RATTE AUSF. G

At one point the German military fielded proposals for an immense series of "landkruisers." This model shows one of the proposed designs, the 1,000 ton "Ratte" (Rat). Although never produced (It would have required enough steel to produce a year's worth of Panthers!), the sheer scale of the vehicle is staggering. Dwarfing the the Tiger II (seen next to it), the Ratte would have 35 meters (115 feet) long, 14 meters (46 feet) wide, and 11 meters (36 feet) high. The main armament was to be two 280mm cannon of the type normally used for battleships and coastal defense, with six 75mm guns in separate, hull-mounted turrets. The 280mm guns were to be mounted in a turret all their own. Atop this was to be another turret mounting twin 88mm flak guns, as well as eight smaller turrets packing twin 20mm antiaircraft guns.

As the Ratte was never made, questions such as speed, crew, and thickness of armor, are unknown. Its weight would have made it a highly impractical vehicle, and no bridge in Germany would have supported it. Other the other hand, the initial appearance of such a machine, a literal mobile fortress, would have been frightening, to say the least.