CHAPTER 16
"[I]n future wars, the tank-infantry team will be the great striking force. Such a team should not be made up on the battlefield but must be trained long before battle. Its men must know each other well, must work together, and must learn each other's capabilities and limitations."
-Maj. William Campbell, 745th Tank Battalion
the concept of infantry -support tank battalions had been thoroughly vetted and proved in all theaters of operations. "The mission of tanks in support of infantry as laid down in FM 17-33 is substantially correct," concluded the European theater's General Board set up after VE-Day. Looking back at the reality that tanks had often fought tanks, it added, "Tanks should be assigned the role presently assigned to tank destroyers."'
The General Board endorsed the continued use of separate battalions fielding special tanks, specifically mentioning "super-heavy" tanks but presumably including the panoply of equipment seen during the war, including mine-clearing, amphibian, and flame-throwing tanks. It concluded that such battalions should be consolidated under the control of a special-equipment headquarters.' Given that the United States had not fielded any super-heavy tanks during the war, one wonders whether this reference was a nod to the effectiveness of German Tiger battalions.
Opinion among infantry division commanders in Europe overwhelmingly favored making tank battalions an organic part of the infantry division, and the Pacific Warfare Board reported that armor officers in that theater also endorsed the idea. The General Board recommended that a tank regiment of three battalions be made organic to the infantry division, with one battalion assigned to each infantry regiment. Division commanders favored keeping some general headquarters tank battalions in existence and available to the army commander, but the board rejected this idea.'
The army decided to split the difference between a battalion and a regiment. In 1948, it established a new table of organization for the infantry and National Guard divisions that included an organic tank battalion, plus one medium tank company per infantry regiment.4
There was a remarkable degree of consistency regarding equipment preferences between the European and Pacific theaters. In Europe, officers from separate tank battalions showed little enthusiasm for the M26 heavy tank, expressing a desire for some variant of the M4A3E8-or a new tank entirely. Officers in the Pacific were open to using some M26s, but they also made clear their desire for the Easy 8. The 13th Armored Group proposed a battalion consisting of one company of M26s, two of Easy 8s, one of M24 light tanks, two platoons of flamethrower tanks, and a platoon of 105-millimeter howitzer tanks. In the Korean War, as things worked out, both the M26 and M4A3E8 played major roles.
Sentiment in both theaters favored making formal the usual field practice of consolidating all six assault guns in a platoon.' The army's postwar net assessment of their utility in tank battalions was ambiguous, however: "The use of howitzer tanks (10 percent of gun tanks) as an accompanying support gun was not conclusively shown to be required or desired in World War II. They were largely used in roles which can be far better performed by self-propelled artillery."6 Tankers nevertheless used the 105-millimeter howitzer Sherman in Korea.
Amphibian tankers were basically pleased with their equipment. The World War II-vintage LVT(4) amtrac served in the Korean War. The main complaint about the LVT(A)(4) amtank was addressed with an updated version, the LVT(A)(5), which incorporated a ball-mounted machine gun at the assistant driver's position and two machine guns mounted atop the turret. The turret top was armored to protect the crew from airbursts. Amtank units also received ANIVRC-3 radios so they could tie in to the infantry net, although amtrac units did not'
POSTWAR DOCTRINE
Postwar doctrine for tank battalions reflected the lessons learned during the war and was to mold the armored battalions that fought in Korea. The 1949 field manual for the tank battalion (FM 17-33) in one simple paragraph captured the retention of the World War II-era separate battalion's mission. The two substantial changes were incorporating the battalion into the infantry division and giving it the mission assigned to tank destroyers:
Each infantry division has an organic tank battalion. The role of the battalion in the infantry division is to support the over-all division mission. The battalion is used in the greatest possible concentration consistent with the situation. It may be reinforced or may be used to reinforce infantry units. The battalion increases the strength and firepower of the attack and counterattack, exploits successes, and adds depth to the antitank defense in both the offense and defense.'
Tank-infantry communication was hard-wired into the doctrine, including an assumption that the old field-expedient telephone would be available, as was infantry tactical control over attached tanks:
The voice radio between infantry commanders and individual tanks, and the external interphone on each tank, provide the means of communication between the dismounted infantrymen and the tanks in the attack.... Infantry small-unit commanders control the target designation and assist in the selection of terrain for tanks, to ensure coordinated action by the tanks in neutralization or destruction of targets. The tanks act aggressively to fire on such targets. Likewise, the infantry must continue their forward movement to retain the integrity of the team....
Newly formed tank battalions in infantry divisions were to get two weeks of intensive training with an infantry regiment.
The tank battalion organization looked quite similar to the pre-1943 medium tank battalion. There were three line companies, a headquarters and service company, and a medical detachment. Gone were the assault gun and mortar platoons. The medium tank battalion in an armored division had a fourth line company and an assault gun platoon.
The armored group concept had not gone away. In theory, corps-level armored cavalry groups controlled separate tank battalions that could be attached to an infantry division, and division commanders were urged to use such battalions en masse and to avoid superimposing one tank unit on another. Specialized battalions, such as mine-clearing, flamethrower, and bulldozer units, could be subordinated to a group.
Finally, doctrine included an acceptance that tanks might have to fight just about anywhere, and it pulled together the lessons painfully learned by tankers and doughs in the many places they had fought. The 1949 field manual on the tank battalion covered fighting in towns and cities, and the tactics mandated came straight out of the 26th Infantry Regiment's operations in Aachen. Other sections addressed using tanks against fortifications, such as pillboxes; fighting in woods; use of tanks in desert, mountains, and jungles; and amphibious assaults, including the use of flotation devices for tanks.9
The de facto amphibian battalion doctrine developed in the Pacific theater was enshrined in postwar field manuals, too. By 1950, amphibian tank and tractor battalions had been renamed amphibious battalions, but the theory and practice were the same. The battalions remained administratively independent units that supported infantry in amphibious landings. The vision for the use of amphibious tanks reflected that pioneered by the 776th Amphibian Tank Battalion, which saw amtanks as self-propelled artillery rather than tanks but acknowledged the reality that operating as land tanks might be unavoidable. Even the "sea cavalry" operations on Leyte became enshrined in doctrine, which specified that amtanks and amtracs could be used for raids behind enemy lines.10
The lessons and legacy of the World War II tankers were solid and remain relevant to the present day. Tankers in Korea fought much like the men in the preceding war and often were some of the same men. Lt. Col. Welborn Dolvin, who had fought in Italy with the 756th Tank Battalion and then commanded the 191st Tank Battalion in the European theater, organized the 8072d (later 89th) Tank Battalion in two weeks, and then led his tanks into battle against the North Korean invaders near Pusan on 1 August 1950. His tanks were salvaged and rebuilt wrecks from Pacific war battlefields-in theory, no match for the enemy's T-34s. Dolvin's force lost half its tanks, but the tankers-many of whom had had no training with armor-and GIs of the 27th Infantry stopped the Communist drive. "For the first time, they had met firepower that would knock them out," said Dolvin.11 By late August, an amphibious tank company and several tank battalions shipped from the States, including the storied 70th Tank Battalion, were in action. Tankers again proved they could operate in terrain that had been deemed unsuitable for armor before the war.12
The armored cavalry, part of the armor branch since 1950, served extensively in Vietnam and convinced Gen. William Westmoreland that he had been wrong when he thought the armored troopers unsuitable for his war.13 The 1st Squadron of the 4th Cavalry accompanied the 1st Infantry Division to Vietnam in 1965 and proved so effective that earlier convictions that tanks could not be used in Vietnam collapsed. When the 25th Infantry Division arrived in early 1966, the 69th Armored Regiment's 1st Battalion came, too. An army monograph concluded, "The myth that armor could not be used in the jungle had been destroyed * 1114 Had the army asked the tankers who had fought their way across the Pacific, there would have been no such myth.
By the time of the second war with Iraq, the integration of tanks into infantry divisions was so complete that the Americans were able to use the 3d Infantry Division in April 2003 to spearhead the thrust to Baghdad, a mission that in World War II probably would have fallen to an armored division. Echoes of the past reverberated through the engagements that soldiers and marines fought in the cities of Iraq, including the use of "grunt phones" attached to the back of M1A1 Abrams tanks to enable the marines to talk to the tank crews. The men likely had no idea they were using a technique first tested by the army on Kwajalein seven decades earlier.15
The day of massed, heavy armor action may or may not be over. But almost wherever the infantryman fights, he is probably going to want to have his partner in the tank right beside him.