M26 Pershing

The M26 also saw service in the Korean War. When the war began in June 1950, the four American infantry divisions on occupation duty in Japan had no medium tanks at all, having only one active tank company equipped with M24 Chaffee light tanks each. When these divisions were sent to Korea at the end of June 1950, they soon found that the 75mm gun on the M24 could not penetrate the armor of North Korean T-34 tanks, which had no difficulty penetrating the M24’s thin armor. In a Tokyo ordnance depot, three M26 Pershing tanks were found in poor condition; they were hastily rebuilt, but they had no fanbelts for their engines, so a substitute was used. These three M26s were formed into a provisional tank platoon commanded by Lieutenant Samuel Fowler and sent to Korea in mid-July; used to defend the town of Chinju, the tanks soon overheated when the substitute fan belts stretched and the cooling fans stopped working, and the only three American medium tanks in Korea were lost.[6] More medium tanks began a