M3 Mk. B Halftrack: A LEGO® creation by Nathan Elkins : MOCpages.com

M3 Mk. B Halftrack

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The M3 Mk. B Halftrack was an improvised halftrack used by the Israeli Defense Force in the 1973 Yom Kippur War

About this creation

After the Second World War and the Korean War, the United States military found itself with thousands of obsolete M3 Halftracks on its hands. To preserve US interests in the Middle East and bolster an ally, the US gave many halftracks to the fledgling IDF.

In typical Israeli fashion, the IDF adopted the M3 as an APC and a mortar carriage, modifying the M3 to be more reliable under desert conditions and generally upgrading it.

In the 1973 Yom Kippur War, Egypt, Syria, Iraq and Jordan attacked Israel (again). This time the Arab Coalition was armed with new Soviet AT-3 "Sagger" ATGM. The AT-3 was man portable and proved highly effective against Israeli armor.

The drawback was that the missile had to be guided by wires and a joystick and left a revealing puff of white smoke after launching. Also, the operator needed to keep his eyes on the missile to effectively guide it into its target. Discovering this, the IDF made a modification to their M3s. They strapped five machine guns to the M3s and inserted one of these specially converted halftracks with every 10 or 15 tanks. The theory was that once a Sagger was launched, all the guns would turn towards the puff of white smoke and start firing. This barrage of bullets would cause the operator to duck, and miss his target.

Below is the M3 Mk. B at the museum I work at.