Yak-9T - incredible firepower (or maybe incredible tank's lack of armor?)

[Pursuivant]

Originally Posted by IceFire

That all said... attacks against tanks had secondary effects.

Like he said. One report that's reasonably easy to find with a Google search is a report on the relative effectiveness of rocket attacks by Typhoon fighter bombers on German tanks during the breakout from Normandy.

Don't get fooled by simple ballistics vs. armor penetration calculations, though. It's no secret that a relatively small-caliber cannon shell (like a 20 or 30 mm cannon) firing AP ammo could penetrate the top armor of even late war heavy tanks like the Panther, Tiger and Josef Stalin. Likewise, there's no dispute that if the shell hit in the right place its effects could be devastating.

Likewise, it's no contest that good hit by a rocket can also cause damage that could knock out a WW2 heavy tank.

So, hypothetically planes shooting 20 mm or 30 mm AP shells should be lethal to even the best-armored WW2 era tank. Case in point: Hans Ulrich Rudel.

The problem was that few pilots had the skill and suicidal courage to get close enough for their shots to hit and penetrate. If you look at gun camera films taken by ground attack aircraft, you'll notice that they are usually shooting from extreme distances and at extreme angles of attack relative to any vulnerable surfaces on the tank. This means that many shots miss, and that, of the shots that hit, many ricochet rather than penetrating.