Optics destroyed!

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Russia is a pretty cool place. Board a train, and within half an hour you can be in remote wilderness, untouched by man for decades. And sometimes, the men that touched it last left some cool stuff for you to find.

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“Look what I found”, album by Yuri Florov (click for more)

20 years ago, an old man told Dmitriy Mihailovich Bratan about his time in the village of Martushino when he was a boy. The old man, born in 1927, was not old enough to join the army in 1941. He remained in the village when the war started, and soon, the Germans came.

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Photo from Bundesarchiv, “Soviet Union, tank attack near Istra”. The terrain indicates that the village in the photograph is likely Martushino

According to the eye-witness, the village was defended by a group of Soviet soldiers, led by a Lieutenant (the eye-witness remembers him well, as they played cards together). The squad’s anti-tank armament was composed of a single 45 mm AT gun. Against a number of tanks, a single AT gun isn’t much, and the village soon fell to the Germans. However, the Soviet gunner made his mark.

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A well-placed shot knocked the cupola clean off. It was left there for over 70 years, until the area started being developed for cottages, and Bratan evacuated the cupola by means of a pick-up truck. As a valuable piece of military history, it’s on its way to a better place.

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Next time you hear “optics destroyed!”, be happy your crew doesn’t have to get out of the tank, and hoist the cupola back up on top of the turret.

72 thoughts on “Optics destroyed!”

  1. “Next time you hear “optics destroyed!”, be happy your crew doesn’t have to get out of the tank, and hoist the cupola back up on top of the turret.”

    Implying wargaming would develop such feature in this decade.

      • That would be an intelligent use of the feature. As far as we have been told, the Havok physics will only affect parts of the tank flowing when the tank itself is destroyed.

        • Well cupolas are one thing – WG said that there will be more damage models including turret ballistics and when the turret goes walkabout the crew tend not to worry about how to get it back on the tank. In the wild dead tanks range from what looks like working tanks from most angles to a pair of smoking lengths of tracks. WG are only going to model the most dramatic outcomes

          • I look forward to the sound of ‘bail out’ when the tank is destroyed… but if the turret its off… then it may be litteral and you will need to grab buckets to bale the tank out ;)

  3. just make a seperate blog about all this trivial bullshit… most of us are here only for the wot leaks like 8.9 td line and 9.0 japanese tanks or t57 foch nerf

    • if you dont intrested in that then do not read it ! it can’t be too difficult to do that
      let this over for some guys that might be intrested in

    • Funny how this guy is rocking proudly a clan tag. Is being an arrogant douche a prerequisite to joining one now, or do I just have bad luck with clanners?

    • @llVIU[F_O_S

      stfu bitch, you have no way of knowing what “most of us” are fucking here for you stupid fucking whore.

    • Hey idiot, do you know what TAGS are, and how do they work? You have them up there on the top of the page, but if you are still too stupid to find them – here you go http://ftr.wot-news.com/category/qa/ .Post topics narrowed only to q&a, but even without that one can easily see on the main page if the post is in the area of our interest….

    • Someone’s got up with the wrong foot. Bitchy because mom dressed you in the same clothes again?

    • You didn’t get any warm milk this morning?! “Your opinion is very important to us!” – NOT!
      I really hope you get slapped on the back of the head by the same person that slaps you when you’re forced to click this website and read stuff you don’t want to … Stupid ignorant!

      • and again ensign is trying to justify his fucking commie propaganda…and no matter how hard you try you won’t brainwash people who have their own head to think no matter how young is the night…i still don’t get why SS is still keeping you…your articles are 99% pure soviet supremacy-german inferiority bullshit…

        • everything that doesnt support my german superiority point of view, even when backed up by historical documents = bullshit
          *yawn*

        • medejed, still primitive as fuck i see, its really a shame you breathe the same air as the rest of us…

          • Paaranoja still obsessed with other peoples lives….and calling someone primitive “as fuck” doesn’t make you any better….and i could say the same for you…really a shame you exist

          • same goes for ensigns commie..when you read his comments and articles one would ask himself how come uber soviet red army haven’t won the war in 2 days when they were so superior to zee germanz

            • That’s about the only basis I could think of, too, and it’s plain bizarre – surely even a raving Nazi fanboi [totally not implying anything here] should be aware than as total faceroll as Barbarossa for the most part was the Germans neverhteless took their share of casualties?

            • Probably because Barbarossa wasn’t a “total faceroll”, the Soviets were very capable of resisting, and even winning, in battles of local importance, during an overall retreat. There’s a difference between that and throwing away your gun and running East until you hit the commissars, which seems to be what said raving nazi fanboys believe happened.

            • In the grand scale of things it kind of was, given that the Soviets lost most of their existing forces in the West and obscene amounts of territory. Scattered local successes hardly altered *that*.
              ‘Course, turned out they could take that kind of pummeling and keep standing which AFAIK soon started to worry the more astute among the German commanders – as did the initially isolated but multiplying signs of the Red Army starting to get its shit together.

            • Oh yes, on the strategic level, the Red Army was doing abysmally, but on the tactical level, the units that actually had ammunition and fuel were more than capable of standing up to the Wehrmacht. Those are the units that bought enough time for the rest of the country to get its shit together and start pushing the Germans back in late ’41.

            • Well it’s a little debatable to what degree they’d found their collective arses by late ’41; let’s just say that I recently read Osprey’s book on the less than brilliantly succesful Second Kharkov in May ’42…

          • i didn’t said this article in particular is commie propaganda, but why does ensign have the need to justify himself….my comment was just a respond on his: “All the people that are usually yelling “Russian bias! Get out of here with your communist propaganda!” the moment I post anything. Though, the night is young, there is hope for them yet.”
            Just read the last sentence. Wtf was that supposed to mean? That all he said is true and it’s just the matter of time when we will start to believe it wanted or not?! I sense comme regime there. It’s like you either go to war or to gulag. There is no 3rd option. Same here, either you believe everything i pull out of my ass as a proof or you are nazi fanboi.

    • whoa, stand back, looks like this nerd is angry

      I like these little snippets SS, keep posting them. ignore this huge nerd, he really likes to hate things

    • Liviu, you much more of a douche-bag than I tought you were(@forums).
      As the guys said above, if you’re not interested, who the fuck forces you to read, and even worse, to talk trash.

      And sorry to dissapoint you, you’re wrong.Most of us that are here read and enjoy all the stuff Frank and his mates bring.
      And if you don’t trust me(not that you even had to), there are polls made by Frank which shown that people want to see as many posts as possible from his blog.

    • Hmm, someone seems to have a SHORT memory. Don’t you remember that poll where a majority of people want as many articles as possible and not just he Q&A? Where did you get this ego that makes you think that you can speak for all of us?

  9. SS I had enough of this shit!!! Convert this site ASAP to a porn gallery so we all can enjoy it finally :) :) :)

    p.s. I don’t want to read about any of these shity tanks, I want boobs!!!

  10. That Panzer IV just standing there on the driveway, it’s as if the crew is hiding in the nearby building and waiting.

    “We attack ze Russians now, ja?”

  11. By cupola.. you mean that thingy on the top of the tanks turret? Sorry, I’m not familiar with the terms :3

    That looks like the commanders hatch of pzIII-IV [ In the game ]

    • “Hatch” would be the hinged panel you open to get in or out. “Cupola” would be one of those raised thingamajigs usually with periscopes, vision slits or whatever all over for the purpose of improving the vehicle commander’s situational awareness without having to stick his head out. Usually also includes his access hatch because why not and saves space.

  13. ” Next time you hear “optics destroyed!”, be happy your crew doesn’t have to get out of the tank, and hoist the cupola back up on top of the turret.”

    I’d actually be more satisfied with that instead of having a tank crippled only by being shooted in it.

  15. I’ve seen photos of a removed/replaced cupola used as a grave marker for dead German troops. The cupola making an impromptu place for flowers etc.
    Perhaps the guy should have recorded where he found it as there are probably some human remains underneath.