When the British first employed the Sherman in North Africa during late 1942, it proved to be at 1east equal, if not superior, to the German second-generation tanks, Mark III and IV. The Sherman's low-velocity 75 or 76 mm gun was chosen because the Army's artillery branch wanted a cheap, reliable weapon for fire support.įor all these reasons, the US Army standardized on the M4 Sherman medium tank, an excellent compromise between reliability, mobility, armor protection, and gunpower. Chance encounters between tanks might occur, but the primary role of the armored division was to exploit and pursue, not fight enemy armor. US doctrine for employing armored divisions foresaw tank destroyers, not tanks, defeating enemy armor. While combined arms, tactical air support, and overwhelming sustainment and numbers enabled Army divisions to maneuver to defeat the German Army, American tankers typically lost three or four Sherman’s for every German tank they destroyed. After investing in a flawed concept, the Army had to adapt tactics to counter superior German tanks with the Sherman.

In combat, the Sherman quickly found itself overmatched by German panzers designed for fighting other tanks. The Sherman was optimized for infantry support, reliability, and ease of manufacture, while the Army relied upon the unproven concept of purpose built tank destroyers to fight enemy Armor. The Army fought World War II with the M4 Sherman as its primary tank. There were seven different models of the M4, including tanks powered by several engines various models were equipped with 75 and 90 mm guns, 105 mm howitzers, special artillery cannons, mine detectors, and related accessories. Production of the M4 required considerable manufacturing flexibility in its own right, because the same basic tank was equipped in a variety o1 ways. A total of 49,324 tanks was produced in 11 plants between 19.Ĭhrysler manufactured about 18,000 M4s from the summer of 1942 through the summer of 1944.

The M4 was employed in North Africa, Sicily, Italy, and western Europe and throughout the Pacific Theatre. The M4 was the most widely used tank series in the war, being employed not only by the US Army and Marine Corps but also by British, Canadian, and Free French forces. tank to have an all-welded (instead of riveted) body, and the first to carry its main gun on a 360-degree rotating turret. the 32-ton M4 General Sherman tank presented a radically new design it was the first U.S. The M4 General Sherman was the main battle tank designed and built by the United States for the conduct of World War II.

First all-welded military tank