21 of 22 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A View from a Different Place, January 28, 2005
This review is from: On Armor (Military Profession) (Paperback)
There are a large number of books available that describe every conceivable type of armored vehicle. Comparisons can be made of the size, armament, speed, weight, etc. of the German Mark IV and the Russian T-34 or of any other.
Much less common is discussion on what the various armies did with not only their tanks, but how they interfaced with armored cars, infantry, self propelled artillery, etc. This is a book on the ideas, problems and opportunities that armor made possible for 20th century armies. The abilities of the generals to organize their armies to get the most out of the equipment was as important a story as the speed, size, etc.
From this it is a logical extension to make some predictions as to what armored forces will look like in the future battlefield.
A very enjoyable book that looks at history in a slightly different way.
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16 of 17 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Kelvin (Hong Kong), May 6, 2006
This review is from: On Armor (Military Profession) (Paperback)
The content of book is unbalanced. Too little on post WWII period. The three chapters on German armored organization is excellent and enable us know deeply on German panzer division and remove some traditional but incorrect view e.g. The reduction of one tank regiment in Panzer division is bad thing in traditional view but author adjust this. But during the cold war, only some about Middle East or Korean armored warfare but nothing on US armored division or Soviet tank/motor rifle divisional organization.It is disappointing.
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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Excellent work on the subject of armor., December 15, 2008
This review is from: On Armor (Military Profession) (Paperback)
Another excellent work by Bruce Gudmundsson. This is an excellent work, not on tanks and armored vehicles exclusively, but on the *doctrinal* thinking processes that produced different types of armored vehicles and their application. This work should be seen from that standpoint.
Gudmundsson covers the unique and often odd beginnings of armored warfare. For example, most early armored fighting vehicles in WWI were developed and crewed (by varying degree) by *naval* personnel! Mr. Gudmundsson explains the phenomena from a doctrinal standpoint.
He covers not simply the Germans in the interwar period, but also the French and the Soviets - in most works, these are usually ignored or overshadowed by discussion of the Germans. Yet, operationally speaking, people such as Mikhail Tukhachevsky in the USSR were probably ahead of the Germans in the use of armor and mobile units.
Mr. Gudmundsson does an excellent job of touching on armored vehicles other than tanks such as armored cars and assault guns, as well as other forms of accompanying mobile forces using half-tracks, motorcycles, trucks, etc.
Some may wonder why post WWII armor isn't covered as well as that during WWII. The answer is that nothing *doctrinally* had changed. In the Arab-Israeli wars, for example, nothing was done that hadn't been seen in WWII. If one wanted to, one could look at the 1967 conflict with Israelis as Germans and the Arab forces as the French in May 1940 and the comparison wouldn't be too far off the mark!
I would have liked for Mr. Gudmundsson to have expanded his last chapter on the future of armor. I personally think that armored vehicles must become lighter and go back to wheels in order to stay relevant in the future. This is a good work and it should be in the library of every serious student of armor of warfare in the 20th century.
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