Centurion said it was a great tank when it didn't have mechanical issues which was often, but that it had much better space inside compared to the turret. He also mentioned about one regret he has from fighting the Chinese in Korea: He told me a Chinese self propelled gun came out in the open and he wanted to fire, but his instinct told him it was a trap to give away his position, regardless of probably making the right choice he still regrets not blasting that Chinese unit. He also mentioned the Canadian tanks in Korea were meant to sit on a hill to let the Chinese shoot at them so that they could locate the Chinese and have the American planes come in and hit them, he also mentioned sometimes the Americans hit them by accident :(. Gramps joined up when he was 16 in ww2 and saw some action in Holland with an artillery unit and then moved over to Lord Strathconas Horse Regiment and became a tank commander working his way up to Warrant Officer. Also the Canadian army pronounces Lieutenant the British way of LEFTenant.

Too bad a katana could easily slice through an entire tank platoon... silly western inventions

as someone who usually has multiple chats open in Facebook the miscommunication is very relateable. then again I wasn't trained for this

God I love this channel, you teach me stuff in a few minutes in such an easy way with awesome model examples and I actually remember everything. Cheers!

Great story about mixing up radio comms. That's still a problem today - I regularly make fun of my officer when he grabs the phone set and boldly orders the engine room supervisor to "blow down the steam generator", only to be told by the bridge "wrong MC, nub!"

As a FDC chief for a howitzer battery (6/37 FA 2 ID) and I used three radios to communicate with our FO's, Battalion and Division. The FO's radio being cranked up to full volume, the other two turned down. The big difference between us and a tank as far as commo went was we had a extra set of head phones for my assistant when things got really busy with multiple missions. Also the guns were 50 to 100 yards away when they went off vs having a gun go off right beside you like a tank. You're right about radio traffic. It has to be tightly controlled. The biggest violators were our officers. I was constantly yelling at them to get off the radio. An acting E6 telling LT's, Capt's and Majors to get off the radio might raise a few eyebrows and normally you'd get your butt chewed.I never did. The General backed me up. The reason the general was so forgiving of my roughshod attitude to my officers was one day he passed by me and I didn't salute him. I just wished him a good morning with the usual "Sir". He locked my heels and asked why I didn't salute him. I replied "That's a sniper check. Sir!" I never had to salute him again although the officers did. I was training for war. My officers were playing army. MG Louis C. Menetrey got that, may he rest in peace.

A poppy! I knew you would wear one!

Up next: Lindybeige reviews Girls und Panzer.

Radio operator: important job so naturally give it to the loader, the guy that does the most moving around indide the tank. Brilliant.

my great grandfather was able to destroy a whole platoon of tanks with just a spandau with a katana bayonet

17 pounder had troubles with cracking Panthers hull and King Tigers.

Is it true tank commanders could tell the driver when to turn by kicking him in the shoulders?

I played a tank operation with an ARMA-community a few years ago with three radios set up like this. To remember witch radio to send on was a constant issue for most commanders. It was pretty hilarious when the company commander shouted at the top of his lungs to some platoon commander that he hadn't listen to him, only problem was that the company commander had given instruction and corrections on the wrong channel all the time. It did work out in the end though and it was great fun.

Can we do Navy next? I know most people know this already, but I still would like to see it.

A running joke with crew commanders was if the intercom was down, we were to grab the pickaxe handle from the vehicle kit to control the driver with pokes and smacks. You couldn't do it in most AFVs that we operated, but . . .

Lovely set of models, great topic, thanks for posting.

When I was a Tankie we knew them as Troops. And in a cavalry/MBT regiment a soldier is a Trooper. 3 tanks per troop. 4 combat troops and1 Sqn HQ troop of 2 mbts, plus support vehicles. Troop leaders were officers, or sgts/staffsgts. Our tank ic was permanently live. You had to press to send. We typically ran two radio sets working same system, or a third set working a different one. I have personally run 4 sets of 3 different nets/systems. ....it was a ball ache. Decoding, encoding, transmitting, loading, keeping the commander informed, loading, receiving, decoding, loading lol whilst not getting squished in the ring or by the breach

Lindybeige has the honor of being one of the few youtubers whose comment section I actually enjoy reading. I always learn something from lindy and I always learn something from the comments. Keep at it lindy, you're doing great work.

You may be interested to know that these same tactics are employed in modern American (as of 2002) anti-tank infantry platoons. 15 dudes. 1 - LT 1 - Platoon Sergeant 2 - Section Leaders 2 - Squad Leaders 4 - Gunners 4 - Drivers We had 5 HMWVs in a platoon. The Platoon Sergeant rode around with in a supply truck HMMV so he didn't count. The platoon was divided into two sections, with two HMMVs each. Each HMMV is equipped with a TOW missile. Then two .50 BMGs and two MK19s were split between each section. The sections, as they often do, could work independently of each other. For inter-HMMV talking, we could just talk to each other. Each HMMV was equipped with 2 radios. One for platoon traffic. One for company traffic. The LTs/PS' truck often had 3 radios. The 3rd radio for battalion traffic. Every radio is capable of talking to any net. It's just a simple changing of the station.

Fascinating, he always makes such complicated topics so approachable

I like how he look like a 8 year old playing with his toys. Man I love you lloyd

Thankyou for sharing the tradition of the poppy. I saw it and knew what it was right away, however, I was not aware that in England you wear it for several weeks leading up to the first Sunday after November 11th. Here in the US we see it worn in late May for our Memorial Day (with several areas claiming to start a May Memorial Day during/following our Civil War in the mid 1860's). But only for a day. It never ceases to amaze me how much more seriously the UK takes such traditions, versus what often seems like lip service here in the US.

Real hard to leave a like without a capitalized title, but the content is just too good!

Or as WW2 British tank commander Lieutenant Ken Giles so eloquently put it: “The 75[mm] is firing. The 37[mm] is firing but is traversed round the wrong way. The Browning is jammed. I’m saying ‘Driver, advance!’ on the A set and the driver, who can’t hear me, is reversing. And as I look over the top of the turret and see twelve enemy tanks fifty yards away, someone hands me a cheese sandwich.”

Watched a couple of your videos and they're real quality content. Awesome stuff!

I know Fury is a bit of a joke movie but I loved the amount of radio communication they decided to put in. The internet spends a lot of time fussing over details of tanks but I don't often see information about what it was like to be a crewman. Good video!

Same problem with the radios happen in planes. It's very embarrassing to hit VHF and tell tower something you meant to tell approach on UHF.

God I love Lindybeige

The great state of Texas loves your work lindybirge

I love your tank videos! I throw my hat in for MORE TANK VIDS! Thanks!

Tanks operate within a cavalry like structure. Troops, Squadrons, etc.

Through mud and blood.

I really enjoyed this video. Keep it up! I love the tank/ platoon/tactics explanation

I served as a CV9030 commander in the Finnish army and I can confirm that the mix up with the intercom and radio did indeed happen to most of us. It happened to me during a stressful and large military exercise when I spotted the Leopard 2s of the "enemy" and naturally wanted to "tactically retreat" to a better position. The company got a big kick out of my increasingly desperate pleads to my driver to back out, it took me quite a while to realize my error and I went from calm to desperate and from desperate to furious. Luckily I wasn't the only one who did this, but that didn't relieve much of the embarrassment in the moment...

Lindy is horrible, oh wait, I meant to tune this to the A set. Lindy not talking about you. Nothing here.

Unfortunately a spandau can absolutely decimate any tank platoon.

I love the little model tanks you have. I think your videos were recommended because I made stop motion movies with tiny tanks. I love war movies and building the models but I didn't know much about them. Now I can't stop watching your videos, glad to learn more about the war machines through history and methods people had to use them.

I really enjoyed your Company and Platoon videos. Thanks for sharing this info

lyndi... i love when you go full nerd

has modern tech changed the usual tank platoon? I imagine communication is different by now.

as always Lindy, fantastic little insights which make history a delight

Mr. Lloyd, another very interesting and excellently delivered video... 'tanks' for that

Each platoon leader has to constantly monitor command (B Channel in Britain?) to receive orders. No multi-band duplex radios in WWII. And thank you for the poppy.

But did those tanks fight in individual duels?

Keep up the interesting video's, enjoying myself a lot and learning in the process!

Lloyd, I really enjoy these videos about units and military concepts - you break it down in a very commonsense and straightforward way. Thank you for making these videos.

Aw... I misread the title as "Tank Pantaloons"

"17 pounder was a contender for the best Anti-Tank gun" not particularly. when testing the weapon the US Army found that after about 1500 meters 1 in 5 rounds hit the target. where as the 76mm US gun on the same range at the same distance hit with 4 of the 5 rounds fired.the 17 pounder has very good penetration with the late 44 early 45 sabot ammunition.

I love these set of videos, amazing work!

I love this channel! keep up the great videos!!!

Very interesting indeed! But I wonder. Would I have to tune in to the B set to hear commands from Regiment? or would I be only sending on IC, A or B but receiving all channels?

You really need to do a video comparing the 17pd and 76mm US guns. Then again, seeing the Bren/MG arguments still raging, maybe not.

Thank you for this. Very concise but good-humored.

I'd just like to say that this is one of my favorite channels. Keep up the great work good sir.

Would love to see your review and further commentary of the movie Fury (or any other tank movie)

Where can I buy a Brodie helmet like yours?

I' have been waiting for a video like this for ages.

As a small addition, British tank platoons had already evolved to 4 per troop prior to the adoption of the Firefly. The Sherman Ic or Vc (Firefly) were added in their separate troops, resulting in a unit consisting of 3 troops of "75" Shermans or Cromwells and one troop of Fireflies. IIRC some time in august they integrated one Firefly in each of the troops, as described in the video, to have them more readily on hand in a fight rather then having the all Firefly troop be the local reserve called in to deal with armoured opposition. With the new mixed tank troop, the British adopted the doctrine that the three regular tanks went forwards while the Firefly was tasked to provide overwatch and observation, ready to bring its gun into action against any German tank that thought to interfere with the three going forwards. This would appeared to have worked very well. Troop commanders were, as far as I can tell, free to pick leading from the front in a 75 armed tank or keeping an overview by manning the Firefly.

Open radio errors .. its still an issue in Aviation in 2019!

lit fam

Enjoying your ponderings and surmisings!

I love these videos! Please make more!

No, I never broke "text discipline" l. So I can never be tank commander? T_T

Tank commanders even today sometimes make that mistake of using wrong channel to command the crew. Happened to one of our commanders during training. Driver reversed over couple trees while the commander kept yelling in company radio "stop the tank."

From what I remember from overseas, neutral position was internal comms, toggle up (had to told it up) was external comms, and toggle down (it stuck in that position) was microphone off. MRAP in Iraq

Been on a binge of Lindybeige vids this evening. I love your content! Incredibly interesting and informative. Great narration. Keep it up!

More video's like this.

I imagine the fun of being inside an Italian rather shitty tank in the african desert with 50 degrees Celsius baking alive knowing that the first shot of enemy at guns you will burn alive... I guess the radio operators had big fun exchanging jokes.

Got to say I just love your videos very informative and quite interesting and entertaining as well

Very good. Thank you for this. The resulting discussion below is also quite informative.

LLOYD LLIVES

No dislikes yet? Good, that's the way it should stay

Love your work, sir. Great information amusingly presented.

I love your videos just binge watching recently

Nicholas Moran, a historian and ex tanker working for wargaming NA once gave a little presentation on myths about american armor in WW2. In that he mentioned that the platoon size there was 5. Could the number of tanks in a platoon have varied from nation to nation?

A set, B set: two people talking.

Lloyd, I loved your Crossfire videos. Please do more! Your channel is the best.

Love this series! I learn a lot!