German Armored Forces & Vehicles

Panzerkampfwagen IV asuf A

The \"A\" version of the PzKw IV, Germany\'s medium tank. This is obviously an early-war photo, and not just because of the tank\'s model. The tankers are wearing berets, which IIRC, were not used after the 1941 Russian campaign. But more tellingly, the cross on the tank\'s turret is white. This means the picture was taken during or before the Polish campaign of 1939, when Germany had very few PzKw IVs. The Germans changed to the black-on-white cross because the Poles taught them the hard way that the solid white cross made an excellent target for anti-tank weapons. German loses were higher than many people think: for example, one of their panzer division lost 25% of all their vehicles in their drive on Warsaw.