Tank Killers: A History of America's World War II Tank Destroyer Force

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It was tanks that led me to tank destroyers (TDs). While researching Steel Victory, The Heroic Story of America’s Independent Tank Battalions at War in Europe (Presidio Press, 2003), I frequently encountered this other presence: A doctrinal division between the tank and tank destroyer forces that left tankers poorly equipped to deal with heavy German panzers, references to tank destroyers in radio logs and after-action reports (AARs), a photograph of an M4 and an M10 fighting side by side in the streets of Aachen. Then a friend and colleague handed me a copy of Dr. Christopher R. Gabel’s short work on tank destroyer doctrine, part of the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College’s Leavenworth Papers series. I was hooked.

The tank destroyer was a bold—if some would say flawed—answer to the new challenge posed by the seemingly unstoppable blitzkrieg. The tank killers were in on the fighting from the start in both American theaters, from the losing battle against Japan in the Philippines and the Allied landings in North Africa. The history of the TD battalions is woven into that of the American fighting formations in World War II. This work examines their battle against Hitler’s Germany, for it was the struggle against the panzers that determined the destiny of the Tank Destroyer Force. Other battalions fought in the Pacific under conditions bearing no relationship to those anticipated in tank destroyer doctrine.

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