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Totally Tanked podcast

John and Rob

It's a podcast about tanks. Do you want to listen to people talking about tanks? If so this is the podcast for you! World Wars, Cold Wars, modern tanks, we cover them all while drinking a lot of beer.

Be warned though, we grapple with the politics behind the tanks, the economics, the industrial policies. Tanks are intensely political objects in both their creation and their use.

So if you just want to hear dudes banging on about lethality, well, we've got dudes banging on anyway.

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20 episodes
monthly
Avg 2 hr 3 min
English

Episodes 20

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S1 · E85
August 8 · 1 hr 33 min
85 - TAM - A Marder with a Boomstick!
Argentina wanted a tank, some Germans wanted some money moved out of Switzerland, the TAM was born. A Marder hull, a 105mm gun, a lightish modular family of vehices it all looked good. And yet it failed to get to the fight the one time it mattered.
S1 · E84
July 4 · 2 hr 22 min
84 - Sherman Revisited - Better than people say
Recorded to celebrate America's 250th birthday with beer and it's greatest tank we explore the M4 Sherman in all it's glory as an exemplar of everything that made America great.
S1 · E83
June 13 · 2 hr 13 min
83 - Challenger 3 - The best Britain can do...
Britain is trying to build a new tank. But they're doing it with a gun that entered service in the 1970s and re-tread hulls that ended production a quarter century ago. And they're building fewer than 150, which for a completely orphan fleet is a "courageous" approach.
S1 · E82
May 16 · 1 hr 54 min
82 - T-70 - Soviet Mediocrity!
With over 8,000 produced the T-70 should not be an obscure tank. With an extremely unusual profile it should be easy to ID. And yet it's not exactly at the top of anyone's list, but we are going to try and shed some light on this Soviet light tank.
S1 · E81
April 25 · 2 hr 9 min
81 - Abrams - The Lord of Battle
What time period exactly was this great tank the greatest tank ever?
S1 · E80
March 21 · 2 hr 11 min
80 - Multi-Turret Tanks - Too Much of a Good Thing
When all the world was bright and new and small boys were allowed to design tanks a lot of concepts were created for lumbering landships lurching slowly across the battlefield while delivering justice and vengeance to the enemy from a series varied weaponry in multiple turrets. More boring designs eventually proved more useful, but in this episode we explore this inter-war golden era where tanks sprouted turrets like mushrooms after rain.
S1 · E79
February 21 · 1 hr 27 min
79 - Leopard 2 - The Tank of the Free World
Failed joint procurement programs somehow led to the one tank that a cashed up country making its own decisions would buy. With the production lines open again it's time to revisit the Leopard 2!
S1 · E78
January 31 · 2 hr 16 min
78 - SU76M - The Swamp Fighter
The Soviets decided they didn't have a need for light tanks. And instead built a very useful light vehicle with a big gun. And they built a lot of them. And this is their story.
S1 · E77
Dec 6, 2025 · 2 hr 39 min
77 - Vickers MBT - Steel Tank for Iron Men
Vickers went out on a limb and built their own tank in 1963. And a bunch of countries decided something tough and simple was exactly what they wanted. India built 2,000 of them and took them to war with great success. This episode we're going to take a look at what was going on with the Vickers MBTs and the Indian Vijayanta. The halftime interview features @lottiethetankwhisperer !
S1 · E76
Nov 8, 2025 · 1 hr 58 min
76 - Panzer II - Tour De France Champion
Early war tanks on all sides were surprisingly rattly and rickety contraptions. In this episode we're going to count the rivets on the Panzer II which really proved that some tank is better than no tank as it conquered Poland and France. The halftime interview features Graham from ‪@xacoupeguy‬ reflecting on a year spent working with tanks.
S1 · E75
Oct 18, 2025 · 2 hr 22 min
75 - Centurion revisited - Tougher than the rest
After a world war spent building very bad tanks the British got their act together and unleashed Centurion on the world. It would fight with distinction in the Korean War, the Suez Crisis, Indo-Pakistani wars, Vietnam, and on both sides of Arab-Israeli wars. Bruce Springsteen was probably thinking of Centurion when he wrote "Tougher Than The Rest": "If you're rough enough for love / Baby, I'm tougher than the rest" Centurion was the first audio episode we tried to record remotely during the Covid lockdowns and John's technical errors made him sound like a dalek so it was a good candidate to revisit. The halftime interview features Chris from ‪@HistoryofEverythingChannel‬ on Air Disaster Hill just outside Canberra.
S1 · E74
Sep 20, 2025 · 2 hr 3 min
74 - M10 - Wolverine - Panzer Hunter
The US Army had a lot of ideas for tank destroyers, but they arrived half a war too late, leaving the operators driving open-topped assault guns. But the M10 was there when they needed it in crucial moments of the Second World War, packing a big gun on a reliable chassis. We'll also be discussing China's new tank, current events in modern warfare, wrapping up AusArmourFest25, and as much nerdy tank stuff we can get to while drinking a few litres of beer each. Join us for the livestream where the tank chatter gets willing! Special thanks to our halftime guests; tank whisperers Nick and Phil Rutherford.
S1 · E73
Aug 9, 2025 · 1 hr 45 min
73 - Maus - Fail Big
Outfuelled, outmanned, outgunned. The desperate Germans needed a tank that could turn the tide of battle. Fortunately they came up with this 190 tonne monster instead. For all the slides and links check out: Totallytanked.net
S1 · E72
Jul 19, 2025 · 2 hr 12 min
72 - AMX-30 - When the going gets tough, the French get weird.
The ancestor of all failed Franco-German military procurements the AMX-30 was a strange result of meeting the requirements of its moment precisely, while being birthed into a world that had changed from the time of its design. Despite seeming strange to us in 2025 it enjoyed a great deal of success in markets too odious for the Germans to sell Leopards to.
S1 · E71
Jun 14, 2025 · 2 hr 15 min
71 - Matilda II Revisited - The Tortoise of War
From Northern France to the gates of Moscow, to the jungles of the South Pacific one tank kept rumbling slowly on. A vastly superior sequel; the Matilda II was a true tortoise of war. This is our second episode featuring Matilda II as the expanded format of the current show made it worth coming back to.
S1 · E70
May 17, 2025 · 2 hr 8 min
70 - Chi Ha - The Sword of Empire
How good was the Japanese Chi Ha? Just ten of them destroyed the British Empire. In this episode we find out how!
S1 · E69
Apr 12, 2025 · 2 hr
69 - Bradley - A Real Tank Killer
In this episode we take on the life and times of one of history's most controversial armoured vehicles, the Bradley! We also take a deep dive into it's namesake Omar Bradley, and share some thoughts on recent world events.
S1 · E68
Mar 15, 2025 · 1 hr 52 min
68 - Soviet BTs - Stalin's Hotrods
In the interwar period the Soviets went hard on tank production, and a tank the communists took to war from Spain to Manchuria was the BT series, with suspension from an American racecar designer, a 500 horsepower engine, and a whopping (for the time) 45mm gun. Come join us as we explore a machine that killed fascists long before the war began. The episode also features an interview with Kurt from the Australian Museum of Armour and Artillery.
S1 · E67
Feb 15, 2025 · 1 hr 51 min
67 - M103 - The last American Heavy
The USA had one last go at a heavy tank before settling on the MBT concept. It was not to the Army's liking but the Marines wanted as much tank as they could put ashore. In this episode we will explore the design, development and deployment of the last American Heavy.
S1 · E66
Jan 18, 2025 · 1 hr 46 min
66 - Crusader - Britain could do better
In Britain's darkest hour they turned to the industrial genius of William Morris and he gave them the Crusader tank. It was not the tank they needed, it was not the tank they deserved, but it was the tank they got. As promised the link to Mike Pezullo's article: https://www.aspistrategist.org.au/gradually-then-suddenly-in-geopolitics-decades-can-happen-in-weeks/

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