During a standard 3-shell exercise in T-72 I would routinely hit a pop-up target withing 5 seconds from it's appearance and twice more as fast as autoloader would cycle - 7-8 seconds, so about 21-24 seconds total for 3 shots (timing measured electronically by a passing shell short-circuiting the wire-screens).
The target would pop-up at about 1200 yards and would be moving toward me at about 15mph,
the tank would be moving forward at about 20mph on relatively flat ground.
Of course the target was a tank - sized siluette, but all three shells would hit within a 2 feet circle. With a correctly sighted gun that circle would be right under the turret.
For exercises I was using a regular HE shell , initial velocity about 1400 meters/sec, not an AP shell with 2100 meters/sec velocity and much flatter trajectory.
The turret traverse speed was very high (about 60 degrees/sec) but that was not an issue because the target would pop-up in the expected direction.
I do not remember the sight magnification, I think it was x8.
I am pretty sure that if I saw an enemy fighter in my sight at a reasonable distance (2-3 miles) travelling roughly towards me, I would have had no problem putting a round into it at 9-600 yards.
We did have exercises shooting at airborne targets but they were not much different than shooting tanks. Of course they were directed against helicopter-shaped targets.
I am pretty sure that with some luck (a gunner looking and turret pointed approximately in the right direction and the cannon loaded) it would be quite possible to hit a closing plane from a WWII tank.
The reason why that was not done has to do with other aspects of warfare then the capabilities of the weapons systems:
Whenever the tank was travelling in column, it was mostly in the dark and/or in the forest roads. The crew's view was severely limited and the guy in the gunner's position usually was sleeping. Whoever was driving concentrated on the road and a guy in the commander cupola watched out with a machinegun. Also, while travelling, the turret is usually locked and the cannon not loaded.
When digged in for defence, the visibility is usually blocked/camouflaged from all sides and often from above and concentrated on the pretty narrow forward field of fire. A plane could fly right over the tank and not see it. A guy who would try to shoot that plane down would be court-marchalled for revealing his tank's position to the enemy.
When attacking in any formation, there is usually so much dust and smoke that you cannot see anything, much less the aircraft. The gunner with limited view of fire and maximum magnification would concentrate on the most likely cites for the ground enemy emplacements. Commander could keep an eye on the sky, but would mostly concentrate on the ground as well.
I am sure that if tanks were forced to operate on a flat dust-free surface we would have seen many more cases of planes shot down by tanks. But that kind of environmemt is very unnatural.
Of course the tanks should not even be there in the first place.
miko--
