Who invented tanks in World War 1?

Answer 1

The British Admiralty.

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That is partly true. It so happened that a Committee to study the development of armoured vehicles was set up by Winston Churchill in 1915. He was First Lord of the Admiralty, and was approached by several officers who had been operating armoured cars in France and Belgium and who were members of the Royal Naval Air Serice. So it came about that tanks were, at first, investigated by the British Admiralty. Even though Army Officers and civilian engineers were soon added to the committee, their work remained under the Admiralty for some time before the department was transferred to the British Army.

However, many people played an important role in the creation of the tank. Vehicles very like Tanks (i.e. an armoured body containing armament and travelling on caterpillar tracks) were designed in France, Austria, Russia, and Australia between 1900 and the outbreak of WWI. One was also contemplated in Great Britain. However, no Army or government chose to pursue the idea.

After the start of WWI, the British and French both began building Tanks, each unaware of the other's project. In Britain the most significant figures were Sir Eustace Tennyson d'Eyncourt, Major Ernest Swinton, and Willliam Tritton. It was Swinton and Tritton who jointly designed and built the prototype that became the Tank Mark I. In France, the likeliest candidate is Colonel J.B.E. Estienne, who had plans drawn up and persuaded the military to build them. The French and British projects were neck-and-neck, beginning in 1915, although it was the British who first used Tanks on the battlefield, on September 15th, 1916. The French first used their own in April, 1917.

The consensus is that no one person can be considered the inventor of the tank, and that France and Britain both developed tanks.