>>1662549France built prototypes off the King Tiger, and the Panther was the standard by which the post-war tanks at least in the west were judged.
>>1662547>there planes and tanks were massively superiorNo. Early-war, their tanks were inferior to both the English and French, and the bulk of their experience-refined battle-tested designs were still inferior to the basic Soviet design at the start of the war.
Even the German tanks that overpowered individual Russian tank designs were not "superior" in the sense of how they could be fielded, because there were never going to be enough of them to overpower weaker but easier designs. And even then, when the Soviets built overpowered heavy tanks, theirs were still better than the German equivalent, eg: IS2.
It's Western propaganda to play up the Germans as having "wunderwaffe", because they want to excuse A) losing, in the case of the UK and France, and B) building knowingly inferior tanks, in the case of the Americans.
That said, the Sherman isn't that bad. It was perfectly fine for 1942/3, and peripheral theatres, but it was too tall, too weak, and too combustible for combat in Europe, especially in an environment like Normandy.
If they'd been supplemented from the outset with a heavy tank of their own, like the T34s were by the KV1, then their weaknesses would have mattered a lot less.
>>1662570Looks a lot like a T34-KV hybrid.
