Renault FT

The Renault FT, frequently referred to in post-World War I literature as the "FT-17" or "FT17", was a French light tank that was among the most revolutionary and influential tank designs in history. The FT was the first production tank to have its armament within a fully rotating turret. The Renault FT's configuration – crew compartment at the front, engine compartment at the back, and main armament in a revolving turret – became and remains the standard tank layout. Over 3,000 Renault FT tanks were manufactured by French industry, most of them during the year 1918. Another 950 of an almost identical licensed copy of the FT (the M1917 or "Six Ton Tank") were made in the USA, but not in time to enter combat. Armour historian Steven Zaloga has called the Renault FT "the world's first modern tank." However R.L. DiNardo states that the distinction should be applied to the earlier Motorgeschütz design prototype, which never saw production, created by the Austrian Leutnant Günther Burstyn.

Development
Studies on the design of a light tank were initiated in July 1916 by Louis Renault, a major automobile and truck manufacturer. Louis Renault laid down the new tank's design and overall specifications, notably its projected weight which could not exceed 7 tons. Renault was unconvinced that a sufficient power-to-weight ratio could ever be achieved with the engines available at the time to give acceptable mobility to the heavy tank types requested by the military. Charles-Edmond Serre, a close associate of Louis Renault, was placed in charge of development and production. Rodolphe Ernst-Metzmaier, one of Renault's most talented designers, produced the final drawings. Among other innovations : the FT's tracks were automatically kept under constant tension to prevent derailments, while a rounded tail piece facilitated the crossing of trenches. Because the engine continued to function normally under any inclination, very steep slopes could be negotiated by the Renault FT without loss or diminution of power.

Renault's design was technically far more advanced than the other two French tanks at the time, namely the Schneider CA1 (1916) and the heavy Saint-Chamond (1917). Nevertheless Renault encountered some early difficulties in getting his proposal fully supported by the head of the French tank arm, Colonel (later General) Jean Baptiste Eugène Estienne. After the first British use of heavy tanks on 15 September 1916 during the Battle of the Somme, the French military still pondered whether a large number of light tanks would be preferable to a smaller number of superheavy tanks (the later Char 2C). However on 27 November 1916, Estienne had sent to the French Commander in Chief a  personal memorandum proposing the immediate adoption and mass manufacture of  a  light tank based on the specifications of the Renault prototype. After receiving two large government orders for the FT tank, one in April 1917 and the other in June 1917, Renault was at last able to proceed. However his design remained in competition with the superheavy Char 2C until the end of the war.

The prototype was refined during the second half of 1917, but the Renault FT remained plagued by radiator fan belt problems throughout the war. Only 84 were produced in 1917 but 2,697 were delivered in 1918 before the Armistice. At least 3,177 were produced (the number delivered to the French Army); some estimates of total production for all versions go as high as 4,000. Furthermore 514 were delivered directly to the U.S. Army, 24 to Great Britain, and six to Italy – giving a probable total production number of 3,694.

Manufacturers
About half of all FTs were manufactured in Renault's factory at Boulogne-Billancourt near Paris, with the remainder subcontracted to other concerns. Of the original order for 3,530, Renault accounted for 1,850 (52 per cent), Berliet 800 (23 per cent), SOMUA (a subsidiary of Schneider & Cie) 600 (17 per cent), and Delaunay-Belleville 280 (8 per cent). Renault agreed to waive any royalties. When the order was increased to 7,820 in 1918, production was distributed in roughly the same proportion.

When the USA entered the War in April 1917, its army was short of heavy materiel, and had no tanks at all. The American Expeditionary Forces were first issued 514 French-made Renault FT tanks in 1918. Previously, in December 1917, a sample tank of the Renault FT type had reached the USA with detailed drawings and a Renault engineer. Contracts to produce 4,400 Renault FT type tanks for the US Army, by three American assembly plants, were promptly signed. American-made Renault type tanks were officially named Six Ton Tank M1917 and closely resembled the French Renault FT original. Finished machines started to come through in October 1918 just one month before the Armistice of 11 November. Production of the American-made "Six Ton Tank" continued after the Armistice, reaching a final number of 952 delivered to the US Ordnance Department.

Turret
The first turret designed for the FT was a circular, cast steel version almost identical to that of the prototype. It was designed to carry a Hotchkiss 8mm machine gun. In April 1917 Estienne decided for tactical reasons that some vehicles should be capable of carrying a small cannon. The 37mm Puteaux gun was chosen, and attempts were made to produce a cast steel turret capable of accommodating it, but it was unsuccessful. The first 150 FTs were for training only, and made of non-hardened steel plus the first model of turret. Meanwhile, the Berliet Company had produced a new design, a polygonal turret of riveted plate, which was simpler to produce than the early cast steel turret. It was given the name "omnibus", since it could easily be adapted to mount either the Hotchkiss machine gun or the Puteaux 37mm with its telescopic sight. This turret was fitted to production models in large numbers. In 1918 Forges et aciéries Paul Girod produced a successful circular turret which was mostly cast with some rolled parts. The Girod turret was also an "omnibus" design. Girod supplied it to all the companies producing the FT, and in the later stages of the war it became more commonplace than the Berliet turret. The turret sat on a circular ball-bearing race, and could easily be rotated by the gunner/commander or locked in position with a handbrake.

Service history
The Renault FT was widely used by French forces in 1918 and by the American Expeditionary Forces (AEF) in France in the later stages of World War I. George S. Patton was the commanding officer and organizer of the first US Light Tank Brigade, entirely made up of Renault FT tanks. The first French engagement of the Renault FT occurred on 31 May 1918 east of the Forest of Retz at Ploisy-Chazelle, between Soissons and Villers-Cotterets, during the Second Battle of the Marne. This first engagement was a complete success. Then increasingly larger numbers of Renault FT tanks were deployed together with smaller numbers of the older Schneider CA1 and Saint-Chamond tanks. As the war had become a war of movement during the summer of 1918, the lighter Renault FT tanks were often transported on heavy trucks and special trailers rather than by rail on flat cars. Estienne had initially proposed to overwhelm the enemy defences using a "swarm" of light tanks, a tactic that was eventually successfully implemented. Beginning in late 1917, the Entente allies were attempting to outproduce the Central Powers in all respects, including artillery, tanks, and chemical weapons. Consequently a goal was set of manufacturing 12,260 Renault FT tanks (including 4,440 of the US version) before the end of 1919.

After the end of World War I, Renault FTs were exported to many countries (Belgium, Brazil, Czechoslovakia, Estonia, Finland, Iran, Japan, Lithuania, Netherlands, Poland, Romania, Spain, Switzerland, Turkey, and Yugoslavia). Renault FT tanks were used by most nations having armoured forces, generally as their prominent tank type. The tanks were used in many later conflicts, such as the Russian Civil War, Polish-Soviet War, Chinese Civil War, Rif War, Spanish Civil War, and Estonian War of Independence.

Renault FT tanks were also fielded in limited numbers during World War II, in Poland, Finland, France, and Kingdom of Yugoslavia, although they were already obsolete. In 1940 the French Army still had eight battalions equipped with 63 FTs each and three independent companies with ten each, for a total organic strength of 534, all equipped with machine guns.

Many smaller units assembled after the start of World War II also used the Renault FT. This usage gave rise to the popular myth that the French had no modern equipment at all; in fact, they had more modern tanks than the Germans. The French suffered from tactical and strategic weaknesses rather than from equipment deficiencies. When the best French units were cut off by the German drive to the English Channel, the complete French materiel reserve was sent to the front as an expediency measure; this included 575 FTs. Earlier, 115 sections of FTs had been formed for airbase defence. The Wehrmacht captured 1,704 FTs. They used about a hundred for airfield defence and about 650 for patrolling occupied Europe. Some were used by the Germans in 1944 for street-fighting in Paris, but by this time they were hopelessly out of date. Vichy France used Renault FTs against Allied invasion forces during Operation Torch in Morocco and Algeria. The French tanks, however, were no match for the newly arrived American M4 Sherman and M3 Stuart tanks.

The FT was the ancestor of a long line of French tanks: the FT Kégresse, the NC1, the NC2, the Char D1, and the Char D2. The Italians produced the FIAT 3000, a moderately close copy of the FT, as their standard tank.

The Soviet Red Army captured fourteen burnt-out Renaults from White Russian forces and rebuilt them at the Krasnoye Sormovo Factory in 1920. Nearly fifteen exact copies, called "Russki Renoe", were produced in 1920–1922, but they never used in battle because of many technical problems. In 1928–1931 the first completely Soviet-designed tank was the T-18, a derivative of the Renault with sprung suspension.

In all, the Renault FT was used by Afghanistan, Belgium, Brazil, the Republic of China, Czechoslovakia, Estonia, Finland, France, Nazi Germany, Iran, Japan, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Philippine Commonwealth, Poland, Romania, the Russian White movement, the Soviet Union, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, Norway, the United Kingdom, the United States and the Kingdom of Yugoslavia.

Nomenclature
Much confusion surrounds the name of this tank.

It is sometimes stated that the letters FT stand for the French terms faible tonnage (low tonnage), faible taille (low weight), franchisseur de tranchées (trench crosser), or force de terre (land force). None is correct. Nor was it named the FT 17 or FT-17; nor was there an FT18.

All new Renault projects were given a two-letter product code for internal use, and the next one available was 'FT.'

The prototype was at first referred to as the automitrailleuse à chenilles Renault FT modèle 1917. Automitrailleuse à chenilles means "armoured car with tracks." By this stage of the War, automitrailleuse was the standard word for an armoured car, but by the time the FT was designed there were two other types of French tank in existence and the term char d'assaut (from the French char - a cart or wagon, and assaut; attack or assault), soon shortened to char, had on the insistence on Colonel Estienne, already been adopted by the French, and was in common use. Once orders for the vehicle had been secured it was the practice at Renault to refer to it as the "FT." The vehicle was originally intended to carry a machine-gun, and was therefore described as a char mitrailleur. Mitrailleur (from mitraille; grapeshot) had by this time come to mean "machine-gunner."

Many sources, predominantly English language accounts, refer to the FT as the "FT 17" or "FT-17." This term is not contemporary, and appears to have arisen post World War One. In Estienne's biography, his granddaughter states, "It is also referred to as the FT 17: the number 17 was added after the war in history books, since it was always referred to at Renault as the FT." Lieutenant-Colonel Paul Malmassari (French tank officer and Doctor of History) states, "The Renault tank never carried the name FT 17 during the First World War, although the initials F.T. seem to appear in August 1917." Some confusion might also have been caused by the fact that the American version of the vehicle, produced in the USA under licence from Renault, was designated the M1917.

When it was decided to equip the FTs with either cannon or machine-guns, the cannon version was designated char canon (cannon tank) and the latter, in accordance with French grammar, renamed char mitrailleuse (machine-gun tank).

It is frequently claimed that some of these tanks were designated FT 18. Reasons given for the claim include: it distinguished tanks produced in 1918 from those of 1917; it was applied to FTs armed with cannon as opposed to those those with machine-guns; it distinguished FTs with a cast, rounded turret from those with a hexagonal one; it referred to the 18 horsepower engine; it indicated a version to which various modifications had been made.

However, Renault records make no distinction between 1917 and 1918 output; the decision to arm FTs with a 37mm gun was made in April, 1917, before any tanks had been manufactured; because of various production difficulties and design requirements, a range of types of turret were produced by several manufacturers, but they were all fitted to the basic FT body without any distinguishing reference; all FTs had the same model 18 hp engine. The Renault manual of April, 1918 is entitled RENAULT CHAR D'ASSAUT 18 HP, and the illustrations are of the machine-gun version. The official designation was not changed until the 1930s, when the FT was fitted with a Model 1931 machine-gun and renamed the FT31. By this time the French Army was equipped with several other Renault models and it had become necessary to distinguish between the various types.

Variants

 * Char canon: an FT with a 37 mm Puteaux SA18 short-barreled gun – about 3/5 of tanks ordered, about 1/3 of tanks actually produced
 * Char mitrailleuse: an FT with an 8 mm Hotchkiss M1914 machine gun – about 2/5 of tanks ordered, about 3/5 of tanks produced
 * FT 75 BS: a self propelled gun with a short barreled Blockhaus Schneider 75mm gun – at least 39 tanks were produced
 * Char signal or TSF: a command tank with a radio. "TSF" stands for télégraphie sans fil ( "wireless"). No armament, three-men crew, 300 ordered, at least 188 produced
 * FT modifié 31: upgraded tanks with 7.5 mm Reibel machine gun. This modification started in 1931 on the 1580 chars mitrailleurs still in French stocks; all the metropolitan guntanks were (at least officially) scrapped to build utility vehicles on their chassis and the guns used to equip the R 35. This version was sometimes referred to as the "FT 31", though this was not the official name.
 * FT-Ko: Thirteen modified units imported by the Imperial Japanese Army in 1919, armed with either the 37 mm Puteaux SA18 cannon or machine guns; used in combat in the Manchurian Incident and subsequently for training
 * Six Ton Tank Model 1917 – US-built copy. 950 built, 374 of which were gun tanks and fifty of which were radio tanks. During World War II the Canadian Army purchased 236 redundant M1917s for training purposes.
 * Russkiy Reno: the "Russian Renault", the first Soviet tank, produced at Krasnoye Sormovo. A close copy.
 * Renault FT CWS: the Renault FT CWS or Zelazny ("mild steel") tanks were built in Poland for use as training vehicles only (Polish combat tanks were French manufactured). These tanks used spare French engines and components. The hulls and turrets were manufactured to French specifications in all other respects. Around 27 CWS FT tanks were built. CWS is the abbreviation for Centralne Warsztaty Samochodowe (translated as "Central Workshops for Motor vehicles" or "Central Truck Workshop"), a plant in Warsaw which performed maintenance and depot level repair.
 * Renault M26/27: a development of the FT with a different suspension and Kégresse rubber tracks; a number were used in Yugoslavia and five in Poland.
 * T-18 – A Soviet derivation with sprung suspension.
 * FIAT 3000 – an Italian derivation.
 * Polish gas tank – A Polish modification built in the Wojskowy Instytut Gazowy ("Military Gas Institute") and tested on the Rembertów proving ground on 5 July 1926. Instead of a turret, the tank had twin gas cylinders. It was designed to create smoke screens, but could also be used for chemical attacks. Only one was produced.

Surviving vehicles
Approximately 41 FTs, 20 Six-Ton Tanks, two Russkiy Renos and three FT TSF survive in various museums around the world.


 * Musée des Blindés, Saumur, France. The museum owns three FTs, with two in running order. The inoperable one came from Afghanistan, and is in a static display. Two other tanks from Afghanistan were given to the General George Patton Museum of Leadership in Fort Knox, Kentucky. Another one was given to Poland, where it will be renovated. The Musée des Blindés also owns an FT TSF; it currently has no tracks and driving train, but the museum intends to restore it.
 * Musee de l'Armee, Paris, France. One FT
 * Glade of the Armistice, near Compiègne, France. One FT
 * Old Rhinebeck Aerodrome in Rhinebeck, NY. One driveable Six-Ton Tank
 * Hayes Otoupalik, Military Collectibles and Historical Americana, Missoula, Montana. One driveable Six-Ton Tank. Tank is from the personal collection of Hayes Otoupalik. He owned a French Renault FT, sold to the National World War I Museum.
 * Bovington Tank Museum, United Kingdom. One FT, an unarmoured training model.
 * Museu Militar Conde de Linhares in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. One FT
 * Ropkey Armor Museum, Crawfordsville, Indiana A Six-Ton Model 1917
 * National Armor and Cavalry Museum, Fort Benning GA in the United States. In 2003, two FT tanks, one would have mounted a 37mm cannon and the other a 8mm mg, were discovered in Kabul by Major Robert Redding. With permission from the Afghan government, the two tanks were transferred to the United States, where one of them, a machine gun tank, was restored and originally put on display in the Patton Museum of Cavalry & Armor, until the Armor Branch collection was transferred to Fort Benning. This FT will be on display in the Armor Gallery of the NIM. The NACM currently is restoring the other FT, 37 mm gun tank. The Patton Museum previously owned an FT17 tank, but it was transferred to U.S. Army Heritage & Education Center at Carlisle Barracks, PA.
 * Louisiana State Military Museum at Jackson Barracks, New Orleans, Louisiana. An FT was inundated by floodwaters of Hurricane Katrina in 2005. It is being restored and will be returned to display.
 * Royal Military Museum, Belgium. One FT is on permanent display.
 * National World War I Museum, located at Liberty Memorial, Kansas City, Missouri. An FT, damaged by German artillery.
 * Musée de l'armée Suisse, Burgdorf, Switzerland. An FT is displayed as the first tank of the Swiss Army, adopted in 1922.
 * National Military Museum (Romania), Bucharest, Romania. An FT is on permanent outdoor display.
 * Military Museum (Belgrade), Belgrade, Serbia. An FT is on permanent outdoor display.
 * Parola Tank Museum, Parola, Finland. An FT is on outdoor display, another in the tank hall.
 * Two full-scale, working replicas of Renault FTs were built from scratch by an enthusiast for Jerzy Hoffman's Battle of Warsaw 1920 2011 film.
 * An FT is being placed on static display at the U.S. Army Heritage and Education Center in Carlisle, PA, beginning in April 2012.
 * The US First Infantry Division museum at Cantigny in Warrenville, IL, has an M1917 on static display in the outdoor tank park.
 * The Afghan National Army has begun a restoration project on an FT, intending to place it in a static display outside the new Ministry of Defence Headquarters in Kabul, once construction of the building is complete. On 20 October, the Afghan Defence Ministry officially handed over the vehicle to the Polish Ambassador in Kabul Piotr Łukasiewicz. The FT will be renovated by Stefan Czarniecki Land Forces Training Centre in Poznan.
 * Museu Eduardo André Matarazzo, Bebedouro, Brazil. One FT is on permanent display
 * Australian War Memorial, Canberra. One FT at the Treloar storage and conservation annexe in Mitchell, Australian Capital Territory http://www.awm.gov.au/collection/RELAWM05039.001