Customer Reviews

Allied Artillery of World War II

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A good book, I think it is the most complete on the subject. The description of all the most important piece of artillery of the allied in WW2 is very wide, referring to field, heavy, anti-tank, anti-aircraft and railway and coastal artillery of UK,US and URSS. The most important remarks are on the tables at the end of the book, where the information is not homogeneous: the units of measure are anglo-saxons for US and UK and metric for URSS (and the description in the tables are not correct). Besides the book does not deal with French artillery that was very important in 1939/40.

This Book was ok if you just wanted to know what Artillery the Allies used. When I went to look for the specs, some were not even there, others were incomplete and some had some wrong information. In the Appendix Data Table, the Barrel Lengths say in inches, yet it clames some guns have 1 inch barrels which is incorrect. Other then that it is ok for a beginner, but not for a person that knows Artillery.

There is a lot of information in this relatively small book, but I was left with many unanswered questions. There seemed to be too much attention given to obscure British coastal artillery installations, most of which were unique rather than standardized. But if this particular category is the spark that ignited the author's passion, it can be forgiven. I was particularly appreciative of the section on the very heavy U.S. artillery, the 8-inch gun and 240mm howitzer, especially the rare photographs showing emplacement of these behemoths. However the chapter on Soviet artillery seemed incomplete and I had trouble following the narrative in places. The M1942 122mm howitzer appears in several photos, but nowhere in the text, for example. Overall I think its a great start and I would like to see an updated version. Perhaps Hogg's volume on British and American artillery exclusively that came out a few years later is the book that this was intended to be.