Wednesday 28 May 2014

#D-Day 6th June 1944 More Of Hobart's Funnies


Last night I forgot to mention a couple of Hobart's inventions created for D-Day.
The AVRE was an armoured bulldozer, useful for pushing obstacles aside and also for Engineers to shelter behind.





There was also a bridge laying tank, again a Churchill:
Churchill Bridge Laying Tank

There was no need for Royal Engineers to spend hours building a bailey bridge under fire when they had these, they were ideal for crossing narrow rivers.








To summarise, These were British inventions, not American. Sometimes the British used American kit and improved it for different scenarios such as the DD swimming tank and the Sherman fitted with a 17pdr gun.
I can't help but scratch my head as to why General Bradley didn't adopt these tanks in larger numbers, even if only for D-Day instead of relying on frontal assaults by engineers and infantry. they may have saved many lives.

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