The Real Tank Genius Of WW2 - Percy "Hobo" Hobart
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This video is less funny, i just found the topic super interesting. Lemme know what you thought. I appreciate the feedback
Do a video about that one time we’re 155 Irishmen fought against 4000 Congolese
You got a cross over with the line crosser let’s gooo
Please do a video on admiral Willis Augustus Lee jr.
You liked my last message, but just in case, plEAASE do a video on Léo Major my man.
Honestly do whatever interests you that’s what has brought so many people to your channel. I may be a history nerd but certain people in war like this is super fascinating.
I like how Hobart’s funnies go from “that’s kind of a wacky way to solve a problem” to “that bunker offends me, remove it” and “cleanse their sins in fire”
"Well, that escalated quickly" in armor form.
This made me have the evilest laugh
The Emperor protects
Align reticule, press trigger, make dead.
As for the "it offends me" part, ask BUFF when you need to rearrange terrain. Betty doesn't tell him to "pull up" just informs him that the ground needs to go down.
Well said!
I am a Guide at the Tank Museum in Bovington, we have several "funnies" and other vehicles from 79th Armoured Division. I was so pleased to see this video as I am a little bit of a Sir Percy Hobart Fanboy and it is great to see him finally get some recognition for the genius that he was.
I wonder if it might be worth getting Nick to do a "Safe for Public Viewing" version and running it on a loop in the museum. If you guys do it they could use it at the Combined Services Museum in Maldon too
As an American, I find it wholly offensive that I was never taught a single thing about this man in any of my history classes in high school. I chalk it up to the failing public education system in the United States. I never even heard the name “Sir Percy Hobart” before watching this video, now I absolutely MUST read every book I can find on the man.
I was at Bovington Camp, Junior Leaders Regiment in 1969. Loved the Tank Museum, we could get in free with the uniform or I.D.. spent hours in there at weekends. I suspect I wouldn’t recognise it now though.
Bovington tank museum is fantastic! I visited a few years ago highly recommended 👌
@@willymac5036How old are you? I'm 69 and I never heard of Hobart in school either. But, my interest in all things military lead me to learn of him.
The flail tank has always been a favorite of the funnies for me. The idea of just going “screw you, I’m just going to harvest your mines” amused me.
I've been saying that the Brits invented the flail tank because they had a problem with mines on the beach. Now the Brits have a problem with idiots in orange vests. Just saying. :-)
Now, technically, using the flail-o'-doom on German infantry is one of the few times that yes, it's a war crime _even the first time_ but you can't tell me you don't kinda wanna.
@@Archris17 Sometimes when life gives you a flail you gotta thump a few guys.
@@Archris17 i mean, it's not like the bodies will be recognisable after the tanks go over them so anyway
@@Archris17I guarantee at least one German found himself meeting god after a flail tank driver saw him.
Every single time I see a TFE video, I stop what I'm doing and watch it.
Thanks for explaining history in a way that the American education system won't. I am so much prouder to be an American with the information you give me.
I literally clicked the notification button for this video the second it popped up
Not only the way it's taught but the information left out. It's all about controlling information.
I stopped my live stream to watch this.
I concur.
Gurl same
my respect for Churchill just doubled
It was Churchill who sent Montgomery to Africa too. Churchill had a number of problems of course and wasn't liked in parliament (people either remembered his involvement with the disaster in ww1 or his other things, but he also champioed the tank in ww1), but during the war he was the leader needed
@@bionicgeekgrrl Not great on the societal aspect of being a Head of State. A lot of issues with workers rights, colonialism, etc.
However, he was the man stubborn enough and crass enough for that War.
Churchill was the right man in the right place at the right time. He's still a man with many issues.
At the end of the day, Churchill remained a soldier first, a statesman third.
@@drd675 the German propaganda tried to depict Churchill as a unstable belligerently drunk thug who could be ready to go off at any moment and make everything worse for everyone, the allied forces loved the idea of this Tommy gun wielding, mob boss like leader of men who’s constantly on the sauce and ready to go at any moment.
The Crocodile utilized fascinating tactics. Although they had very limited juice, they would start firing as they advanced while the Germans were out of range. Seeing the fire coming closer, Germans surrendered. The tankers also would do a “wet spray” dousing the Germans in petrol so that they knew the next shot would be burning agony. The Germans often surrendered.
"Hans!"
"Ja?!"
"Zey brought ze flammenwerfer!"
"Scheiße!"
My grandfather, an American infantryman in North Africa, never spoke about the war. One time got serious and said, "Those weak fu*kers couldn't organize their way out of a paper bag. They needed a tough 'Limey' to come up with a plan for them and then they needed drugs to get the balls to do it!."
Now I know who he was referring to.
"Hobart's Funnies" is exactly the right amount of British understatement for the name of a unit that sails their goddamned tanks onto shore, hits the ground with chains to blow up your traps, builds their own bridges _on the fly_ and sets you on fire from another time zone.
It's funny... Because it's not.😅
I think there's a term "It's funny when you're not the butt of the joke".
Considering tanks themselves got their name when British said they were water tanks as a security measure but then just kept it as an official designation that sounds about right
Hobart's Funnies were straight out of the British psyche of the time. Look up Ben McIntyre's account of Operation Mincemeat, based on a mad idea by a bloke called Ian Fleming. Or Barnes Wallis's 5 ton bomb that bounced across water. Or the wooden Mosquito bomber. Or Frank Whittle's development of the jet. Or the development of radar.
Imagine being the infantry position being overrun by a flail tank. What a terrifying way to go.
I'm British and knew nothing of this man! Thank you for educating us all in something and someone that absolutely should not have been brushed under the carpet...
You knew nothing because the same clique that comprised the officer corps also determined the curricula at schools around the nation.
Persona non grata are rarely celebrated by the peerage and gentry regardless of how much they contribute to the success of the nation.
Seriously? I knew at least about Hobart's Funnies, and I'm an American.
The bitchy officers had probably something to do with it.
I heard about the funnies long ago but I had no idea about the tactics. You Brits, from what I've seen have some incredible engineers who are always doing quirky things that actually work. If we had those tanks before D Day we would have had alot less white crosses in Arlington
Same here, I'm a Brit and have never heard of this man
The thing is, we do know about Hobart's Funnies here in the UK, in fact we had an entire department of the British War Office dedicated to insane specialist weapons. Officially the Office of Miscellaneous Weapons, more commonly called The Wheezers and Dodgers, they were a crack team of madmen, who's entire brief is to come up with inventive solutions to problems.
So... Q section but for the military?
@@francisphang242 Pretty much. There biggest project was the so called Mulberry Harbours. Basically, in order to maintain the supply lines following D-Day, the allies needed harbours to dock supply and troopships, but all the harbours on the French coast were still in German hands. So, the OMW, designed pre-fabricated, floating harbours that were towed across the English channel, moored and sunk into place, to serve the allied supply chain, until the French ports could be captured.
That is the most American solution to that problem and I am both pissed and thoroughly impressed our limey cousins came up with it first.
As a former Royal Engineer, the antecedents of the ‘funnies’ are still part of the armoured Engineers,bridge laying and other gap crossing methods, incidentally the troops who carried out the beach survey prior to D-day were a Sapper Officer and a SNCO
America's approach in WW2 - Effective Weaponry/Tech and Strategy.
Britain's approach in WW2 - Chicanery/Trolling and Shenanigans
'You got trolled, you got trolled, you're in the Hague'
My 2 favourite trolls by the British
1. A British pilot escaped a POW camp, dressed in full gear, because he created a fake id that said he was a Bulgarian spy. So he walked out the front gate. The name he used?? “I. Buggeroff”
2. The Germans built a decoy airfield somewhere in France. Timber planes timber everything. It was all fake. The day after it was completed the British dropped a timber decoy bomb on it. As a way of saying “we know and you’ve wasted all your time.
Case in point, the De Havilland DH98 Mosquito.
British Intelligence pretty much clowned on the Abwehr and left it more compromised than a one dollar whore.
In gaming terms:
America - Pure OP with lots of money
Britain - Troll the enemy until they ragequit.
One of the biggest reasons I left the Marine Corps was bad leadership. The handful of great leaders I had were all shit on by command. I have so much respect for them and leaders like Percy Hobart, I can barely articulate it. These men are constantly being harassed, mocked, and even having their careers ruined by the very military they are trying to serve. Yet when their country calls, they put their lives on the line without hesitation. They deserve every bit of praise we can heap upon them. Percy Hobart deserves to be remembered. Thank You for honoring him.
I appreciate the depth on your comment. Thank you for your service, however long or short it was.
I also appreciate your double-spacing after a period.
@@Hazaerdt You MUST be an English teacher or at least a typist/typing instructor of some sort. We used to get beaten up SEVERELY by our teacher over those double spaces if we didn't do it properly. I took typing in High School back when the Apple IIc was the instructional tool of choice. Now, I put them in without even thinking twice. It does make for a much more reader friendly text though.
@@leftistsarenotpeopletry to be concise instead of your typing speed POG.
I recall a book by a Marine sniper from the early battles of Afghanistan and Iraq who was pioneering the use of "humvee's" as mobile sniper nests. He had been working on it since the 90's, and was given the runaround by many officers who eventually stuck him with a logistics battalion. In that battalion was a man he chose to nickname "Officer Bob", a walking breathing CF who could always be counted on to give the wrong orders.
When I hear about bad command officers, I now always think "Officer Bob." Anyway, the sniper's tactics worked and soon it was being used to give cover to the grunts advancing in the front line.
@@leftistsarenotpeopleDouble spacing after a period was taught by a few while I was still in school, but it was completely done away with by the print industry decades ago and is actually grammatically incorrect. It was just something some teachers asked for because they found it easier to read.
As a Brit myself and a bit of an amateur military historian, I wanted to say "Thank you..." I did know about Hobart, but am grateful you are bringing his story to hundreds of thousands of other people. He should be celebrated in British history more than he is. My own interest stems from my Grandfather being a tanker (Royal Wiltshire Yeomanry). He'd never talked about the war, the only time was our conversation the final time I visited him before he passed away. I'd just returned from a business trip to Milan, he off-handedly commented that he'd finished the war in Northern Italy. I pushed him and he opened up a little about his experiences. He'd been in Crusaders, M3 Lee/Grants and then M4 Shermans - variously driver, loader and gunner. From El Alamein through North Africa, then Sicily and all the way up Italy. He was a little dissapointed that the liberation of Rome by Allied forces had barely a mention. Of course it had coincided with D-Day. He liked the Sherman - easy to operate, easy to repair and it kept going. Lost 3 of them, all to losing a track. Two because of A/T mines, the other an anti-tank gun.
I have a BA in Military and Diplomatic history. While I was aware that German armor tactics originated in the UK, I was unaware of all the contributions of Hobart. I mainly knew him for the "funnies" but not his pre-war contributions to tactical theory. Thank you.
Makes you dig for more information n history because bias has caused innaccurate history to be written.
When people ask how Britain went from the largest empire the world has ever seen, to ‘that little island off the coast of Europe that everyone pretty much ignores’… it’s examples like this that I point out. As a Brit I am consistently ashamed of how well we award conformity and mediocrity over innovation and forward thinking.
America is doing the same thing and it pisses me off! Well.. to be honest, we're awarding the lowest in the damned barrel, not even mediocre! I have to take a break from thinking on it because it is just so infuriating that it turns me into a bit of a hag 😂. Like my grandma when she got old and crotchety lol!
Here is the question. How do we honor these doers (WWII} that made a great safe society for us? For myself, It’s just about you community and being a part of that. I do think values have been changed for no ones benifit.
@@capeclint by making your environment a product of you rather than you being a product of your environment.
Oh and remain dangerous and free
Hobarts rule. Yes.
I’ve noticed through the years TFE gets more and more passionate about this content. He’s gone from being more “funny” to being a little “funny” and a ton more serious. It’s been exciting to watch his evolution with his content. I used to watch him because he’d make me cry laughing. Now I watch him because I’m excited about what he will teach that day. You’re doing an amazing job, don’t stop.
Hell yeah, dropping less profanity, so the kids can Actually Learn HISTORY.
13:10 amphibious tank
14:00 road Placer tank to roll the (probably) not so red metal carpet (silly looking but effective)
14:56 weed/mine/barbed wire wacker tank
15:34 tank with bigger gun (not much to joke about that wasn't said)
16:00 flamethrower tank (extra scary if you are out in the open)
16:31 bridge tank, just drop a bridge on the hole they made
16:52 stick filler tank
👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼
@@jwdundon I mean as a child I learned history from people swearing and smacking me upside the head to make sure I was respectful.
Other interesting developments by Hobart was the bulldozer tank which as the name implied was a British Cromwell tank with its turret removed and a massive dozer blade mounted on the front, other tanks includes the double onion, a metal frame to pole mounted to a Churchill, armed with one or more satchel charges and can be used to breach solid walls allowing a tank or infantry to bypass a choke point or breach into an enemy compound with ease
I think you'd probably like the story of Robert Blair "Paddy" Mayne. He was a capped professional rugby player for Ireland, lawyer, amateur boxer, his party piece was a standing backwards jump onto a fireplace hearth and was one of the founding members of the SAS with a penchant for punching English officers and ripping apart BF109s by hand when he didn't have any bullets or explosives left.
I'm guessing you've been watching 'that' TV series.
@@marktaylor6491 Not sure what TV series you're referring to but I don't watch TV anyway so nope! I live near where he was from.
@@MacMeaties Shame, because if you did. I would have recommended to you the excellent 'SAS: Rogue Heroes'. It's about the founding of The SAS in the desert during WWII. It features paddy Mayne as one of its three main characters, and yes. He is the stuff of legends.
@@marktaylor6491 oh nice, I'll have a look for it, bound to be on a streaming service somewhere!
He’s literally the definition of “if it looks stupid and works, it isn’t stupid.”
Aka something the US Marine Corps would like to hang out.
@@ardantop132na6 I mean they loved the Bazooka tank I imagine they'd love every single one of these things as well.
@@adarkwind4712
Marine: "I love it but it needs a little something..." (slaps on an extra .50cal) "Perfect!"
@@GhostBear3067 🤣 it's funny because it's true.
@@adarkwind4712 The marines would 100% have tried running a flail tank into a Banzai charge...
There's a line in Apocalypse Now where they say something to the effect of, "Command wasn't mad that Kurtz defected. They were mad because he was winning the war on his terms and not on the military's terms."
It's a tale as old as time. happens in corporate too.
This man has single handedly taught me more about WWI and WWII than any history teacher ever.
Hobart retained control of his funnies. They were lent out and had to be returned after use. Crocodile tanks would often give german bunkers an unignited squirt, and if the terrified petrol soaked soldiers didn't surrender, then they got a hot squirt.
The two greatest contributions to allied success were the Mulberry harbours and PLUTO (pipeline under the ocean).
I’ve watched almost all material on WW2 and have always thought Hobart’s inventions and tactics were CRIMINALLY underrated. He single-handedly created modern armored warfare. Thank you so much for highlighting this!
Ok..
I hear you …
German blitz… stolen from lessons learned of British
Tell me how Monash fits in
Need to know
No hobart single handidly created the concept of the armored engineering vehicle. The germans created modern armored warfare to the point the US military literally copied rommel during gulf 1 evwn going ao far that they had pictures of rommel around to make people remember.
@@Banthisyoutube-zs6sx That's because everybody knows about Rommel.
If you were to ask somebody if they knew about Erwin Rommel, chances are they would.
Ask them about Hobart, they'd more than likely just go "Huh?"
@@airplanemaniacgaming7877 this is very true i remember hobart more for his specialist vehicles and cause i am a tank nerd. As far as ideas go Hobart may have come up withbit but he couldn't execute and i would argue execution is more important. Anyone can say "hey this would be a really awesome thing" but if you can't bring it to life......its just a fantasy. Semantics i know but life runs on semantics. Now we can blame british high command this is true butbit was the germans that said "this is some good shit" and built a gameplan around it. With the execption of the desert rats the brits really weren't that successful tankwise. Blame ot on the detioration of the wehrmacht in europe, point to the far wider use of fighter-bombers by the allies, just chock it up to the bocage. The western allies really only had the african theatre to have eastern front-esque armor battles. And thw germans shit kicked the americans at kasserine and rommel almost had the brits in egypt. But i am armchair quarterbacking here.
I find it fitting that the two tanks he's best known for are the minefield meals on wheels mace machine, and the flamethrower so souped up he convinced the Germans "you know what, maybe this IS a warcrime..."
one Brit officer approached a German bunker under a white flag of Parley. He told the German officer he had a flame thrower tank. The germans had a choice, they could fight, and he'd have them all roasted alive, or they could surrender. He politely asked for their surrender because he didn't want to burn them all to death.
they surrendered.
@@MrSGL21 I would think everyone would start telling the germans that even if they didn't have one.
@@skurdibbles7913but what if they do have one. I don’t want to fight a flamethrower tank
@@MrSGL21 A similar thing happenned in the pacific war. It did not go well for those british officers.
@@KingofDiamonds117 A sane offer does not go well when fighting indoctrinated nutjobs who want to die for "honour" .
The war didnt end well for the Japanese did it.
Love EVERY TFE video. My son and i watch them together and discuss the topic. Its made him seriously interested in history. So no matter what else, know this Sir, youve helped a 17 year old boy AND his friends start to learn history, and be passionate about it. And in todays world, it is SO important. Thank you so much Nic. Its a godsend.
Good job Mom! We are gonna need all these kids that Nick turns into Patriots because sadly we are at the "weak men create bad times" portion of the scenario so we MUST build "the strong men" from scratch in order to get back to "the good times".
A small correction for you. Hobart took his inspiration from Sir John Monash who used early blitzkrieg tactics in WW1 in the battle of Hamel and later the battle of Amiens
Preach. And Rommel himself was no slouch. Hobart might have written the book on tank warfare, but Rommel put it into practice VERY well and wrote his OWN book on INFANTRY warfare. He's not called The Desert Fox for nothing!
If you want to keep the British officer streak up you definitely need to do a video on "Mad Jack" Churchill, a British officer in WWII that went into battle with a longbow, broadsword, and bagpipes. When he participated in the landings in Norway he was reported as playing the bagpipes while landing on the beach and only pausing to throw grenades at the Nazis.
I think dankula did a mad lads video on him
I think Fat Electrician already did one on Mad Jack
Also got the last reported longbow kill in warfare
I'm asking because I don't know: landings were in Norway? or Normandy? For all I know it could be both.
@@julieenslow5915 there were in both Norway and Normandy but in this case I do explicitly refer to Norway in December of 1941 or about 2 1/2 years before June 6th 1944 (D-day Normandy).
16:01 The Petartd's shell contains roughly 28 lb of explosives. For reference, the Churchill's standard 76mm HE shell contianed just 1.5 lb.
"THAT'S A LOT OF DAMAGE!!"
"We had a problem that we couldn't send enough bang to the enemy, so now we decided to just throw the whole canister of it into them"
Modern ish would be a CEV, right,
@@mikethurman3147 Yup! :D
Percy Hobart lived in my village in England. A few years ago, the owners were rebuilding the kitchen, and found numerous press-clippings and old newspapers under the floor, written about Hobart. The lady of the household then wrote a novel called "only the good boys" with Hobart as one of the central characters!
17:49 and the reason Hollywood hasn't really showcased the Canadians in WWII, is because we always showed up, and showed up the American forces and drove back more of the German forces, with regiments 1/3 the size of the American.. My Great uncle was a Major in WWII, and told some fantastic stories
Fine troops the Canadians, scary bastards in battle.
@@Kili121416 3 of the top 10 longest sniper shots in the world, belong to us Canadians. #7 Arron Perry in 2002 2310m #6 Rob Furlong in 2002 2430m & #2 (unk Canadian) May 2017 3540m and being outed by Viacheslav Kovalskyi from the Ukraine, Nov 2023 with an impressive 3800m (3.8 km or 2.3 miles)
Truly the Canadians are the reason for the Genevea Convention after WW1. Salute, you Canucks.
Hollywood doesn’t show Canadian contributions because Hollywood is an American establishment, making movies for Americans. Hollywood isn’t obligated to make movies for foreigners. Hollywood makes movies for money, and making movies for foreigners doesn’t make as much movies as movies for Americans. It’s simple economics. If you don’t like it, make your own movie.
@@gloverfox9135 Canada is called Hollywood North for a reason. Most of the "Blockbuster movies" are filmed in Canada.
Ryan Reynolds (Deadpool) is Canadian.
Reenu Reeves (John Wick) is also Canadian. Along with Michael Cera, Kim Cattrall, Ryan Gosling, Seth Rogen, etc. etc.
The best part of this is the method behind the Sherman Crab.
"Oh so the ground is trying to kill our soldiers too? BEAT THE GROUND INTO SUBMISSION."
Mine-killer tanks to this day still use the basic mine flail chain spindle in the front. It's a perfect example of getting the idea perfectly the first time.
@@DVAcmeI think the only real next step is some form of wave or energy device that would trigger mines at a distance, but until that, the flails will feast
@@drd675 **smiles in Mine Clearing Line Charge**
That's some straight up HFY story material - "When humans both weaponized the ground and then beat it into submission"
As a Brit I love how you don’t shit talk us like some Americans do and recognise some of the cool shit we did
Game recognize game
We criticize your higher leadership, like we criticize our own higher leadership. There's some fucking amazing stories about the british side of WW2 that never get mentioned. My fav is one of the Scot antiheroes who literally walked out of a POW camp, twice, and told the guards to fuck off when they caught up to him, AND THEY DID!
@@the_fat_electricianI love your videos. Keep up the good work.
I mean considering how often you guys like to do that to Americans it isn't to much of surprise
@@phoenixmastm Say WHAT?!
Scottish Badass:"Fook off"
Nazi Prison Guard:"... Not paid enough for this shit. You know what? Fine!"
Awesome video. In Devon England (where I'm from) there are a couple of sunken tanks where they trialed other ways to float tanks. They sank and got stuck to the sand banks, no one hurt. Ehen the tide went out they where buried to deep to retrieve so they where left. You can actually walk out to them on the sand at super low tides. Love this channel and all your content. Keep on going dude :)
So many issues with WW2 can be summed up as "WW1 officers wanted WW1 part 2". Especially Britain and France.
"You told me you took installments" Absolute GOLD!!! I am dying over that.
So say I'm a complete fuckin moron but, what does that mean?
@@RickyDeanGaming8 inches but not all at the same time.
Hands down the funniest shit I've heard all month and it's the 7th 😂😂😂😂
@@RickyDeanGaming I salute you for asking this question in my stead, if you are a moron so am I! Morons stand together!
Fully sent me on that one
This is *no* overstatement... You are doing a service to history and humanity with this style of content and stories.
I mean they are good videos, but that’s to far lol
@@MKZ3003
I disagree. He is telling the true stories of how individuals made contributions that won the wars. My history classes never mentioned any of this and said it was sheer numbers and logistics that won those wars when in truth it was individual rogue men who found a better way to do battle that actually made a huge difference. Percy's teaching of his men in Egypt the how's and whys of their campaigns are still used very effectively today.
@@elonever.2.071 I don’t care if you disagree, you’re wrong
@@MKZ3003 No... No it's not. In an age where it's trendy to be ignorant as hell. Ignorance makes a population gullible or desperate. A gullible or desperate population is capable of all levels of sheer insanity. Just look at how people behaved during all of 2020. The ruinous effects are still felt today.
*For those that don't know history are DOOMED to repeat it.* History shows this so damn often it should be an official law of physics! But the opposite is also true, as many scholars have said, "those that *know* history are destined to shape it." That is the power of the knowledge of history.
EDIT: That willful ignorance makes you even more dangerous to civilization as well...
Fun fact, yes Juno Beach was the second deadliest beach, and it was in fact the Canadian Beach, and it was completely taken in record time due yes in part to Hobarts Tanks but also to Canadian brave men dying. In fact Canada went to England and then to China to fight at the onset of WW2.. yet no one mentions our Grandfather's contributions when making movies , videos etc. or lists us as one of their important allies..
Probably my favorite thing about Hobart’s Funnies is the fact that (with one or two exceptions) almost every single one of Hobart’s inventions is still in use today with the British and American militaries in one form or another.
It's amazing how the aristocracy thinks that military leaders, a.k.a. those who lead bands of men into places to savagely administer unhealth care to their opposition, should have agreeable personalities.
Right!?
In short, the more human they are, the harder they are to control and the aristocracy would rather control you and tell you what to do then actually take care to remind themselves that you are a human being that can do way more than what they think you can do.
When it really comes down to it, all the officers do is point the infantry in the right direction and try to stop them from committing war crimes. It's just strategic baby sitting.
Welcome to Modern Corporate Middle Management.
Sounds a bit like my experience in the trades, too. Sometimes the undeniably best workers can be rough around the edges and get screwed because others often see their own dislike of a man's personality more than they see his skill and quality
20,000 people walk into a shop within 30 minutes of the store opening.
This guy and his stories are awesome.
One hour , 63 ,400 + views .
3 hours and over 120k people came by.
I tend to double dip his content. My watch time on his videos are probably around 190%-210%.
Deviance due to good or bad "for sponsor videos."
7 hours. 225k
16 hours and 333.5k visitors.
@@elonever.2.071 A day ago and 401k. Awesome.
I've heard of the name Percy Hobart, but I had no idea! I've never heard of any of this before. Thanks for covering this.
Bro you are one of the best examples of how history should be taught. Listening to you teach is equivalent to learning things in a flow state learning capacity. The way you connect everything together, the way you hold the listeners intrest, the passion you have while teaching all of it is truly a gift man. If teachers model themselves after your teaching methods history wouldn't be so easily forgotten. You are truly an artist in what you do and its been awesome seeing you grow from where you started to now! Thanks for doing what you do!
It never ceases to amaze me how up their own ass senior officers and politicians are when it comes military matters and they will go so far out their own way to put down good ideas just to preserve their own egos.
Of the seven deadly sins, Vanity is by far the most dangerous it stokes Greed, breeds Jealousy, and feeds Wrath.
@@msihcs8171 Remember Pride from Full Metal Alchemist Brotherhood. There's a reason he was the eldest and most powerful among his siblings. The author of the story knew that pride was the strongest sin and what it could do to a man was scary.
And every other organization on the face of the earth. People are PETTY.
It's called protecting their little fiefdoms. Nothing new its an age old problem even in 2024!
"Scientific Progress is made one fuberal at a time" is a famous quote for a reason. There is no one more dedicated to holding up new ideas than the former champions of new ideas that have become the old ideas.
My father was a Desert Rat, he was in Tobruk then took a tour of North Africa with some friends, as he put it, followed by Greece and Italy! He would not talk about the detail, I think it was pretty bad. He used to get angry at people taking democracy and freedom for granted. An amazing role model.
Thank you for an very spirited bio of Hobart. Dad was of that mould.
I had heard of/seen most of these tanks over the course of various games and movies... But I had never heard of Hobart. Thank you for giving the man the credit that he was owed and was previously robbed of. Love the channel, keep it up!
As someone who spent 12 years of my Army Career as Mechanized Infantry, this was so cool to see how it all began. We still use the bridge layer tanks, Of course swimming a Bradley Fighting Vehicle was kind of scrapped LOL. and I bet Hobart would have loved to see everything a mech unit could do. I think he would have loved the MCLC the most!!!! Great story!
15:50 "You told me that you would take it on installments" LMAO
The cool thing is, is some of the concepts that Hobart funnies used are still in use today. Our Engineers still use mine flails(Rollers?) and bridge layers because it works. So we can thank a British Armor officer for laying the foundation for all of modern armored warfare.
It was also a British officer who developed the Bailey Bridge. Basically an erector set that let you assemble pieces to make a bridge strong enough to cross tanks in just a few hours. Yet each of the individual pieces were small enough to be man handled into place by 6 guys with no need for cranes or other machinery (all though the engineers would take the heavy equipment if it was on offer;).
Except HE DID NOT. What TFE fails to mention here is Hobart was part of the 'all the army needs is tanks' crowd. He literally believed Artillery and Infantry were obsolete. He was one of those who proposed the Tank carrier, and if you think that is a ground vehicle acting as a tank carrier much as aircraft carriers do for aircraft you would be absolutely right. Yes, he actually proposed the idea. Seriously.
The development of British Armoured Doctrine was not down to one man, it certainly was NOT down to Hobart and Hobart alone. The man did have some genuinely good ideas, but he also has some abjectly shit ones as well.
Hobart was not sidelined because the British senior Officers were throwbacks ignoring a genius, he was sidelined because he was an unmitigated douchebag that literally no one could work with unless he deemed they thought similarly to him. The guy was a complete tosspot.
Laying the foundation for modern warfare my pimpled arse....
@@alganhar1 Could you point out the source for those ideas? Sounds like it could be an interesting read.
Speaking of Blitzkrig.
The guy who came up with the broken company formation was Emory Upton at the battle of the muleshoe in the US Civil War. This became crucial not only in the taking of trenches during WW1 ,but also part of the inspiration for what Hobart advaned upon.
I'm a 62 year old Navy vet who prides himself on his historical knowledge and This is the first I've ever heard this guy's name.
Well done buddy.......well done.
Tut Tut
Figures British officers would promote stupid tactics like dragoon tanks. This is up there with “not taking cover while under fire” and “generally acting nonchalant on the battlefield.” Because a corpse is very inspiring to the men
Or, like they show in Band of brothers, the british tank commander saying "We can't bloody well shoot something we can't see" even though the troops were telling him just blast a hole in the building. Tank is on the other side.🤦♂️
Like, yeah. With bombs blowing up, bullets flying everywhere, the literal WORLD is at war, but we stopped you because we thought it would be funny to get you to blast a hole in a house.
The incompetence of British officers as the rule rather than the exception is exaggerated. You dont get to build the biggest Empire the world has ever seen by being led entirely by idiots and duffers who dont know how to innovate and adapt.
Gotta make a video on the 1st Minnesota at Gettysburg. They are almost forgotten by everyone save for the most die hard Civil War history buffs.
Love your take on history! AF vet, worked on B-52’s, TR-1’s, Electronic Warfare equipment for FB-11’s, F-16’s, etc. my G’pa was a tank driver/mechanic in WW2 and was there when one of the camps was liberated. Wish I had persuaded him to give me more of his experiences but he didn’t want to talk about it…GBA and keep it up!
Man, he is a perfect example of someone who puts the mission and greater good over personal glory. Nearly every move he took both made his country's military better and took the spotlight off of himself at the same time. This guy should be talked about more, and held up as an example to all officers
Some historical badasses that you could cover:
Lauri Törni: the finnish soldier that hated russian so much, he joined 3 different armies to keep fighting them.
Mad Jack Churchill: the man who fought in ww2 with a bow and sword.
John Paul Jones: the scottish pirate during the revolutionary war that stole british ships and gave them to america. He's credited with being the father of the US navy.
JPJ also invaded England one time
That's a "no" on John Paul Jones. He raped a 10 year old Russian girl during his time in Russia. An investigation found that the girl's accusations were founded. The American and French governments pressured Russia and Catherine the Great into only exiling him, rather than charging him. Jones' defence was that the 10 year old girl was a whire who lived in a brothel and was asking for it.
Any military greatness takes a backseat to the rape of a 10 year old girl.
It is a crime against humanity that only one of those listed has a Sabaton song after them.
*Törni.
I'm fairly certain Mad Jack is actually credited with being the last man to kill another combatant via Longbow.
Loved the point about old school British officers not wanting the enlisted men to think, just shut up and soldier. One main strength of the U.S. military is empowering and listening to the enlisted soldiers. There is always a push back by some entrenched officers, but good officers and staff leaders pay attention to their enlisted personnel. As so many of your videos show, it is the guy whose life is on the line who finds a new, better, bolder way to destroy the enemy!
One thing to mention is that Churchill AVREs (Armed with the petard mortar) and Churchill Crocodiles would work in tandem in a pretty based and terrifying way. The Petard would crack the concrete of a bunker, and the crocodile would fire upon it, causing the flaming fuel to seep into the bunked through the cracks.
You are honestly more educational to watch than almost every single history class I have ever had the displeasure of attending.
"I taught you everything you know, but not everything I know." Is such a hard line that never fails.
In the Netherlands we have 2 of Hobart 's creations in a museum the Churchill avre and the Sherman crab they are in the war museum in Overloon
I thank you immensely for shining a light on this unsung absolute badass of modern warfare. I was a tanker in the U.S. Army, and I learned about him in training. My platoon sergeant in basic was a fan. It's sad that history is often written by the wrong people, and some of our greatest warriors are forgotten as a result. That is why I appreciate what you do on this channel. These people deserve their stories to be told.
You SGT was a smart man :)
The real scary thing about the Churchill Crocodile? Unlike most other flame tanks, the flamethrower replaces the hull machinegun, not the turret maingun.
So even if you shoot the trailer fuel tank or it runs out of scary burn juice, you still have a fully-functional Churchill tank to deal with... A huge heavy tank with almost as much armour as a King Tiger and none of the transmission problems.
Also the Brits had another flamethrower vehicle, the Wasp.
Basically you take a Universal Carrier, which is essentially a tracked battlefield taxi designed to go in, drop off ammo and extra dudes, pick up wounded and leave, and you replace the seating and cargo space with a flamethrower and pressure tank.
So if you were A Brit in WWII and you wanted armoured flamethrower support it came in two flavours: The featherweight and the heavyweight, and both of them were 100% going to ruin someone's day.
@@AusFirewing had a ford v8 lump and was light weight, they could take off going over hills, most bust the exhaust because when they landed they'd twat the exhaust pipe and rip it off xD
and could climb insane hills and go over massive ditches
@@AusFirewing there isn't enough money on the planet to get me to drive that into combat. It had to attract ALL the enemy rounds from everything with line of sight. And it doesn't have any armor to speak of.
@@ImezRuezOnly thing is: it requires the Germans to have the weapons handy to take it out at range, or to get close enough to use other weapons. Meanwhile you can convince them that getting too close is a very.....bad idea.
Thank you for actually giving the British some recognition, this was a brilliant watch mate 👍, he was a genius & indeed the founder of "Blitzkrieg".
Pre-war Britain really was stocked to the gills with absolute mad lads.
The sheer genius and innovative design behind so many of the machines they invented is truly remarkable.
Weird part is that I read a book on WWII (one of those DK Eyewitnesses books) that had the inflatable tanks, the road tanks, the bridge tanks, the flail tanks, the flame tanks, and even mentioned the stick bundle tanks. Not a word about Percy Hobart.
Establishment doesnt like him its sad
The book I've got that mentions the Hobart's Funnies mentions them as 'Hobart's Funnies', but yea, no info on the man behind them.
A Fat Electrician episode always brightens my day 😊
Especially when his wife has a cameo. I always die laughing.
@@michaelmartin4874 Yeah that always cracks me up, definitely need and episode with her as a guest host, that be fun
This guy reminds me a lot of Admiral Yi. A guy who did the impossible so well that ~400 years later the decendents of the people he crushed still said he was the best admiral ever.
To the extent that said people never were really a threat to him. His own government was the biggest threat to him.
To be honest it was Hobart who not only pioneered tank warfare in general but even mechanized warfare all together, considering how much the US army has is credited to Percy Hobart, another funny which is a little less know about is called the Conger, essentially it’s a British universal carrier with its engine removed and operated much like a trailer that would be towed by a tank, as for its purpose its main aim was to blow up large areas of mines the best way I can describe it is that it’s basically the grandfather or the M1159 assault breacher and if you don’t know what it is go look it up. Essentially the conger would be armed with a single massive rocket, attacked to a mile long fire hose connected via a reel, and so what’ll happen is that the conger would fire its rocket, dragging along the rubber fire hose along with it until it reaches its maximum range, once it’s landed an operator with massive balls would fill the rubber pipe with nitroglycerin, you know that extremely and highly volatile and unstable liquid which can explode just by sneezing next to its container it’s that volatile where in one incident a British conger accidentally blew up killing about half a dozen people as well as completely blowing the back half of the Churchill tank to shreds leaving a two meter wide crater because the explosion was so powerful, but again its main role was to essentially, fly up and over a mine field, fill the rubber pipe with nitroglycerin and then denote the pipe via a remote detonator from preferably a safe distance and then blow up any mines in the general vicinity.
The one thing interesting about Hobart’s funnies is that we still use a form of them today. The TFE is right about Hobart fathering modern tank combat and using these speciality vehicles in conjunction with mechanized combat today. There are breacher vehicles with a blade on front and no main gun on essentially a M1 chassis. The same with the bridging track. While we don’t have the flamethrower tank Bradley’s and strikers often have mortars incorporated with them. Funny how a man’s ideas which were belittled by his opponents and peers are now a integral part of the modern battlefield
An interesting thing about the Sherman Crab is that oftentimes the flail would simply eat the mines it hit, smashing them to pieces before they could detonate. The same thing happens with modern day mine clearing flails. Yes, they're still around today! If it ain't broke, don't fix it!
The flails & the bridge aren't "armor" anymore but moved to engineering companies and still used everywhere. I wonder if he's taught more there then armor school. Went through basic at Knox in 02-03 and didn't hear his name mentioned.
That's because American Army officers don't like to give credit to other military officers!
My ARMA 3 group runs a bunch of historical battles (from WW1 to Vietnam) and one thing that we always include when running the missions from WW2 is historical accuracy, like the bridge tanks
Awesome as always, I didn’t realize this part of History.
Got to love Churchill, and I love your banter with your wife.
Thank you for these.
18:54 , as a Canadian with a grandfather who piloted a landing craft on Juno, I just want to flex and say that we also made it to our first day objectives, pushing further in land than anyone else despite the second-most fortified beach. We were the only force to do so. Our boys fought hard.
Its a stark contrast to Canada today. How the mighty have fallen.
my great grandfather and great uncle both served they just didn't enter France till the 10th and in July of 44 my great uncle was killed they where in the royal Winnipeg rifles there engineer core made landings on juno tho witch is cool
Canadians were pretty fucking awesome in both world wars, in WW1 one of their "snipers" (technically wasn't a real thing at that point) had the record for most kills at the end. His name is Francis Pegahmagabow (Sabaton also has a song about him, Ghost in the Trenches). My dad is Canadian, and is very glad that he got out of there when he did though.
As an American who spent a lot of time in Canada……. I still feel that if push came to shove you Canucks will raise to the occasion. Maybe not right away, but our neighbors to the north still have some spunk in them. All that being said, I understand your frustration
Don't worry, buds. Apples don't fall far from their trees, and those tough men and women from the 30s had to rise to the occasion, and we can still do that today.
Trust me, we in the US feel the same about the state of our country 😭
13:29 I don't remember where the quote came from but, "If it's stupid and it works, it ain't stupid." 😂
I just wanted to let you know that we home school my kid and Fridays we watch your videos for history class.This is one of my favorites so far...
Thank you, always been a big fan of this legend. People need to know more about how much Britain contributed to tank warfare in ww2. They are always overlooked
Hobart also developed the first killdozer. They took a d7 and armored it. It was the only big cat dozer with a hydraulic blade in ww2 if i recall properly all the others used an overhead cable operated unit
Yeah the army used the international td25 with overhead winch to run the blade
@jakeford7688 I'm sure somebody built one at one point but I've never seen an international with an overhead cable blade. Most of the ww2 ones I've seen were hydraulic blades. I think they had already started using Bucyrus erie blades. Same with Allis Chalmers and the little Clark airborne dozer. Cat was the only one to hold so stubbornly to cable blades at that point. Having run both styles from that Era the cable blades do grade a lot easier.
As usual, you knocked it out of the park again! I wish more people would take the time to research history the way you do. At 45 years old, I've acquired more historical education from your videos than I ever did in high school. Your information is prudent and to the point. Your delivery is clear and concise. If I had to critique any part of your videos, it would be possibly finding a way to offer a version without the language so educators could use your videos in a school setting. I personally have zero issue with the language, I swear just as much. I'm only saying that, because I truly think that your delivery and lack of boring filler could truly spark some interest in history to a generation that is not receiving a proper and engaging education. Please keep doing what you're doing, brother! Sorry for the book report. Lol
Im working on having older videos censored and ill launch a clean channel
@@the_fat_electrician Curious why you would want to have them censored. Just leave them up and use your other channel. It wouldn't be TOO hard to edit previous content with a little different lexicon.
@@the_fat_electrician welp THAT'S gonna cut the video run time in half! 🤣
@@chipsawdust5816 no that is what im doing like all my videos stay up but ill have clean versioms om a diff channel
@@the_fat_electrician Does that mean you’ll change your name to “the kidnap resistant electrician”?
Great vid! As a follow up the tank museum's tank chats #45 starts a mini series on him & has several of the actual tanks.
Used to go to Normandy most years from 1990-1995 for the D-Day week.
Recall one year on the ferry, over there was a Tanker veteran with some family along....
Got talking to him. He was one of the Funnies crews. Best ferry trip ever. Amazing stories about his service in the specialist tanks models. He was very surprised when we knew all the model names and even some snippets of unit history.
That was the great thing about the trips then, plus the WW2 events in general.... there'd be WW2 veterans to talk with & swap tales.
I am British, I knew a bit about him as in his inventions and tactics saved countless lives and that his efforts were most forgotten or given to others but I did not know that his men were split between different regiments and divisions. Thank you for sharing this as with out people like you TFE history will become lost to us and made what makes people feel good.
Thank you for all your hard work every video is amazing, support from Scotland
The sheer fact that SPR had that detail is a shout to the importance of those DD tanks. Percy was a huge impact on the war and it’s amazing to keep learning at 34. Wish every history teacher in school was the in depth
I definitely didn't catch those references the first time I watched SPR, but now looking back, it turns out there are a few references to this. As another YT guy points out at about 20:40 of his video ua-cam.com/video/f5tNwN1F4Zs/v-deo.html, MOST of the tanks sunk, but a few, like maybe 3 made it. Sure enough, included in SPR, there is the bit of dialogue, where an officer tells Capt Miller, "I gotta clear these obstacles; Make holes for the tanks." to which Miller responds, "all the armor is floundering in the channel!"
Of course, not ALL the armor, just MOST of it, which is hinted at, by the fact that faintly in the background of that very scene, you can make out ONE tank, still crawling up the beach.
The intro made me think for a second this video was about Guderian, because he is literally the one who wrote THE book on tank warfare. He also had major opposition in Germany before the war, but he proved his methods were superior.
1984, Erlangen, 2-81 Armor, my battalion commander gave an hour long monologue on Hobart during our weekly officer professional development session. We were enthralled.
Red Lions!
Your CO was a smart men.
Having a great love of tanks, Hobart was a topic I know of. He furthered most WWII tactics but Romel used combined tactics and Gerdarian and Patton made it work through logistics. Hobart deserves credit, but the geniuses that stood on his shoulders can't be robbed of their work.
True, he got the definition of Blitzkrieg a bit wrong, it's the tactic of the whole army and not only of the armored divisions and it would still be Blitzkrieg without the tanks.
@@patrick3426kind of hard to really do as much of Blitzkrieg when a large chunk of it requires the armour to roll in to deal with whatever cant just be bombed or circumvented.
@@airplanemaniacgaming7877 depends, using Blitzkrieg with the Stormtroopers in WW1 was a lot better than the other tactics xD
All three deserve major credit on their individual accomplishments in the realm of effect tank warfare, for sure.
I love how many of Hobarts ideas and concepts are still used in the developmemt of engineering vehicles
Hobart is like the college professor you ACTUALLY WANT to take when taking a class that’s known to be difficult, and all the other teachers just read off of the stupid power point without actually explaining. God bless you Percy Hobart 🫡
To his credit Geuderian took the tank deep strike idea and added the communication between air and Infantry to create the combined arms that we all know and love. Britain was still a bit too posh and reserved to allow air and ground forces to work together.
Sir Percy couldn't think of everything
Which is ironically considering the commonwealth forces of Australia and Canada used combined arms in some of the most successful attacks in WW1
Hobart really went into his interview, and when asked "where do you see yourself in 5 years?" Man said "doin your wife"
😂😂😂
Makes you wonder if the interviewer went home 5 years later & found a guest was already there.
This was truly interesting, and the fact the man is practically unmentioned in the greater realm of common knowledge about WWII is unbelievable!
Thanks from a Brit to a Yank for telling the story of Percy Hobart. One of the Greatest of the greatest generation.
It’s honestly a failure of history teachings and borderline a crime that Percy Hobart is not talked about or respected the same as other generals. I didn’t know about him at all until this video. Thank you for giving him his flowers.
You know a video’s good when the fat electrician is serious in the beginning.
Must have been fat that brought me here.
Loved this episode. My grandfather was a part of Operation Overlord in the East Riding Yeomanry as driver of a DD Sherman with a 75mm front landing on Sword Beach. Thankful of Hobart’s floatation device and other planning leading to what was a relatively low casualty assault onto the beach in the plainly named, ‘Jane’. During the diversion from Caen due to traffic his crew were either killed or wounded during the assault on Tilly-sur-Suelles. He came home with shrapnel through his jaw and a relatively uneventful rest of the war. After a much needed rest having been a part of it since 1941.
I had long heard of Hoberts funnies, but his writing the textbook for tank warfare is completely new to me, as was the input of Churchill. Both to keep Hobert on board and also in WW1 encouraging the initial development of tanks.
I've been a POG for 20 years but am blessed enough to know many tankers and I've never heard of Percy Hobart until today.
You're doing military history a favor and frankly should be teaching this stuff at the academies.
Unfortunately, you're far too Hobart to receive that honor.
Please keep this up as this history needs to be taught.
Awesome story! The early years of WW2 was basically British lads who knew better just disregarding their superiors and proving their ideas in the field. The battle of Britain pretty much was won by pilots telling the RAF higher ups how to fight an air battle. The SAS completely derailed the Nazi advance in Africa and still had to fight the leaders just to continue to exist.
Not quite right - Battle of Britain was won because Dowding's air defence system was so far ahead of anything the Luftwaffe could conceive of that the basic architecture is still in use today, by basically everyone. The BoB was won the moment the Germans thought they'd start it.
The SAS was disbanded after the war too only to be brought back years later when they realised they couldn't fight a modern war without special forces.
So many of your videos talk about someone we’ve never heard of, and are absolutely tier 1 operators. The amount of small details that you add are awesome. Learning and being entertained at the same time, brilliant!