     "Clang!" The impact of the high-velocity armor-piercing shell shook the King Tiger and hurled Rheinhold Minke, its commander, against the cupola. He straightened up and realized that he, his crew, and his tank, were unhurt. They had taken a direct hit at point-blank range from a Sherman and were unscathed. The terror brought on by the impact gave way to a sense of invulnerability and then, blood lust. "Get 'em, Kurt!" he shouted to his gunner.
     Kurt stomped on the treadle plate that rotated the turret. Slowly the huge gun came to bear on the Sherman not 200 meters away. An evil grin spread across Minke's face as he imagined what was going on inside that Sherman right now. "Nothing can save you now!" he muttered triumphantly. The huge gun belched fire, and the Sherman's turret was half torn-off by the impact. The driver's hatch popped open and the driver climbed out, his clothing smoking. "Mow him down!" Minke shouted, but Kurt was already firing the machine gun. The American got ten yards and then his body flopped into the snow like a broken doll.
     Another round hit the turret; Minke's nose was broken when his face hit the cupola. Kurt's arm was cut by a metal flake that had spalled off the inside of the turret at the impact point. The spot was still glowing a dull red. Again the huge turret traversed, again the mighty gun roared, and another Sherman disintegrated.
     More rounds hit, clawing deep gouges in the Tiger's armor, but never penetrating it. Minke's crew was battered and cut, but not incapacitated. Working methodically, they destroyed two more of their attackers. Then the Americans fled. Rheinhold Minke, king of the battlefield, nursing two cracked ribs and bleeding from the nose, let them go.
/The King Tiger
Adolf Hitler had a yen for weapons. He was furious when he learned in 1941 that the Russian T34s could outfight any German tank. He demanded a tank more powerful than anything the Allies might build. Thus was born the Panzer VI, or Tiger.
   The original Tiger looked for all the world like a bigger, heavier version of the Panzer IV: at 55 tons, it had over twice the weight of the Panzer IV! Boasting 100 mm (4 inches) of frontal armor, this tank was almost invulnerable. Its gun was the mighty 88mm KwK 36 L56 gun, the fabled anti-aircraft gun that had proved to be deadly against tanks. This tank, the Tiger I, made its debut in late 1942; 1,350 of these were built.
   In January 1944 a greatly improved model, the Tiger II or "King Tiger" began production. This monster, weighing 70 tons, went far beyond anything else on the battlefield. Its immensely thick armor (six inches thick in places) was cunningly sloped to deflect shot. It boasted the improved 88 mm KwK 43 gun, fully 71 calibers long. This killer gun could penetrate 9 inches of armor at 1,000 yards. Even at 2,500 yards, it could penetrate 6 inches of armor. (The Sherman tank had 3 inches of armor and its gun could penetrate 3 inches of armor at 1,000 yards.)
   The King Tiger was an impressive tank, but overall it was a failure. It took twice as long to build a King Tiger as it took to build a Panther, so only about 500 were built, of which perhaps 200 fought in the Battle of the Bulge. It was slow and clumsy, bogged easily, and was too heavy for many bridges. In the end, the King Tiger was overwhelmed by the thousands of Shermans that poured out of the American factories./