They are now part of my standard Friday viewings and have encouraged me to be a friend and patreon of the museum. Fascinating and I love these more in-depth explorations.
Cherish that intergenerational passion - and I think it says something about how good this channel is considering it can appeal to all ages, and /how/.
When I was at the Armor Officer Basic Course 1974-75, the Head of the Tactics Division expressed it this way "Cavalry is a mission, not a method of transportation"
There is only so many ways you can say "here is this prototype only 5 where built it was/wasnt very good (insert sassy David Fletcher remark)" =( I like the French prototypes, but you don't get any satisfying history with tanks that have always sat around or became target practice
@@Paciat you basically named a single vehicle of WW2, and two of the cold war area. The first was mediocre at best, the other was a very successful light tank and the last was basically just a 10t lighter Leo. 1 with a weird HEAT projectile and arguably less successful.
@@Tankliker And your point is? Get out of your tank hatch and you will notice that the second part of my comment is a response to Jessie comment calling amx tanks as prototypes. But most French tanks were designed badly. S35 included.
@@Paciat my point is, that you haven't named a single prototype. What about the AMX 50 series? ELC's? Sumoa? There are a lot of prototype and could have been models yet all you did was name three production models completely missing his question.
My grandfather's division (2nd DLM /1st Army) was equiped with the S35. Alongside the 3rd DLM they distinguished themselves at the Battle of Hannut in May 1940, one of the largest tank battle in WWII, where they repelled the assault of the 3th and 4th Pzdv. They suffered heavy losses during the battle however and all surviving S35s of the division had to be scuttled at Dunkirk like the rest of the division's equipment. The men only spent 3 days in Britain (at Weymouth in the case of my grandfather's regiment) before being sent back to the front line in France but with less equipment as the rate of attrition had been too high compared to the industrial output. The locations where the S35s were manufactured were about to fall to the Germans and in the absence of any foreign equipment as a substitution, this was the begining of the end. This tank was not flawless but it was definitely a good one by 1940 standard.
But it's also important to remember that the tanks was not the main reasons the German Panzer divisions worked so well. What made them so effective is something the Germans had already perfected which were their sturmtroopen from WW1. These were adapted into panzergrenideer batalions and later divisions which worked exceptionally well with the tanks. The tanks securing the open fields and the panzergranideers securing the more difficult terrain with the air force defending them. The British didn't really have storm troop batalions and without them tanks were easily halted by obstacles and small fortifications. The effectiveness of stormtroops had already been proven in 1918 with the massive spring offensive. The tanks just added the final component to that success which was the firepower to directly punch through heavy army formations. The German army was very effective cause it was able to take the strengths of both France and Britain. It had a large well trained professional army of about 800k just like Britain did but it also had a massive and well motivated conscript army of around 5 million like France did. Germany also had about twice the industrial power of Britain and nearly twice the population of France so it could keep pace with them on both fields at the same time. During the interwar period while the German army was only 100k they kept up their standards very strictly and their small size meant that by 1932 they were arguably the best trained army in the entire world. Then you also had the very successful expansion to that 800k which instead of being done by just throwing new units in divisions was done very carefully to take away experienced soldiers to help train the new ones but not break up the effectiveness of the old divisions. That combined with lots of training of those new professional divisions over the course of 5 years put them nearly on par with the British. The conscripts were quite a bit above their French counterparts as they had been training for 5 years already and had already seen combat in Poland as well as in Denmark and Norway. You also had the fact that while there was a division between the professionals and the conscripts in the German military they were still part of the same army in contrast to the British professionals and French conscripts which meant they could coordinate much better. Though while the British professionals didn't do so well in France they proved their worth a year later in the tank dominated wastes of North-Africa by defeating an Italian army 8 times their size.
I think this is the best of all the tank chats so far; clear, detailed and historically insightful. It gets away from the top trumps style obession with numbers and focuses on the S35 in its proper historical context with a wonderfully delivered narrative that explains clearly the situation facing France and how and why decisions were made, scotching as it does some long standing myths. Mr Willey's work just gets better and better. Excellent.
Love these more in depth tank chats..I enjoyed the short 5 minute videos but prefer these more in depth talks..Think all the tanks deserve chats like this :)
Thanks for providing a more in-depth look into the S35. One minor correction though with regards to the cavalry: they adopted the Hotchkiss H35 and later H39. Since the R35 were all going to the infantry after Renault having won the competition for the new light infantry tank and the Hotchkiss competitor was more or less its equal, they picked the Hotchkiss because that was what they could get in relatively short order. They weren't fans of the H35/H39 because of its speed so they tended to split units so that the various units wouldn't be bound to each other's speed when operating. A number of the unit diaries report on the H35/H39 having technical issues during troop movements and while retreating from northern Belgium.
very well done, and nicely done showing the other side of French operations and effects of politics caused issues in production and complicated delivery and the 1 years conscription added to issues. and how the French were doing what most countries did with the armor packaging.
Interesting to see a French specimen. The French vehicles don't seem to get that much coverage, despite the country's solid examples, especially in more recent years.
French sort of do that to themselves by a culture of keeping military technology relatively inaccessible to the public even long after it is technically no longer secret. Either the government still keeps the stuff close to the chest or they do very little to help others use the information when asked for it. Another big headache is French developers often have a unique method of communicating with each, ways of writing and talking that makes sense to each other, but less sense to outsiders. Be it how they create statistics, make drawings, or what have you,. it takes practice and patience to comprehend a lot of French technical information. This further limits detailing French technology. Thankfully, more French and Anglophone historians are taking the time to actually pry the knowledge out of the French systems, so we are getting more data than we used to, but it is a process. All the more reason to throw support at institutions like Bovington and to buy the books that historians like Zaloga writes, so these people can afford to take the time necessary to overcome indifferent governments who see little to no value in aiding historians research.
Thank you for the comprehensive review of this solid French tank and the challenges of rapid rearmament, global economics, politics, radios AND training had on battle field deployment.
Thank you for sharing this very (but too short) interesting lecture. AMD => Automitrailleuse de Découverte AMR => Automitrailleuse de Reconnaissance AMC => Automitrailleuse de Combat
A wonderful, in-depth discussion on the development and employment of the Somua! Well done David Willey and the rest of the crew who developed his narrative which was highly enlightening.,
A fascinating in depth historical review. Really informative. That you've even covered social and political circumstances adds valuable insight. Thank you once again for sharing your knowledge in this way.
Some Somua tanks were painted with a very particular camouflage, the bottom of the body was painted brown to simulate the color of the ground, the middle of the tank was painted in different shades of green to simulate the colors of the vegetation while the top of the turret was painted blue-gray to confuse it with the color of the sky. It was a camouflage in 5-6 colors it was very original
I would really like to see more of these longer videos. This was super interesting! For me a huge step-up from the usual short summaries. This is probably the best video that I have seen on this channel.
I've always had a soft spot for this vehicle, it's quite underrated for the period it was produced and fell prey to the poor doctrine of the French armed forces that seemed to plague them during the invasion.
French vehicles of WW2 are pretty underrated (outside of their light tanks though if they weren't all using FT turrets and shells they would be remembered better) shame only thing people see when they look at WW2 France is "haha cowards haha"
Same here. Always struck me as a good tank that found itself in the right place at the right time, but in the wrong hands. Compare it to the majority of medium tanks of the period, and it verily shines. Has a lot of the same qualities as the T-34 at an early stage actually - good all round sloped armour, good multipurpose gun that can defeat anything the enemy has at comfortable range (unfortunately, serviceability doesn't seem to have been one of those qualities) and the same general 'way of the future' air about it. Also, I'm not totally convinced about how big a drawback the one-man turret really was. Seems that most of the criticism of it comes from RUclips comment sections and literature published decades after the war (and the comments stem from that, of course). Germany was the second biggest user, so I'd like to see what they honestly thought of it _at the time_, especially considering many of their own tanks had one-man turrets also. Somewhat of a drawback for sure, but was it really a battle/war-losing drawback, if the same tanks were otherwise used as part of a mutually supporting combined force, with sensible strategy and tactics, in a well organized fashion and to their best possible ability?
Just a fantastic segment - thank you for the thorough review of this tank. Funny enough, the WW2TV channel just had a segment on the German view of Dunkirk, which made me think of the Somua S-35 tank and the battles of Hannut / Gembloux. Now maybe this is worth another segment, like the Battle of Arras that you did, but would be interested in hearing about the French employment of tanks at Hannut and Gembloux. My impression was that the French as a whole, acquitted themselves decently well at the tactical level, in holding off certain German advances, but were completely undermined by the strategic victory of the Germans breaking through the Ardennes? Anyways, really great perspective. Much appreciated. But would like to see a clip on the Tank Museum's take on Hannut and the Gembloux Gap. Supposedly still up there in terms of size of battle with the number of tanks involved.
SOMUA also made railcars and trolleybuses. Adolphe Kegresse is also the one who in 1935 developed the world's first dual-clutch transmission, the AutoServe, at Citroen. It was supposed to go into the Traction Avant but Kegresse ran out of money before he cold test it in an actual vehicle.
Great video, loved all the detail. A lot of sources say they were hard to maintain but I loved getting all the technical explanations and the dive into french doctrine!
What a brilliant analysis and explanation. Thank you for explaining what, was to me, impact the political and industrial decision making had on the use and impact of this tank. I knew it was good, but not that good. I cannot imagine how different the story would have been if the army were professional and industry allowed to work effectively coming out of the Great Depression…. A great topic for discussion over an ale or two. Thank you for these marvelous presentations.
A grand overview of this tank once more. HOWEVER just bear in mind for future videos, when you're adding period footage with a commentator reporting as part of that footage, keep the audio lower for those clips because at times you struggle to hear David's voice who continues speaking whilst the clip is playing. You could always post links afterwards to the various footage clips so that people can go back and hear those news reporters but for this tank chat video is important that David's voice is clear throughout.
Came for the tank, stayed for the French politics and tactics. Very interesting to need to say "look, politics at the time were weird, they didn't want a professional army, so the training was low" as part of an explanation. One of the reasons I love these videos, you get so much nuance.
Excellent video as always and providing a fuller picture of this tank than is usually provided. Interesting the impact of design and other factors such as the limited numbers of radios provided and how the small turret was a limiting factor. Seemed quite a common design "flaw" from that era...the early T-34s, for example, arguably didn't deliver their full potential because of the small turret and lack of radios. Concerning the German use of armour and concentration, IMO the situation is a little more nuanced. The Germans realised the need for armoured support for infantry...however, they simply didn't have enough tanks. So, they decided the best use was to concentrate their limited tank resources. The original idea behind the Stugs...cheaper to produce than tanks...was to provide the support for the infantry that there were not enough tanks to do so.
There is a photo of a S35 in the 21st Panzer Division while rebuilding in Normandy after coming out of North Africa in a book I have. They changed the commander’s cupola to the German pattern
There is a photo of two 'German versions' on a parade. Hard to say if they could do it in combat but the photo has one in the commander's hatch and one sitting on the rear hatch/seat. So... speculation... The Germans forced the second crewman into the turret to be full time loader?? Stab II/Pz/Reg 22 (the second bn of the Pz regiment) was mixed with PzIV and Somuas at roughly 1:2 ratio in favour of the Somuas. PzAbt 206 and Panzer-Ersatz Abteilung 100 over in the US part of the Normandy campaign also had some Somuas in service.
Great exposé. Very informative and thorough. First I have heard about using the radio operator as loader-I have always wondered about this, especially as it was a pretty big turret.
Another fantastic detailed video by David. All good stuff for us military history students. My understanding was that one of the main reasons for the poor French performance in 1940 (and touched on in this video) was the overall social and political situation in France. An unpopular government and a general national malaise and anti war attitude leading to poor national morale. This is quite well described in the 1970's World at War series - episode 3 The Battle of France.
@@jjsmallpiece9234 I’ve read Deighton. That one is okay but it’s much more from the British perspective. Jackson is almost entirely from the French perspective. Deighton talks mainly about the British actions in the north, while Jackson talks about the whole front and about the parlours state of French politics at the time.
Mistake: a 40 hrs shift does not limot work to one shift a day.. I used ro work either early morning, late afternoon and night. With 40 hrs .shifts, a factory can well work around the clock!
I''ve always wondered how effective this French camouflage system would be ? Maybe that could be another video to compare the effectiveness of US/British olive drab to French to German 3 tone and German grey when trying to hide vehicles in woods etc.
Bear in mind areas of France are quite dry including on the Mediterranean coast and the border with Spain. A mix of browns with a dash of green would be apposite. The current French Camouflage Centre Europe is a lighter version of the US woodland camo for this very reason.
Camouflage is very regionally specific, so in order to be practical regarding logistics and the having to repaint AFVs every time they moved to a different region, a general pattern would have to be adopted, thus the development of the German three colour style which was often down to individual crew choice.
@@simongee8928 true....also I always figured, although I could be wrong, that the camo scheme used on the S35 had something to do with how the French expected the tank to be viewed by the enemy (in the type of war the French were familiar with)....from low to the ground as from a trench or trench periscope, with the intention of making it blend in with the horizon and layers of low hills, walls, and vineyards. Not sure if it really worked, but it sure looked aesthetically pleasing to the eye. Those bold contrasting colors and outlines almost give it a French impressionist art feel.
I heard that there was some debate at the time about perhaps contracting for license production of Somua S35 in the USA during the 1930s. Apparently this was intended to overcome some of the tank production line bottlenecks in France at the time that were mentioned in the video. Funds were not made available however and all prewar production was therefore in France at a modest pace. In an alternate timeline, France might have built up to 500 before the war plus ordered 500 from the US with 300 of those delivered before the invasion. Having 800 Somua S35 would not have stopped the Nazi forces but could have perhaps slowed them down. Larger numbers of German armored vehicles are destroyed, blunting their advances. Then the UK has time for a more orderly withdrawal from Dunkirk. When the beginning of the Free French Army is just forming up in the UK, they receive the 200 remaining S35 from the US contract. The US decides to build some S35 for themselves and with access to the S40 plans, builds some S40 as well. These significantly improve the early US armor capabilities as M3 tank production ramps and probably continue production until M4 are delivered. Would not have changed the outcome of the war but could have perhaps tipped the balance enough to change time schedules, casualty ratios, and equipment inventories.
Despite the one man turret and lack of radio I have a strange love for this tank. The hull reminds me of a Sherman crossed with a T-34, with a stupid amount of armor for its time. It was genuinely a match for the Panzers it faced. Probably would have been more well loved if it had a better turret and radio, and if the french had a better doctrine.
I have been looking forward to this episode for long! An innovative tank in many ways but not in the ways that matter like 3 man turret, good vision and abundant radios. It'd have been interesting to see what France would have come up with it if they had fended off Germany during the battle of France. Not sure how they'd fit a turret that'd fit 3 crewmen but regardless interesting to think about.
Yeah, would be interesting. I suspect the first-next-step would have been a medium tank in the M3 Grant, M11/39, or Char B2 line of thinking: Put the main gun on the hull so you don't need a three man turret. Pondering a lighter-tank is harder because the French command and control was so poor it would need reform for modern armoured warfare, but potentially we'd have seen a fake-gun/machine-gun command tank, with the regular tanks having clip-ammo for a two man turret. Guessing further into the future.... well eventually we have to assume that they'd go for a home-produced Medium Tank mounting the Matériel de 75mm Mle 1897. Then later a heavy tank much like the ARL44
FCM did actually work on 2 and 3-man turrets for the S35 to be produced by Vichy in 1942 that David was talking about. Since the original turret ring was much narrower than the hull could actually allow, it was easy to increase the turret ring to a respectable 1435mm or 56.5", similar to other 3-man turrets with a small gun. That was with the more powerful 47mm SA37 btw, more comparable to the German long 5cm. Otherwise, 2 and 3-man turrets were designed for most future tanks planned for 1941/42. G1, AMX-40 and B40.
Those were all points of difference and I don’t think an6 of them were decisive in the outcome. He’s given you a good background into why the French were less successful with their tanks than the Germans and it had a lot more to do with the way they were used. For this reason, the Germans were able to make up for the fact that their tanks were mostly inferior to the French tanks. It wasn’t radios or one man turrets. It was poor training and running out of fuel (because the Germans had bombed or captured the fuel dump) or the fact that orders weren’t getting through… the list is almost endless. None of the things you describe are decisive matters and all can be worked around. The qualitative differences weren’t enough to matter and probably favour the SOMUA anyway.
Thanks for an excellent presentation. I really enjoy these more detailed Tank Chats and David’s wealth of knowledge and style of delivery is quite superb.
Wait, so David Willey from Squire series is real employee of Bovington Museum? Nice to know and good thing to hear his story of S-35 and probably other stories on channel of museum :).
There is a good reason. I've read the US had ignored tanks after WW1. When it was decided to rebuild a US tank force in the late 1930's they looked at what other counties were doing, the easiest way to catch up and they liked this tank and took some of the idea's in development of the M2 which led to the M3 and M4. The Americans had the time to iron out the problems making the M4 very reliable.
@@binaway At least one Free French unit affixed the "Somua" plate on the Shermans they were issued, although the Sherman's 3 man turret and 75mm gun must have been a step up.
Great video on a great tank. I heard only one tiny mistake repeated a couple of times. Schneider, despite the name is a French company so it's pronounced in the French, not German way. I made that mistake a couple of times when calling them (I work sales) and got reprimended hard ! :)
![Rohff - Ma nature [Clip Officiel]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/P5l5cvqJhZQ/mqdefault.jpg)
Hello Tank Nuts! Let us know your thoughts on this week's video from David Willey.
1 word: AMAZING! Keep up the great work.
They are now part of my standard Friday viewings and have encouraged me to be a friend and patreon of the museum. Fascinating and I love these more in-depth explorations.
Loving the long video!
Amazing as always. But it way better if you remove the sound when you play the war footage at the beginning of the video
Nice slice of information, especially the social context around the 'development hell' that plagued interwar French armor.
As a modern Schneider employee it's always fun seeing some of our old products. ....Not that we make tanks anymore.
I'm intrigued at how the first Schneider and this one have vaguely similar running gear.
I laughed at that as Schneider is a big customer of ours.
You should probably start doing that again.
Just installed some Schneider electrical components on a job last week. I was telling my co-workers that Schneider made tanks, and they were shocked.
As someone who works for subcontractor manufacturing parts for Schneider: You guys should get back to it. Would be way cooler.
My 7 year old son got me into this channel and now I am addicted.
That is so sweet!
Maybe buy him something from the museum online shop to say thanks, especially with Christmas approaching 😊
You've got to have a very intelligent and curious 7 year old kid for him to be interested in such voluminous talks!
From your name, your son will also be able to help you plot out the Future of Humanity
Cherish that intergenerational passion - and I think it says something about how good this channel is considering it can appeal to all ages, and /how/.
When I was at the Armor Officer Basic Course 1974-75, the Head of the Tactics Division expressed it this way "Cavalry is a mission, not a method of transportation"
He was wrong. Cavalry comes from french cheval and that means horse.
Don't trust the bottom 10% of high-school graduates. He will be invariably wrong.
@@vorrnth8734 Being rude literally comes from horse in French and they have never apologized for it
Loving the French tanks, would be great to see more, especially the AMX family.
There is only so many ways you can say "here is this prototype only 5 where built it was/wasnt very good (insert sassy David Fletcher remark)" =(
I like the French prototypes, but you don't get any satisfying history with tanks that have always sat around or became target practice
I dont. So many things done the wrong way.
@ Jessie What French prototypes are you talking about? 500 S35, 7700 AMX13 and 3571 AMX30 were build.
@@Paciat you basically named a single vehicle of WW2, and two of the cold war area.
The first was mediocre at best, the other was a very successful light tank and the last was basically just a 10t lighter Leo. 1 with a weird HEAT projectile and arguably less successful.
@@Tankliker And your point is?
Get out of your tank hatch and you will notice that the second part of my comment is a response to Jessie comment calling amx tanks as prototypes. But most French tanks were designed badly. S35 included.
@@Paciat my point is, that you haven't named a single prototype.
What about the AMX 50 series? ELC's? Sumoa?
There are a lot of prototype and could have been models yet all you did was name three production models completely missing his question.
They give it a fancy camouflaged paint job, then paint a bright bullseye on it!
A really comprehensive analysis of the machine and French tactics. Another terrific Tank Chat with David Willey.
My grandfather's division (2nd DLM /1st Army) was equiped with the S35. Alongside the 3rd DLM they distinguished themselves at the Battle of Hannut in May 1940, one of the largest tank battle in WWII, where they repelled the assault of the 3th and 4th Pzdv. They suffered heavy losses during the battle however and all surviving S35s of the division had to be scuttled at Dunkirk like the rest of the division's equipment. The men only spent 3 days in Britain (at Weymouth in the case of my grandfather's regiment) before being sent back to the front line in France but with less equipment as the rate of attrition had been too high compared to the industrial output. The locations where the S35s were manufactured were about to fall to the Germans and in the absence of any foreign equipment as a substitution, this was the begining of the end.
This tank was not flawless but it was definitely a good one by 1940 standard.
But it's also important to remember that the tanks was not the main reasons the German Panzer divisions worked so well. What made them so effective is something the Germans had already perfected which were their sturmtroopen from WW1. These were adapted into panzergrenideer batalions and later divisions which worked exceptionally well with the tanks. The tanks securing the open fields and the panzergranideers securing the more difficult terrain with the air force defending them. The British didn't really have storm troop batalions and without them tanks were easily halted by obstacles and small fortifications. The effectiveness of stormtroops had already been proven in 1918 with the massive spring offensive. The tanks just added the final component to that success which was the firepower to directly punch through heavy army formations.
The German army was very effective cause it was able to take the strengths of both France and Britain. It had a large well trained professional army of about 800k just like Britain did but it also had a massive and well motivated conscript army of around 5 million like France did. Germany also had about twice the industrial power of Britain and nearly twice the population of France so it could keep pace with them on both fields at the same time. During the interwar period while the German army was only 100k they kept up their standards very strictly and their small size meant that by 1932 they were arguably the best trained army in the entire world. Then you also had the very successful expansion to that 800k which instead of being done by just throwing new units in divisions was done very carefully to take away experienced soldiers to help train the new ones but not break up the effectiveness of the old divisions. That combined with lots of training of those new professional divisions over the course of 5 years put them nearly on par with the British.
The conscripts were quite a bit above their French counterparts as they had been training for 5 years already and had already seen combat in Poland as well as in Denmark and Norway.
You also had the fact that while there was a division between the professionals and the conscripts in the German military they were still part of the same army in contrast to the British professionals and French conscripts which meant they could coordinate much better. Though while the British professionals didn't do so well in France they proved their worth a year later in the tank dominated wastes of North-Africa by defeating an Italian army 8 times their size.
o
@@MrMarinus18comment worth reading thank you. I will study how Panzergrenadiers compared with French Dragons Portés in equipment and tactics.
Great talk, thanks! My Dad was the last commander of the two Hungarian SOMUAs from late 1943 to September 1944.
Thats interesting!
@@BoryShotz Thanks!
@@woff1959 It's quite interesting in general, the role of minor nations in WWII, like the Ukrainian partisan roles or the Australian role.
@@BoryShotz And they get overlooked a lot, which is a pity.
@@woff1959 Yeah, I am currently reading Churchill's WWII memoirs in which he barely mentions it.
I think this is the best of all the tank chats so far; clear, detailed and historically insightful. It gets away from the top trumps style obession with numbers and focuses on the S35 in its proper historical context with a wonderfully delivered narrative that explains clearly the situation facing France and how and why decisions were made, scotching as it does some long standing myths. Mr Willey's work just gets better and better. Excellent.
Love these more in depth tank chats..I enjoyed the short 5 minute videos but prefer these more in depth talks..Think all the tanks deserve chats like this :)
Agreed.
Díky!
The duck of doom! Love the S35 at the museum and the camo scheme.
Great tank chat as always.
Thanks for providing a more in-depth look into the S35. One minor correction though with regards to the cavalry: they adopted the Hotchkiss H35 and later H39. Since the R35 were all going to the infantry after Renault having won the competition for the new light infantry tank and the Hotchkiss competitor was more or less its equal, they picked the Hotchkiss because that was what they could get in relatively short order. They weren't fans of the H35/H39 because of its speed so they tended to split units so that the various units wouldn't be bound to each other's speed when operating. A number of the unit diaries report on the H35/H39 having technical issues during troop movements and while retreating from northern Belgium.
This gentleman is good speaker, as he sums up the important information at the end.
very well done, and nicely done showing the other side of French operations and effects of politics caused issues in production and complicated delivery and the 1 years conscription added to issues. and how the French were doing what most countries did with the armor packaging.
Interesting to see a French specimen. The French vehicles don't seem to get that much coverage, despite the country's solid examples, especially in more recent years.
French sort of do that to themselves by a culture of keeping military technology relatively inaccessible to the public even long after it is technically no longer secret. Either the government still keeps the stuff close to the chest or they do very little to help others use the information when asked for it.
Another big headache is French developers often have a unique method of communicating with each, ways of writing and talking that makes sense to each other, but less sense to outsiders. Be it how they create statistics, make drawings, or what have you,. it takes practice and patience to comprehend a lot of French technical information. This further limits detailing French technology.
Thankfully, more French and Anglophone historians are taking the time to actually pry the knowledge out of the French systems, so we are getting more data than we used to, but it is a process. All the more reason to throw support at institutions like Bovington and to buy the books that historians like Zaloga writes, so these people can afford to take the time necessary to overcome indifferent governments who see little to no value in aiding historians research.
Agreed. I love seeing the Somua her beautiful tank and I feel underrated like most French designs.
Leclerc is beautiful in its power... though I have to say the French have been very original and successful with their wheeled vehicles
@@genericpersonx333 they seem to have no problem selling everything to the Chinese to copy.
The LeClerc tank for one.
Thank you for the comprehensive review of this solid French tank and the challenges of rapid rearmament, global economics, politics, radios AND training had on battle field deployment.
Thank you for expanding and deepening my grasp of history!
Always a pleasure to listen to David’s discussions.
Thank you for sharing this very (but too short) interesting lecture.
AMD => Automitrailleuse de Découverte
AMR => Automitrailleuse de Reconnaissance
AMC => Automitrailleuse de Combat
You're providing excellent information and taking great care of these vehicles, what a magnificent job you guys are doing at The Tank Museum.
A wonderful, in-depth discussion on the development and employment of the Somua! Well done David Willey and the rest of the crew who developed his narrative which was highly enlightening.,
Amazing you got this ALL memorized.. no notes. Preparation is awesome
@Paul Fellows He is.. really knows his stuff. Just great to watch
omg that photo at 2:47 with so many FTs with their little hats going every which way. The cutest gaggle of tanks.
A fascinating in depth historical review. Really informative. That you've even covered social and political circumstances adds valuable insight. Thank you once again for sharing your knowledge in this way.
Another great episode. The amount of time and research that is put in to each one of your videos is fantastic. I thank you very much.
I like the camouflage on the French tanks.
I think the idea was to make them blend in with the horizon when viewed from a trench periscope. The vivid colors are quite appealing, I agree.
Some Somua tanks were painted with a very particular camouflage, the bottom of the body was painted brown to simulate the color of the ground, the middle of the tank was painted in different shades of green to simulate the colors of the vegetation while the top of the turret was painted blue-gray to confuse it with the color of the sky. It was a camouflage in 5-6 colors it was very original
I also like their division logos consisting of playing card symbols ♠️♥️♣️♦️
I would really like to see more of these longer videos. This was super interesting! For me a huge step-up from the usual short summaries. This is probably the best video that I have seen on this channel.
I've always had a bit of a thing for the S35 I just love it
I've always had a soft spot for this vehicle, it's quite underrated for the period it was produced and fell prey to the poor doctrine of the French armed forces that seemed to plague them during the invasion.
If only it had a two man turret with voice radios (a three man turret probably wasn't possible given the size of the hull and better engine access
French vehicles of WW2 are pretty underrated (outside of their light tanks though if they weren't all using FT turrets and shells they would be remembered better) shame only thing people see when they look at WW2 France is "haha cowards haha"
Same here. Always struck me as a good tank that found itself in the right place at the right time, but in the wrong hands. Compare it to the majority of medium tanks of the period, and it verily shines. Has a lot of the same qualities as the T-34 at an early stage actually - good all round sloped armour, good multipurpose gun that can defeat anything the enemy has at comfortable range (unfortunately, serviceability doesn't seem to have been one of those qualities) and the same general 'way of the future' air about it.
Also, I'm not totally convinced about how big a drawback the one-man turret really was. Seems that most of the criticism of it comes from RUclips comment sections and literature published decades after the war (and the comments stem from that, of course). Germany was the second biggest user, so I'd like to see what they honestly thought of it _at the time_, especially considering many of their own tanks had one-man turrets also. Somewhat of a drawback for sure, but was it really a battle/war-losing drawback, if the same tanks were otherwise used as part of a mutually supporting combined force, with sensible strategy and tactics, in a well organized fashion and to their best possible ability?
France wish it had these tanks back during the Franco-Prussian War
@@christiandauz3742 I think anyone would desire them priorto the actual invention of the tank lmao
Wonderful channel for old and newer tank information, and it’s well presented. A very good intelligent speaker who communicates very well.
Just a fantastic segment - thank you for the thorough review of this tank. Funny enough, the WW2TV channel just had a segment on the German view of Dunkirk, which made me think of the Somua S-35 tank and the battles of Hannut / Gembloux. Now maybe this is worth another segment, like the Battle of Arras that you did, but would be interested in hearing about the French employment of tanks at Hannut and Gembloux. My impression was that the French as a whole, acquitted themselves decently well at the tactical level, in holding off certain German advances, but were completely undermined by the strategic victory of the Germans breaking through the Ardennes?
Anyways, really great perspective. Much appreciated. But would like to see a clip on the Tank Museum's take on Hannut and the Gembloux Gap. Supposedly still up there in terms of size of battle with the number of tanks involved.
David Willey is so nice to listen to... respect.
As always a wise documented balanced account - thank you Sir and the Tank Museum.
The most scholarly examination I've every seen . Great piece.
Very interesting, succinct delivery David.
An outstanding presentation by a master of his subject.
Dear Mr Willy
You¨ve got so much style!
Thank you
Sincerely Steen
Another fascinating and captivating extremely well-done video.
SOMUA also made railcars and trolleybuses.
Adolphe Kegresse is also the one who in 1935 developed the world's first dual-clutch transmission, the AutoServe, at Citroen. It was supposed to go into the Traction Avant but Kegresse ran out of money before he cold test it in an actual vehicle.
Great video, loved all the detail. A lot of sources say they were hard to maintain but I loved getting all the technical explanations and the dive into french doctrine!
For me, one of the most beautiful tanks in the early war period.
Awesome video you rock be safe out there One of my favorite tanks
What a brilliant analysis and explanation. Thank you for explaining what, was to me, impact the political and industrial decision making had on the use and impact of this tank. I knew it was good, but not that good. I cannot imagine how different the story would have been if the army were professional and industry allowed to work effectively coming out of the Great Depression…. A great topic for discussion over an ale or two. Thank you for these marvelous presentations.
Love hearing stories about French tanks. Not many left.
A grand overview of this tank once more. HOWEVER just bear in mind for future videos, when you're adding period footage with a commentator reporting as part of that footage, keep the audio lower for those clips because at times you struggle to hear David's voice who continues speaking whilst the clip is playing. You could always post links afterwards to the various footage clips so that people can go back and hear those news reporters but for this tank chat video is important that David's voice is clear throughout.
It never ceases to amaze me as to the knowledge you have on the various tanks.
A very good looking tank. It does look a little cramped in the interior, but it makes good use of its armor.
It IS very cramped. The Chieftain trying to get into it via the hatch was hilarious
A 40 minute video on French tanks and doctrine? Sign me right up ☺️
Wonderful video. Always great to see French armour getting attention 👍
Great presentation, thank you for sharing your expertise! 👍💪🍻
Came for the tank, stayed for the French politics and tactics. Very interesting to need to say "look, politics at the time were weird, they didn't want a professional army, so the training was low" as part of an explanation. One of the reasons I love these videos, you get so much nuance.
Very informative, loving the series. Great work.
I like these chats of a bit longer. Thanks again!
Excellent video as always and providing a fuller picture of this tank than is usually provided. Interesting the impact of design and other factors such as the limited numbers of radios provided and how the small turret was a limiting factor. Seemed quite a common design "flaw" from that era...the early T-34s, for example, arguably didn't deliver their full potential because of the small turret and lack of radios.
Concerning the German use of armour and concentration, IMO the situation is a little more nuanced. The Germans realised the need for armoured support for infantry...however, they simply didn't have enough tanks. So, they decided the best use was to concentrate their limited tank resources. The original idea behind the Stugs...cheaper to produce than tanks...was to provide the support for the infantry that there were not enough tanks to do so.
Excellent presentation. 1st I have seen on the S-35 and very well researched and analyzed.
The most adorable looking tank to ever be built
There is a photo of a S35 in the 21st Panzer Division while rebuilding in Normandy after coming out of North Africa in a book I have. They changed the commander’s cupola to the German pattern
There is a photo of two 'German versions' on a parade. Hard to say if they could do it in combat but the photo has one in the commander's hatch and one sitting on the rear hatch/seat. So... speculation... The Germans forced the second crewman into the turret to be full time loader??
Stab II/Pz/Reg 22 (the second bn of the Pz regiment) was mixed with PzIV and Somuas at roughly 1:2 ratio in favour of the Somuas.
PzAbt 206 and Panzer-Ersatz Abteilung 100 over in the US part of the Normandy campaign also had some Somuas in service.
Love they tank chats :)
Great exposé. Very informative and thorough. First I have heard about using the radio operator as loader-I have always wondered about this, especially as it was a pretty big turret.
Love these long in-depth chats. More please.
Thanks!
Another fantastic detailed video by David. All good stuff for us military history students.
My understanding was that one of the main reasons for the poor French performance in 1940 (and touched on in this video) was the overall social and political situation in France. An unpopular government and a general national malaise and anti war attitude leading to poor national morale.
This is quite well described in the 1970's World at War series - episode 3 The Battle of France.
Read Julian Jackson’s book, “The Fall of France”.
@@thethirdman225 Or the book Blitzkrieg by Len Deighton
Another good book is To Lose a Battle by Alastair Horne.
@@jjsmallpiece9234 I’ve read Deighton. That one is okay but it’s much more from the British perspective. Jackson is almost entirely from the French perspective. Deighton talks mainly about the British actions in the north, while Jackson talks about the whole front and about the parlours state of French politics at the time.
@@thethirdman225 Ok. Agree Deighton is more of a mass market historian. Will take a read of the other book
@@jjsmallpiece9234 They all have their place.
Mistake: a 40 hrs shift does not limot work to one shift a day.. I used ro work either early morning, late afternoon and night.
With 40 hrs .shifts, a factory can well work around the clock!
Thanks for the tank chat, really appreciated and in depth
I''ve always wondered how effective this French camouflage system would be ? Maybe that could be another video to compare the effectiveness of US/British olive drab to French to German 3 tone and German grey when trying to hide vehicles in woods etc.
Bear in mind areas of France are quite dry including on the Mediterranean coast and the border with Spain. A mix of browns with a dash of green would be apposite. The current French Camouflage Centre Europe is a lighter version of the US woodland camo for this very reason.
Camouflage is very regionally specific, so in order to be practical regarding logistics and the having to repaint AFVs every time they moved to a different region, a general pattern would have to be adopted, thus the development of the German three colour style which was often down to individual crew choice.
@@simongee8928 true....also I always figured, although I could be wrong, that the camo scheme used on the S35 had something to do with how the French expected the tank to be viewed by the enemy (in the type of war the French were familiar with)....from low to the ground as from a trench or trench periscope, with the intention of making it blend in with the horizon and layers of low hills, walls, and vineyards. Not sure if it really worked, but it sure looked aesthetically pleasing to the eye. Those bold contrasting colors and outlines almost give it a French impressionist art feel.
From the video it looks like This S-35 was meant for the Mediterranean
Reminds me of the Soviet yellow-green tank camouflage
On these things history turns. Great informative post.
Thank you
This guy's knowledge of tanks is encyclopedic
He should really try to find a job where he can do this full time. 😉
That's his job, to know tanks.
Finn has coached him well.
🙌Tanks! Never knew SKODA was a subsidiary of Schneider. Always assumed Skoda was an Austro-Hungarian/Czech enterprise.
I think it was. Though by the time of the 1920s and 1930s I think that became the case due to the post-WWI economic environment
Nice summary, including technology, doctrine, and historical details.
Thanks for your chat of the French S35.
Finally the Somua S35! I don't care about what people think of it. Its smol, its cute, its like the Sherman Lite. I love it and its aesthetics.
I heard that there was some debate at the time about perhaps contracting for license production of Somua S35 in the USA during the 1930s. Apparently this was intended to overcome some of the tank production line bottlenecks in France at the time that were mentioned in the video. Funds were not made available however and all prewar production was therefore in France at a modest pace.
In an alternate timeline, France might have built up to 500 before the war plus ordered 500 from the US with 300 of those delivered before the invasion. Having 800 Somua S35 would not have stopped the Nazi forces but could have perhaps slowed them down. Larger numbers of German armored vehicles are destroyed, blunting their advances. Then the UK has time for a more orderly withdrawal from Dunkirk. When the beginning of the Free French Army is just forming up in the UK, they receive the 200 remaining S35 from the US contract. The US decides to build some S35 for themselves and with access to the S40 plans, builds some S40 as well. These significantly improve the early US armor capabilities as M3 tank production ramps and probably continue production until M4 are delivered.
Would not have changed the outcome of the war but could have perhaps tipped the balance enough to change time schedules, casualty ratios, and equipment inventories.
Cracking stuff - Thank you, more please!
This SOMUA tank definitely has “the ViBE” of a very good tank that for its time was cutting edge tech.
A brilliant presentation
Despite the one man turret and lack of radio I have a strange love for this tank. The hull reminds me of a Sherman crossed with a T-34, with a stupid amount of armor for its time. It was genuinely a match for the Panzers it faced. Probably would have been more well loved if it had a better turret and radio, and if the french had a better doctrine.
It is said that the M4 Sherman cast hull was inspired by the Somua S35.
I too have an inexplicable fondness for this tank.
A very good long look at the S35 Thanks.
Very interesting and informative video - thank you
Brilliant video. Gripped for the whole 40 minutes
S35 is one of my favorites in World of Tanks. Nice video, subscribed.
Oh really ? This tank is so cheated in WoT...
I have been looking forward to this episode for long! An innovative tank in many ways but not in the ways that matter like 3 man turret, good vision and abundant radios. It'd have been interesting to see what France would have come up with it if they had fended off Germany during the battle of France. Not sure how they'd fit a turret that'd fit 3 crewmen but regardless interesting to think about.
Yeah, would be interesting. I suspect the first-next-step would have been a medium tank in the M3 Grant, M11/39, or Char B2 line of thinking: Put the main gun on the hull so you don't need a three man turret. Pondering a lighter-tank is harder because the French command and control was so poor it would need reform for modern armoured warfare, but potentially we'd have seen a fake-gun/machine-gun command tank, with the regular tanks having clip-ammo for a two man turret.
Guessing further into the future.... well eventually we have to assume that they'd go for a home-produced Medium Tank mounting the Matériel de 75mm Mle 1897. Then later a heavy tank much like the ARL44
FCM did actually work on 2 and 3-man turrets for the S35 to be produced by Vichy in 1942 that David was talking about. Since the original turret ring was much narrower than the hull could actually allow, it was easy to increase the turret ring to a respectable 1435mm or 56.5", similar to other 3-man turrets with a small gun. That was with the more powerful 47mm SA37 btw, more comparable to the German long 5cm.
Otherwise, 2 and 3-man turrets were designed for most future tanks planned for 1941/42. G1, AMX-40 and B40.
@@pavarottiaardvark3431 Funny that you mention the M3 Grant. The S35 reminds me a little of a mini Sherman.
Those were all points of difference and I don’t think an6 of them were decisive in the outcome. He’s given you a good background into why the French were less successful with their tanks than the Germans and it had a lot more to do with the way they were used. For this reason, the Germans were able to make up for the fact that their tanks were mostly inferior to the French tanks. It wasn’t radios or one man turrets. It was poor training and running out of fuel (because the Germans had bombed or captured the fuel dump) or the fact that orders weren’t getting through… the list is almost endless.
None of the things you describe are decisive matters and all can be worked around. The qualitative differences weren’t enough to matter and probably favour the SOMUA anyway.
I wish my model LT VZ 35 had that cool muzzle break. Might have to print one or make one with thermal mold plastic.
Thanks for an excellent presentation. I really enjoy these more detailed Tank Chats and David’s wealth of knowledge and style of delivery is quite superb.
The Tank looks like you can purchase it at a confectionery. It looks delicious 😋
Been waiting so long for this one and I'm not really sure why.
🤔 I always liked the S35...looks cool, like a Metal Slug tank 😁
Always love French tanks, hope to see ARL44 later
Unfortunately Bovington hasn't got one. But they've done Tank Chats on loan vehicles before, so all hope is not lost.
Brilliant video.
Just brilliant!
Wait, so David Willey from Squire series is real employee of Bovington Museum? Nice to know and good thing to hear his story of S-35 and probably other stories on channel of museum :).
BRAVO. A great history lessen
Wonderful detailed overview of a tank that should have more of the lime light of famous tanks of WW2 !
Very good video, love from france
In some ways you could see it as a 'mini Sherman'. Certainly a better machine than the M2
Can't help noticing how much the Somua looks like a Sherman.
Straight from the front, maybe. But internally, not even close.
To respect the time flow, the Sherman looks like the Somua😊
Thought it was just me that thought it was a mini Sherman!
There is a good reason. I've read the US had ignored tanks after WW1. When it was decided to rebuild a US tank force in the late 1930's they looked at what other counties were doing, the easiest way to catch up and they liked this tank and took some of the idea's in development of the M2 which led to the M3 and M4. The Americans had the time to iron out the problems making the M4 very reliable.
@@binaway At least one Free French unit affixed the "Somua" plate on the Shermans they were issued, although the Sherman's 3 man turret and 75mm gun must have been a step up.
Great video on a great tank.
I heard only one tiny mistake repeated a couple of times. Schneider, despite the name is a French company so it's pronounced in the French, not German way.
I made that mistake a couple of times when calling them (I work sales) and got reprimended hard ! :)
1:06 "In other words it wasn't just about the horse, but what the cavalry was there to do."
Good chat. Merci.