When the U.S. entered the Great War in 1917, it had no armored vehicles. Gen. John Pershing requested a tank corps for frontline deployment, but you cannot create a tank force if you don’t have tanks, so the U.S. Army needed a fleet. However, developing and building tanks takes time, more so if you create them from scratch.
In a show of unity, the French and the British shared their tank designs with the Americans, with the British proposing the Mark VIII Heavy Tank. However, this tank took too long to produce, with the factory where it was supposed to be assembled only finishing construction by November 1918 — just as the war ended.
On the other hand, the French decided to license the Renault FT Light Tank design to the U.S., hoping it could produce the tank in numbers Stateside. Because it was an already existing design, it was meant to be a quick fix while the heavier Mark VIII was still being developed.
This licensed-built tank was named the M1917 Light Tank, with the US initially ordering 4,440 tanks to be built, but only 950 were produced. It was meant to be the first model for the U.S. Tank Corps — the first-ever American armored division. It was assembled by then-Capt. George Patton, who eventually became the commanding general of the 1st Armored Corps in World War II.
There were several delays in building the M1917. For example, American and French factories used different unit measurements. The former used imperial units, while the latter used metric. This meant that American manufacturing facilities weren’t suited to build things using French plans.
Of the 4,400 ordered tanks, only 64 were completed by the time the war was declared over. Just 10 made it to France, and none saw combat.
