Customer Reviews

Jane's Submarines: War Beneath the Waves from 1776 to the Present Day

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

An attractively illustrated book, this is not however really something you can read cover to cover: it's more in the style of an encyclopedia article. Nor is it really a complete reference work, since a number of intermediate classes are simply omitted, e.g., Gato class subs are fully covered, but the Balao and Tench classes are unmentioned.

Quite good enough for a dabbler like me, but this will not satisfy someone looking for the kind of comprehensive treatment one associates with Jane's.

Great illustrations and photographs. Spent 11 years on subs, and this is a book every submariner should have in his collection.

This covers the early history of submarines, Bushnell's Turtle through Holland's efforts for the U.S. Navy through the early pre-World War 1 submarines, especially well. Both of the World War submarines fleets are examined, but not in great detail, as this is a relatively thin book. The Cold War also has a lot of coverage in other books, and the treatment here was somewhat thin. No Victors or Novembers for the Soviet Union, for example.

Overall a good book for an introduction. I've deducted a star for the horrid editing and fact checking. Most every page has a spelling or grammatical mistake. Some dates are obviously wrong, transposed digits, but what other mistakes might be hiding in here?

Its not a BAD book, but there are too many typos, editorial mistakes and factual errors to list. Many of them are quite obvious such as wrong or missing pages listed in the index or measurement unit conversion errors (e.g. meters to feet). Who knows what else.

Its annoying, but since I have another similar (and superior) book to take its place ("Submarines" by John Parker, pub. Hermes House) its just a glossy toilet book. Shook my confidence in Janes, I got the Naval Institute Combat Fleets instead of Janes offering alternatively.

[hardcover]

Cheers!

Being a prior enlisted yet top side sailor, I found this to be a really informative piece of literature on my "silent service" brethren. Encompassing not just submarine vessels of recent but letting you know the history of how they came to be.

One of the submarine accident of Turkey shown in "appendix-2:The submarine accidents 1905-2000" as lost. The lost one "TCG ATILAY" was found in 1992. She hit a WW-2 mine at the approaches of Canakkale Straigt(Dardanels). The other submarine "TCG DUMLUPINAR" sunk after colliding with a merchant at Canakkale Straight.

Also there is no place called Constantinople for centuries. It must be Istanbul. And Scutari must be Uskudar.

Burak AKCAY