M26 Pershing tanks in the indirect fire role in Korea on August 24th 1950

Apart from their primary role providing direct fire, tanks can also be called upon to provide indirect fire support as ad hoc artillery. As their gun elevation is limited in order to give the vehicle a lower profile, they can increase their firing angle and therefore range by firing from a ramp. This is demonstrated in this footage by tanks of the 89th Heavy Tank Battalion in Korea. The shells are not ideal, because fired from a high velocity tank gun they need to be thick-walled to withstand barrel acceleration, and this leaves less room for explosive filler. That said, the M71 HE shell presumably being fired here still carried a filler of almost 1 kg, about the same as an 81mm mortar round. Elevated in this manner, the M26 could fire such a projectile over 15 kilometers, outranging the contemporary standard 105mm howitzer by a considerable margin. By using a proximity fuze, the shells could be set to burst at a predetermined distance from the ground, making them much more effective against