TANKS AND ARMOURED VEHICLES OF WORLD WAR II 2nd Edition

Tanks and armoured vehicles, the essential pillars of military arsenals.

Exhausted by the Great War, the victorious powers were slow to embark on the development of new tactics suited to armoured warfare. Only the arrival of the German Panzerdivisionen forced strategies and national production programmes to accelerate. After the opening campaigns of the Second World War, each general staff evaluated the results to draw lessons; armoured units had achieved unimaginable successes in terms of territory seized, speed of advance, and the disorganisation of opposing armies. Furthermore, they had conducted these operations with human losses and collateral damage far lower than any previous modern weapons system. From this assessment, tanks and armoured vehicles became essential pillars of military arsenals.

Beyond their considerable tactical advantages, among all the equipment that makes up land armies, they are the most spectacular, the most photogenic and the best known to the public. Their presence is synonymous with technical achievement, as illustrated by this didactic and richly illustrated work featuring period photographs — some previously unpublished and colourised — modern photographs, and precise annotated illustrations. Here is the story of these fascinating military machines and their necessary technical evolution during the Second World War. The principal models, the pride of the belligerents' national industries, are detailed here and set in context through the great battles in which they took part. The book concludes with a presentation of the impressive tank collection at the Musée des Blindés de Saumur, some of which are still in working order, and a complete list of the main armour museums in Europe.