The Essential Vehicle Identification Guide: Western Allied Tanks 1939-1945 (Essential Vehicle Identificatn)

A lovely book for the modeler. Whilst the volume is not an exhaustive encyclopedia on all examples of allied tanks, it places particular tanks in particular theaters of action. This, together with the unit to which the tanks belong and color schemes is invaluable to modelers.

fantastic book for modeller and history buff. bit expensive but overall very good ref book.

My best book thanx

Companion guide to those on Soviet and German forces. Useful to thumb through as a wargamer. Probably not detailed enough for a real buff but some good coloured illustrations.

This is a very nice looking book. It presents allied military involvement in the second world war in chronological order describing, the actions, the vehicles involved and command structures. Overall a nice book and given how cheap it is, I am still glad I bought it. But it does have several short-comings(i) Identity. The book isn't sure what it is trying to be. The front cover says tanks, but inside there also staff cars, jeeps, half-tracks, armoured cars, self-porpelled guns. But they are covered as an aside so I doubt very much the list is very complete.(ii) Completeness. I expected a book with 192 pages dedicated to Allied Tanks in WWII to cover every tank there was. But the very first I looked up, the Centaur IV is missing. Yes it's not the most famous of tanks but it is not the most obscure either. It certainly appears in most other tank books I own.(iii) Too much space wasted by organisations. The book is filled with large diagrams of tank squadrons. To give one example, a squadron of RAM tanks consists of 4 troops, each with 9 RAM tanks. There I have described the squadron in 14 words. In addition this books uses an additional half page to show 27 little RAM tanks in plate view - they are all the same tank, just cut and pasted 26 times. It doesn't really convey any extra information but uses up half a page of the book. This is repeated many times throughout the book.(iv) Lack of detail. This book is not encyclopaedic. Don't expect to be able to read up much detail on any one tank. Even the most famous of tanks just gets a nice colour side elevation drawing, a single sentance, and a 'top trump' style specicification.So overall, pretty book, with good coverage but with unexpected omissions, but not quite what I was expecting.I have the Russian one on order. I had planned to buy the German ones aswell but I think I will reconsider because in total it would be a rather expensive way to not meet my hopes.

Great book. Full of useful information and great for research. Covers all areas and theatres of war.

Ned Middleton has sensibly corrected the problem of his mismatched review for us, but his one-star caution could still lead to potential buyers being misled. This is a fine book, beautifully reproduced. You get high-quality side elevations in colour of just about every tank used by the western allies. The dustjacket spiel says incorrectly that the elevations are to constant scale, but that's a minor detail. Additionally there are sample pictorial organisational charts, with the side elevations repeated to indicate numbers for each component of the TOE. The book includes brief details of each armoured vehicle used, some very well chosen photographs of tanks in action and, finally, some really interesting appendices. You turn through the book expecting it to tail off, and discover instead 'The development of US armour', 'Combat trials - M26 Pershing', badges of the Allies' armoured divisions, tables of production numbers, armaments, and a report by 9 RTR on 'Aspects of close support to infantry in forest fighting.' Some really good websites are listed, most of them familiar to those interested in this subject but they will be extremely helpful to readers for whom the book is acting as an introduction.You won't find a better value book on AFVs, and note that there are a number of companion volumes. If you are interested in armoured warfare in World War Two I guarantee you won't be disappointed. 5 stars for sure.