KNIGHTS OF THE BLACK CROSS; STUG IV VARIANTS SDKFZ 167 IN 1/15 SCALE. As in the Dark Ages, The Teutonic Knights waged their bloody wars in Eastern Europe ostensibly to convert the heathen Slavs, the emblem of their armor was the Christian Cross. Seven centuries later when the Soviet Union was invaded by Germany and her allies; again the dominant emblem was the cross, whether the German Balkan cross, the Hungarian tricolor cross, the Finnish Hakaristi cross or the Rumanian Michael’s cross, these symbols have long historical roots, and so too do the symbols of war. The German Panzerwaffe(armored corps) with their black crosses on its vehicles and the commitment to the traditional annihilation concept made an enormous impact on the Second World War. As so the Sturmgeschutz, which has been regarded as the finely honed cutting edge of the German Panzerwaffe, and ranks among the most successful and characteristic German weapons of World War II. The Sturmgeschutz IV (SdKfz 167) consisted of the upper body of a StuG III mounted on a Panzer IV chassis, and was armed with a 7.5cm StuK 40 gun with Saukopf mantlet. The cubic front body work in the drivers area is typical, which was increased by the addition of slabs of concrete six inches thick to the front plate of the drivers compartment. The resultant combat weight of this vehicle was almost 24 tones. The Sturmgeschutz on the Panzer IV chassis received Hitler’s complete approval and full support for production was provided to attain a high production rate of this vehicle for which 1,138 of them were built.
