Circle Markings on Pz II in (probably not) Poland.

[Owen]

Reading a book as mentioned on this thread >> Blitzkrieg.
There is a photo of a Panzer II in Poland with some concentric circle markings on the turret's rear corners.
What do they signify?

[Capt.Sensible]

I've seen similar markings on a Pz II in a photo of a Russian scrapyard. It's in a Polish book I have at home, I think. I will look it up tonight but I have a feeling it said something about a specialist engineering or flamethrower version of the Pz. II.

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[von Poop]

From the smoke dischargers it does appear to be a Flammpanzer.
Had a shufti & two other photos of them from a similar period seem to have the circles as well, so flamethrower marking seems quite likely?

[Owen]

Did they have Pz II Flammpanzers in 1939?
All I can find are references to the Flamingo in 1941.

[Gotthard Heinrici]

Could it be the markings of a Command Tank?

[Gotthard Heinrici]

Lads, just had a shufti on Wiki (I know, I know) and here is the content about the Panzer II "Flamm" or "Flamingo" as Owen has identified:

Panzer II Flamm
Based on the same suspension as the Ausf. D and Ausf. E tank versions, the Flamm (also known as "Flamingo"^[1])used a new turret mounting a single MG34 7.92 mm machine gun, and two remotely controlled flamethrowers mounted in small turrets at each front corner of the vehicle. Each flamethrower could cover the front 180° arc, while the turret traversed 360°.
1800 7.92 mm rounds were carried and 320 l of fuel for the flamethrowers along with four tanks of compressed nitrogen. The nitrogen tanks were built into armored boxes along each side of the superstructure. Armor was 30 mm to the front and 14.5 mm to the side and rear, although the turret was increased to 20 mm to the sides and rear.
Total weight was 12 tons and dimensions were increased to a length of 4.9 m and width of 2.4 m although it was a bit shorter at 1.85 m tall. A FuG2 radio was carried. Two sub-variants existed: the Ausf. A and Ausf. B which differed only in minor suspension components.
155 Flamm vehicles were built from January 1940 through March 1942, mostly on new chassis, but 43 using existing Ausf. D and Ausf. E chassis. The Flamm was deployed in the USSR but was not very successful due to its limited armor, and survivors were soon withdrawn for conversion in December 1941. Given that the variant only commenced production in 1940 it seems unlikely that the circles relate to flammpanzers. Unless of course the photo is not from the Polish Campaign but from the French one. Another route to travel would be to look for any other "Flammpanzer" variants of Pnzer III's or IV's and see if the circles are on those.

[von Poop]

I'm not convinced the picture is Poland.
No longer convinced it's a flammpanzer either, seems they were all based on Ausf D running gear which is very different to the above. Couldn't decide on smaller turret or not as they look similar from behind but that's very much A/B/C/F running gear.
(Still have 2 pictures that are definitely flammpanzers with those circles though.)

[Bodston]

Originally Posted by Owen

Did they have Pz II Flammpanzers in 1939?
All I can find are references to the Flamingo in 1941.

From Chamberlain & Doyle's 'Encyclopedia Of German tanks of WW2'

On 21 January 1939 an order was placed... for 90 flame-throwers on the Pz Kpfw II. ausf D chassis were completed for this purpose as early as April 1939, and a soft steel prototype was completed in July 1939.

This is the famous pic of a Flamingo captured by the popov's

[Bodston]

Originally Posted by von Poop

I'm not convinced the picture is Poland.

Very unlikely, I would think.

[Owen]

What Ausf is that one in post #1?