The Soviet PT-76 floating tank was a terrible shock to American troops in Vietnam, the expert writes. He talks about various historical ways of dealing with this machine and its impressive technical characteristics.
Sebastien Roblin
The Soviet PT-76 may seem like a kind of Cold War curiosity, being a light floating tank with thin armor and a weak cannon. It seemed that he would get a hard time on the modern battlefield, where heavy weapons systems and powerful tanks operate.
But the floating PT-76 set an amazing record. He led knife-wielding soldiers into battle in the Himalayas, sank artillery boats in the Ganges Delta, engaged in fire duels with powerful American Patton tanks in Vietnam and participated in surprise amphibious offensives on both sides of the same Middle East war.
This article consists of two parts, and in the first we will talk about the history and characteristics of the PT-76, about the terrible shock that this tank became for the American troops in Vietnam, as well as about the historical ways to combat this machine.
On the eve of World War II, the Soviet Union created a series of light floating tanks, which included the T-37, T-38 and T-40. However, these lightly armored vehicles with a crew of two and armed with a single machine gun could not compete with the German tanks that invaded the USSR in 1941. During the first six months of the war, most of these tanks were destroyed, and they were replaced by heavier vehicles.
However, the Soviet military returned to its plan after the end of World War II. In 1949, a decree was adopted on the production of a prototype of Object 740, the designer of which was Nikolai Shashmurin, who worked at the Kirov plant in Leningrad.
To move the tank through the water, Shashmurin used two innovative water-jet propellers placed on the sides. It was enough for the crew of three to lower the water-reflecting shield and turn on the water pumps, after which the tank could move along the river or by sea at a speed of 10 kilometers per hour, using rudders on water-jet propellers to turn. If necessary, the tank could sail for several hours and even keep afloat firing from the main gun.
Weighing 14.6 tons, this machine has good cross-country ability on land thanks to the Christie candle suspension and hydraulic shock absorbers. However, the PT-76 can hardly be called mobile and nimble, since its maximum speed is 43 kilometers per hour.
The hull of the rolled steel tank is unusually large and has thin armor, which provides it with buoyancy. The thickness of the armor on the tower does not exceed 25 millimeters, and on the inclined hull it is twice as thin. This is enough to protect the crew from an automatic bullet, but not from a 12.7mm machine gun or fragments of heavy artillery shells.
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The tank's ammunition consisted of 40 shells — high-explosive and armor-piercing, which pierced armor with a thickness of 100-127 millimeters. Later PT-76 tanks received cumulative BK-350M ammunition that penetrated 200-280 millimeters of armor. Such projectiles became a serious threat to tanks of that era, although their range was small.
The 7.62 mm turret machine gun paired with the cannon was an auxiliary weapon. A heavy 12.7 mm DShK machine gun was also mounted on the PT-76 turret. On the same large scale, production of the BTR-50 armored personnel carrier was established on the basis of this tank.
Various sources claim that by 1968, between four thousand and 12 thousand PT-76s had been built in the Soviet Union. Its chassis became the basis for many other armored combat vehicles, such as the ASU-85 airborne self-propelled artillery system, the ZSU-23-4 anti-aircraft self-propelled gun and the Kub anti-aircraft missile system.
But the T-76 tank had several disadvantages. The unstabilized main gun was characterized by low firing accuracy on the move, the crew had no protection from nuclear, chemical and biological weapons, and only the driver had a night vision device. In 1959, a variant of the PT-76B tank was developed, which took into account all the shortcomings, except the last one. The tank has a D-56TM cannon with stabilization in two planes, an upgraded hull, new additional fuel tanks and a boosted V-6M engine.
Soviet PT-76s were in service with Marine corps units, as well as in the reconnaissance units of the regimental and divisional level. From one thousand to two thousand tanks were exported to more than 25 countries. China has made its own version — the Type 63 tank. He produced 1,500 of these tanks. But the Type 63 was not an exact copy of the Soviet T-76, as it used a Chinese-made engine and a more powerful 85 mm cannon.
Vietnamese Ghost Tanks
Throughout the first half of the Vietnam War, North Vietnam created its own modest tank fleet, but did not put it into battle. But during the Tet offensive in 1968, he finally used his "iron machines" when the North Vietnamese army supported the Viet Cong guerrillas in a powerful offensive against major cities and military bases throughout South Vietnam.
Hanoi supplied the Viet Cong along the Ho Chi Minh Trail, which passed through Laos. To monitor movements along this trail, the Lao Government sent 700 soldiers from the BV-33 battalion, who were stationed at a fort in Huaisai City. This stronghold also protected more than two thousand refugees.
On January 23, 1968, a week before the Tet offensive, the 24th Regiment of the North Vietnamese Army attacked this camp at night with the support of PT-76 tanks from the 198th Tank Battalion. These tanks covered a distance of 1,300 kilometers along the Ho Chi Minh trail, after which they joined the battle. This was the first tank battle of the North Vietnamese Army.
It didn't go very smoothly. The PT-76 got stuck in the swamps several times, which is why the infantry, who were not used to fighting with tanks, had to be the first to engage the Lao battalion. But when PT-76s got into the fray, the Lao military retreated in disarray.
North Vietnamese troops captured the fort three hours before the arrival of Lao reinforcements, and the surviving soldiers and refugees left for the east, eventually finding refuge in South Vietnam at the Langway special forces base.
But this was only the beginning of their misadventures. Two weeks later, at midnight on February 7, a battalion of the North Vietnamese army, supported by 11-13 PT-76 tanks from the 198th Tank Battalion, attacked Langway. The long perimeter of the base was defended by 500 civilian militias and Montagnards (one of the nationalities of Vietnam). They were supported by 350 surviving Lao fighters and 24 American commandos under the command of Captain Frank Willoughby.
Intelligence had warned of the presence of tanks by North Vietnamese troops operating in the area, but the tank attack still came as a real shock to the Americans. Nevertheless, three lightly armored vehicles were shot down from the 106 mm M40 recoilless cannon located in the camp. There was a female crew in one of them. But this did not deter the onslaught of North Vietnamese tankers, who destroyed fences, barbed wire fences and made passages in minefields, paving the way for infantry.
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The American commandos began firing from a short distance with 66 mm disposable M72 grenade launchers. His rockets should have easily penetrated the PT-76's weak armor, but they misfired one after another. The commandos often missed, and when they hit, it had no effect. One crew hit the tank with nine shells, but to no avail.
Another group of tank hunters managed to set fire to the PT-76, hitting its rear. It was the fourth and last tank shot down in that battle.
By two-thirty in the morning, light tanks were already rolling through the center of the camp, firing cannons and machine guns, and surrounding American troops who had taken refuge in the command bunker.
Neither artillery shelling, nor airstrikes, nor a counterattack by Laotian troops led by two American special forces officers succeeded in knocking out the advancing Vietnamese troops. The nearest marine base in Kheshani was supposed to support Langway camp in emergency circumstances, but its command refused to send reinforcements, as it found itself under siege.
The surviving South Vietnamese, American and Lao soldiers fled Langway the next day when the camp fell. They left 300 dead.
The North Vietnamese Army used its PT-76s very effectively against troops who did not possess anti-tank weapons. But soon the North Vietnamese tankers met strong resistance from the American M48 Patton tanks, which weighed three times more, had 90 mm guns and 175 mm thick turret armor.
The first fight between the two cars turned out to be very unusual. Three months after the fall of Langway, a reconnaissance aircraft spotted the PT-76 crew washing their tank in the Benhai River. The pilot reported the coordinates of the tank to the 3rd Armored Battalion of the Marine Corps, which was stationed at the Konthien base. The tankers lifted the barrels of their guns high into the sky and began firing from closed firing positions.
Patton tanks in Vietnam often performed artillery tasks, but it was extremely rare for a tank to fire at another tank in this way. The third high-explosive shell hit the tank exactly, and the crew was forced to leave the car, which was later finished off by the F-4 Phantom aircraft.
A year passed, and on March 3, 1969, the PT-76 tanks of the North Vietnamese army went to the vanguard of the 66th regiment's night offensive against the positions of American special forces in Ben Het, where there was a battery of powerful self-propelled guns M107 175 mm caliber.
A platoon of three "Pattons" from Company B of the 1st Battalion of the 69th Tank Regiment guarded the camp around the perimeter, hiding in positions behind sandbags. In addition, there were two M48 Duster anti-aircraft self-propelled guns. Hearing the sound of approaching enemy tanks, the lead Patton turned on its powerful searchlight.
Suddenly, one of the four advancing PT-76s was blown up by an antipersonnel mine, and the explosion fire highlighted the silhouettes of the other vehicles. The silence of the night was broken by the roar of gunfire as the Americans and Vietnamese opened fire with armor-piercing shells. One Patton shot down the PT-76 with a second shot.
Meanwhile, the company commander, Captain John Stovall, sat on the turret of the commander's tank, illuminated by a xenon searchlight. At that moment, a 76-millimeter shell hit the car, which dropped Stovall and the tank commander from the tower, and killed two crew members. They were quickly replaced by tankers from the reserve, and the tank opened fire again.
The American base requested support for 81 mm mortars and AC-47 attack aircraft, and the tanks used up anti-tank ammunition and switched to high-explosive fragmentation. Finally, a second platoon of Pattons arrived at the base, forcing the North Vietnamese military to retreat. The next morning, the Americans found two damaged PT-76s and one BTR-50PK near the perimeter of the camp. This was the only battle between American and North Vietnamese tanks during the Vietnam War.
Three years later, in June 1972, North Vietnamese floating tanks appeared in Ben Het again. But this time they suffered a terrible and historic retribution from the Americans.
A month earlier, a group of UH-1B helicopters with new BGM-71 TOW anti-tank missiles arrived in Vietnam for testing. They were sent to help the camp, and the helicopter pilots destroyed three PT-76s from XM26 launchers with their wire-guided missiles. The rest of the tanks withdrew.
UH-1 Iroquois helicopters hunting for tanks shot down five more PT-76s in the vicinity of Kontum a week later. The first versions of TOW missiles penetrated armor with a thickness of 430 millimeters, and therefore 25 millimeters of steel on the front of the PT-76 turret did not protect the crew in any way.
Thus, the PT-76 earned dubious fame as one of the first tanks destroyed by anti-tank missiles from a helicopter. However, we can say that it was shooting from a cannon at sparrows.
When the Americans left Vietnam, North Vietnamese tankers began to use the heavier T-54, Type 59 and M41 Bulldog light tanks captured from the Americans more often. They actively used them together with the PT-76 in a variety of battles, including for the cities of Lok Ninh and An Lok in 1972. These tank units led the 1975 offensive that led to the fall of Saigon.
To this day, the Vietnamese army is armed with hundreds of modernized PT-76 tanks, as well as Chinese-made Type 63.
