M60 Patton
The M60 Patton is an American second generation main battle tank introduced in December 1960. With the United States Army's deactivation of their last heavy tank battalion in 1963, the M60 became the Army's primary tank during the Cold War. Although developed from the M48 Patton, the M60 series was never classified as a Patton tank, but as a "product-improved descendant" of the Patton series. In March 1959, the tank was standardized as the 105 mm Gun Full Tracked Combat Tank M60. Over 15,000 M60s were built by Chrysler. Hull production ended in 1983, but 5,400 older models were converted to the M60A3 variant ending in 1990; the M60 underwent many updates over its service life. The interior layout, based on the design of the M48, provided ample room for updates and improvements, extending the vehicle's service life for over four decades, it was used by the U. S. and its Cold War allies those in NATO, remains in service throughout the world today, despite having been superseded by the M1 Abrams in the U.
S. military. Egypt is the largest operator with 1,716 upgraded M60A3s, Turkey is second with 866 upgraded units in service, Saudi Arabia is third with over 650 units. During the Hungarian Revolution of 1956, a Soviet T-54A medium tank was driven onto the grounds of the British embassy in Budapest by the Hungarians. After a brief examination of this tank's armor and 100 mm gun, British officials decided that their 20 pounder was incapable of defeating it. There were rumors of an larger 115 mm gun in the works. Hence there was a need to adopt a more powerful gun, which emerged as the famed 105 mm Royal Ordnance L7; this information made its way to the United States, where the Army had been experimenting with a series of upgrades to their M48 Patton tanks. These experiments were concerned with improving the armor and the introduction of a variety of autoloader systems, such as that used in the 105 mm gun tank T54; the T95 program, launched after the Questionmark III conference in June 1954, was the intended replacement to the M48.
It featured a host of innovative and experimental components such as its 90 mm smoothbore T208 cannon rigidly affixed to its turret, its new powertrain and suspension. The burden of developing them, slowed the overall program to a crawl. General Taylor approved of a new tank development program in August 1957; this incorporated many ARCOVE recommendations and foresaw the eventual replacement of the light and heavy tanks with two types: the airborne reconnaissance/assault vehicle, the main battle tank. The MBT was to combine the firepower and protection sufficient for the assault role with the mobility to perform as a medium tank. A tank of the T95 series, armed with a smoothbore cannon and powered by a compression ignition engine, was envisaged by the Army Staff as the bearer of the role of future MBT; some T95 hulls were used from 1960 to 1964 to develop the T118E1 prototyping of the M728 Combat Engineer Vehicle. The course of this tank program was the source of widespread debate; the Bureau of Budget believed that the Army was not progressing with sufficient speed in its tank modernization program and recommended the immediate replacement of the M48A2.
Predicting that the BoB would not approve the procurement of the M48A2 after the fiscal year 1959, the Deputy Chief of Staff, Logistics proposed a tank based on the M48A2 featuring improved firepower and the AVDS-1790 engine. The alternative was to introduce a tank from the T95 series, but it remained experimental with its compression ignition engine not as developed as the AVDS-1790. An influential group of senior officers, by May 1958, concluded that the T95 had only marginal advantages over the M48A2, they proposed that the most important improvements, better firepower and fuel economy, could be achieved by mounting a compression ignition engine and a more powerful gun on the M48A2. The main gun was chosen after a comparative firing test on the Aberdeen Proving Grounds. Participating in the test were six guns: the 90 mm M41, the 90 mm T208E9, the 105 mm X15E8, the 105 mm T254, the 120 mm T123E6, the 120 mm M58; the 120 mm T123E6 was preferred by the Ordnance Department because its ammunition, the same as that for the M58 gun, was at an advanced state of development.
The T123E6 however had a slow rate of fire as, unlike the M58 on the M103, there would only be one loader servicing it. This led to the weapon having a max rate of fire of 4 rpm vs. the T254's 7 rpm. The factors evaluated were lethality of a hit, rate of fire and penetration performance. Based on these tests, the 105 mm T254E2 was selected and standardized as the M68, it used a vertical sliding breechblock instead of the L7's horizontal breechblock, the US gun was fitted with an eccentric bore evacuator instead of a concentric model in order to provide more clearance over the rear deck. Until American-made tubes could be obtained with comparable accuracy, British tubes were to be used; the gun is capable of using a wide range of ammunition including APDS-T, APFSDS-T, APFSDS-DU, HEAT-FS, APDS dummy and target practice rounds, HEP/HESH, white phosphorus and canister rounds. Composite armor made with fused silica glass was intended on the hull; this composite armor provides protection against HEAT, HEP, HE rounds.
However, repaired castings suffered a loss of kinetic energy protection. This led to the
United States
The United States of America known as the United States or America, is a country composed of 50 states, a federal district, five major self-governing territories, various possessions. At 3.8 million square miles, the United States is the world's third or fourth largest country by total area and is smaller than the entire continent of Europe's 3.9 million square miles. With a population of over 327 million people, the U. S. is the third most populous country. The capital is Washington, D. C. and the largest city by population is New York City. Forty-eight states and the capital's federal district are contiguous in North America between Canada and Mexico; the State of Alaska is in the northwest corner of North America, bordered by Canada to the east and across the Bering Strait from Russia to the west. The State of Hawaii is an archipelago in the mid-Pacific Ocean; the U. S. territories are scattered about the Pacific Ocean and the Caribbean Sea, stretching across nine official time zones. The diverse geography and wildlife of the United States make it one of the world's 17 megadiverse countries.
Paleo-Indians migrated from Siberia to the North American mainland at least 12,000 years ago. European colonization began in the 16th century; the United States emerged from the thirteen British colonies established along the East Coast. Numerous disputes between Great Britain and the colonies following the French and Indian War led to the American Revolution, which began in 1775, the subsequent Declaration of Independence in 1776; the war ended in 1783 with the United States becoming the first country to gain independence from a European power. The current constitution was adopted in 1788, with the first ten amendments, collectively named the Bill of Rights, being ratified in 1791 to guarantee many fundamental civil liberties; the United States embarked on a vigorous expansion across North America throughout the 19th century, acquiring new territories, displacing Native American tribes, admitting new states until it spanned the continent by 1848. During the second half of the 19th century, the Civil War led to the abolition of slavery.
By the end of the century, the United States had extended into the Pacific Ocean, its economy, driven in large part by the Industrial Revolution, began to soar. The Spanish–American War and World War I confirmed the country's status as a global military power; the United States emerged from World War II as a global superpower, the first country to develop nuclear weapons, the only country to use them in warfare, a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council. Sweeping civil rights legislation, notably the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and the Fair Housing Act of 1968, outlawed discrimination based on race or color. During the Cold War, the United States and the Soviet Union competed in the Space Race, culminating with the 1969 U. S. Moon landing; the end of the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 left the United States as the world's sole superpower. The United States is the world's oldest surviving federation, it is a representative democracy.
The United States is a founding member of the United Nations, World Bank, International Monetary Fund, Organization of American States, other international organizations. The United States is a developed country, with the world's largest economy by nominal GDP and second-largest economy by PPP, accounting for a quarter of global GDP; the U. S. economy is post-industrial, characterized by the dominance of services and knowledge-based activities, although the manufacturing sector remains the second-largest in the world. The United States is the world's largest importer and the second largest exporter of goods, by value. Although its population is only 4.3% of the world total, the U. S. holds 31% of the total wealth in the world, the largest share of global wealth concentrated in a single country. Despite wide income and wealth disparities, the United States continues to rank high in measures of socioeconomic performance, including average wage, human development, per capita GDP, worker productivity.
The United States is the foremost military power in the world, making up a third of global military spending, is a leading political and scientific force internationally. In 1507, the German cartographer Martin Waldseemüller produced a world map on which he named the lands of the Western Hemisphere America in honor of the Italian explorer and cartographer Amerigo Vespucci; the first documentary evidence of the phrase "United States of America" is from a letter dated January 2, 1776, written by Stephen Moylan, Esq. to George Washington's aide-de-camp and Muster-Master General of the Continental Army, Lt. Col. Joseph Reed. Moylan expressed his wish to go "with full and ample powers from the United States of America to Spain" to seek assistance in the revolutionary war effort; the first known publication of the phrase "United States of America" was in an anonymous essay in The Virginia Gazette newspaper in Williamsburg, Virginia, on April 6, 1776. The second draft of the Articles of Confederation, prepared by John Dickinson and completed by June 17, 1776, at the latest, declared "The name of this Confederation shall be the'United States of America'".
The final version of the Articles sent to the states for ratification in late 1777 contains the sentence "The Stile of this Confederacy shall be'The United States of America'". In June 1776, Thomas Jefferson wrote the phrase "UNITED STATES OF AMERICA" in all capitalized letters in the headline of his "original Rough draught" of the Declaration of Independence; this draft of the document did not surface unti
Tanks in the Cold War
During the Cold War, the two opposing forces in Europe were the Warsaw Pact countries on the one side, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization countries on the other side. The Warsaw Pact was seen by the West as having an aggressive force outnumbering the NATO forces. Soviet domination of the Warsaw Pact led to effective standardization on a few tank designs. In comparison, NATO adopted a defensive posture; the major contributing nations, Germany, the USA, the UK developed their own tank designs, with little in common, while the smaller nations of NATO purchased or adapted these designs. After World War II, tank development continued as it had been because of the Cold War. Tanks would not only continue to be produced in huge numbers, but the technology advanced as well. Tanks became their armour became thicker and much more effective. Aspects of gun technology changed as well, with advances in shell design and terminal effectiveness. However, most contemporary tanks in service still have manually breech-loaded guns, a trait of the earliest tanks, shared with most self-propelled and field guns.
Many of the changes in tank design have been refinements to targeting and ranging, gun stabilisation and crew comfort. Armour has evolved to keep pace with improvements in weaponry, guns have grown bigger, but there have been no fundamental changes. After World War II, tank design budgets were cut and engineering staff was scattered. Many war planners believed that with the advent of nuclear weapons the tank was obsolete, given that a tactical nuclear weapon could destroy any brigade or regiment, whether it was armoured or not; the Korean War proved that tanks were still useful on the battlefield, given the hesitation of the great powers to use nuclear weapons. In the 1950s, many nations' tanks were equipped with NBC protection, allowing mechanized units to defend against nuclear and chemical weapons, or to conduct breakthroughs by exploiting battlefield nuclear strikes. Medium tanks evolved into the new concept of the main battle tank; this transition happened in the 1950s, as it was realized that medium tanks could carry guns that could penetrate any practical level of armour at long range.
The World War II concept of heavy tanks, armed with the most powerful guns and heaviest armour, became obsolete since they were just as vulnerable as other vehicles to the new medium tanks. World War II had shown that armed armoured tanks were of little value in most roles. Reconnaissance vehicles shown a trend towards heavier weight and greater firepower during World War II. An increasing variety of anti-tank weapons and the perceived threat of a nuclear war prioritized the need for additional armor; the additional armour prompted the design of more powerful cannons. The main battle tank thus took on the role the British had once called the'Universal tank', filling all battlefield roles. Typical main battle tanks were well armed and mobile, but cheap enough to be built in large numbers; the classic main battle tanks of the 1950s were the British Centurion, the Soviet T-55 series, the US M47 and M48 series, which saw continuous updates throughout the Cold war. For example, the Centurion began life with the effective 17-pounder gun, but was upgraded to 20 pounder and 105 mm main armament by 1959, with improved fire control and new engines.
The Russian T-55 started with a 100 mm gun, but has been upgraded with both 115 mm and 125 mm guns, much improved fire control systems, new engines, etc. The M47 series evolved through to the M60 series; the first Soviet main battle tank was the T-64. These vehicles and their derivatives formed the bulk of the armoured forces of NATO and the Warsaw Pact throughout the Cold War. Light tanks, such as the Soviet PT-76, maintained limited roles such as amphibious reconnaissance, support of Airborne units, in rapid intervention forces which were not expected to face enemy tanks; the US M551 Sheridan had similar strengths and weaknesses, but could be airdropped, either by parachute or LAPES. The value of light tanks for scouting has been diminished by helicopters, although many continued to be fielded. Heavy tanks such as the T-10 continued to be developed and fielded along with medium tanks until the 1960s and 1970s, when the development of anti-tank guided missiles and powerful tank guns rendered them ineffective.
The combination of large HEAT warheads, with a long effective range relative to a tank gun, with high accuracy meant that heavy tanks could no longer function in the stand-off, or overwatch role. Medium tanks were just as vulnerable to the new missiles, but could be fielded in greater numbers and had higher battlefield mobility. After the Yom Kippur War of 1973, when Israeli tanks were destroyed in large quantities by man-portable wire guided missiles fired by Egyptian infantry, concerns were raised on the vulnerability of tanks on the battlefield to antitank weapons. Subsequent analysis showed that Israeli forces had underestimated their opponents during the first phases of the war. Tactically, there was renewed recognition for the need for combined-arms tactics; this advanced artillery tactics and warheads. Tanks alone were vulnerable to
M551 Sheridan
The M551 "Sheridan" AR/AAV was a light tank developed by the United States and named after Civil War General Philip Sheridan. It was designed to swim across rivers, it was armed with the technically advanced but troublesome M81/M81 Modified/M81E1 152mm gun/launcher, which fired both conventional ammunition and the MGM-51 Shillelagh guided anti-tank missile. The M551 Sheridan entered service with the United States Army in 1967. At the urging of General Creighton Abrams, the U. S. Commander of Military Forces in Vietnam at the time, the M551 was rushed into combat service in Vietnam in January 1969. In April and August 1969, M551s were deployed to units in Korea, respectively. Now retired from service, it saw extensive combat in Vietnam, limited service in Operation Just Cause, the Gulf War; the Australian Army trialled two Sheridans during 1967 and 1968, but judged that the type did not meet its requirements. The Sheridan was retired without replacement in 1996. A large bulk of Sheridans were retained into service at the National Training Center at Fort Irwin, California and as Armor Officer Basic training at Armor Training Center located at Fort Knox, Kentucky.
They worked as simulated Soviet armored opposition force to train U. S. military units on simulated tank on tank armored combat to test on combat effectiveness in a desert environment. They were retired from the NTC in 2003. In the immediate post-World War II era, the US Army introduced the M41 Walker Bulldog into service to fill the role of a light tank; the lifespan of the M41 was short. Plans were started to build an lighter replacement mounting the same gun, resulting in the T71 and T92 test designs. Two prototypes of the 19 ton T92 were ordered. However, as the prototypes were entering testing, information about the new Soviet PT-76 light tank became available; the PT-76 was amphibious, soon there were demands that any U. S. light tank should be able to swim as well. The T92 was in the prototype stage and could not be refitted for this role, so the design of an new system started as the XM551. In the 1960s the Army was developing the MBT-70 main battle tank with West Germany. Fearing Congress would balk at funding two developmental tank programs, the Army chose to designate the Sheridan as a armored reconnaissance vehicle rather than a light tank.
At the time of the M551's acceptance into service production in 1966, the United States Army no longer used the heavy and light tank classifications. In 1960, with the deactivation of its last heavy tank battalion, the fielding of the new M60 series tank, the U. S. Army had adopted a main battle tank doctrine; the U. S. Army still retained the M41 Walker Bulldog light tank in the Army National Guard, but other than the units undergoing the transitional process, the regular army consisted of MBTs; because of this policy, the new M551 could not be classified as a light tank, was classified as an "Armored Reconnaissance/Airborne Assault Vehicle". In April 1965 the Army awarded a four-year $114.5 million contract to the Cadillac Gage division of the General Motors Corporation for the production of the M109 howitzer and the XM551 General Sheridan. GMC said the Sheridan would be delivered to the Army in June. In February two squadrons totaling 54 Sheridans were operated in Vietnam. In March 1969, after the Army invoked secrecy in declining to disclose program costs, a Government Accountability Office official said development costs had reached $1.3 billion.
Congressman Samuel S. Stratton criticized Army officials for the program's high costs, accused officials of concealing cost figures to cover up for their own "bumbling ineptness." A GAO report leaked in May revealed the Army had fast-tracked the program to avoid budgetary scrutiny, despite indications by May 1966 that the tank's caseless ammunition was prone to cooking off. The problem had since been resolved by a compressed-air system that forced hot ammunition residue from the breech, the Army told Congress; the Army said. A Congressional report in July identified $1.2 billion wasted on the Sheridan. The report said attributed several Vietnam casualties to Sheridan design faults, said that the tank had been wholly unready for combat there "without extensive and costly retrofits."The vehicle designed to mount the gun had a steel turret and aluminum hull. Although the hull could defeat heavy machine gun fire of up to 12.7mm AP, it was defeated by rocket propelled grenades, which could destroy the vehicle if the spalling contacted the caseless main gun rounds.
Like the M113 armored personnel carrier, it was vulnerable to mines. Swimming capability was provided by a flotation screen, similar to that used by the World War II, amphibious DD Tanks; the front armor was overlain by a wooden "surfboard" three folded layers, hinged together. This could be opened up into a sloping vertical surface in front of the driver providing a bow of a boat hull, about level with the top of the turret. Fabric formed the rest of the water barrier, folding up from compartments lining the upper corner where the side met the top of the hull, held up at the back with poles; the front of the "hull" was provided with a plastic window, but in practice it was found that water splashing onto it made it useless, the driver instead had to take steering directions from the vehicle commander
Tanks of the interwar period
This article discusses tanks of the interwar period. World War I established the validity of the tank concept and between the two world wars, many nations needed to have tanks, but only a few had the industrial resources to design and build them. During and after World War I, Britain and France were the intellectual leaders in tank design, with other countries following and adopting their designs; this early lead would be lost during the course of the 1930s to the Soviet Union and, to a lesser extent, Nazi Germany. The final tank designs of 1918 showed a number of trends; the joint US and British Mark VIII tank was supposed to be a common heavy tank design for them and the French. The design should have overcome the limitations of the earlier British heavy tanks; the 34-foot-long, 37-ton armored vehicle was powered by a 300-hp V-12 engine and capable of 7 mph cross-country. Although 100 were built, it was the much smaller Renault FT that set the pattern for all tanks that followed it. Worldwide, many sizes of tank were considered, much of the development effort went into light tanks that were useful against infantry or for colonial police-type work.
The worldwide economic difficulties of the 1920s and 1930s led to an increased emphasis on light tanks as they were much cheaper to produce than medium or heavy tanks. However, the Spanish Civil War showed that tank-versus-tank engagements and tank-versus-towed antitank gun engagements would now be a major consideration for the future of tank warfare, it became clear that tanks would need to be armoured and carry larger guns. Tank shape guided purely by considerations of obstacle clearance, now became a trade-off between a low profile, desirable for stealth, weight savings. In Britain, a great deal of study on the future of tank warfare was carried out, there were some differences. Whilst both J. F. C. Fuller and Basil Liddell Hart foresaw a war where all arms, infantry and artillery, would be mechanised, Fuller's theories looked at all-arms formations with artillery and military engineers mounted on similar vehicles to keep pace with the tanks, he foresaw armies using heavy all-arms formations to break through opponents defences, allowing lighter, faster units to make rapid advances, thereby not allowing the enemy to re-establish any defences.
Liddell Hart considered that armoured vehicles would carry their own supporting infantry, in much the same way as modern warships carry their own marine detachments. During the 1930s the British Army established the Experimental Mechanized Force, to test these theories and look at the basic problems of managing and commanding all arms formations, including the use of aircraft. Many of the units involved in this force were posted to North Africa, where their experience played a major part in the British success in the East African Campaign and General Wavell's initial successes in the Western Desert campaign; the British used three classes of tank: the'Infantry', for supporting the infantry. In the U. S. J. Walter Christie developed a series of fast tanks, based on his revolutionary Christie suspension system; this was combined with high power-to-weight ratios achieved by fitting large aircraft engines in his tanks. Although his prototypes were capable of high speeds, in some cases designed to be air transportable, disputes with the United States Army Ordnance Corps and a high price meant they were never produced in the USA.
Christie's prototypes were however purchased by the Soviet Union, were to be developed into the BT tanks and on the eve of World War II, the famous T-34. The success of the BT series, when observed by Fuller, at Russian Army manoeuvres, influenced the British to buy a Christie Tank, imported as a "Tractor", which led to Christie's suspension incorporated into British cruiser tank designs such as the A13 Cruiser Mk IV, others. Today it may be difficult to understand why the tank idea found such resistance from the leadership of several armies. Part of the explanation is. Tanks were rightly considered troublesome equipment as late as the early 1930s. Weak engines, poor transmissions, fragile, short-life tracks contributed to this reputation; the otherwise-incomprehensible resistance to tanks from'traditional' military leadership can be understood in this light. The international success of the Vickers six-ton tank is due more to its high reliability than any brilliance in the design. However, as the decade passed, engines and tracks all improved.
By the beginning of World War II, reliable engines and transmissions, as well as high-speed suspension designs were all available. A final trend in the between-the-wars period was changes in manufacturing methods. France pioneered the use of large castings to form gun mantlets and with the S-35, entire tank hulls; the widespread use of casting was copied by the US and USSR, to a lesser extent in the UK. Casting enables the fast manufacture of ballistically well-shaped components. Germany never made much use of large cast components, limiting casting to smaller items such as mantlets. Welding replaced riveting and bolting as a means of faste
Tanks of the United States
This article on military tanks deals with the history and development of American tanks: their origin during World War I. The U. S. entered the First World War on the side of the Entente Powers in April, 1917, without any tanks of her own. The following month, in the light of a report into British and French tank theories and operations, the American Expeditionary Forces' commander-in-chief, Gen. John Pershing, decided that both light and heavy tanks were essential for the conduct of the war and should be acquired as soon as possible. A joint Anglo-American programme was set up to develop a new type of heavy tank similar to those in use by the British, it was, expected that sizeable quantities of tanks would not be available until April 1918. The Inter-Allied Tank Commission decided that, because of the wartime demands on French industry, the quickest way to supply the American forces with sufficient armour was to manufacture the Renault FT light tank in the U. S; some heavy tanks would be supplied by Great Britain.
Captain Dwight Eisenhower General Eisenhower of World War II fame, had gone to Camp Meade, Maryland, in February 1918 with the 65th Engineer Regiment, activated to provide the organizational basis for the creation of the army's first heavy tank battalion. In mid-March the 1st Battalion, Heavy Tank Service was ordered to prepare for movement overseas, Eisenhower went to New York with the advance party to work out the details of embarkation and shipment with port authorities; the battalion shipped out on the night of March 26. He had performed so well as an administrator that, upon his return to Camp Meade, he was told he would be staying in the United States, where his talent for logistics would be put to good use in establishing the army's primary tank training center at Camp Colt in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. Eisenhower became the #3 leader of the new tank corps and rose to temporary Lieutenant Colonel in the National Army and trained tank crews at "Camp Colt"–his first command–on the grounds of "Pickett's Charge" on the Gettysburg, Pennsylvania Civil War battle site.
The American Army in France had Captain George S. Patton, as the first officer assigned to train the crews, he set up a light tank school; the M1917 was the U. S.'s first mass-produced tank, a license-built near-copy of the French Renault FT. The US Army ordered 4,440 M1917s between 1918 and 1919, receiving about 950 before cancelling the contract. A requirement of 1,200 was decided increased to 4,400, some sample Renault tanks and various parts were sent to the US for study; the design was to be carried out by the Ordnance Department, under the job title "Six-ton Special Tractor," and orders for the vehicles placed with private manufacturers. However, the project was beset by problems: the French specifications were metric and incompatible with American machinery; the Army in France was expecting the first 300 M1917s by April, 1918, but production had not begun by June, which forced the US to acquire 144 Renault FTs from the French. Production of the M1917 did not begin until the autumn, the first completed vehicles emerged only in October.
Two arrived in France on November 20, nine days after the end of hostilities, a further eight in December. The Ford 3-Ton M1918 was one of the first light tank designs by the U. S, it was a small two-man, one-gun tank, armed with a M1919 Browning machine gun and capable of a maximum speed of 8 mph. Design on the 3-ton tank started in mid-1918; the 3-Ton was a two-man tank designed so that American forces could use another tank besides the Renault FT. Its two Model T ford engines were controlled from the driver- seated at the front- with a gunner beside him who had control of a.30/06 machine gun on a limited-traverse mount. A contract for 15,000 of these vehicles was awarded. S. Tank Corps felt; the contract for the 15,000 tanks was ended after the Armistice, leaving only the fifteen original vehicles produced. Two independent US tank organizations developed in parallel. Throughout the war, the army units, resulting in a divided command structure with two men—Rockenbach and Welborn—separately directing the development of the American armored arm.
Eisenhower's mentor, Lt. Colonel Ira Clinton Welborn, was an infantry officer, awarded the Medal of Honor for service in Cuba during the Spanish–American War. On March 5, 1918, Secretary of War Newton D. Baker appointed Welborn to serve as director of the Tank Service in the United States; the Tank Corps, was created in France as a unit of the American Expeditionary Force, on December 22, 1917 Its first commander was Colonel Samuel Rockenbach, though Captain George S. Patton was the first officer assigned to the new unit. During the Punitive Expedition of 1916, George Patton had served as aide to Pershing in his pursuit of Pancho Villa. Accompanied by ten soldiers of the 6th Infantry Regiment, using three Dodge touring cars, Patton conducted the United States' first motorized attack; the mission, in which three Villa sympathizers were shot, received considerable publicity. In November 1917, Patton reported to General Garrard of the French Army. At Champlieu, Patton tested its trench-crossing ability.
In August 1918, he was placed in charg
