This Week In Getting Killed By Technology History

This week marks the anniversary of the first use of the tank, one of the 20th century's most-iconic and kick ass weapons. Bow to their might!

During the First World War, infantry and cavalry assaults proved suicidal in the face of barbed wire, machine guns and modern artillery, and by 1916 it was a bloody stalemate with neither side able to advance...until the British unveiled a new secret weapon: the tank.

Combining firepower, protection and mobility, the tank made warfare mobile again and did away the trenches of WWI. The tank could make strategic advances faster than ever before. The Germans were the first to master this technique, which they called blitzkrieg (lightning war). WWII saw German tanks roll across most of Europe by 1940.

Many now argue the heavy tank is an industrial relic, made obsolete by smart bombs and guided missiles, unsuitable to urban counter-insurgency, but with new types of armor, new weapons and new electronics, the tank looks set to have a place in warfare well into the 21st century.