The striking image above shows a glider-borne tank, tested unsuccessfully by the Soviet Union in the 1940s. The genesis of this idea was even stranger, like something out of a Command and Conquer game:

‘Tuchachevsky likewise paid particular attention to the Air Force. For some years he had studied the problem of combining the functions of aeroplane and tank in a machine to be known as the ‘flying tank,’ i.e., an armoured car which automatically or by a few turns of a handle could be transformed into an aeroplane and then changed back again into a tank that was ready to go into action as soon as it landed. There is also a compromise solution of this problem in the form of large-sized aircraft which can transport a tank by air and land it behind the enemy’s lines.

‘The study of the ‘flying tank’ led to successful experiments in the large-scale employment of special shock troops that could be dropped behind the enemy’s lines by parachute. It is no mere chance that this idea of aerial infantry originated in the brain of Tuchachevsky, the Commander-in-Chief of the first Red Army of workers and peasants.

‘The idea of dropping such detachments in the enemy’s rear presupposes that this area is peopled by inhabitants in sympathy with the aerial invaders, for otherwise such aerial shock troops as survived the attentions of the enemy’s anti-aircraft batteries would be wiped out by mechanized units hastily despatched to deal with them. The conception of a parachute corps is therefore closely connected with the idea of an international Socialist Revolution.’ 

From Erich Wollenberg’s book The Red Army – which is great as well as free to read online.

The genius of Tukhachevsky was such that even when he was preoccupied with a bizarre idea, like a plane that could turn into a tank, he ended up stumbling on a great idea – parachute soldiers. It’s also fascinating that the original inspiration for the idea of paratroopers was Tukhachevsky trying to figure out ways to help socialist revolutions in hostile countries.

Images from Aircraft Wiki and Wikimedia Commons