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A forty-five-ton Panther tank rolls down a village street at midnight. Fifteen metres away, a Canadian rifleman with a spring-loaded tube waits for it to get closer.
June 1944. Bretteville-l'Orgueilleuse, Normandy. Twenty-two Panthers of the 12th SS Panzer Division funnel into a village held by the Regina Rifles — men who had been on French soil for exactly two days. The tank crews expected infantry to scatter. The infantry had other plans.
By autumn 1944, a phrase kept appearing in German after-action reports and prisoner interrogations. Tank crews — veterans of Kursk and Kharkov — were saying that Canadian infantry was harder to deal with than enemy armour. Armour had weak spots you could study. These men in the hedgerows were invisible, unpredictable, and carried a weapon that gave no flash, no smoke, no sound.
What made Canadian infantry different from every other Allied force the Germans had faced — and why did it break the one advantage tanks had held on every front since Poland?
#canadianwarstories #ww2 #canadianarmy #militaryhistory #canadianhistory #worldwar2
A forty-five-ton Panther tank rolls down a village street at midnight. Fifteen metres away, a Canadian rifleman with a spring-loaded tube waits for it to get closer.
June 1944. Bretteville-l'Orgueilleuse, Normandy. Twenty-two Panthers of the 12th SS Panzer Division funnel into a village held by the Regina Rifles — men who had been on French soil for exactly two days. The tank crews expected infantry to scatter. The infantry had other plans.
By autumn 1944, a phrase kept appearing in German after-action reports and prisoner interrogations. Tank crews — veterans of Kursk and Kharkov — were saying that Canadian infantry was harder to deal with than enemy armour. Armour had weak spots you could study. These men in the hedgerows were invisible, unpredictable, and carried a weapon that gave no flash, no smoke, no sound.
What made Canadian infantry different from every other Allied force the Germans had faced — and why did it break the one advantage tanks had held on every front since Poland?
#canadianwarstories #ww2 #canadianarmy #militaryhistory #canadianhistory #worldwar2
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LearningTranscript
00:00June 8th, 1944.
00:02Bretteville-Lorgueilleuse, Normandy.
00:05Just past midnight.
00:06Rifleman Joe LaPointe of the Regina Rifles
00:09crouched behind a stone wall on the main street,
00:1215 meters from a 45-ton Panther tank
00:15that was rolling straight toward battalion headquarters.
00:18The Panther's machine guns were firing blind
00:20down the ditches on both sides of the road,
00:22stitching tracer rounds across the cobblestones.
00:25Behind it, more engine noise.
00:27A lot more.
00:28Twenty-two Panthers of the 12th SS Panzer Division
00:32were funneling into a Norman village
00:34held by Canadian infantry
00:35who had been on French soil for exactly two days.
00:39LaPointe had a PIAT,
00:41a spring-loaded tube that weighed 32 pounds
00:44and had an effective range of about 50 yards.
00:47To use it, he had to stand in the open,
00:49brace the thing against his shoulder,
00:51and fire a shaped-charge bomb at a tank
00:53whose crew could not miss him if they saw him.
00:55The Panther's frontal armor was 80 millimeters thick.
01:00Its 75-millimeter gun could kill a Sherman at 1,000 yards,
01:04and LaPointe was close enough to touch the exhaust heat on his face.
01:08He fired.
01:10The bomb hit.
01:11The Panther lurched forward 30 meters,
01:14then ran over an improvised mine the Reginas had built
01:17from 75 grenades lashed together with cord.
01:20The track shattered.
01:22The tank slewed sideways and climbed the curb.
01:25LaPointe reloaded,
01:26a process that required lying on his back
01:29and pulling against that enormous spring with both legs,
01:32and fired again.
01:33The Panther stopped.
01:35Its crew bailed out into the dark
01:37and were shot before they reached cover.
01:39A second Panther,
01:41seeing the first burning,
01:42fired wildly,
01:43and hit the first Panther,
01:45fracturing the rear of its turret.
01:47That crew bailed out too.
01:50The Canadians killed them in the street.
01:52If this story matters to you,
01:54a subscribe helps it reach the people who should hear it.
01:57Here is the question this video answers.
01:59By the summer of 1944,
02:03German tank crews on the Western Front
02:05had fought Americans,
02:06British,
02:07Poles,
02:07and French.
02:08They had learned how each army's infantry behaved
02:11when armor appeared.
02:12Most infantry did what infantry was supposed to do.
02:15They found cover,
02:17called for their own tanks,
02:18and waited for the steel to fight the steel.
02:21Tanks killed tanks.
02:23Infantry killed infantry.
02:25That was the logic of mechanized war,
02:27and it had held from Poland to Kursk to Tunisia.
02:31But in the Canadian sector,
02:33that logic broke.
02:34German tank crews began reporting something
02:37they had not encountered before.
02:39Infantry that did not retreat when armor arrived.
02:42Infantry that held its fire
02:43until the tank was close enough
02:45to read the stenciled numbers on its hull.
02:48Infantry that carried weapons
02:49that gave no flash,
02:51no smoke,
02:52no sound that a tank crew could locate.
02:54And infantry that seemed to have
02:56an almost irrational willingness
02:58to wait at ranges
02:59where a single burst of coaxial machine gun fire
03:02should have scattered them.
03:04In after-action reports
03:05and prisoner interrogations,
03:07a phrase began to appear.
03:09Not in those exact words.
03:10German military reports were precise,
03:13not poetic.
03:14But the meaning was consistent
03:15across multiple units,
03:17multiple encounters,
03:18multiple months of fighting.
03:20The men inside the tanks
03:21were saying that Canadian infantry
03:23was harder to deal with
03:25than enemy armor.
03:26Armor, they understood.
03:28Armor had weak spots you could study,
03:30ranges you could calculate,
03:32silhouettes you could recognize.
03:33But these men in the hedgerows,
03:35you could not see them,
03:36you could not predict them.
03:38And when you killed one,
03:39another appeared in the same position
03:41with the same weapon
03:42and the same insane patience.
03:44This is the story of how that happened.
03:46Not because Canadian soldiers
03:48were braver than anyone else,
03:49but because an entire army
03:52was organized, trained,
03:53and equipped around a single idea
03:55that no other allied force
03:57pursued with the same depth,
03:59the idea that infantry
04:00does not hide from tanks.
04:03Infantry hunts them.
04:05And it starts with a number.
04:07The 3rd Canadian Infantry Division
04:09landed on Juneau Beach
04:11on June 6th, 1944,
04:13carrying nearly 300 anti-tank guns.
04:16Remember that number,
04:17because what it means
04:18is not what you think it means.
04:20In the spring of 1944,
04:22a German Panther crew
04:23rolling through open country in France
04:25had every reason to feel invincible.
04:28The Panther's 75mm gun
04:30could punch through the front of a Sherman
04:32at over a thousand yards.
04:34Its own frontal plate
04:35was sloped at 55 degrees,
04:37thick enough to bounce
04:38most allied anti-tank rounds.
04:40At range, the mathematics were simple.
04:43A Panther crew that saw the enemy first
04:46killed the enemy first.
04:47And at range,
04:48the enemy was always another tank.
04:51That was the world German armor understood.
04:54Tank versus tank.
04:55Steel versus steel.
04:57A problem of optics, range finding,
05:00and who pulled the trigger
05:00half a second faster.
05:02The men inside those turrets
05:04had been trained on the eastern front,
05:06where the killing distances
05:07stretched across open step
05:08and the threat came from T-34s.
05:11Visible, loud,
05:13throwing up dust clouds
05:14you could spot at 2 kilometers.
05:15Even in Normandy,
05:17the expectation held.
05:19Allied tanks would come.
05:21German tanks would kill them.
05:23The infantry on both sides would watch.
05:25Hold that assumption.
05:27Because in June of 1944,
05:29in a planning room in England,
05:31a Canadian general
05:32was building an army
05:33designed to destroy it.
05:35The 3rd Canadian Infantry Division
05:37that landed on Juneau Beach
05:39was not a normal infantry division.
05:41Historian Mark Milner,
05:43digging through operational planning documents
05:45that previous historians had overlooked,
05:47uncovered something
05:48that changes the entire story
05:49of the Canadian role on D-Day.
05:51The 3rd Division
05:52was not primarily designed to advance.
05:55It was designed to stop tanks.
05:57Nearly 300 anti-tank guns,
06:006-pounders at the battalion level,
06:0217-pounders at the division,
06:04M-10 tank destroyers
06:05with open turrets
06:06and 3-inch guns,
06:08plus a full armored brigade of Shermans.
06:10On top of that,
06:12every single rifle platoon
06:13in the division
06:14carried a PIAT.
06:15Not one per company,
06:17one per platoon.
06:19That meant a frontage
06:20held by a single
06:21Canadian infantry battalion
06:23could present a German tank column
06:25with 6 towed anti-tank guns,
06:27multiple PIATs firing from concealed positions,
06:30and the ability
06:31to call down the fire
06:32of 72 25-pounder field guns
06:34within minutes.
06:35No other Allied division
06:37that landed on D-Day
06:38carried that density
06:39of anti-tank firepower.
06:41Not the American divisions
06:42on Omaha and Utah.
06:44Not the British 3rd Division
06:45on SWORD.
06:46The Canadian 3rd was,
06:47by design,
06:48the most powerfully armed formation
06:50on any beach that morning.
06:52And nearly all of that power
06:53was aimed not at bunkers,
06:55not at infantry,
06:56not at the beach defenses.
06:57It was aimed at what would come after,
06:59the panzers.
07:00This was not an accident.
07:02Allied intelligence knew
07:03that three German armored divisions
07:05sat within striking distance
07:07of the Normandy coast.
07:08The 21st Panzer,
07:10the 12th SS Hitlerjugend,
07:12and the Panzer Lair.
07:13The question was not
07:14whether they would counterattack.
07:16The question was when.
07:18And the 3rd Canadian division
07:19was positioned at the hinge
07:21of the Allied line,
07:22directly in the path
07:23of the most likely armored response.
07:26So the men who landed on Juneau
07:28carried more anti-tank weapons
07:29per rifle company
07:31than any Allied infantry force
07:32in the war to that point.
07:34They had trained with those weapons
07:36for months in England.
07:37They had rehearsed specific
07:39anti-tank drills.
07:40Not abstract lectures
07:42about armor thickness
07:43and penetration tables,
07:44but physical drills.
07:46A 6-pounder crew
07:47in the Regina rifles
07:48had practiced unlimbering their gun,
07:51digging it into a hedgerow position,
07:52and firing the first round
07:54in under 90 seconds.
07:56Pite teams had crawled
07:58through English fields
07:59learning to let a moving vehicle
08:00close to 50 yards
08:01before firing,
08:03a distance where the shaped charge
08:04could not miss,
08:05and the crew inside
08:06could not react.
08:08Every one of those drills
08:09was built on a single assumption
08:11that contradicted
08:12everything German tank doctrine
08:14believed about infantry.
08:15The assumption was this.
08:17When a panther appears,
08:19you do not run.
08:20You do not call
08:21for your own tanks.
08:22You hold your position,
08:23you hold your fire,
08:25and you let the panther
08:26come to you.
08:27Because at 1,000 yards,
08:29a panther is invincible.
08:31At 500, it is dangerous.
08:33At 50, it is a target.
08:35But numbers on paper
08:37and drills in English fields
08:38are not combat.
08:40The men who rehearsed
08:41those 90-second gun deployments
08:43had never heard
08:43a panther's engine in the dark.
08:45They had never felt
08:46the ground shake
08:47under 45 tons of moving steel.
08:50They had never had to decide,
08:52in the two seconds
08:53between seeing a muzzle flash
08:54and hearing the round
08:55pass overhead,
08:56whether to fire or flatten.
08:58The first test came 36 hours
09:01after they hit the beach,
09:02and what happened that night
09:04at Brettville
09:04would determine
09:05whether the plan
09:06was a theory or a weapon.
09:08June 8, 1944,
09:10late afternoon.
09:12SS-Standartenfuhr Kurt Meyer
09:14stood in the bell tower
09:15of the Abbe d'Aldene,
09:17west of Caen,
09:18and studied the Canadian positions
09:20through field glasses.
09:22He had already thrown
09:23the Canadians back
09:24from Autie and Buron
09:25the day before,
09:26killing dozens of prisoners
09:28in the process.
09:29His 25th Panzer Grenadier Regiment
09:32had ambushed a column
09:33of the North Nova Scotia Highlanders
09:35and destroyed 28 of their
09:36supporting tanks in minutes.
09:39Meyer was not worried
09:40about Canadian infantry.
09:42That evening,
09:43he ordered Max Wunscher
09:44to take the Panthers
09:45of the 1st Battalion,
09:47SS-Panzer Regiment 12,
09:49and punch through
09:49the Canadian line
09:50at Brettville-Lorgueilleuse.
09:53The village sat
09:54on the Caen-Bayou Highway,
09:55and holding it
09:56meant controlling
09:57the lateral road
09:58that connected
09:58the entire Canadian sector.
10:00If the Panthers
10:02took Brettville,
10:03the Canadians
10:03would be split in half.
10:05Wunscher assembled
10:0622 Panthers,
10:07the first three companies
10:09of his regiment,
10:10plus two batteries
10:11of self-propelled artillery
10:12and a motorcycle company.
10:14Against them
10:15stood the 1st Battalion
10:16of the Regina Rifles,
10:18commanded by
10:18Lieutenant Colonel
10:19Foster Matheson,
10:20dug into slit trenches
10:22and stone buildings
10:23with exactly the weapons
10:24they had rehearsed with
10:25in England.
10:26Six-pounder anti-tank guns,
10:28PI-ATs,
10:29grenades,
10:30and a battalion commander
10:31who had ordered his men
10:32not to fire
10:33until the tanks
10:34were inside the village.
10:36Think about what
10:37that order meant.
10:37Matheson was telling
10:39his riflemen
10:40to sit in their holes
10:41and watch 45-ton tanks
10:43roll past them
10:44in the dark,
10:44engine noise
10:45shaking the ground,
10:46machine guns firing
10:48down the ditches,
10:49muzzle flashes
10:49lighting the street,
10:50and wait.
10:52Not because waiting
10:53was safe,
10:54waiting was suicidal
10:55if the tanks spotted you,
10:56but Matheson understood
10:58something that Meyer
10:58did not.
10:59A Panther at 300 yards
11:01could see a muzzle flash
11:03and traverse its turret
11:04before a six-pounder crew
11:05could reload.
11:06A Panther at 30 yards
11:08could not traverse
11:09fast enough
11:10to hit a man
11:10standing beside its hull.
11:12The attack came
11:13just after midnight.
11:15The first Panther
11:16entered Brettville
11:17from the east,
11:17driving straight down
11:18the main street
11:19toward the church.
11:20The crew did not know
11:22that Canadians
11:22had strung grenades
11:23across the road.
11:25They did not know
11:26that Joe LaPointe
11:27was behind a wall
11:27to their left,
11:2815 meters away,
11:29with a P-I-A-T
11:31braced against his shoulder.
11:33LaPointe fired.
11:34The shaped charge
11:35hit the Panther's flank.
11:37The tank kept moving,
11:3930 meters,
11:40then hit the grenade string.
11:41The track broke.
11:43The tank slewed
11:44into the curb.
11:45LaPointe reloaded.
11:46He had to lie
11:47on his back in the street,
11:49brace his feet
11:49against the shoulder plate,
11:51and haul the massive spring
11:52back until it locked.
11:54While a crippled Panther
11:55sat burning 20 meters away,
11:57and its crew scrambled
11:58out of the hatches.
12:00He fired again.
12:01The tank stopped for good.
12:03Behind it,
12:04a second Panther
12:05saw the flash
12:06of the burning hull
12:07and opened fire,
12:08but in the confusion,
12:10its gunner hit the first Panther
12:11instead of the Canadian position.
12:13The 75-millimeter round
12:15fractured the rear
12:16of the first tank's turret.
12:18The second crew,
12:19now staring at two burning vehicles
12:21blocking the only road
12:22into the village center,
12:23reversed into the dark.
12:25But the battle was not over.
12:27It was not even close.
12:29More Panthers circled the village
12:31from the south and west,
12:33blasting slit trenches
12:34and stone walls.
12:35Parachute flares
12:36turned the sky white.
12:38Buildings caught fire.
12:40A German dispatch rider
12:41on a captured Canadian motorcycle
12:43came roaring
12:44down the main street.
12:46Lieutenant Colonel Matheson
12:47shot him with a Sten gun
12:48from the battalion
12:49headquarters doorway.
12:51A German officer
12:52drove a Volkswagen
12:52up to the headquarters entrance
12:54and stepped out of his car.
12:55A P-I-A-T bomb
12:58hit him directly.
12:59He disintegrated.
13:01Nearby,
13:02Sergeant Major Basil Curry
13:03crouched behind a low wall
13:05with a P-I-A-T
13:06and a dwindling pile of bombs.
13:09Two Panthers were grinding
13:10toward the mortar positions.
13:12Curry fired,
13:13reloaded,
13:14fired again.
13:15Rifleman Sergeant Erwin Wood
13:17pressed flat beside him,
13:19watched every shot.
13:20Years later,
13:21quoted in Mark Milner's history,
13:23Wood described what he saw.
13:24Curry opened fire,
13:26firing as fast
13:27as he could slap the bombs on.
13:29He bounced bombs
13:30off both tanks.
13:31With the last bomb,
13:32he crippled the nearest one.
13:34By dawn,
13:35the SS had pulled back
13:36to Rott's.
13:37They had failed
13:38to take Brettville.
13:3951 Reginas
13:40were dead or wounded,
13:41but the village
13:42and the highway
13:43remained Canadian.
13:45Multiple Panthers
13:46sat burned out
13:47on the streets
13:47and in the surrounding fields,
13:49and inside those wrecked turrets,
13:51something had shifted.
13:53The tank crews
13:53who survived that night
13:55carried a new piece
13:56of information
13:56back to their commanders.
13:58The Canadian infantry
13:59had not called for tanks,
14:01had not retreated
14:02to wait for armored support,
14:04had not done
14:04what infantry does.
14:06They had stood in the dark
14:07at distances
14:08where a man can hear
14:09a tank commander
14:10breathing through an open hatch,
14:12and fired weapons
14:13that gave no flash.
14:14The Panthers
14:15had rolled into Brettville
14:17expecting to scatter riflemen.
14:18What they found
14:20was something else entirely,
14:21and the weapon
14:22that did most of the killing,
14:23the PIAT,
14:25had a characteristic
14:26that no German tank crew
14:28had ever encountered before.
14:30Understanding that characteristic
14:32changes everything
14:33about this story.
14:34Every anti-tank weapon
14:35on the Western Front
14:36in 1944
14:37announced itself
14:38the moment it fired.
14:40An American bazooka
14:41threw a tongue of flame
14:42and a plume of white smoke
14:44out the back of the tube,
14:46backblast that lit up
14:47the firer's position
14:48like a signal flare.
14:49A German Panzerschreck
14:51did the same,
14:52worse.
14:53The crew had to wear gas masks
14:55to avoid inhaling
14:56their own propellant.
14:57A towed anti-tank gun
14:59kicked up a cloud of dust
15:00and debris
15:01with every shot,
15:02and the muzzle flash
15:03at night
15:03was visible
15:04for hundreds of meters.
15:06Even a rifle grenade
15:07left a smoke trail
15:08in the air.
15:09Every one of these weapons
15:11could kill a tank.
15:12But every one of them
15:13also told the tank
15:14exactly where the shooter
15:15was standing.
15:17And a tank that knows
15:18where you are
15:18is a tank that kills you.
15:21A panther's turret
15:22could traverse
15:22a full 360 degrees
15:24in 18 seconds.
15:26A coaxial machine gun
15:27could put 30 rounds
15:29into a hedgerow
15:29before a bazooka team
15:30could crawl 2 meters.
15:32The equation was brutal,
15:34but honest.
15:35You fire,
15:36you reveal yourself,
15:37and you have about 4 seconds
15:39before the tank fires back.
15:41The PIAT broke that equation.
15:44The projector,
15:45infantry,
15:46anti-tank
15:47did not use combustion.
15:48There was no rocket motor,
15:50no propellant charge
15:51in the tube.
15:52The bomb was launched
15:53by a massive coiled spring
15:55and a spigot,
15:56a steel rod
15:57that struck a cartridge
15:58in the tail
15:59of the projectile.
16:00The result was a weapon
16:01that produced
16:02almost no flash,
16:03almost no smoke,
16:05and almost no sound.
16:06A dull thud,
16:08a metallic clang,
16:09and a 2.5 pound
16:11shaped charge
16:11flying at a tank's flank
16:13from a position
16:14that the crew inside
16:14could not locate.
16:16Picture what that meant
16:17for a Panther crew
16:18rolling through
16:19a Norman hedgerow
16:20at night.
16:21A bang.
16:22Not the sharp crack
16:23of an anti-tank gun,
16:24not the whoosh
16:25of a rocket,
16:26but something muffled,
16:27directionless.
16:29Then an explosion
16:30against the hull.
16:31The driver slams the hatch,
16:33the gunner traverses,
16:34the commander screams
16:36for a direction.
16:37But there is no smoke trail
16:39hanging in the air,
16:40no burning backblast
16:42illuminating a ditch,
16:43no second shot
16:45from the same position
16:46because the PIAT team
16:48has already crawled
16:4910 meters to the left
16:50and is reloading
16:51behind a stone wall.
16:53The tank cannot see
16:54what is killing it.
16:55Now multiply that
16:57by the bocage,
16:58the hedgerow country
16:59south of the Normandy beaches.
17:01Centuries-old earthen banks,
17:032 to 4 meters high,
17:05topped with dense tangles
17:07of hawthorn and oak.
17:08Every field,
17:09a closed room.
17:11Every lane,
17:11a corridor.
17:13Visibility,
17:1450 to 100 meters
17:15in any direction.
17:16A panther that dominated
17:18open ground
17:19at a thousand yards
17:20was blind here.
17:21Its width made it struggle
17:23on the narrow,
17:24sunken lanes.
17:25Its long gun barrel
17:26caught on branches
17:27and walls
17:28during traversal.
17:29And every hedgerow
17:30could hide a man
17:31with a spring-loaded tube
17:32who would remain invisible
17:34after firing.
17:35General Fritz Beierlein,
17:37commanding the
17:37Panzerlehr division,
17:38one of the finest
17:39armored formations
17:40Germany possessed,
17:41reported to his superiors
17:43in language that
17:44career officers rarely used.
17:46The panther,
17:47he wrote,
17:47proved ill-adapted
17:48to the terrain.
17:49He praised the Sherman
17:51for its maneuverability.
17:52The panther,
17:53he said,
17:53was poorly suited
17:54for hedgerow country
17:55because of its width.
17:56But Beierlein
17:57was describing
17:58a mechanical problem.
17:59The deeper problem
18:00was human.
18:01His tank crews
18:02were developing a behavior
18:03that no training manual
18:05covered.
18:05They were slowing down,
18:07stopping at hedgerow gaps
18:08instead of driving through,
18:10requesting infantry
18:11to clear the next field
18:12before they advanced.
18:13In the doctrine
18:14they had been taught,
18:15tanks led
18:16and infantry followed.
18:18Now,
18:18in the Canadian sector,
18:20tank commanders
18:20were asking infantry
18:21to go first,
18:22because the invisible weapons
18:24in the hedgerows
18:24were doing something
18:25to morale
18:26that 80mm armor plate
18:27could not fix.
18:29A panther crew
18:30could study an enemy Sherman.
18:31They knew its weak spots,
18:33the hull sides,
18:34the turret ring,
18:35the ammunition storage
18:36behind the driver.
18:37They could calculate
18:38deflection angles,
18:39estimate range
18:40by the size of the silhouette,
18:42predict where it would move
18:43based on terrain.
18:44Armor was a known problem
18:46with known solutions.
18:47But a man lying in a ditch
18:49with a PIAT
18:50had no silhouette,
18:51no engine noise,
18:52no dust trail.
18:54He did not move
18:55until he chose to,
18:56and the weapon he carried
18:57gave the tank
18:58no warning
18:58and no direction.
19:00That was the first layer
19:01of what German tank crews meant.
19:03Armor was a visible enemy.
19:05Canadian infantry
19:06infantry was not.
19:07But invisibility alone
19:09does not explain
19:10what happened
19:10over the next four months.
19:12Because the PIAT
19:14was only one weapon
19:15in a system,
19:16and the system
19:17had a depth
19:17that no single encounter
19:19could reveal.
19:20What the German tank crews
19:22had not yet discovered
19:23was that the man
19:24with the PIAT
19:25was never alone.
19:27He was the closest layer.
19:29Behind him
19:30were five more.
19:32And each one
19:33was calibrated
19:33to kill
19:34at a different range.
19:35A German tank column
19:37approaching a Canadian
19:38infantry position
19:39in Normandy
19:39moved through layers
19:40of death,
19:41and the geometry
19:42of those layers
19:43was the opposite
19:44of what any tank commander
19:45expected.
19:46At a thousand yards,
19:47the range where a Panther
19:49felt safest,
19:50the 17-pounder
19:51anti-tank guns
19:52of the divisional
19:53anti-tank regiment
19:54opened the killing.
19:55The 17-pounder
19:57was the best allied
19:58anti-tank gun
19:59of the war.
19:59Its armor-piercing round
20:01left the barrel
20:02at nearly 3,000 feet
20:03per second
20:04and could punch
20:05through a Panther's
20:05front plate
20:06at 500 yards.
20:08At a thousand,
20:09it could still crack
20:10the side armor
20:10of anything the Germans
20:11fielded.
20:13These guns sat
20:14behind the infantry,
20:15dug into reverse
20:16slope positions,
20:17camouflaged and silent
20:18until the first tank
20:19entered their field of fire.
20:21One round,
20:22one kill.
20:23Then the crew
20:24waited for the next.
20:25At 700 yards,
20:27still open ground,
20:28still a range
20:29where a Panther crew
20:30felt they were fighting
20:31a gunnery problem.
20:32The 6-pounder
20:33anti-tank guns
20:34of the infantry battalion
20:36opened up.
20:37Six per battalion.
20:39Smaller than the 17-pounder,
20:41lighter,
20:41faster to reposition.
20:43A 6-pounder
20:44could not kill a Panther
20:45from the front,
20:46but it could kill
20:47a Panzer IV,
20:48and it could cripple
20:49a Panther's tracks,
20:50its optics,
20:51its engine deck
20:52from the side.
20:53The crews who fired them
20:55had trained to hold fire
20:56until the tank
20:57presented a flank,
20:58which meant letting
20:59the tank drive
21:00past the gun's position
21:01before pulling the lanyard.
21:03Side shots,
21:04rear shots,
21:05never frontal.
21:07At 400 yards,
21:08the M10 tank destroyers
21:10joined the fight.
21:11Built on Sherman chassis
21:13with open turrets
21:14and 3-inch guns,
21:15the M10s were not tanks.
21:17They were ambush vehicles.
21:19They sat in defilade,
21:20hull hidden behind a rise,
21:22only the gun visible,
21:23and waited.
21:24Their 3-inch gun
21:26could kill a Panther
21:27at this range
21:27with a flank shot.
21:29And because their turrets
21:30were open-topped,
21:31the commanders
21:32had better visibility
21:33than any buttoned-up Panther crew
21:35trying to peer
21:35through armored glass.
21:37At 200 yards,
21:39a distance that a Panther
21:40could cross
21:40in under 10 seconds,
21:42the Bren gunners
21:43opened fire.
21:44Not to kill the tank,
21:46to blind it.
21:47A Bren gun firing
21:48into the vision slits
21:49of a Panther
21:50forced the driver
21:51to close his periscope covers.
21:53A blinded tank slows down.
21:55A tank that slows down
21:57in a hedgerow lane
21:58is a tank that has already
22:00entered the range
22:00of the weapon
22:01it cannot see.
22:03At 50 yards,
22:04the PIAT teams fired.
22:06And here is what
22:07that layered system
22:08meant in practice.
22:10A German tank column
22:11approaching
22:12a Canadian battalion position
22:13did not encounter
22:14one threat
22:15and then safety.
22:16It encountered
22:17escalating danger.
22:19Every 100 yards closer
22:21brought a new weapon
22:22into play.
22:22And the weapons
22:24did not thin out
22:24as the range closed.
22:26They got denser.
22:27The final 50 yards,
22:29the space where
22:30a tank commander
22:30expected infantry to scatter,
22:32was the most lethal ground
22:34on the battlefield.
22:35Because at 50 yards,
22:36the PIAT teams
22:37fired from positions
22:38they had chosen
22:39hours earlier,
22:40from angles the tank
22:42could not cover,
22:43with a weapon
22:43the tank could not see.
22:45And if the shaped charge
22:46did not kill the tank,
22:48the infantry was close enough
22:49to throw grenades
22:50into the open hatches.
22:51The entire system
22:52was designed
22:53to do one thing,
22:54invert the psychology
22:56of the tank-infantry encounter.
22:58In standard doctrine,
22:59a tank's survival
23:00increased as it closed
23:01with infantry.
23:02Distance protected infantry.
23:04Proximity favored the tank.
23:06The Canadian system
23:07reversed that.
23:08The closer a tank
23:09got to Canadian infantry,
23:11the more likely
23:11it was to die.
23:12On the morning
23:13of June 9, 1944,
23:16Lieutenant Gordon Henry
23:17of the First Hussars
23:18sat in the turret
23:19of his Sherman Firefly
23:20near Norrie-en-Bassin,
23:22a village held
23:23by Canadian infantry
23:24just east of Brettville.
23:25A column of Panthers
23:27from SS Panzer Regiment 12
23:29came down the road,
23:31expecting to find
23:32the same riflemen
23:33they had pushed around
23:34the day before.
23:35They found
23:36the layered system instead.
23:38Henry's Firefly,
23:39armed with a 17-pounder gun,
23:42opened fire
23:42and destroyed
23:43five Panthers
23:44in under two minutes.
23:46The infantry PI-8s
23:48and six-pounders
23:49caught the rest
23:49from the flanks.
23:50The column ceased to exist.
23:53That engagement
23:54lasted less time
23:55than it takes
23:56to read this paragraph.
23:57But the men
23:58who survived it
23:59carried the experience
24:00back to every Panther crew
24:01in the 12th SS.
24:03And the experience
24:04was this.
24:05The Canadian position
24:06did not weaken
24:07as you approached it.
24:08It hardened.
24:10The killing did not stop
24:11when you closed the range.
24:13It intensified.
24:14And the final layer,
24:16the men with the spring-loaded tubes
24:18and the patience
24:18to wait at 30 yards,
24:20was the layer
24:21you never saw coming.
24:22But there is a difference
24:23between a system
24:24that works in Norman hedgerows
24:26and a truth
24:27about what infantry can become.
24:29Because the deepest test
24:31of whether Canadian soldiers
24:32were genuinely harder
24:33to kill than armor
24:34did not happen
24:35in the bocage,
24:36where terrain gave them cover
24:37and numbers gave them depth.
24:39It happened five months later,
24:41on a flooded riverbank
24:42in Italy
24:43where a single man
24:44with a PIAT
24:45stood between three Panther tanks
24:47and an entire bridgehead
24:48with no hedgerows,
24:50no six-pounders,
24:51no 17-pounders,
24:52no system at all.
24:54Just nerve.
24:55October 21, 1944.
24:57The Savio River,
24:59Northern Italy.
25:00Torrential Rain.
25:02Private Ernest Alvia Smith,
25:04known to every man
25:05in the Seaforth Highlanders
25:06of Canada as smoky,
25:08crouched in a ditch
25:10on the German side
25:11of a river
25:11that was trying to kill him
25:12before the Germans could.
25:14The Savio had risen
25:16six feet in five hours.
25:18The vertical mud banks
25:19had collapsed
25:20into the current.
25:21The engineers had looked
25:22at the crossing site,
25:23looked at the water,
25:24and said what engineers say
25:26when the mathematics
25:27do not work.
25:28No bridge.
25:29No tanks,
25:30no anti-tank guns.
25:32Nothing heavier
25:33than what a man
25:34could carry on his back
25:35was getting across
25:36that river tonight.
25:37Two companies of Seaforths
25:39had already crossed.
25:40They were consolidating
25:41a bridgehead
25:42on the far bank,
25:43a rectangle of muddy ground
25:45roughly 400 yards wide,
25:47when the ground
25:47began to shake.
25:48Three Mark V Panthers
25:50of the German
25:5126th Panzer Division,
25:53supported by two
25:54self-propelled guns
25:55and approximately
25:5630 infantry,
25:57came out of the darkness
25:58on the road
25:59that led straight
25:59into the bridgehead.
26:01The Seaforths
26:02had no armor,
26:04no towed guns,
26:05no 17-pounders,
26:07no M-10s,
26:08no layered system.
26:09They had rifles,
26:11Thompson submachine guns,
26:13grenades,
26:14and two PI-80s.
26:16That was the entire
26:17inventory of anti-tank
26:19capability
26:19available to 200 men
26:21facing 150 tons
26:23of moving steel.
26:25Remember what the system
26:26in Normandy looked like?
26:28The 1,000-yard ring
26:29of 17-pounders,
26:31the 700-yard ring
26:32of 6-pounders,
26:34the 400-yard ring
26:35of M-10s,
26:36the 200-yard ring
26:38of Bren Fire,
26:39and the 50-yard ring
26:40of PI-80s.
26:42Strip all of that away,
26:44every ring,
26:46every layer,
26:47leave only the innermost one,
26:50the man with the spring-loaded tube
26:52in the dark.
26:54That was the Savio River
26:55on the night of October 21st.
26:58Smokey Smith was 30 years old.
27:01He had been born
27:02in New Westminster,
27:03British Columbia.
27:04He had been promoted
27:06to corporal nine times
27:07during his service
27:08with the Seaforths.
27:10He had been demoted
27:11back to private nine times.
27:13The reasons varied,
27:15but the pattern did not.
27:17Smith did not take orders
27:18he considered stupid,
27:20did not stay quiet
27:21when he disagreed
27:22with an officer,
27:23and did not pretend
27:24to be someone he was not.
27:26He had landed in Sicily
27:28in 43,
27:29fought through Ortona,
27:30been wounded twice,
27:32and by October of 44
27:33was one of the most experienced
27:35infantry soldiers
27:36in the Canadian army.
27:38Also,
27:39one of the most insubordinate.
27:41The fact that he was still
27:42a private after four years
27:43of combat
27:44told you everything
27:45about the man
27:46and nothing about his ability.
27:48He led his P.I.A.T. group,
27:51two men,
27:52across an open field
27:53toward the road.
27:54No cover.
27:56No hedgerow.
27:57Flat ground
27:58under parachute flares
27:59with three panthers
28:00grinding toward them.
28:02He positioned one man
28:03on the P.I.A.T.,
28:04then crossed the road
28:05with private Jimmy Tennant
28:07to find a second P.I.A.T.
28:09They found one
28:10almost immediately.
28:11What they also found
28:12was a panther
28:13coming straight down the road,
28:14machine guns firing
28:16along the ditch line.
28:17Tennant was hit.
28:18A burst caught him
28:19in the shoulder
28:20and dropped him
28:21into the mud.
28:22Smith grabbed the P.I.A.T.,
28:24turned toward 45 tons
28:25of panther
28:26and held his ground.
28:27Ten meters.
28:29He let the tank close
28:30to ten meters.
28:31Thirty feet.
28:32A distance where he could
28:34see the mud
28:34caked on the drive sprocket,
28:36hear the squeal
28:37of the track pins,
28:38feel the heat
28:39of the exhaust
28:39pushing against his chest.
28:41At ten meters,
28:42a panther fills
28:43your entire field of vision.
28:45Its hole is a wall.
28:46Its gun barrel
28:47passes over your head.
28:49In the coaxial machine gun,
28:51the one aimed
28:52wherever the main gun aims,
28:53is pointed directly
28:54at your face.
28:55He fired.
28:57The P.I.A.T. bomb
28:58hit the panther's flank
28:59and detonated.
29:00The tank lurched,
29:02slewed,
29:02and stopped.
29:03The engine died.
29:05The infantry riding
29:06on the back
29:06of the panther
29:07dismounted.
29:08German soldiers
29:09spilled off the hull,
29:11four,
29:11five,
29:12six men,
29:13and rushed
29:13Smith's position.
29:15He dropped the P.I.A.T.,
29:17picked up his
29:18Thompson submachine gun,
29:19and fired.
29:20Four Germans fell.
29:22The rest scattered
29:23back into the dark.
29:25A second panther
29:26moved up the road.
29:27Its commander
29:28had seen the first tank die
29:29and was looking
29:30for the weapon
29:31that killed it.
29:32But there was
29:32no smoke trail,
29:33no rocket flare,
29:35no burning backblast
29:36to mark the spot.
29:37The P.I.A.T.
29:38had given Smith
29:39the same gift
29:40it gave Joe LaPointe
29:41at Breadville,
29:42invisibility.
29:44The second panther
29:45fired its machine guns
29:46into the ditches,
29:47raking the ground
29:48on both sides
29:49of the road,
29:49but it was shooting
29:50at a position
29:51Smith had already left.
29:53He had dragged Tennant,
29:54shoulder wound,
29:55bleeding,
29:56semi-conscious,
29:57behind a low wall
29:58and was reloading.
30:00The second P.I.A.T.
30:01round hit
30:02the second panther.
30:03The damage was enough
30:04to disorient the crew.
30:06The tank reversed,
30:07veered off the road,
30:08and wandered
30:09in a strange direction.
30:11The driver's optics
30:12were cracked.
30:13The commander
30:13was screaming bearings
30:14that no longer
30:15matched the terrain.
30:16It withdrew.
30:18Smith carried Tennant
30:19to cover,
30:20applied a field dressing
30:21to the shoulder wound,
30:22and then,
30:23alone,
30:24with a Thompson
30:25and whatever ammunition
30:26he had left,
30:27went back.
30:28The rest of the German force
30:29was still pressing
30:30the bridgehead.
30:31Smith counter-attacked
30:32into them on foot.
30:34By the time
30:34the action ended,
30:36the Canadians
30:36had destroyed
30:37three Panthers,
30:38two self-propelled guns,
30:39a half-track,
30:40and a scout car.
30:41The bridgehead held.
30:43And the man
30:44most responsible
30:45for holding it
30:45was a private
30:46who had been demoted
30:47nine times
30:48for not following orders,
30:50but who followed
30:51the one order
30:51that mattered.
30:52The order
30:53that the entire
30:54Canadian infantry system
30:55was built on,
30:56the order rehearsed
30:57in English fields
30:58and proven
30:58in Norman hedgerows,
31:00the order that
31:00contradicted
31:01everything Armored
31:02Doctrine believed
31:03about what happens
31:04when a tank
31:04meets a man
31:05in the open.
31:06Do not run.
31:08Let it come to you.
31:10And fire at a range
31:11where you cannot miss.
31:13What Smokey Smith
31:15did at the Savio
31:16was not what the system
31:17was designed for.
31:18The system assumed
31:19depth, layers,
31:20overlapping fields of fire.
31:22Smith had none of that.
31:23What he had
31:24was the mentality
31:25the system was built
31:26to create.
31:27An infantryman
31:28who looked at a Panther
31:29and saw a target,
31:30not a death sentence.
31:31And that mentality
31:33was the thing
31:33German tank crews
31:34could not understand
31:35and could not defeat.
31:38But the full weight
31:39of what Smith's action meant,
31:41what it proved
31:41about Canadian infantry
31:43and what it cost
31:44the men inside the tanks
31:45who faced them
31:46would not become clear
31:47until the reports
31:48were written
31:49and the prisoners
31:50were questioned.
31:51And what those prisoners said
31:52changes the meaning
31:54of everything
31:54you have heard so far.
31:56The reports
31:56came in fragments.
31:58Prisoner interrogations
31:59from the 12th SS
32:00after Normandy,
32:02after action assessments
32:03from panzerlaer officers
32:04captured in the fillet's pocket.
32:07Debriefings of tank crews
32:08pulled out of the Scheldt
32:09in the Rhineland.
32:10They were written
32:11by different intelligence officers
32:12in different sectors
32:14across different months.
32:15But read together,
32:17they described
32:17the same phenomenon.
32:19German tank crews
32:20had developed
32:21a specific fear
32:22of the Canadian sector.
32:23Not a general anxiety
32:25about combat.
32:26These were men
32:26who had fought at Kursk,
32:28at Kharkov,
32:28on the Dnieper.
32:29They understood
32:30armored warfare.
32:31They understood casualties.
32:33What they did not understand
32:35was an infantry force
32:36that violated
32:37the basic psychological contract
32:39between tanks
32:40and foot soldiers.
32:41That contract,
32:42unwritten but universal
32:44on every front
32:45since Poland,
32:45said that when armor appeared,
32:47infantry's job
32:48was to survive,
32:49dig in,
32:50call for support,
32:51and wait for the steel
32:52to pass.
32:53The tank's advantage
32:54was not just firepower.
32:56It was fear.
32:57The sound of the engine,
32:59the sight of the turret
33:00traversing toward your position,
33:02the knowledge that the machine gun
33:04could fire 500 rounds per minute
33:06and you had a rifle.
33:08Fear was the tank's primary weapon,
33:10and on every front
33:11against every army,
33:12it worked.
33:13Against Canadian infantry,
33:15it stopped working.
33:17The prisoners described
33:19the same pattern
33:19from different angles.
33:21Tanks would advance
33:22into a position
33:22that appeared empty.
33:23No anti-tank guns visible,
33:26no armor in the field,
33:27just hedgerows
33:28and stone walls
33:29and silence.
33:30The crew would begin
33:31to relax.
33:32And then,
33:33a sound they could not locate,
33:35a hit they could not trace,
33:37and a track
33:37or an engine
33:38or a crew member gone.
33:40The surviving tanks
33:41would pull back,
33:42regroup,
33:43advance again
33:44along a different axis.
33:46The same thing would happen.
33:48One encounter like that
33:49was bad luck,
33:50two was a problem.
33:51After the third or fourth,
33:53something changed
33:54inside the turret.
33:56The driver began
33:56to hesitate
33:57at gaps in the hedgerows.
33:59The gunner began
34:00to traverse toward movement
34:01that was not there.
34:02The commander,
34:03who in doctrine
34:04was supposed to ride
34:05with his head
34:06above the hatch
34:06for visibility,
34:07began to button up,
34:09sealing himself
34:09inside the turret
34:10where he could see
34:11almost nothing.
34:12A buttoned-up tank
34:14in bocage terrain
34:15was a half-blind animal,
34:16and half-blind animals
34:18make mistakes.
34:19The mistakes compounded.
34:21A panther that hesitated
34:22at a hedgerow gap
34:23gave a six-pounder crew
34:25an extra three seconds
34:26to aim.
34:27A tank column
34:28that slowed its advance
34:29gave the Canadian forward observer
34:31time to call in artillery,
34:33and the Canadian artillery system
34:34could drop a regimental concentration
34:36on a grid reference
34:37in under four minutes.
34:39A commander who buttoned up
34:41lost his peripheral vision,
34:42which meant he could not see
34:43the PIAT team
34:45crawling along the ditch
34:46to his left
34:46until the bomb
34:47was already in the air.
34:49The fear created
34:50the vulnerability.
34:51The vulnerability
34:52created more fear.
34:54And the cycle fed itself
34:55across weeks and months
34:57until,
34:58by the autumn of 1944,
35:00German armored units
35:01in the Canadian sector
35:02were exhibiting a behavior
35:03that would have been
35:04unthinkable in June.
35:05They were refusing to advance
35:07without infantry
35:08clearing the route ahead.
35:09Think about what that means.
35:11Tanks asking infantry
35:12to protect them
35:13from infantry.
35:14The entire hierarchy
35:16of the mechanized battlefield,
35:17the assumption
35:18that armor leads
35:19and infantry follows,
35:20that the tank
35:21is the apex predator
35:22and the rifleman
35:23is prey,
35:24inverted.
35:25Not by a wonder weapon,
35:26not by air superiority,
35:28not by a new tank design,
35:30by men with spring-loaded tubes
35:32and the discipline
35:33to wait at ranges
35:33where waiting
35:34should have been impossible.
35:35That was the deepest layer
35:37of what the phrase meant.
35:38Armor was predictable.
35:40You could study
35:41a Sherman's weak spots,
35:42calculate a 17-pounder's
35:43trajectory,
35:44predict where an M-10
35:46would set up its ambush.
35:47Armor obeyed physics.
35:49It had specifications.
35:50It followed doctrine.
35:52You could write a manual
35:53on how to defeat it,
35:55and the manual
35:55would work next time.
35:58Canadian infantry
35:59did not obey a manual.
36:00They adapted.
36:02At Bretville,
36:03the Reginas improvised
36:04a mine from 75 grenades
36:06tied to a cord.
36:08At Nori,
36:09the six-pounder crews
36:10held fire
36:10until Panthers
36:11drove past them
36:12and then shot them
36:13in the rear.
36:14At the Savio,
36:15a single private
36:16closed to 10 meters
36:18because the system
36:18he had been trained in
36:19told him that 10 meters
36:21was where a panther
36:22stopped being invincible
36:23and became a box
36:24full of men
36:25who could not see him.
36:26Every engagement
36:27was different.
36:28Every tactic
36:29was local.
36:30And the men
36:31who executed
36:32those tactics
36:32were not specialists.
36:34They were riflemen,
36:35farmer's sons
36:36from Saskatchewan
36:37and mill workers
36:38from New Brunswick
36:39and fishermen
36:39from Nova Scotia
36:40who had been taught
36:41one idea so thoroughly
36:43that it became instinct.
36:44You do not hide from tanks.
36:46You kill them.
36:47The 12th SS Panzer Division,
36:50the formation that had rolled
36:51into Bretville in June
36:53with 22 Panthers
36:54and the confidence
36:55of youth and ideology,
36:57ceased to exist
36:58as a fighting force
36:59by September of 1944.
37:02Of its 21,500 men,
37:05barely 1,500 remained.
37:07Its panthers
37:08were burned out holes
37:09in Norman fields
37:10and ditches.
37:11Its officers
37:12were dead or captured.
37:13Its war diary,
37:15recovered after the war,
37:16recorded engagement
37:17after engagement
37:18with Canadian infantry
37:20in language
37:20that grew progressively shorter,
37:22progressively more exhausted,
37:24and progressively more bewildered.
37:26They had arrived in Normandy
37:28believing they would drive
37:29the Canadians into the sea.
37:31Three months later,
37:32their tank crews
37:33were asking infantry
37:34to walk ahead of them
37:35on open roads.
37:37And the man
37:38whose action
37:38at the Savio River
37:39proved that the Canadian mentality
37:41could survive
37:42without the system,
37:44that it lived in the soldier,
37:45not in the organization chart,
37:47received a letter
37:48from Buckingham Palace
37:49in December of 1944.
37:52The night before the ceremony,
37:54his officers locked him
37:55in a jail cell in Rome
37:56to keep him out of trouble.
37:58Private Smokey Smith
37:59stood in Buckingham Palace
38:01on a December morning
38:02in 1944 wearing a uniform
38:05that fit him worse
38:06than any he had worn in combat
38:07and received the Victoria Cross
38:10from the hands of King George VI.
38:13He was the only Canadian private soldier
38:15to earn it in the entire war.
38:17He never talked about the Savio
38:19the way citation writers
38:20talked about it.
38:22When people asked him later,
38:23decades later,
38:25in television interviews
38:26and school visits
38:27and legion halls,
38:28what he had been thinking
38:29when he led a panther
38:30close to 10 meters,
38:32he said what men like him
38:33always said.
38:35He said he was doing his job.
38:37He went home to British Columbia
38:39after the war,
38:40worked for the government,
38:42never lost the edge,
38:43the voice,
38:44the directness,
38:45the absolute refusal
38:46to be impressed by rank.
38:48He lived to be 91 years old,
38:51the last surviving Canadian
38:52Victoria Cross recipient
38:54of the Second World War,
38:55and died in Vancouver
38:57on the 3rd of August, 2005.
39:00His funeral procession
39:02went through streets
39:02where people stood in silence
39:04for a man most of them
39:05had never met.
39:07Joe LaPointe,
39:08the rifleman who killed a panther
39:10at 15 meters
39:11on the main street of Brettville,
39:13survived the war.
39:14The photograph of him
39:16standing beside
39:16the burned-out panther,
39:18taken by a Canadian Army photographer
39:20on the morning of June 9th,
39:21became one of the most reproduced images
39:24of the Normandy campaign.
39:25He is standing with his P.I.A.T. team,
39:29rifleman Gil Kearney
39:30and Lance Corporal Clarence something,
39:32the records are not complete,
39:34looking at the tank he stopped
39:35with a weapon
39:36that weighed less than his pack.
39:38He looks tired.
39:39He does not look like a man
39:41who thinks he did anything extraordinary.
39:43He looks like a man
39:45who wants to sleep.
39:46The Regina Rifles
39:47held Brettville-Lorgueilleuse
39:49for the entire campaign for Cannes.
39:51The village never fell.
39:53Of all the ground
39:54taken by Canadian infantry
39:55in the first days after D-Day,
39:57Brettville was among the most attacked
39:59and among the least yielded.
40:01Lieutenant Colonel Matheson,
40:03the battalion commander
40:04who ordered his men
40:05to hold fire
40:06until the Panthers
40:06were inside the village,
40:08continued to lead the Regina
40:09through the Falaise Pocket,
40:11the Scheldt,
40:11and the Rhineland.
40:13His decision on the night of June 8th
40:15was not courage
40:15in the way movies depict courage.
40:18It was something colder.
40:19It was the decision to trust
40:21that his men would do
40:22what they had rehearsed
40:23at distances where rehearsal
40:25and reality are separated
40:26by a heartbeat
40:27against an enemy
40:28that outweighed them
40:29by a factor of a thousand.
40:31They did what they had rehearsed.
40:33The 12th SS Panzer Division,
40:35Hitlerjugend,
40:36the formation that Kurt Mayer
40:38had led with such ferocity
40:40and such criminality
40:41from the bell tower
40:42of the Abbe Dardenne,
40:43lost its Panthers,
40:45its half-tracks,
40:46its self-propelled guns,
40:47and most of its young soldiers
40:49in the fields and lanes
40:50between Caen and Falaise.
40:53Mayer himself was captured
40:54in Belgium
40:54in September of 1944.
40:57He was later convicted
40:58of responsibility
40:59for the murder
41:00of Canadian prisoners of war.
41:01The boys he commanded,
41:03many of them 17 and 18 years old,
41:06had been told
41:06they would throw the invasion
41:07back into the channel.
41:09Instead,
41:10they learned
41:10what every German armored unit
41:12in the Canadian sector
41:13eventually learned,
41:14that the men in the hedgerows
41:15did not behave
41:16the way infantry
41:17was supposed to behave,
41:18and that no amount
41:19of armor plate
41:20could protect you
41:21from an enemy
41:21you could not see
41:22and could not frighten.
41:24Here is the quiet truth
41:25at the center of this story.
41:27The tank was not designed
41:28to destroy infantry
41:29with its gun.
41:31It was designed
41:32to destroy infantry
41:33with its presence.
41:34The engine noise,
41:35the ground tremor,
41:37the rotating turret,
41:38the certain knowledge
41:39that the machine
41:40in front of you
41:40could kill everyone
41:41in your platoon
41:42and you could not
41:43scratch its paint.
41:44That was the weapon.
41:46Fear.
41:47And for five years,
41:49on every front,
41:50it worked.
41:51Infantry ran,
41:52or froze,
41:53or called for its own armor.
41:55The contract held.
41:57Canadian infantry broke the contract.
41:59Not with a secret weapon.
42:01Not with superior tanks.
42:03Not with a technological advantage
42:04of any kind.
42:05They broke it
42:06with a 13-pound,
42:08spring-loaded tube
42:09that had an effective range
42:10of 50 yards,
42:11a system that placed
42:12anti-tank capability
42:14at every level
42:15from platoon to division,
42:16and an institutional culture
42:18that told every rifleman
42:19in the army,
42:20from the farms of Alberta
42:22to the fishing villages
42:23of Cape Breton,
42:24that a tank is not a god.
42:26It is a machine.
42:27And machines have blind spots.
42:29The men inside the Panthers
42:31learned that lesson
42:32in the dark,
42:33at ranges where learning
42:35comes too late.
42:36And what they reported,
42:38the phrase that echoes
42:39through the interrogation transcripts
42:41and after-action assessments
42:42and unit diaries
42:43of the summer and autumn of 1944,
42:46was not a complaint
42:47about a weapon or a tactic.
42:49It was an admission
42:50about what they felt.
42:51They felt that the men
42:53in the hedgerows
42:53were harder to kill
42:54than the tanks in the open.
42:56Because the tanks could be seen.
42:58The tanks could be studied.
43:00The tanks obeyed rules.
43:02The Canadians did not.
43:05Thank you for watching this one
43:06all the way through.
43:07These stories take a long time
43:09to research
43:09and a long time to tell.
43:11And the fact that you stayed
43:12means more than I can say.
43:14If you think this story
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43:16by more people,
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43:20And if you are not yet subscribed,
43:22I would be glad to have you here.
43:24We tell a new story every week.
43:27If anyone in your family
43:28served with the Canadian forces
43:30or fought alongside them,
43:32I would be honored
43:33to hear about it
43:33in the comments.
43:34You
43:34You
43:34You
43:34units.
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