Definitely +1, but for the record, infantry anti-tank weapons can destroy the heaviest tanks with flank or rear shots. The exact details depend on the tank and the weapon of course.
U.S. Bazookas in WWII:
World War II
Secretly introduced via the Russian front and in November 1942 during Operation Torch, early production versions of the M1 launcher and M6 rocket were hastily supplied to some of the U.S. invasion forces during the landings in North Africa. On the night before the landings, Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower was shocked to discover from a subordinate that none of his troops had received any instruction in the use of the bazooka.[16]
Initially supplied with the highly unreliable M6 rocket and without training, the M1 did not play a significant armed role in combat in the North African fighting,[12] but did provide a German intelligence coup[2] when some were captured by the Germans in early encounters with inexperienced US troops. A US general visiting the Tunisian front in 1943 after the close of combat operations could not find any soldiers who could report that the weapon had actually stopped an enemy tank.[12] Further issue of the bazooka was suspended in May 1943.
A U.S. soldier fires an M9 bazooka at a German machine gun nest, Lucca 1944.
During the Allied invasion of Sicily, small numbers of the M1A1 bazooka (using an improved rocket, the M6A1) were used in combat by US forces. The M1A1 accounted for four medium German tanks and a heavy Tiger I, with the latter being knocked out by a lucky hit through the driver's vision slot.[12] A major disadvantage to the bazooka was the large backblast and smoke trail (in colder weather), which gave away the position of the shooter, mandating quick relocation of the squad. Moreover, the bazooka fire team often had to expose their bodies in order to obtain a clear field of fire against an armored target. Casualties among bazooka team members were extremely high during the war, and assignment to such duty, widely known as Medal of Honor work, in the face of German counterfire was typically regarded by other platoon members as not only highly dangerous, but nearly suicidal.
When the existence of the bazooka was revealed to the American public official press releases for the first two years stated that it "packed the wallop of a 155mm cannon"—a great exaggeration, but widely accepted by the American public at the time.[17]
In late 1942, numbers of early-production American M1 bazookas were captured by German troops from Russian forces who had been given quantities of the bazooka under Lend-Lease as well as during the Operation Torch invasions in the North African Campaign.[2] The Germans promptly developed their own version of the weapon, increasing the diameter of the warhead from 60 mm to 88 mm (2.4 to 3.5 in). In German service, the bazooka was popularly known as the Panzerschreck. The German weapon, with its larger, more powerful warhead, had significantly greater armor penetration; ironically, calls for a larger-diameter warhead had also been raised by some ordnance officers during U.S. trials of the M1, but were rejected. After participating in an armor penetration test involving a German Panther tank using both the RPzB 54 Panzerschreck and the U.S. M9 bazooka, Corporal Donald E. Lewis of the U.S. Army informed his superiors that the Panzerschreck was "far superior to the American bazooka": ‘I was so favorably impressed [by the Panzerschreck] I was ready to take after the Krauts with their own weapon.[18]’
The M1 bazooka fared much better on the rare occasions when it could be used against the much thinner armor typically fitted to the lower sides, underside, and top of enemy tanks. To hit the bottom panel of an enemy tank, the bazooka operator had to wait until the tank was surmounting a steep hill or other obstruction, while hitting the top armor usually necessitated firing the rocket from the upper story of a building or similar elevated position. During the 1944 Allied offensive in France, Major Charles "Bazooka Charlie" Carpenter mounted a battery of three M9 bazookas on the wing-to-fuselage struts on each side of his L-4 Grasshopper aircraft in order to attack enemy armor, and was credited with destroying six enemy tanks, including two Tiger I heavy tanks.[19][20]
Despite the introduction of the M9 bazooka with its more powerful rocket—the M6A3—in late 1943, reports of the weapon's effectiveness against enemy armor decreased alarmingly in the latter stages of World War II, as new German tanks with thicker and better-designed cast armor plate and armor skirts/spaced armor were introduced. This development forced bazooka operators to target less well-protected areas of the vehicle, such as the tracks, drive sprockets, bogey wheels, or rear engine compartment. In a letter dated May 20, 1944, Gen. George S. Patton stated to a colleague that "the purpose of the bazooka is not to hunt tanks offensively, but to be used as a last resort in keeping tanks from overrunning infantry. To insure this, the range should be held to around 30 yards."[12] The extreme difficulty of closing to grenade-throwing distances unnoticed before hitting small spot targets on an enemy tank helps explain the high mortality rate of men assigned to anti-tank rocket launcher duty.
In the Pacific campaign, as in North Africa, the original bazookas sent to combat often had reliability issues. The battery-operated firing circuit was easily damaged during rough handling, and the rocket motors often failed because of high temperatures and exposure to moisture, salt air, or humidity. With the introduction of the M1A1 and its more reliable rocket ammunition, the bazooka was effective against some fixed Japanese infantry emplacements such as small concrete bunkers and pill boxes.[21][22] Against coconut and sand emplacements, the weapon was not always effective, as these softer structures often reduced the force of the warhead's impact enough to prevent detonation of the explosive charge.[23] Later in the Pacific war, most infantry and marine units often used the M2 flamethrower to attack such emplacements.[23] In the few instances in the Pacific where the bazooka was used against tanks and armored vehicles, the rocket's warhead easily penetrated the thin armor plate used by the Japanese and destroyed the vehicle.[24] Overall, the M1A1, M9, and M9A1 rocket launchers were viewed as useful and effective weapons during World War II, though they had been primarily employed against enemy emplacements and fixed fortifications, not as anti-tank weapons.[18] General Dwight Eisenhower later described it as one of the four "Tools of Victory" which won World War II for the Allies (together with the atom bomb, Jeep and the C-47 Skytrain transport aircraft).[25][26]
^ Green & Green 2000, pp. 38–39.
^ Green & Green 2000, p. 38.
^ Popular Mechanics, January 1944.
^ a b Green & Green 2000, p. 39.
^ Piper Cub Tank Buster, "What's New in Aviation", Popular Science 146 (2), February 1945: 84.
^ Carpenter, Leland F, "Piper L-4J Grasshopper", Aviation Enthusiast Corner, Aero Web, retrieved 21 October 2011.
^ Rottman, Gordon L (2007), US Airborne Units in the Pacific Theater 1942–45, Osprey, p. 43, ISBN 978-1-84603-128-1.
^ Harclerode, Peter (2005), Wings of War–Airborne Warfare 1918–1945, Weidenfeld & Nicolson, pp. 332–33, ISBN 0-304-36730-3.
^ a b Kleber & Birdsell 2001, pp. 549–54.
^ Green, Michael (2004), Weapons of the Modern Marines, Zenith Imprint Press, p. 45, ISBN 978‐0‐7603‐1697‐9.
^ "The US Forces included Navy, Army, Army Air Force and Marine Corps". Digger history. Archived from the original on 12 December 2008. Retrieved 2008-11-19.
^ "Douglas VC-47A Skytrain DC-3". Aircraft. March field. Archived from the original on 3 December 2008.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bazooka
