Leonardo da Vinci designed the first armoured vehicle. To quote from Wikipedia: Günther Burstyn (6 July 1879 in bath Aussee, Steiermark - 15 April 1945 in Korneuburg (Lower Austria)) was a technician and officer of the Austro-Hungarian Army. He designed in 1911 the first cross-country tank with swivelling turret. The draft design, which was more modern than the tanks of the First World War, was rejected both by Austria-Hungary and by the German Empire. In 1941 Günther Burstyn was awarded with the War Merit Cross. # http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gunther_Burstyn The British were the first to deploy tanks during WW1 in an attempt to end the stalemate of trench warfare. To quote from Wikipedia: Initial results with tanks were mixed, with problems in reliability causing considerable attrition rates when getting the tanks into combat and on the move. The heavily shelled terrain was hard going, and only very mobile tanks such as the Mark I and FT-17 performed reasonably. The Mark I's rhomboid shape meant it could navigate larger obstacles, especially long trenches, better than many modern armoured fighting vehicles. The tank would eventually make the trench warfare of World War I obsolete. # http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_tank