Steel Soviet Union

It is not an easy task to break through the front face of King Tiger, which is 180 mm thick and has a slight inclination.

Taking into account the problem of more or less incident angle tilt that must exist in actual combat situations, and the resulting disguised enhancement of equivalent thickness armor. This level of defense is very close to the maximum penetration depth of most anti-armor firepower during World War II. Even for the 122 Heirloom, the most proud of the Red Army's heavy tank, it is not as easy as talking on paper to defeat King Tiger in actual combat.

The biggest advantage Malashenko has here is not actually the three elements of firepower, protection, and mobility, but the asymmetry in mastering key intelligence information. A simple and straightforward manifestation is that Malashenko is fully aware of all the key performances and weaknesses of King Tiger.

As for the IS6 heavy tank, which has just begun mass production and has been put into the front line on a large scale, the German army still knows nothing about the core performance data and only has a few photos of the prototype in Guderian's hands.

The asymmetry of information and intelligence is a very important advantage in war, whether it is the current World War II or the future wars of distant future generations.

Not only is he familiar with the performance of his main gun, but he also knows the opponent's defense strength and weaknesses. Malashenko, who has poor intelligence on the Germans, is betting that his IS4 is definitely strong enough. As the most powerful firepower of the current German tanks, the Chang 88 is useless and unbearable in front of the IS4. The indestructible armor is Malashenko's greatest confidence in daring to approach the King Tiger head-on.

As for whether the 122 Heirloom can effectively penetrate the tiger king's big face when shooting at close range, to be honest, Malashenko, who only talks on paper based on the publicly available data of later generations, is still in a state of uncertainty and has no 100% absolute. grasp.

But the current reality that the arrow is on the string and has to be fired does not leave Malashenko with other options. Whether it can penetrate can only be known after trying it.

The final distance has been shortened to within the 300-meter straight line set in Malashenko's mind. Whether one shot can penetrate the front armor of the King Tiger turret depends on this. Iushkin, who received Malashenko's order, has already thought about it without thinking. Take action and perform the final calibration lock before the roar of artillery.

"Aim! Remember not to hit the gun mantlet!"

This was the last reminder from Malashenko before he finished speaking.

"I know, don't rush me! Give me time!"

Iushkin was calm, breathless, and as always did not like anyone to interrupt and urge him at the last moment before he was looking for the opportunity to fire, even though this was a key detail that Malashenko must explain clearly.

This King Tiger, which was only 300 meters away from Malashenko's command vehicle, had not yet realized that the disaster was coming. From the perspective of Iushkin's gun scope, the deflected turret was indeed not an excellent attack angle. , obviously aiming at other tanks.

But at this point, there is no other choice. The IS4, which is not known for its mobility, but uses almost invincible armor protection, cannot move sideways, correct its shooting angle, and try to be as vertical as possible by taking advantage of its shortcomings and avoiding its strengths. Attacking the Tiger King's frontal armor is simply not realistic at the moment.

Seryosha accurately grasped the joystick in both hands and based on his past cooperation experience, he quickly completed the parking on the spot after estimating that Iushkin had roughly completed his aim.

As Seryosha expected, Iushkin, who was praised by Lavrinenko as "the best gunner of our division", was indeed not a free man. Iushkin, who had already mastered the realm of "man-gun integration", had already completed the rough aiming of the turret just when Seryosha started to slow down, and the height machine and the direction machine were operated simultaneously and in one go.

The 60-ton heavy steel body with the huge inertia of rushing forward on the slippery road could hardly be stopped. The main gun, which was rising and falling with the shaking of the body, would soon be completely horizontal and stationary, leaving Iushkin to be precise. The aiming time is only such an extremely short period of less than two seconds.

But fortunately, two seconds was enough for Iushkin.

boom--

There was no loud report of the completion of the aim, nor Malashenko's loud roar of the order to fire.

Iushkin, who knew what he should do and who had to believe in himself at critical moments, pulled the firing lever of the main gun at hand and ignited the cartridge primer at the moment he thought was most appropriate.

The violently burning propellant is instantly converted into surging and spreading chemical energy. The high-energy flames in the closed barrel of the gun violently rush out through the barrel against the projectiles squeezed out of the shell. Under the muzzle of the storm and flames, it headed straight towards the target with a sound barrier that tore through the air and screamed.

The King Tiger that stood still was still aiming at the target. No one knew whether the King Tiger would choose to fire in the next second, but the current reality was that the King Tiger was in danger at this second.

The shell accurately hit the King Tiger's turret with an incident angle of less than 10 degrees deflection from the left front. Iushkin, who received Malashenko's final reminder, perfectly avoided the King Tiger's pig-nosed gun mantlet and tied the shell firmly. It hit the face of the big-faced turret armor, and it was perfect.

One end smashed the armor-piercing projectile used to maintain speed and reduce wind resistance. It carried extremely strong kinetic energy. Due to the inclination of the armor itself and the incident angle of the projectile, there was an equivalent homogeneous steel with a thickness of 190 mm on the trajectory. Armor was blocking the advance.

But this is obviously not enough to completely resist the 122mm full-caliber hooded armor-piercing projectile that maintains a huge velocity at a firing distance of 300 meters.

The artillery shells did not completely penetrate the armor and penetrate it as Malashenko expected, but they did not go to waste like the previous IS6 cluster fire. The final result of this accurate shot even made Malashenko Kedu was somewhat unexpected.

The huge-caliber armor-piercing projectile ran out of kinetic energy before it completely penetrated the armor and entered the vehicle. It got stuck in the severely distorted front armor of the King Tiger turret.

But very fortunately for Malashenko, the front end of the projectile that was stuck directly on the face of the King Tiger turret had actually completely penetrated the armor and penetrated into the turret. The rear half of the butt, which gets thicker as it goes back, is the culprit that causes projectiles to get stuck in the armor and fail to fully penetrate.

This situation has a special way of describing it in military terminology, and Malashenko also knew that he had rarely encountered it before, just like winning five million in a lottery with a very low probability!

The professional term is semi-penetration. What is the effect of semi-penetration?

Looking at the internal armor fragments that were smashed by the tip of the projectile and pushed away, and the armor-piercing delay fuse was successfully triggered, you can fully know the upcoming explosion of the warhead with full yield.