In war, technology can make all the difference when it comes to who wins and who loses. This means that wartime is often a period of significant technological advancement.
World War 2 is a classic example of this. As the fighting dragged on and the death toll rose both the Allies and the Axis came up with increasingly out-of-the-box ideas, coming up with increasingly ingenious ways to solve age-old problems.
Problems like getting both your infantry and your armor onto the battle in a safe but expedient way. This led to the invention of the Antonov A-40, Russia’s “flying” tank. This unconventional creation, also known as the “Krylya Tanka” or Tank Wings, aimed to marry the might of a tank with the mobility of an aircraft.
Sounds pretty impressive, which raises the question: if it was such a good idea, why don’t we have flying tanks today?
What was the Antonov A-40?
The Antonov A-40 was the world’s first flying tank, kind of. It was an attempt by Soviet engineers to find a new way to drop their tanks onto the battlefield and quickly enter the fighting.
It was essentially a glider attachment designed to transport a T-60 light tank. This unorthodox fusion aimed to revolutionize airborne operations by providing a means to swiftly deliver armored vehicles directly into the heart of the conflict.
This wasn’t a new problem the Soviets were trying to solve, as getting armor into the fighting had been a problem for a while. Other nations had “solved” the problem by loading their light tanks onto gliders and for years the Soviets had been doing something more straightforward, strapping small T-27 Tankettes to the bottom of heavy bombers and landing them on airfields that way.
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The Soviets actually got fairly good at this during the 1940 occupation of Bessarabia. They took to getting their TB-3 bombers as low as possible and then dropping their light tanks from just a few meters off the ground. As long as the tank’s gearbox was in neutral the tanks would absorb the shock of the landing eventually roll to a stop, ready for action.
For those wondering about dropping tanks from bomber aircraft, you will be unsurprised to hear this approach came with some problems. Firstly, technological restraints meant only the smallest of tanks, like T-27 could be airdropped in this way. About the size of a car and lightly armored, the T-27 was limited in how much support it could actually offer infantry troops once it arrived.
Another problem was the fact you couldn’t air-drop the tank’s crew with the tank itself. Humans are squishy and don’t respond well to being dropped out of planes in metal death traps, especially incredibly small, claustrophobic metal death traps. The crew being dropped separately from the tank often led to delays in the tank reaching the action if the tank was even found at all.
The third problem was that dropping tanks like this put both the tank and the bomber carrying it at risk. The weighed-down bombers had to fly extremely low to drop the tanks safely, putting them at risk of enemy fire, especially when trying to drop them near the fighting.
This all led the Soviets to task one of their greatest airplane designers, Oleg Antonov, with the job of developing a glider that could be used to land tanks. Antonov had other ideas though and started designing something far more interesting than a normal glider.
The Design
Antonov planned on marrying the Soviet T-60 light tank with the biplane to create something new. The result was the Antonov A-40. What he designed was essentially a detachable cradle that consisted of wood and canvas wings in a biplane configuration and a double boom tail at the back.
Rather than adding a propeller to the tank or cradle the A-40 was designed to be towed by a heavy transport plane like a Petlyakov Pe-8 or a Tupolev TB-3 to near the battlefield, and then it could be released and glide down. As the tank approached the ground the driver could fire up the engine and get the treads up to speed for landing, turning the tank into the glider’s landing gear.
Some reports also claimed that by rotating the tank’s turret the driver could control roll and lift the barrel up and down to control elevation. Apparently offering the crews any control in their flying tank was considered more of a “nice to have” than an essential.
It all sounds mighty impressive but there were limitations. The T-60 was a light tank but for Antonov’s design to work it needed to be even lighter.
This meant getting rid of its main armament, some of its armor, ammunition, and most of its fuel. The main gun was replaced with a much less powerful 20 or even smaller 12.7-millimeter machine gun. It was a lot of sacrifices to make just to turn a tank into a glider.
But was It a success? No. By 1942 the design for the Antonov A-40 was ready to leave the drawing board and begin testing. The test was a mixed bag.
Its first and only test flight was carried out on September 2, 1942. Things got off to a bad start when the mothership tasked with dragging it, a TB-3 bomber, had to ditch the tank early to avoid a nasty crash. It turned out the tank was causing an extreme level of drag, causing the bomber’s engines to overheat. Not good.
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The good news was that once gliding, the tank reportedly glided smoothly and its pilot, the famous Soviet experimental glider pilot Sergei Anokhin, managed to land the contraption safely near the target airport. After ditching the wings, he successfully drove it back to base.
Despite being a partial success, the project was quickly shelved after the test. The tank may have landed safely but the Soviets didn’t have any planes powerful enough to drag it at the required 160 km/h (99 mph) and the design was ultimately deemed more trouble than it was worth.
A Waste of a Good Invention?
So, should the Soviets have carried on? In hindsight, it appears that the A-40’s design was inherently flawed for practical battlefield use and they did the right thing by ditching the design. The project faced major challenges, including the difficulty of managing a glider with an attached tank, the susceptibility to enemy attacks during the towing phase, and the overall complexity of the operation.
The design also called for too many compromises. In particular by the time the tank had lost most of its fuel, armor, ammunition, and weaponry how useful could it actually be? Furthermore, there were concerns its lightly armored underbelly would make it a sitting duck during the gliding phase.
The Antonov A-40, often regarded as the tank that could fly, remains a captivating chapter in the history of military experimentation. This audacious attempt to combine the prowess of a tank with the flexibility of an aircraft exemplifies the bold thinking that emerged during the crucible of World War II.
However, the A-40’s fate serves as a cautionary tale, highlighting the fine line between visionary concepts and practical battlefield solutions. In the relentless pursuit of innovation, not every idea takes flight, and the Antonov A-40 stands as a reminder of the challenges inherent in pushing the boundaries of conventional warfare.
Top Image: The only known photograph of the Antonov A-40 in flight. Source: Tempshill / Public Domain.
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