Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1952-01-14
Army Forced Gamble
On Infested Tanks
Won, Collins Reveals
Chief Of Stoff Says Move
Soved One Full Year in
VitoI Production Time

rO1t4 ANOA, Ay., Od11s IT.
Gen. j. Lawton Collins. Army
Chief of Staff. said today the
Army was forced to gamble"
when it ordered production of new
tank designs before service tests
were made, but that initial
serious deficiencies" have been
overcome and the gamble won.
Gen. Collins speech at the an
nual meeting Of the United States
Armor Association clarified q sit
uation produced by reports that
many light and medium tanks
failed to pass inspection. Con-
fusion had arisen from an OBJ
scurely worded Army explanation
The Army Chief of Staff ex-
planned that when the Korean
War started there were no light
tanks in production; no medium
tanks had been produced since
World War II, although about 800
World War II Pershing mediums
were being equipped with new en-
gines. and heavy tanks were Still
only on paper"
The decision was to make a
family of three new tanks-light.
medium and heavy.
Gen. Collins said:
"After a careful review of all
factors, we decided that since the
prototype of the light tank had
undergone extensive testing we
could afford to gamble on it. In
the medium field we were not in
so fortunate a position. However,
we still decided to go ahead and
use the new high velocity 80 MILL
meter gun.
Mounted on Pershing.
"To keep the gamble to a mini
mum, we decided to take the
newly designed turret and mount
it on the chassis Of the combat
proven Gen. Pershing. This COM
bination, now known as the MAT,
was placed in production late in
the summer Of 1851.
= Eve were also forced to take
other CANDLES. Since IL to 10
months lead time is required from
the time a contract is let until
the first tank comes off the pro-
duction line, we decided to forego
the normal procedure of building
pilot models for engineering and
service tests. We felt that if any
deficiencies occurred they could
be corrected in the early phases
Of production, or modified later
before issue to troops.
ut is history now that we did
find serious deficiencies in both
the new light and medium tanks.
And, as was expected. they were
generally confined to the turret
components. Early tests re-
vealed Is major deficiencies in
the medium tank and about the
same number in the light tank
which would have to be corrected
before these tanks could be con-
sidered suitable for general issue
to troops.
Could Not Be FOreseen.
"Most Of the deficiencies could
not have been foreseen and were
to be expected in the production
of INFESTED vehicles. In the light
tank, for example, two unusual
existed. One was an
engine failure, the other a torsion
bar "a unit Of the transmission
failure. Both were traced to
manufacturing errors.
"All of the deficiencies which /
have referred to have been cor
rected in the vehicles now coming
of the production lines. The modi-
ficationS Of the medium tanks are
now being tested at Camp Irwin,
Calf, and the light tanks are be-
ing tested at Camp Drum, N. 2,
the latter part Of this month. It
is our belief that the outcome of
these tests win further prove that
our new tanks are better than
anything we have had before and
more than match for their So
Wet counterparts.
Despite our troubles we are still
q year ahead Of the time schedule
We would have been on had we
waited for complete test and de-
velopment before going into pro-
duction. In other words, it has
been worth the gamble"