MONSTER TANKS.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 60, Issue 45, 2 December 1939, Page 2

MONSTER TANKS.

NEW FRENCH WEAPON. EVEN LAND MIKES DEFIED. In their advance on the' front from the Moselle to the Vosges Mountains, the French used their new 70ton tanks, which have surprised the German .High Command, states 'the News of the World. It was not ,thought possible that any practicable tank four times the size of the largest wartime tank could be devised, nor wins is believed that it could mount, as do the new French Tanks, a gun of the Calibre of the French “75” the equivalent of the British, light field gun. Constructed on entirely new principles and armoured with ia special type of steel, the tanks are being used .in large numbers. Anti-tank guns and rifles and even land-mines have proved useless against them. It appears that nearly all the German anti-tank defences have overlooked the possibility of such weapons. The advent of the 70-ton. tank has virtually nullified the effect of the electrically-fired German machine-guns, the existence of which was mentioned in a French' war communique. It was known by the British and French General Headquarters that the Siegfried Line contained countless machine-gun pillboxes, operated electrically from a, central control two miles behind.

The Germans thought these machinegun nests' would be able to wipe out infantry following up a barrage or a tank attack. But the 3iew French tanks are able to demolish the pillboxes, not only by direct fire from their “75” guns, but by crushing them.