We continue our article series “Weapons of Victory”, dedicated to the 70th anniversary of the Victory in Europe Day. Several unique vehicles will be added to the game as exclusive and we would like to brief you about them!

M18 Hellcat driving through the city

The M18 Hellcat was a US tank destroyer in WW2. It was produced from mid 1943 till October 1944 and joined the Northern Europe and Italian theaters. The Hellcat had a modified chassis from the Chaffee light tank and the 76mm M1 cannon of the Sherman. Being very lightly armoured, the M18 was the fastest armoured vehicle in WW2 and and even for 2 decades after the war. The Hellcat was an extremely deadly tank destroyer - the most efficient in the U.S. Army. The M18 was highly vulnerable to German tanks and its gun could hardly penetrate the frontal armour of the Panther or Tiger, so any combat tactics relied on the vehicle’s speed and maneuverability, the Hellcat was able to accelerate and change direction rather quickly so German tanks were left with both the flanks or rear exposed, unable to rotate their turret fast enough to counter the M18, the M1 cannon proved deadly to these vulnerable side profiles. 

M18 Hellcats of the 805th Tank Destroyer Battalion (which operated in Italy) were some of the more colourful, the vehicles were marked with tactical numbers painted in black against white and also used a Tank Destroyer emblem - a black panther crushing a tank with its jaws on an orange disc. The naming practice was to start the vehicle’s name with the company letter. Thus the first vehicle of company B (5A-805 TD B-1) was named “Black Cat”. This vehicle in the game will have the historically correct exteriors and interiors of the original vehicle.

	These are some screenshots of the common M18 model in the game. * “Black Cat” will have no muzzle brake and side skirts

Together with the vehicle, we will also add the three connected decals to War Thunder:

'Black Cat' Tactical Sign	'805th Tank Destroyer Batalion' Emblem	'Black Cat' Text

Decals created by Branislav 'InkaL' Mirkov

Don't forget to check previous "Weapons of Victory" articles:

•  Dolgushin's La-7