It cannot be said that my previous article caused a flurry of discussions, but once again it clearly showed for me that there are enough people who are not indifferent to the history of the tank forces of the USSR.
So. The GSVG was preparing to defend its Motherland - the USSR - in good faith. Classes, trainings, exercises - everything went on as usual. And my regiment very often "visited" at the Wunsdorf training ground, practicing many tasks there, and usually we stayed there for a month and a half every six months.
We moved there and back to the PPD by the "railways" of the GDR. For this, each time it was necessary to load tanks onto railway platforms. And if at the training ground it happened decorously and beautifully, then on the way back … the "show" began. And every time. I'll tell you about the first thing I saw: the first impressions are brighter, and even that time I was still more a “spectator”, since “only“old men”went to the battle, and the“youth”studied …
The main characters of the "show" were faulty tanks, and there were enough of them each time. The worst was when the T64 turned into a "pillbox", that is, the engine failed, and for various reasons it was not possible to replace it at the test site. And there were two such cars at that time … Thank God, my platoon did not suffer this fate, but oil leaked on "157", one of the oil lines began to "ooze", and in order to change it, it was necessary to remove the engine. The deputy chief of the battalion looked and decided that, of course, it was bad, but he would live to see "home".
As a result, I turned out to be the head of the column of "disabled", that is, I was given the task of leaving at the head of a column of four "defective" vehicles before the general column of the battalion and bringing it to the waiting area for loading. While I was collecting my "defective" ones, two couplings with slow-moving tanks passed me, strainingly roaring with engines, they went even earlier. I had an interesting "collection", two tanks started to leak oil, one was desperately warming himself, and the last was the most interesting: it turned left only on even gears, right - on odd gears. He became my "commander". In principle, my "invalid team" passed four kilometers to the district without any particular "shocks", the main thing is that they did not break the wood, and literally … There I scattered the cars and waited for loading. There was free time, so I decided to look around. The station did not arouse my special attention, we met even larger half-stations, but here there are two tracks and one access road with a side and end ramp. The village was also small, twenty houses, but all so well-groomed, clean. The largest building was a dairy, where my soldiers, who had been here not for the first time, and “stalked”, bringing from there two AT-1 boxes filled with milk to the top, “friendship is a freundscape” in action …
Half an hour before the start of loading, when a suitable battalion column was already visible, the shunting locomotive handed over the platforms for loading. And then I began to notice that “locals” began to gather on the other side of the “piece of iron”, somehow I was even surprised: why, they didn't see the tanks? But then off we go. The company columns clearly approached the area and stopped. The crews were divided, the commanders and mechanics were left with the tanks, and the gunners, under the control of the company’s zampotechs, ran over to the platforms and began to quickly lower and secure the sides, preparing the platforms for loading the tanks. Moreover, what amazed me, having a narrower track, the German platforms allowed themselves to load two tanks, in the Union they were not "greedy", one tank - one platform …
Well, everything is ready, a short formation, finalizing the loading order and distribution of the "heating units", and we started … The first to go were combat-ready vehicles and "my" "invalids". And when he began to "take" them out of their parking lot, he suddenly noticed that after one of them a rather large oil stain remained on the ground, and there was a path nearby, along which some German was walking at that moment, he carefully looked at our tanks, and it was obvious that he was interested in it and liked it. Noticing the oil stain, he drew my eye with a shout and, pointing to the stain, began to repeat "Kaput?", "Kaput?" I studied English at school and in college, but thanks to our war films I knew the meaning of this word well, so he tried to say understood. Well, let's not drop our Soviet pride, we had to make him a calming gesture and raise his finger to the top to answer "Gut!" To which I heard in response "Gut!?!?!?" and saw huge surprised eyes. Apparently, I inflicted a serious psychological trauma on a person, blurring the boundaries of ideas about "good and bad" in the technical condition of "panzers" …
Well, the overwhelming mass of tanks sank, the setting on the "mountain" brake and locking of the turrets and cannons was checked, and the cannons were additionally secured with cables. Four tanks remained on the ramp, two "dead" and two "alive" and a BTS, on the frontal sheet of which, the soldiers from the repair platoon had already secured the drive wheel of the tank with a cable. And the main "show" began. The "dead" car was hooked with cables in front and behind, cross to cross, to the tank and BTS and began to pull it onto the platform. Sometimes it seemed that she seemed to hang in the air on the stretching of the cables, but everything is done very carefully, slowly, but clearly. The tugboat moved from the extreme platform to the required one, and the "dead" one crawled behind it quietly. So quietly and neatly it is pulled to the right place on the platform, then it is detached from the front tank, and the BTS quietly pulls it back. Then, after installing a pair of spurs, the BTS gently rests the drive wheel fixed on the armor into the stern and pushes it forward until the signal "Stop". Here is another pair of spurs fixed, and the BTS moves back, dragging the tank behind it, again "Stop", that's it, the tank is loaded. The cables are uncoupled, and the BPS dashingly goes to the side ramp, making room for the next coupling … Everything is repeated again, with one exception, the BPS does not go anywhere, but is also fixed on the platform. It should be added that all this is richly flavored with "running around", a bunch of some screams, of which only mate is clearly distinguishable, and an unforgettable army entourage. And most importantly - a whole crowd of spectators, I never thought that so many people could live in two dozen two-story houses, apparently, nevertheless, people from other places came to the dairy plant, there were really a lot of them. To my question: "What are they?" The company commander replied: "Don't feed the German with bread, let me see the military equipment, and what else can they do, but here is such entertainment …"
I decided to continue my story about the service on the T64, but not with the aim of denigrating this machine, since it is dear to me as my first tank, but with the task of showing that service in the tank forces is not an easy thing, and, in particular, because of because you often have to quickly resolve the issues that life puts before you. But, by the way, everything is like everywhere else, but with a "tank" bias.
Now, while printing these articles, I seem to have understood the full depth of the "intention" of the appearance of the T72 tank. The T64 is a good and very interesting car, by the way, made at a very high level, which you immediately understand when you get to know, for example, the T72, that's where minimalism is at the forefront, everything is simple, practical, no frills. But this machine, alas, really was very much ahead of its time, and the transition from such "dinosaurs" as the T55 and T62 could not go just like that, although by the time I started my service, of course, many issues had already been resolved, but … but … A lot of soldiers came to us from the countryside, where they worked on a much simpler and less fastidious technique, where the very fact of using water for the bay, almost from a puddle, is quite a familiar and permissible thing, but "sixty-four" did not forgive this. The "two-stroke" diesel is very "extreme". It is very heat-loaded and high-speed, which, of course, is good for creating an engine with record performance, but in reality the zone of optimal modes is already very narrow, and getting out of it led to engine breakdowns.
As a result, if a military conflict had arisen and the appointees who had previously served on the "dinosaurs" had been called into the tank troops, this would have led to a massive release of equipment from technical malfunctions. T72 was and is more understandable for people who served on T55, T62 - "mobilization" - it is "mobilization"
Yes, and our cars were "conditionally" new, many of them already had marks on their armor about two major repairs. And if the purely "Kharkov women" were still treated well, then the attitude towards the cars that had been in the "skillful" hands of the soldiers-repairmen of the plant in Kehmeizer was … in short, there are no such printed words. Which, in principle, I put as a minus for the designers, although, of course, the designers tried to eliminate the identified "errors" very much, the T64A and T64B are very different machines in many respects, and a lot has been done in terms of reliability. I was "lucky" to serve on the T64A, so believe it or not.
