Скачать или смотреть America Had No Tungsten in 1941 — So GE Built Carbide Rounds That Shattered Panzer Steel

In December 1941, America's war machine was grinding to a halt — not from enemy fire, but from a shortage of tungsten carbide, the one material every factory needed to cut steel, shape artillery barrels, and stamp shell casings. Over 90% of the world's supply sat in foreign mines, and the shipping lanes were crawling with German U-boats.

But the real enemy wasn't overseas. It was in the boardroom.

In 1928, General Electric and Friedrich Krupp AG carved up the global tungsten carbide market, inflating prices by 900%, strangling independent manufacturers, and funneling American royalty payments directly into the accounts of Nazi Germany's largest arms producer — even after Europe was already burning.

It took a Senate investigation, two federal indictments, and one self-taught metallurgist from Latrobe, Pennsylvania to break the cartel and save American manufacturing. Philip McKenna's invention, Kennametal — a tungsten-titanium carbide composite — solved the cratering problem that made GE's product useless on hardened steel, and became the backbone of wartime production.

His carbide cores were engineered into the M93 HVAP round — a hyper-velocity armor-piercing shell that cracked Panzer steel at 3,400 feet per second. At the Battle of Arracourt in September 1944, M18 Hellcats armed with these rounds shattered Hitler's Fifth Panzer Army counteroffensive, destroying over 200 German tanks in four days.

GE was found guilty of criminal conspiracy. Their fine? $2,500. McKenna changed the world.

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📚 Sources & References:
U.S. Senate Truman Committee Reports on International Cartels
U.S. v. General Electric Co., Carboloy Co. (1947)
Kennametal Inc. — Corporate History Archives
Aberdeen Proving Ground Ballistic Test Reports (M93 HVAP-T)
704th Tank Destroyer Battalion — After Action Reports, September 1944
The Ordnance Department: Procurement and Supply (U.S. Army in WWII Series)

⚠️ Disclaimer: This video is a historical documentary for educational purposes. All claims are based on publicly available historical records, court documents, and military archives.

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