NEW ANTI-TANK GUN

Press, Volume LXXXIX, Issue 27055, 2 June 1953, Page 6

NEW ANTI-TANK GUN

“BAT” TESTED BY BRITAIN . LONDON, May 29. The British Army’s new recoilless 120 mm anti-tank gun, the “Bat.” was given its first public tests on Salisbury Plain today. The shell can penetrate more than 6in of armour. The gun weighs only 22001 b, about b third of the 17 pounder guns with which the infantry are at present equipped. It is said to be able to stop a Josef Stalin 111 tank, the heaviest in use.

Th? military correspondent of the ‘Daily Telegraph” says that the “Bat” is remarkable, because it reverses the trend to equip infantry with ever heavier and more cumbrous anti-tank weapons.

The correspondent says that its predecessor, the 17-pounder, is almost impossible to move or conceal in action. The “Bat” has a silhouette of less than 4ft, and is easi ly towed by a jeep. “The ‘Bat’ is seen in the role of the ideal anti-tank gun, but I predict that we will see it before long performing the same role in a tank,” says the correspondent. “We are now producing tanks so large that few ships can take them and almost no bridge can carry them, yet the ‘Bat’ can knock out these monsters easily. The smallest, lightest tanks would suffice to carry it. We should attain an ideal combination of cheapness, numbers mobility and superior gunpower. The Bat’s* shots seemed to me to sound the knell of the heavy tank.”