you bet...I have about 30-40 books on ww2 and the single biggest catagory is ww2 tanks.....

Folks are always discussing late war tanks & Tigers, or the Soviet IS series. Just to be contrary why not chat a moment about the best of 1939?

okay carl, if anyone is reading link.... from the power point-I would say the british matilda and the french char b(and variants)...perhaps the only advantages the germans had were they had radios and a larger turrent(extra man)if not for the 88, then the matilda would have caused more havoc-though her slow speed was not a help....If you ready about early north africa campaings, it is impressive that such a small band of british(perhaps 30-40000) kicked the crap out of/embarrassed 250000 italians who could not stop the matilda(though they could and did damage it) the mk I II and early III IV were poor vehicles for warfare-gives testamony what Rommel did with what little resources he had-esp since in the early days (march 41 and onward) with the mkII and mkIII with the 50 mm L/42 I wont go into the early american m-3s nor the waste-of-armour the japense had...

You would take the Char B (B1bis I presume) over the Souma S35? What about Soviet tanks? anything there that tickles your fancy?

1939?? why that would be german tanks, german tanks. and more super german tanks at that time.

well, believe it or not, I was waiting for that...the souma was more agile and faster I think 25mph vs 15-18, plus the turrent, but, at that time, I would take the hull 75 mm, plus its turrented 47 over the 47 in a turrent alone-and the thicker armour...the extra 20mm(50%) would have been harder for the mighty 37mm atg and the 20mm on the pzII etc.....perhaps in 41,no if they would have(could have) put a higher velocity 47mm on the souma well, about the soviets, if your talking about the multi turrented tanks(t-32/35 etc), I dont think much, and I dont think much of the might 4-8 tn early t tanks or the bts-with the exception of the Bt-5-but I think the best tank early on was the KV-1-very heavy armour for that time, a decent gun(large calibre at that time)-fairly mobile,though not as mechanically reliable as it could have been -these are all before the t-34 of course

Hm...yes there is the armor factor. I would also consider the mechanical problems of the B series. the S35 had a better reputation. The KV was what I'd choose from the Soviet barn. That 76mm gun is the bomb. Speaking of German tanks. Could that 37mm gun they carried penetrate the frontal armor any medium tank of 1939? I've heard not.

sure it could..remember we listed the best...there were still the crappy british crusier tanks, the earlier t-tanks-though the t-26 was fast and decent at that time, the 37mm could have holled it...few of the tanks had sloped armour, thus the 37mm at 500meters would have done some damage-even to the us m-3 stuart of the early days....the polish had tankettes(thus fueling the german believe of their 37mm)

Have you found any solid info. on German intell. concerning forigen tanks in 1939 and 1940? They seemed supried by some of the opposing tanks.

I cant list sources, but to my believe and knowledge, only the t-34 and perhaps the kv-1 were a suprise...there was nothing else good in the early yrs and nothing to worry about... they knew about the matilda and the french models..stalin kept the t-34 a close secret.. besides, I have little faith in german intell(oxymoron)