Spanish World War 2 Tanks That Need Adding to War Thunder

Toreno

In this 16th episode of my series looking at World War 2 Tanks That Need Adding to War Thunder, we take a look at Spanish tank designs!  So join me as we take a look at Spains second attempt at a modern tank in the Verdeja 2 as well as its first SPG design, along with the various German and American tanks that were supplied during and after WW2!  Support me at ⬇️ ☕Buy me a Coffee➡️ buymeacoffee.com/Toreno  Social Media ⬇️ 🦋Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/toreno.bsky.social 🌍Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Toreno4 📸Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/toreno170 🐘Mastodon: Toreno17@mastodon.social 🧵Threads: https://www.threads.net/@toreno170  Sources ⬇️ Ejército de Tierra (Spanish Army). (2008) Acorazadas. Available at: https://web.archive.org/web/20080411161016/http://www.ejercito.mde.es/materiales/acorazadas/index.html.  Malavoglia, G. (2024) Carri Armati della Guerra Civile Spagnola – Vol. 3. N.p.: Soldiershop Publishing.  Tank Encyclopedia. Available at: https://tanks-encyclopedia.com/.  United Nations. (1946) Document NL4/611/27. Available at: https://documents.un.org/doc/undoc/gen/nl4/611/27/pdf/nl461127.pdf (Accessed: 10 March 2026).  United Nations. (1946) Record 209755. Available at: https://digitallibrary.un.org/record/209755?ln=en&v=pdf (Accessed: 10 March 2026).  Valka.cz. (2009) ESP – Carro de Combate Ligero Verdeja 2. Available at: https://www.valka.cz/ESP-Carro-de-Combato-Ligero-Verdeja-2-t82356.  War Thunder. In-game stats.  Zaloga, S.J. (2011) Spanish Civil War Tanks. Bloomsbury Publishing.  Songs used⬇️  Sun Machine One by Loopop  🎮 Game: War Thunder  ⬅️  Vehicles in this episode⬇️  Verdeja 2 Cañón Autopropulsado de 75/40mm Verdeja/Verdeja SPG CV 33 in Spanish service CV 33 rearmed with 2 x MG 34s Panzer I in Spanish service T-26 in Spanish service Panzer IV H in Spanish service Stug III in Spanish service M24 Chaffee in Spanish service M41 Walker Bulldog in Spanish service M47 Patton in Spanish service M37 HMC in Spanish service  Spain during WW2: 00:00 Verdeja 2: 01:31 Verdeja SPG: 06:44 Spanish tank force after World War 2: 09:56  #warthunder #warthundertanks #spain #spanish #verdeja #caudillo #spanishcivilwar #ww2

Transcript

00:00Continuing my series on World War 2 tanks that need adding to War Thunder, we now come to Spain.

00:05A nation that isn't usually well known for its tank development, but much like the last time we

00:10looked at Spanish tanks of the interwar period, we do have a few interesting options here that

00:15could be added to War Thunder. So just a quick background on Spain in World War 2. As I covered

00:20in the Spanish interwar episode, the Spanish Civil War which started on the 17th of July 1936

00:26had ended on the 1st of April 1939, just a few months before the start of World War 2,

00:32with tanks and armoured cars used by the losing republicans being captured, destroyed or taken

00:37over the border to France, as seen here with these T-26s with French officers, while the victorious

00:43nationalists retained their German Panzer 1s and Italian CV33 tankettes, as well as 123 Soviet T-26s

00:51captured from the republicans, with these being the best tanks available to the Spanish nationalists.

00:57The civil war had naturally caused much devastation within the nation, so despite it being heavily

01:02backed by the Germans during the civil war, and from June 1940 having a direct border with the

01:07Germans via southwest France, Francisco Franco, the Caldeo, or head of state of Spain, would keep

01:14Spain out of the war, though they would supply essential raw materials like tungsten for much

01:20of the war, while 45,000 Spaniards would serve in the Fairmarkt on the Eastern Front, as part of the

01:26250th Infantry Division or Blue Division from 1941 to 1944. Despite not being involved in the war,

01:33there was still a desire for Spain to be able to build its own tanks domestically, leading us to the

01:38first Spanish World War 2 tank design, the Videja 2, a successor design for the Videja 1 that I have

01:46previously covered, and that was a design that I thought was pretty good considering it had been

01:50designed during the Spanish Civil War, though it wasn't put into production and I would recommend

01:55watching my video on Spanish interwar tanks for more information on that design. Like with the Videja 1,

02:01this was again designed by Captain Felix Videja, and would begin development on the 20th of July 1942.

02:09To start with, the turret on the Videja 2 was moved to the front of the tank, unlike the rear

02:14-mounted

02:14turret of the previous design of the Videja 1, and was armed with a Spanish 45-44mm Mark 1 gun,

02:22derived from the Soviet 45mm gun as fitted to the T-26. So it should have more or less the

02:28same

02:28performance to that weapon, though in the 1950s the state company set me would develop a new sub-caliber

02:35shell for the 45mm gun, which was capable of penetrating 150mm of steel, or 110mm of steel at 1500m,

02:45with a muzzle velocity of 1200m a second. And this shell could in theory be added to

02:50differentiate it from the Videja 1, while it appears that three machine guns are carried,

02:55two coaxially either side of the main gun, and one in the bow. With the bow machine gun position not

02:59present on the Videja 1, though the bow machine gun doesn't appear to be present on the prototype

03:04today, so maybe it was never actually fitted, or it was plated over at some point.

03:09The armour would max out on the hull at 40mm for the driver and machine gunner ports,

03:13with the frontal curved armour maxing out at 32mm, the upper glasses at 12mm, 20mm for the sides,

03:2124mm for the rear, and 12mm for the hull roof. While the turret would be 28mm frontally,

03:28with an additional 16-24mm for the mantlet, 20mm for the sides, and 12mm for the turret roof.

03:35And lastly, 55mm armoured glass would be fitted for the viewing ports either side of the main gun,

03:41along with a metal cover. So overall, the Videja 2 is not the best protected tank in the world,

03:47but is by no means the worst either. Meanwhile, the 10.9 ton tank has a top speed of 28

03:52.5mph,

03:54or 46kmh from a Lincoln Zephyr 86H engine, making this moderately fast on the battlefield and able

04:01to do reconnaissance work as needed. Then there is the crew, which appears to be four, one more than

04:07the Fideja 1 and boosting its survivability in game, with the driver and machine gunner in the

04:12hull and the commander and gunner in the turret. Though as mentioned, it does appear that the

04:16Bound Machine Gun position isn't present on the prototype today, and Tank Encyclopedia does list

04:21it as free crew, so in theory the Fideja 2 could be implemented with either crew camps, though I would

04:27prefer it to be added with the Bound Machine Gun and the 4 crew if possible, assuming it was actually

04:32built in that configuration at some point. In War Thunder, the Fideja 2 could be added at 1.3,

04:37having an effective 45mm gun and okay protection and mobility, while the potential 4th crew member

04:43boosts its survivability compared to the Fideja 1, and it would be nice to see this relatively unknown

04:49tank added to War Thunder. In real life, despite the Fideja 2 prototype being ordered on the 20th of July

04:551942, it wouldn't be ready until over two years later in August 1944, and although put through

05:02testing successfully, there wasn't much enthusiasm for the design, partly due to the fact that 20

05:07superior German Panzer IV Hs and 10 Stug 3s were delivered to Spain in 1943 in exchange for Tungsten,

05:14but also due to the fact that there wasn't much chance of mass production due to the poor state

05:18of the economy and the difficulty in attaining additional Zephyr engines that would be required

05:24for mass production. That said, despite the Fideja 2 being pretty much obsolete by 1944,

05:29the project wasn't cancelled straight away, and that a prototype would even receive an improved

05:35Pegaso Z202 125hp engine made domestically in Spain by the Enasa company, which could also be added as

05:43a separate variant in game, but in 1953 Spain would start to receive modern American tanks like the

05:48M41 Walker Bulldog, at which point the Fideja 2 became surplus to acquirements and was left as a

05:54target at a firing range. But in 1973 an article written by Gerardo Acreda Valdez would bring

06:01attention to the forgotten prototype, resulting in the tank being transported to the Academia

06:07de Infantería de Toledo, where it still exists today. Unfortunately this is pretty much it for

06:13dedicated Spanish tank designs, as although Felix Fideja would attempt to design a medium tank that was

06:19imaginatively named the Fideja 3, this didn't go beyond a paper design. If we really wanted to

06:25scrape the barrel there was also an attempt at rearming an Italian CV3335 with two MG34s, but with

06:32these having a maximum penetration of just 13mm at 100m, I can't see this being added in game unless

06:39there's like an April 4th tankette only event, and even then I don't think it would do very well.

06:43That said, Spain would also produce an SPG design, as despite not being directly involved in the war,

06:49Spanish military leaders were still keen to learn what they could of modern warfare from various

06:54reports and returning Spanish soldiers who had fought in the Blue Division, and it had quickly

06:58become clear that SPGs were very important vehicles. Especially in a time when Spain didn't possess

07:03such vehicles, with all of its artillery pieces being towed by horses or trucks. However, it would take

07:10Spain a while to act on this information, but finally on the 13th of March 1945, just two months

07:16before the end of the war in Europe, Captain Felix Fideja would be ordered to develop this new SPG,

07:23which would be called the Canyon Autoprop Orsado 75-40mm Fideja. This time, instead of creating an

07:32entirely new vehicle, he would take the prototype of the Fideja 1, which was still around, and he would

07:38convert it into an SPG, with the 75mm length 40 gun mounted at the rear of the vehicle where the

07:44turret used to be, where it would have an elevation of plus 25 to minus 0.25, so not much

07:50depression,

07:51and it had a horizontal traverse of just 4.5 degrees right and left, while the max range was

07:56supposedly limited to just 6km. Unfortunately, beyond this, I haven't been able to find much

08:02information on the gun's history or performance, or even what ammunition it fired. What is known

08:07is that it was called the 75mm RR, and was built in Spain in 1939, and was probably the third

08:14gun of

08:14its type, and it weighed 536kg. As for its ammunition, I would expect its HE shell to penetrate

08:21at least 10-12mm of armour at a minimum, and perhaps more than that, and I'm 90% sure it

08:27would have had a

08:28dedicated anti-tank shell, since Spain would have had time to develop one during WW2, plus it had

08:33two years to study German shells from the Panzer IVs, Stuttgart 3s, and PAK 40s that they received.

08:38And if its performance was similar to those guns, it would in theory make for a very deadly tank

08:43destroyer, though like I say I can't confirm with 100% certainty the ammunition used, and only 8 shells

08:49were carried within the vehicle itself, with the remaining 24 towed behind the vehicle in a trailer,

08:54which would make this problematic to use in long running engagements.

08:59As for the rest of its stats, the armour maxes out at 25mm, while the fighting compartment is

09:04completely open topped and exposed at the rear, and the top speed is 27.3mph or 44kmh from a

09:11Ford V8 model 48 engine, while 3 crew are carried, with the driver in the hull and the commander and

09:17loader in the fighting compartment. In War Thunder, the placement of the Videha

09:21SPG is entirely dependent on the ammunition carried, so if it only carries HE shells it would

09:26probably have to be a 1.0 vehicle, but with anti-tank shells it could go up to at least

09:312.0,

09:32and would allow Spanish players to use it as a basic tank destroyer.

09:36In real life the Videha SPG would undergo trials successfully, but much like the Videha one it was

09:42based on it would not proceed beyond a prototype, being left to rust much like the Videha 2, though

09:48eventually it would be moved like with the Videha 2, today being placed at the Museo de Medios

09:53Acarazados in Madrid. So ultimately Spain would design a whole bunch of tanks, but would ultimately

09:59end the war still relying on pre-war Soviet T26s and German Panzer 1s and Italian CV3335s,

10:07augmented by a small number of modern Panzer 4s and Zug3s, and this is how things would stay for

10:13pretty much the next decade. With Spain unable to import modern tanks from the Allied powers,

10:18due to initially being ostracised on the world stage due to being a far-right dictatorship,

10:24that had been very close to the defeated Axis powers, and in 1946 Resolution 39 would be passed

10:30in the UN, banning Spain from the United Nations by 34-6 votes. However as the Cold War heated up,

10:37Spain's anti-communist stance would trigger a reappraisal, with Resolution 386 reversing the

10:43previous resolution by 38-10 votes, with Spain joining the UN in 1955, and in 1953 Spain and

10:51the United States would sign the Pact of Madrid, allowing for US bases in Spain, and Spain was

10:56now able to acquire American M24 Chaffees, M41 Walker Bulldogs, M47 Pattons and M37 HMCs.

11:06Finally giving Spain a modern tank force, albeit one that was entirely reliant on an outside power.

11:12So that's it for this episode looking at Spanish World War 2 tanks, and I'd be interested on your

11:16views on these vehicles and any others you would like me to cover in the comments below.

11:20As for the next episode, it will likely be British SPGs, with American Tank Destroyers as the second

11:26choice depending on how things work out. Anyway I hope you've enjoyed the episode,

11:30I've been Torano and I'll see you next time.

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