Human-cost band
not a war -- a system; human cost is in the wars that used it
Crews die in the wars that use the type -- counted on those war pages. The type itself has no "death toll."
Industrial cost is steel, fuel, and a state's factory politics.
Bands
Dated span (1916-present (as a type))
Tank is taught as 1916-present (as a type). 1916-09-15 and 2000s-20s are the usual poles.
Theatre (From the Somme to every later armoured .)
From the Somme to every later armoured front is the geography of the ledger -- cities, seas, plants, or ministries as the file requires.
FT and 1918 battles
1918: Turret layout; combined arms.
Sinai/Golan ATGMs
1973: Staff-college shock.
Regions
From the Somme to every later armoured front
Core theatre of Tank (1916-present (as a type)). First massed British tank attack; gains then lost.
Invention
1916-18: Rhomboids to FT.
Industrial peak
1939-45: T-34, Sherman, Panther.
Questioned type
After 1991: Headlines vs inventories.
US / UK / AU / CA classrooms
US/UK/AU/CA museums and air/navy shows carry Tank as a type icon; school hours stay thinner than film.
Korean comparative reader
Tank is read beside Yulgok, Hanwha, and ROK procurement history: a type or firm in a conscript-alliance state, not a live ORBAT.
Key numbers
Span1916-present (as a type)
Cost bandnot a war -- a system; human cost is in.
TheatreFrom the Somme to every later armoured .
Hero articleTank
Makers
Ernest Swinton
Ernest Swinton (British theorist/officer) is a named maker of the Tank story. An early advocate of the armoured idea in 1914-16 -- one name among a committee.
Walter Gordon Wilson
Walter Gordon Wilson (Engineer) is a named maker of the Tank story. Co-designer of the British rhomboid transmission story -- an engineering name.
J. F. C. Fuller
J. F. C. Fuller (Theorist) is a named maker of the Tank story. Plan 1919 and interwar armour writing -- influential and arguable.
Heinz Guderian
Heinz Guderian (German officer) is a named maker of the Tank story. Achtung -- Panzer! and 1940 fame; memoirs that need caution.
Mikhail Tukhachevsky
Mikhail Tukhachevsky (Soviet theorist) is a named maker of the Tank story. Deep operations and a 1937 death in the purge -- a lost institutional path.
Mikhail Koshkin
Mikhail Koshkin (T-34 designer) is a named maker of the Tank story. The engineer name on the 1940 type that 1950 brought to Korea.
Hobby culture can make a killing machine cute. Keep the Somme and 1950 in the frame.
Civilian harm from armour in cities is a war-page ledger.