     "Back up!" screamed Heinz, the tank commander. "Schnell! Schnell!" The driver threw the tank into reverse, and with a great grinding of gears and treads, 50 tons of Panther lurched backward with a start. An instant later, Gunther Bermann, the gunner, heard the whoosh of an anti-tank shot passing just inches in front of the turret. There was no time to contemplate the whims of fate; already the turret was turning towards the ambusher who had nearly killed them all. Gunther hunched over his gunsight waiting for the turret to stop.
     "There -- you see? To the left of the fencepost!" Heinz shouted. Gunther already had it in sight, an American tank destroyer that had lain in wait for them coming down this road. They weren't backing away, either, so they were reloading for another shot. But this time Gunther had the initiative. He lined up the shot carefully; an old pro at 22, it took him less than two seconds to register the crosshairs. Without hesitating, he pulled the trigger. The kick of the mighty gun rocked their big tank. Before the tank had stopped rocking, before Heinz had whooped triumphantly, Gunther had verified the kill.
     Already he was traversing the turret further. American TDs didn't travel alone; there were more out there. Sure enough, he spotted a towed anti-tank gun, probably one of those weakling 57mm guns. "HE!" he called out without looking up. The gunloader had already popped out the shell casing; he grabbed a high-explosive shell instead of the armor-piercing shells they used for anti-tank fighting. By the time he rammed the breech closed, Gunther was ready. A second later, the big gun roared again, and Gunther noted with satisfaction fragments of gun and bodies leaping away from the explosion.
/The Panther Tank
     In 1941, when the Germans invaded Russia, they were shocked by the Russian T34 tank. Fast, with thick armor and a powerful gun, the T34 could defeat any German tank. Fortunately, there weren't many T34s. But the Germans resolved to build a tank that could defeat T34.
     That tank was the Panzer V, or Panther, and it incorporated many design concepts of the T34. Unlike previous German tanks, the armor was sloped. This helped deflect shots away from the tank. The armor was also thicker: 80mm in the front, as opposed to 60mm on its predecessor, the Panzer IV. The other armor was all correspondingly thicker; as a result, (and because of its greater size) the Panther weighed 50 tons, twice the weight of the Panzer IV.
     The main gun, a 75mm KwK.42 L70, was also more powerful than any previous German tank gun: it could penetrate 6 inches of armor at 1,000 yards. (A Sherman tank had 3 inches of frontal armor.)
     The Panther's 12 cylinder, 23 liter gasoline engine generated 690 horsepower and got about 0.6 mpg on roads, 0.3 mpg off-road. It could manage 15 mph cross-country, and its wide tracks gave it good traction on muddy roads. The result of all this was a highly maneuverable machine that could move fast when it was in trouble.
     As with all German tanks, the optics were magnificent, giving Panther a big edge in combat. The combination of tremendous hitting power, thick armor, great maneuverability, and fine optics made the Panther one of the finest tanks of World War II. Fortunately for the Allies, only 5805 Panthers were built. About 800 fought in the Battle of the Bulge./