:: Tanks for nothing ::

Tuesday, August 23, 2005

Tiger I - Wikipedia

The modern approach to tank design with sloped armor to save weight was first applied in the T-34, then in the Panther tank and Tiger II. The Western allies did not pick up upon this philosophy until late in WWII with the American M-26 Pershing Heavy Tank. All in all, the Tiger is one of the best tanks of WWII, the problem was production. There were 40,000 Sherman Tanks produced and another 30,000 Russian T-34's produced, compared to the Tiger I's 1350 and the Tiger II's appoximately 500 produced. Clearly insurmountable odds, regardless of technological superiority. It is estimated that the 1350 Tiger I's produced, achieved a 10:1 kill ratio, knocking out an estimated 12,000 - 14,000 enemy tanks. That statistic alone testifies to the overall brilliance of the Tiger design.

Being a perfectionist is a huge impediment to success, mostly because perfectionism isn't very tolerant of extenuating circumstances. Success within a small scope and success within a much larger one are loosely correlated, but there are times when the two are at odds. Producing a far superior tank (10:1 kill ratio!?) resulted in a very detrimental outcome for the German army of WWII, because it was:

1. Too costly to design
2. Too costly to construct

A single tank which can defeat 10 will be in dire straits when matched against 20 or 30. Flooding the battlefield with cheaper and inferior units proved to be a very successful strategy for the Allies and, as the locus of national competition moved from the war room to the board room (with the latter often grandiosely nicknamed the former), a successful strategy for business as well. Shifts in style may account for part of the reason why televisions are no longer adorned with wooden exteriors, but the cost-effectiveness of plastic plays a far greater role. Even Detroit learned in the early 1980's that customers would trade off a year or two or reliability in return for lower prices.

Making products as close to perfect as humanly possible will result in an untenably expensive price point. That's why my snazzy smart phone started to malfunction in very basic ways and I had to spend 3 hours battling with Sprint to get it replaced. It's also why, now that the hard drive on my Powerbook is failing after just over a year, I expect to spend even longer battling with Apple. Not one bit of my pedantic armchair postulating, however, explains why both had to happen at the same time.

Posted by morland @ 05:30 PM

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