The history of the creation of the T-34

He was called a tank Victory, the tank builder of the Second World War, invincible. And only during the war, more than 52 thousand T-34s of various modifications were produced.

Mikhail Koshkin was born into a peasant family and orphaned early. The way to a distant relative in Leningrad, hunger on the verge of death, the kindness of a bystander and work at a confectionery factory. Army, front, wound demobilization and again the Red Army. Civil War. The first "meeting" with the tank "Ricardo" in the hospital and passion for heavy military equipment for life.

Even after becoming the director of the Vyatka confectionery factory, Koshkin did not abandon his dream of becoming a designer. With a request for assistance, he turned to Sergei Kirov, a Vyatka countryman. Kirov helped change his profession: he recommended Koshkin to Leningrad University, and then to the development department of one of the military factories.

His thesis - a new gearbox for the T-29 medium tank - is being implemented in production, and Koshkin is assigned to a tank-building plant in Kharkov, where, by the age of 40, he soon heads the design bureau of the tank department of the Kharkov steam locomotive plant and gathers a team of enthusiasts to work new tank.

You have to work on the project in your free time: the main work was to increase the security of BT tanks (for which Koshkin received the Order of the Red Banner). Working on a risky project, Koshkin literally risks his life: at the same time, arrests and executions of famous designers are taking place.

Already in the summer of 1938, Koshkin proposed a new project for consideration by the Main Military Council. The tank was criticized, but still allowed for further development. By 1940, the creation of the T-34 was completed, but there was no mileage required for admission to testing and showing to the country's top leadership. Koshkin solved this problem by leading the T-34 race on his own from Kharkov to Moscow and then back. A long journey in a cold winter on an unfinished tank undermined the designer's health, but gave his brainchild a ticket to life. Koshkin managed to put the T-34 into mass production before the start of the war. By June 22, 1941, 1225 tanks of this type were created.
From the instructions of the German military command to combat the T-34: “The T-34 is faster, more maneuverable, and has better off-road capability than our main tanks. His armor is stronger. The penetration capacity of its 7,62 cm cannon is superior to our XNUMX cm tank guns ... " Already posthumously, Koshkin was declared Hitler's personal enemy.

The inspirational biography of the creator of the T-34 is told by the Wargaming video.

Comments

[Lipchanin]

A long journey in a cold winter on an unfinished tank undermined the designer's health,

This is how you need to be a fanatic of your business to do this and endure

From the instructions of the German military command to combat the T-34: “The T-34 is faster, more maneuverable, has better off-road passability than our main tanks. His armor is stronger. The penetration capacity of its 7,62 cm cannon is superior to our XNUMX cm tank guns ... ”.

The best tank characteristic

[svp67]

That is why now, when many documents of that time have already been opened, they have already been sorted out almost by letter, to write this nonsense.

gathers a team of enthusiasts to work on a new tank.

Koshkin accepted the already finished design bureau, where work on the new tank had been going on for several years.
And his main merit is not that he came up with this tank, the main elements were proposed and worked out before his appointment, but that he was able to organize the work of the design bureau ... something that his predecessors failed to do. And many thanks to him for that

[Lipchanin]

Quote: svp67

That is why now, when many documents of that time have already been opened, they have already been sorted out almost by letter, to write this nonsense.

But I didn't like that nonsense

Already posthumously, Koshkin was declared Hitler's personal enemy.

Well, Hitler was not like that and d and from to declare the deceased as his personal enemy

[svp67]

Quote: Lipchanin

But I didn't like that nonsense

"That" is what? Let me clarify.

[Lipchanin]

Quote: svp67

"That" is what? Let me clarify.

I have clarified. Read carefully

[carstorm 11]

The deceased for 75 years as Hitler your enemy? The enemy is not the goal. The enemy is attitude

[Lipchanin]

Quote: carstorm 11

The deceased for 75 years as Hitler your enemy?

What oak fell from?
Where did I say that he is my enemy?

[carstorm 11]

This is a very specific question) so you don't consider him an enemy judging by the answer? Therefore, oovoryu- to call the enemy is to show a swap attitude towards someone, regardless of whether he is alive or dead.

[Lipchanin]

Quote: carstorm 11

Therefore, oovoryu- to call the enemy is to show a swap attitude towards someone, regardless of whether he is alive or dead.

Maybe then I consider Chingiz Khan an enemy?
Napoleon?
So you can easily get into a fool

[carstorm 11]

Do not call it, but consider it as such. It all depends only on your preferences. This is not a sign of stupidity or intelligence, but simply perception. If at my genetic level it is laid down that Hitler is an enemy and any person who glorifies him also becomes an enemy, then this does not mean that it’s time for me to go crazy) and therefore sausages the Russian people when they consider a hero in 404 Bandera. So Hitler could regard any people as enemies. Dead or alive.

[Lipchanin]

Quote: carstorm 11

Do not call it, but consider it as such.

Decide whether to name or count.
And then okroshkaka kaya then

call an enemy it show swap attitude

And right there

Do not call but count such

[carstorm 11]

It's just that I made a proposal wrong) sometimes it happens) it meant that it's not easy to call with and believe in what you say)

[Lipchanin]

Quote: carstorm 11

It's just that I made a proposal wrong) sometimes it happens) it meant that it's not easy to call with and believe in what you say)

Oh how! So when I say that I hate Hitler, I really respect him?
Famously twisted

[Konnick]

Article for the fifth grade of the school. Why the creators of the heart of the tank, the V-2 diesel engine, were not mentioned, without this engine it was impossible to use projectile armor. Why did not the author mention the tank's flaws. Who gave the task to design the tank, formulated the main characteristics of the tank. It looks like Koshkin, on his own initiative, with "enthusiasts" made a tank. A very superficial article. And as for a personal enemy, this is from the realm of fantasy ...

[Kote Pan Kokhanka]

I join your criticism of the preface to the video! And the truth is "weak", where is A-32? Where is the flour with B-2 described, where is the fight against the goose-wheeled mover! But this is just an incomplete sketch of the main keys, without equally important keys (armor, tower, suspension, weapons). The T-34 was a revolution in the tank business, created in an evolutionary way. He was not the first in anti-cannon armor (the French were one step earlier), did not receive the first diesel (the Poles and the Japanese hurried in advance), and he was late with a 72,6mm gun. But having received all this in aggregate, he became "the most decisive tank of the Second World War" !!!

[Reviews]

Wargaming video

[kytx]

no need to say
not a word about Usov
the whole history of T34 has long been sorted out on the shelves
but such populists make articles
not a format for VO IMHO

[alekc75]

here that already 5th grade began to write articles ??? who missed it ??

[Ros 56]

In my opinion, in our country, only newborns do not know the history of the creation of the T-34.

[Konnick]

"The proposals of front-line officers to produce exactly the same tanks as the T-34, in order to rectify the extremely unfavorable situation of the German armored forces in the shortest possible time, did not meet with the designers of any support. the speed of the T-34's critical parts, especially the aluminum diesel engine. " - from Guderian's book "Memories of a Soldier". That was the uniqueness of the T-34, in the engine.

[Alexey RA]

Quote: Konnick

from Guderian's book "Memories of a Soldier".

In wartime documents, Heinz had a very different opinion about the T-34:

... the Soviet T-34 tank is a typical example of backward Bolshevik technology. This tank cannot be compared with the best examples of our tanks, made by the faithful sons of the Reich and have repeatedly proved their superiority ...

© letter from Heinz Guderian, read and recorded in the minutes of the meeting of the leadership of tank forces at Hitler's headquarters on October 21, 1941.

Well, the memoirs were all my life a way to show myself as an unrecognized genius who would undoubtedly have won the war if he had not been interrupted.

[Konnick]

Guderian sent this letter a month before the arrival of the T-34 research commission, then, out of communication with his officers, he changed his mind.

[Alexey RA]

Quote: Konnick

Guderian sent this letter a month before the arrival of the T-34 research commission.

There was no such commission in real life. There was a commission to collect experience in the use of German tanks on the Eastern Front.
For there is no need to send a "commission on T-34" near Moscow, if by August 1300 T-34s remained on the territory occupied by the Germans.

Quote: Konnick

then, out of communication with his officers, he changed his mind.

He changed his opinion due to the need to explain the delay at Mtsensk.
By the way, mentioned by Guderian proposals of front-line officers to produce exactly the same tanks as the T-34, were actually the suggestion of one person. The same commander of the 4th Panzer Division, who

... October 22, 1941 dashed off a verbose report about the "incredible superiority of Russian tanks", and this is the first document since the beginning of the campaign, which speaks of the superiority of the T-34. Although tanks of this type participated in battles from the very first day of the war.

© D. Shein
From there, invulnerable T-34s appeared, flying through the mud like dry land. It cannot be admitted that the Untermensch began to fight normally.

[tank64rus]

You have to work on the project in your free time: the main work was to improve the security of BT tanks (for which Koshkin received the Order of the Red Banner). Order of the Red Star, be more attentive to the material.