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Volume 2 on the famed Sherman medium tank covers the welded-hull, radial-engine-equipped M4 and documents its development and production through its many variations, as well as its combat use around the globe. Produced by Chrysler, Pressed Steel Car Company, Alco, Pullman-Standard, and Baldwin Locomotive Works, the M4 bore the brunt of fighting until late summer 1944, when the M4A3 began to become available in quantity. Powered by a 9-cylinder air-cooled radial engine, the M4 fought in North Afr...

World War II from Above offers a never-before-seen combination of annotated satellite images and expertly drawn battle maps. It aims to satisfy both the military history buff and those seeking a visually stunning history gift book, bringing the war vividly and dramatically to life by showing the actual landscapes where battles took place along with specially commissioned annotations depicting remarkable events, troop movements, heroic last stands, or even where individual soldiers stood or fell....

In spite of the relatively small numbers involved, the Tiger I and Tiger II tanks of the German Army and Waffen-SS heavy Panzer formations played a central role in resisting the Allied invasion of France in the summer of 1944\. British and American tank crews found to their dismay that the Tigers could survive numerous hits while a single round from one of their 88mm guns was enough to penetrate the strongest armour. In his latest book in the TankCraft series Dennis Oliver uses archive photograp...

The beauty of modelling post-World War 2 aircraft can be summed up simply: jets, helicopters and missiles. Unlike World War 2 where almost everything was prop-driven, the post-war years are the years of the jet. In the post war years the jet has developed into a superlative power source enabling post-war designers to go to places barely imaginable in 1945. Attack helicopters, V/STOL (vertical/short take-off), variable geometry wings – and what weaponry. Modern aircraft are always groaning under...

The Rheinmetall heavy Infanteriegeschutz 33 was the most powerful German support weapon at the beginning of World War II, and in January 1940, the first attempts were made to transform it to a tracked vehicle. An improved version, based on the Panzer II chassis, served in Rommel's Afrika Korps, and further alterations were made during the battle for Stalingrad in 1942. The Grille Ausf. H, the adaptation of the sIG 33 on the Czech Panzer 38(t) chassis, served from 1943 onwards with the schwere In...

During the Cold War, the T-54/55 series of tanks represented the most serious threat to Nato land forces in Europe. Available in huge quantities, it formed the core of the Warsaw Pact armoured warfare doctrine, which envisaged massed tank attacks against the weakest point in Nato's front-line defences. Yet the T-54/55 could be stopped by smaller numbers of tanks which had the benefit of better technology and training, as was demonstrated during the Yom Kippur War of 1973 when Israeli tanks deal...

From ancient flint hand daggers to the futuristic M1A2 tanks of today, flip through a series of stunning visuals to discover the weapons and vehicles that have shaped the military world.With rich illustrations, striking photography, and inputs from experts, Machines of War presents the story of all forms of weaponry that have dominated the battlefield, right from the pre-industrial age to the 21st century. Get a close-up look at firearms, aircraft, tanks, warships, and learn about the invention,...

The adoption of blitzkrieg tactics in the German Army prior to the start of World War 2 meant that Germany needed a new kind of fighting vehicle for transporting troops around the battlefield in support of the Panzer spearheads. It was in response to this requirement that the armoured half track was developed during the mid-30s. The SdKfz 251 half-track soon became one of the most numerous vehicles in the German World War 2 arsenal, and saw service on every front from Russia to France. This is t...

Expert author Michael Green has compiled a full inventory of the armoured fighting vehicles developed and deployed by the Allied armies during the six year war against Nazi Germany and her Axis partners. Tank destroyers included the US Armys M18 Hellcat and M36 Jackson, the British Archer and Achilles and the Soviets SU-85, SU-100 and SU-122. Self-propelled artillery vehicles provide indirect fire support. Examples of these were the British Bishop and Sexton, the US M7 Army Priest and The Red...

Since its introduction in 1981, at the height of the Cold War, the Abrams main battle tank has been one of the most visible and iconic symbols of American military power, and it is the fascinating subject of this heavily illustrated historical and modelling guide in the TankCraft series by David Grummitt. Designed to meet head-on the massed tank forces of the Warsaw Pact, its combat debut in fact came in a different scenario in 1991 during the First Gulf War. Since then it has served in the pea...

Tanks is an impressive visual account of the history of the tank, from the early attempts at developing an all-terrain armoured vehicle to the lethal killing machines of the twenty-first century. Produced in association with The Tank Museum in Dorset, this book covers the major technical developments and types, from the British Mark IV, the German Tiger, the Russian T-34 and the American Sherman, to the M1 Abrams battle tank in service today. It describes the most famous tank battles, from Fle...

A monumental, wholly accessible work of scholarship that retells human history through the story of mankind's relationship with the sea. An accomplishment of both great sweep and illuminating detail, The Sea and Civilization is a stunning work of history that reveals in breathtaking depth how people first came into contact with one another by ocean and river, and how goods, languages, religions, and entire cultures spread across and along the world's waterways. Lincoln Paine takes us back to t...

From their first introduction at the Battle of the Somme in the First World War, tanks proved to be one of the most important military developments in the history of warfare. Such was their influence on the battlefield, both as infantry support and as an armoured spearhead, their presence could determine the outcome of any battle. Another significant development during the 1930s was that of airborne forces, with a number of countries experimenting with air-dropped troops. Such a concept offered...

An aviation legend designed in the mid-1940s, the Canberra entered service in 1951 with RAF Bomber Command. It served in the conventional, interdictor and nuclear bomber role with the RAF, in the UK, Germany, the Middle East and Far East. Its performance and adaptability made it ideal as a reconnaissance aircraft, and the final version, the Canberra PR9, only finally retired in July 2006! The Canberra was used in many support roles, especially in signals / electronic warfare. The Canberra was ad...

The first American armoured cars began to emerge around the turn of the century, seeing their first military use in 1916 during the Punitive Expedition against Pancho Villa. When the United States entered World War I, the American Expeditionary Forces used some armoured cars in France, and American armoured cars were used by the French Army. The inter-war years saw considerable innovation and experimentation in armoured car design. Of the 1930s scout car designs, the M3A1 scout car was good en...

This book lists all the important tanks used in the Second World War, both by the Allied (England, France, Russia and the USA) and Axis Powers (Germany, Italy and Japan). Thomas Anderson, an expert on the history of the Second World War, offers an in-depth volume detailling the vehicles, their use in battle and relevant technical specifications. This comprehensive survey is full of authentic eyewitness accounts as well as being profusely illustrated with many photographs having never been publis...

Adding a figure to a kit or a vignette can really bring it to life – yet building and painting figures continues to be a source of frustration to many modellers, with the results all too disappointing. However, help is at hand. The aim of this book is to equip the average modeller with techniques to successfully complete a figure from start to finish, and provides clear and easy-to-follow instructions on how to select, prepare, assemble, modify and paint realistic figures. It covers a wide range...

They helped conquer the greatest armies ever assembled. Yet no sooner had they tasted victory after World War II than American generals suddenly found themselves governing their former enemies, devising domestic policy and making critical economic decisions for people they had just defeated in battle. In postwar Germany and Japan, this authority fell into the hands of Dwight D. Eisenhower and Douglas MacArthur, along with a cadre of military officials like Lucius Clay and the Detroit banker Jose...