Tank warfare in the Chaco War
Encyclopedia
The Chaco War
(1932–35) was the first South American conflict in which tank
s were used. They were used exclusively by Bolivia
, due to its stable economy
based on mining gold, silver, and tin
.
Anticipating imminent armed conflict with Paraguay, in 1926 Bolivia signed a large contract with Vickers Armstrong
worth 3 million pounds sterling. At the insistence of General Hans Kundt
, this initially included a dozen tanks, as well as other military equipment. Though this contract was later reduced to less than 1.25 million pounds sterling due to the crisis of 1929, this still included a small quantity of tanks and tankette
s, as well as rifles, machine guns, artillery, and aircraft.
The Vickers light tanks
were well-built military machines, though while the chassis was of excellent design, the design of the superstructure and turret were rather rougher. This led some countries to focus on improving those parts. All of these examples maintained the Vickers suspension, which was copied by many countries. There were many variants on the Vickers light tank, but those bought by Bolivia were the Type A and Type B, which differed only in the turret type. The tanks were commissioned into the Bolivian army in December 1932, and were originally painted in camouflage patterns. Their factory numbers were VAE532 for the Type A and VAE446 and VAE 447 for the Type Bs.
The Type A had twin cylindrical turrets, and were armed with two armour-protected Vickers 7.65mm water-cooled heavy machine gun. The turrets were mounted side-by-side, each covering 120° to each side of the longitudinal axis of the tank. These were crewed by four people: two machine gunners, a commander, and a driver. In contrast the Type B had a single truncated turret, and was armed with a short, low-velocity QFSA 47mm cannon and a coaxial 7.65 water-cooled machine gun (apparently a variant of the Vickers LMG with the barrel installed in heavy armour protection). The turret was a rough truncated design with a circular horizontal section and a trapezoidal vertical session. This turret contained two crew members, a commander and a gunner, who also served as a loader. The tanks were fitted with a 2 channel radio set, whose use was hampered by the wet environment.
They also received at least two Carden-Lloyd tankettes armed with Vickers 7.65mm machine guns. These vehicles had not originally been designed as assault vehicles, but as mobile platforms for emplacing machine guns on the battlefield. However, improvements in the design of the mounting of the pieces allowed them to act as mobile firing platforms. Its armor was minimal and offered little protection for the crew, while its area of fire was very limited as the machine gun was fixed facing forward on the vehicle.
These vehicles were the first armored vehicles used by Bolivia. The Renault FT-17
was also reported to have been employed by Bolivia in the Chaco War
, though this has not been proven. At least one demonstration unit arrived in La Paz in 1931, but it was never deployed to the Chaco. With this, Bolivia became the first South American country to possess tanks and use them in combat. Between the end of the fighting in 1935 and the signing of the Peace Treaty in 1938, Bolivia acquired a dozen Ansaldo L3/35 tankettes from Italy, whose design was also based on the Carden-Lloyd.
, and provided services to Bolivia as early as 1911. Some of these, such as Major Wilhelm "Wim" Brandt and Major Achim R. von Kries commanded some of the Bolivian tanks, with the rest of the crew drawn from Bolivian volunteers with eight weeks of training. Brandt would be killed in action in World War II
after joining the Waffen SS, while von Kries would be seriously wounded in the Second Battle of Nanawa
. Another foreign recorded as having commanded tanks was Austrian Major Walter Kohn (aka John Kenneth Lockhart). He died on 27 December 1933 during the battle of Kilometer 7 to Saavedra
, while taking part as an infantryman in the assault on a machine gun nest. At least two of the mechanics of the armoured unit were Chile
ans.
The armoured assets entered combat for the first time on 13 September 1932 near Boquerón, when a Carden-Lloyd tankette, commanded by Kohn, tried to break the perimeter at Yujra to aid Colonel Marzana's troops. Major Kohn was later killed after leaving the tankette in the mid of a Bolivian offensive at Kilometer 7, due to heat, to fight on foot, as said above. The Carden-Lloyd had been supporting infantry patrols in no-man's-land before the battle, and at the time of Kohn's death it had been carrying a flamethrower.
The Vickers 6-ton achieved some success during the Second Battle of Nanawa, when a Type B tank broke into the core of the Paraguayan defenses, after wiping out a number of wooden pillboxes. The other Type B was left behind by the Bolivian Army after its transmission was damaged by an artillery round. The derelict tank was ultimately blown up by Paraguayan sappers on 8 July. Its 47mm gun turret was removed by Paraguayan technicians and exposed in the War Museum at Asunción
. Although the Paraguayan infantry was not match for the Vickers, Bolivian reports acknowledge that small-arms fire ricocheting the tanks sapped their crews' morale. The twin-turret tank also sustained some damaged from a volley of rifle fire, while virtually all tanks crewmen suffered injuries of different degree from bullet splinters. The Paraguayan army used 7.62mm armour-piercing rounds during the engagement. As for the tankettes, they were withdrawn from the frontlines in July, after being disabled at Nanawa, one by machine-gun fire, the other when becoming stuck in a ditch.
The surviving tanks led a successful thrust which overran the enemy outpost of Pirijayo –Pirizal for the Paraguayans– on August 1933. After this action, the Type A was placed in an open area in order to keep at bay any Paraguayan counterattack from the nearby woods, while the Type B was driven back to the rearguard due to mechanical failure. The last operational use of the Vickers took place on 15 November, when the Type A's machine guns defeated an assault of the Paraguayan infantry near Alihuatá. The tanks were eventually ambushed and captured during the battle of Campo Vía
on 10 December 1933 by a squadron of the Cavalry Regiment "General San Martin", made up mostly of Argentine
volunteers. The Type A was on display as part of a war memorial in Constitution square at Asunción until 1990, when the tank was returned to Bolivia, along with the turret of the Type B destroyed at Nanawa. The second Type B was sold by the Paraguayan government to the Republican side
of the Spanish Civil War
in January 1937.
Back in Germany, Wim Brandt wrote an article about his experiences in the Chaco War on the magazine Beihefte zum Militar-Wochenblatt. He criticized the Vickers design regarding their engine-cooling system, armour, gunsight and tracks; according to Brandt, the only remarkable feature of the 6-ton tanks were the dampers. He advised against firing the tank guns while moving, a guideline that became standard during World War II. Brandt also recommended that all crew members should undertake training as drivers.
The tanks were employed primarily as part of artillery units, almost as self-propelled support pieces, and infantry units were not trained to operate jointly with armoured units. An example of this was the two units captured at Campo Vía, which had been deployed without supporting infantry protection.
Chaco War
The Chaco War was fought between Bolivia and Paraguay over control of the northern part of the Gran Chaco region of South America, which was incorrectly thought to be rich in oil. It is also referred to as La Guerra de la Sed in literary circles for being fought in the semi-arid Chaco...
(1932–35) was the first South American conflict in which tank
Tank
A tank is a tracked, armoured fighting vehicle designed for front-line combat which combines operational mobility, tactical offensive, and defensive capabilities...
s were used. They were used exclusively by Bolivia
Bolivia
Bolivia officially known as Plurinational State of Bolivia , is a landlocked country in central South America. It is the poorest country in South America...
, due to its stable economy
History of Bolivia
This is the history of Bolivia. See also the history of Latin America and the history of the Americas.Bolivia is a landlocked country in South America...
based on mining gold, silver, and tin
Tin
Tin is a chemical element with the symbol Sn and atomic number 50. It is a main group metal in group 14 of the periodic table. Tin shows chemical similarity to both neighboring group 14 elements, germanium and lead and has two possible oxidation states, +2 and the slightly more stable +4...
.
The first Bolivian Vickers
Vickers Armstrong
Vickers-Armstrongs Limited was a British engineering conglomerate formed by the merger of the assets of Vickers Limited and Sir W G Armstrong Whitworth & Company in 1927...
worth 3 million pounds sterling. At the insistence of General Hans Kundt
Hans Kundt
Hans Kundt was a German military officer from a family of military officers...
, this initially included a dozen tanks, as well as other military equipment. Though this contract was later reduced to less than 1.25 million pounds sterling due to the crisis of 1929, this still included a small quantity of tanks and tankette
Tankette
A tankette is a tracked combat vehicle resembling a small tank roughly the size of a car, mainly intended for light infantry support or reconnaissance. Colloquially it may also simply mean a "small tank"....
s, as well as rifles, machine guns, artillery, and aircraft.
The Vickers light tanks
Vickers 6-Ton
The Vickers 6-Ton Tank or Vickers Mark E was a British light tank designed as a private project at Vickers. It was not purchased by the British Army, but was picked up by a large number of foreign armed forces and was copied almost exactly by the Soviets as the T-26. It was also the direct...
were well-built military machines, though while the chassis was of excellent design, the design of the superstructure and turret were rather rougher. This led some countries to focus on improving those parts. All of these examples maintained the Vickers suspension, which was copied by many countries. There were many variants on the Vickers light tank, but those bought by Bolivia were the Type A and Type B, which differed only in the turret type. The tanks were commissioned into the Bolivian army in December 1932, and were originally painted in camouflage patterns. Their factory numbers were VAE532 for the Type A and VAE446 and VAE 447 for the Type Bs.
The Type A had twin cylindrical turrets, and were armed with two armour-protected Vickers 7.65mm water-cooled heavy machine gun. The turrets were mounted side-by-side, each covering 120° to each side of the longitudinal axis of the tank. These were crewed by four people: two machine gunners, a commander, and a driver. In contrast the Type B had a single truncated turret, and was armed with a short, low-velocity QFSA 47mm cannon and a coaxial 7.65 water-cooled machine gun (apparently a variant of the Vickers LMG with the barrel installed in heavy armour protection). The turret was a rough truncated design with a circular horizontal section and a trapezoidal vertical session. This turret contained two crew members, a commander and a gunner, who also served as a loader. The tanks were fitted with a 2 channel radio set, whose use was hampered by the wet environment.
They also received at least two Carden-Lloyd tankettes armed with Vickers 7.65mm machine guns. These vehicles had not originally been designed as assault vehicles, but as mobile platforms for emplacing machine guns on the battlefield. However, improvements in the design of the mounting of the pieces allowed them to act as mobile firing platforms. Its armor was minimal and offered little protection for the crew, while its area of fire was very limited as the machine gun was fixed facing forward on the vehicle.
These vehicles were the first armored vehicles used by Bolivia. The Renault FT-17
Renault FT-17
The Renault FT, frequently referred to in post-WWI literature as the "FT-17" or "FT17" , was a French light tank; it is among the most revolutionary and influential tank designs in history...
was also reported to have been employed by Bolivia in the Chaco War
Chaco War
The Chaco War was fought between Bolivia and Paraguay over control of the northern part of the Gran Chaco region of South America, which was incorrectly thought to be rich in oil. It is also referred to as La Guerra de la Sed in literary circles for being fought in the semi-arid Chaco...
, though this has not been proven. At least one demonstration unit arrived in La Paz in 1931, but it was never deployed to the Chaco. With this, Bolivia became the first South American country to possess tanks and use them in combat. Between the end of the fighting in 1935 and the signing of the Peace Treaty in 1938, Bolivia acquired a dozen Ansaldo L3/35 tankettes from Italy, whose design was also based on the Carden-Lloyd.
Combat history
The Bolivian Army had a few German instructors, that formed part of the numerous German missions which evaded the clauses of the Treaty of VersaillesTreaty of Versailles
The Treaty of Versailles was one of the peace treaties at the end of World War I. It ended the state of war between Germany and the Allied Powers. It was signed on 28 June 1919, exactly five years after the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand. The other Central Powers on the German side of...
, and provided services to Bolivia as early as 1911. Some of these, such as Major Wilhelm "Wim" Brandt and Major Achim R. von Kries commanded some of the Bolivian tanks, with the rest of the crew drawn from Bolivian volunteers with eight weeks of training. Brandt would be killed in action in World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
after joining the Waffen SS, while von Kries would be seriously wounded in the Second Battle of Nanawa
Second Battle of Nanawa
The Second Battle of Nanawa was a battle fought from July 4 to 9 in 1933 between the Bolivian and Paraguayan armies during the Chaco War. It was one of the bloodiest battles fought in South America in the 20th century, coming to be labeled as the "South American Verdun" by comparison with the...
. Another foreign recorded as having commanded tanks was Austrian Major Walter Kohn (aka John Kenneth Lockhart). He died on 27 December 1933 during the battle of Kilometer 7 to Saavedra
Battle of Kilometer 7
The Battle of Kilometer 7 occurred during the Chaco War between Bolivian forces commanded by Lt Col Bernardino Bilbao Rioja defending Fort Saavedra and Paraguayan forces under Col José Félix Estigarribia, from 7 November 1932 to February 1933, and ended with a Paraguayan retreat to the northeast...
, while taking part as an infantryman in the assault on a machine gun nest. At least two of the mechanics of the armoured unit were Chile
Chile
Chile ,officially the Republic of Chile , is a country in South America occupying a long, narrow coastal strip between the Andes mountains to the east and the Pacific Ocean to the west. It borders Peru to the north, Bolivia to the northeast, Argentina to the east, and the Drake Passage in the far...
ans.
The armoured assets entered combat for the first time on 13 September 1932 near Boquerón, when a Carden-Lloyd tankette, commanded by Kohn, tried to break the perimeter at Yujra to aid Colonel Marzana's troops. Major Kohn was later killed after leaving the tankette in the mid of a Bolivian offensive at Kilometer 7, due to heat, to fight on foot, as said above. The Carden-Lloyd had been supporting infantry patrols in no-man's-land before the battle, and at the time of Kohn's death it had been carrying a flamethrower.
The Vickers 6-ton achieved some success during the Second Battle of Nanawa, when a Type B tank broke into the core of the Paraguayan defenses, after wiping out a number of wooden pillboxes. The other Type B was left behind by the Bolivian Army after its transmission was damaged by an artillery round. The derelict tank was ultimately blown up by Paraguayan sappers on 8 July. Its 47mm gun turret was removed by Paraguayan technicians and exposed in the War Museum at Asunción
Asunción
Asunción is the capital and largest city of Paraguay.The "Ciudad de Asunción" is an autonomous capital district not part of any department. The metropolitan area, called Gran Asunción, includes the cities of San Lorenzo, Fernando de la Mora, Lambaré, Luque, Mariano Roque Alonso, Ñemby, San...
. Although the Paraguayan infantry was not match for the Vickers, Bolivian reports acknowledge that small-arms fire ricocheting the tanks sapped their crews' morale. The twin-turret tank also sustained some damaged from a volley of rifle fire, while virtually all tanks crewmen suffered injuries of different degree from bullet splinters. The Paraguayan army used 7.62mm armour-piercing rounds during the engagement. As for the tankettes, they were withdrawn from the frontlines in July, after being disabled at Nanawa, one by machine-gun fire, the other when becoming stuck in a ditch.
The surviving tanks led a successful thrust which overran the enemy outpost of Pirijayo –Pirizal for the Paraguayans– on August 1933. After this action, the Type A was placed in an open area in order to keep at bay any Paraguayan counterattack from the nearby woods, while the Type B was driven back to the rearguard due to mechanical failure. The last operational use of the Vickers took place on 15 November, when the Type A's machine guns defeated an assault of the Paraguayan infantry near Alihuatá. The tanks were eventually ambushed and captured during the battle of Campo Vía
Siege of Campo Vía
The battle of the Campo Vía pocket was a decisive engagement of the Chaco War between Paraguay and Bolivia which took place in December 1933. It was one of the most prominent battles of the Chaco War. Lt Col José Félix Estigarribia, with a massive force of several divisions of the Paraguayan Army,...
on 10 December 1933 by a squadron of the Cavalry Regiment "General San Martin", made up mostly of Argentine
Argentina
Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...
volunteers. The Type A was on display as part of a war memorial in Constitution square at Asunción until 1990, when the tank was returned to Bolivia, along with the turret of the Type B destroyed at Nanawa. The second Type B was sold by the Paraguayan government to the Republican side
Second Spanish Republic
The Second Spanish Republic was the government of Spain between April 14 1931, and its destruction by a military rebellion, led by General Francisco Franco....
of the Spanish Civil War
Spanish Civil War
The Spanish Civil WarAlso known as The Crusade among Nationalists, the Fourth Carlist War among Carlists, and The Rebellion or Uprising among Republicans. was a major conflict fought in Spain from 17 July 1936 to 1 April 1939...
in January 1937.
Bolivian experiences and tactics
The use of armoured vehicles in the Chaco were relatively ineffective due to their scant numbers, the lack of presence and employment of doctrine, the harsh climate and bushy terrain of the Chaco and by the logistic difficulties faced by the Bolivian Army. As occurred in Europe in the First World War, and during the inter-war period, many Bolivian officers were not convinced of the potential of the tank, being such a novel vehicle and acquired at the exclusive insistence of General Kundt. It was necessary for time to pass and the Bolivians to gain experience with the use of armoured vehicles.Back in Germany, Wim Brandt wrote an article about his experiences in the Chaco War on the magazine Beihefte zum Militar-Wochenblatt. He criticized the Vickers design regarding their engine-cooling system, armour, gunsight and tracks; according to Brandt, the only remarkable feature of the 6-ton tanks were the dampers. He advised against firing the tank guns while moving, a guideline that became standard during World War II. Brandt also recommended that all crew members should undertake training as drivers.
The tanks were employed primarily as part of artillery units, almost as self-propelled support pieces, and infantry units were not trained to operate jointly with armoured units. An example of this was the two units captured at Campo Vía, which had been deployed without supporting infantry protection.
See also
- Vickers 6-TonVickers 6-TonThe Vickers 6-Ton Tank or Vickers Mark E was a British light tank designed as a private project at Vickers. It was not purchased by the British Army, but was picked up by a large number of foreign armed forces and was copied almost exactly by the Soviets as the T-26. It was also the direct...
- Vickers machine gunVickers machine gunNot to be confused with the Vickers light machine gunThe Vickers machine gun or Vickers gun is a name primarily used to refer to the water-cooled .303 inch machine gun produced by Vickers Limited, originally for the British Army...
- VickersVickersVickers was a famous name in British engineering that existed through many companies from 1828 until 1999.-Early history:Vickers was formed in Sheffield as a steel foundry by the miller Edward Vickers and his father-in-law George Naylor in 1828. Naylor was a partner in the foundry Naylor &...
- History of tanks
- TankTankA tank is a tracked, armoured fighting vehicle designed for front-line combat which combines operational mobility, tactical offensive, and defensive capabilities...