Born in the Trenches, when the front became static, the idea of the tank was a resurgence of ...science fiction, when some looked at HG Wells' "land battleships" novel. In UK, development was stirred by Wintson Churchill and the Navy. In France, by an artillery officer, J.B. Estienne. And soon the world took notice. Tanks were rare and few in between still, with grand plans in 1918 that never were realized. When the front was not static, armored cars reigned supreme.
In 1939, thanks had nearly two decades to evolve at peacetime rate, though the boiling of new ideas of tactics and combined arms, with some armies more acute of these than any others. Ground combat proved absolute masters of these new ideas, the Wehrmacht, with luck and opposite incompetence. After moving to USSR, the fight moved to Africa, then to Italy and back to Western Europe at large, driving fast-paced innovation in a deadly food chain contest.
The atomic age started with the opposition of two superpowers, which developed deterrence but at the same time, always considered conventional warfare. Far from peaceful, this second half century, until 1991, saw gradual improvement, with a gap of twenty years before generations, towards 2nd, 3rd and 4th generation main battle tanks and a cohort of armoured personal carriers, infantry fighting vehicles, and many specialized variants, wheeled and tracked.
As the recent conflict in Ukraine shows us, the tank is still useful in the frame of a conventional war. However drones unexpectedly showed deadlier as well as artillery. Between 1991 and 2025are we really seeing a radical transformation of ground warfare ? One thing is sure through for all generals: The main battle tank is still king of the battlefield, when well used and accompanied. From city scapes to desert, steppe, rolly hills and mountains, even coming from the sea, the tank adapted and is there to stay.
11.05.2025 In the early 1930s, the Soviet Army realised the need for mobile anti-air defence to protect troops from air attacks, which were becoming increasingly dangerous, and commissioned various SPAA projects. One of these was the 29K, a simple SPAA based on the hull of the Yaroslavl YaG-10 truck, equipped with the 76 mm M1931 AA gun mounted on its reinforced bed. The 29K was created as a cheaper conversion of the cancelled SU-8, which was based on the T-28 tank and armed with the same gun. Between 40-61 YaG-10 trucks were converted into the 29K, and they were deployed for both anti-air and anti-tank duties during the opening stages of World War II. The 29-K was modified to mount a 76 mm AA M1931 gun usable as anti-tank, featuring fast reload rate, high shell velocity, and good anti-tank capability. However, much like any other trucks, the 29K relies entirely on its crew of 6 to survive and is extremely vulnerable to any kind of incoming fire. As such, combined with its average overall mobility, the 29K is a pure sniper and should only be used as such. Due to its configuration, the 29K can deliver precise shots at unsuspecting enemies from behind cover, only leaving its rear half exposed to retaliation.