Customer Reviews

Jane's Tanks & Combat Vehicles Recognition Guide

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(13)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

It is a really good reference work.It's quite complete covering all the fighting vehicles currently in service.However I think that the description of each vehicles are somewhat sketchy.The author should have stuck to one type of description always listing and explaining the same characteristic.Instead he talks about something on one entry and misses the same kind of info on the next.It is really annoying.There are also big errors.Many words are printed to or three times and the orthograph of certain entries are incorrect.A very good book, not of paramount interest to the expert but very interesting for the military enthusiast.

Just recently picked up the 2002 edition of this book (current edition as above). Great reference book for anyone interested in modern AFV's.

However, there is a major omission, as the book states it contains Self Propelled Anti-Aircraft systems, but they are not included in the book. An obvious error that should be corrected either by including them in a future edition, or removing mention of them being included on the back cover (2000 edition also has this same error).

Only reason for the 3 star rating. Otherwise the book is well worth the price, and has a mountain of detailed info, statistics, color photos & diagrams on most all of the AFV's being used around the world today.

Let's face it, a full-sized Jane's book is too large, too heavy and too expensive for most of us, but we NEED THE INFO. Jane's has done a tremendos service for the fighting man with this Battle Dress Uniform (BDU) pocket-sized armor recognition and description manual. I read it daily. I refer to it often. How can you be a professional Soldier and be ignorant of its contents? This book should be on the required reading lists and be issued to Soldiers and tested on it. This is a matter of life/death to know the weaponry that is out there in use by us and the enemy.

I wish Christopher Foss put an email address in the book so we could interact and improve future versions of this affordable and important book. If you don't have this book, get it right away and start studying what is out there on the battlefield. I learn something every day from this book.

Airborne!

I found this book useful but as another reviewer said earlier, it is a poor man's version of the more detailed reference book by Jane's. I found that some of the more recent Russian, Ukrainian and American tanks were not included but possibly they would not have been known at the time of publication. I was surprised by the sheer number of typographical errors in the text, which is something I did not expect from Jane's. The part on Self Propelled guns and missiles were very good and these are often not included in reference books on armoured vehicles.

This book is immensely enjoyable and of tremendous value due to the large number and variety of armored vehicles pictured. It would be an even better book without the "key recognition features" (about which the pictures say enough),and with less exhaustive specifications. This book is not a "dust collector", but is one to which the researcher and enthusiast will refer time and time again.

All though the book gives a brief look at possibly every military vehicle in service, there needs to be less description of the vehicles in the text, as there are photos accompaning the text, and the numbers of vehicles in service with each country and their costs even if it is just a general estimate. The other information left out, which is possibly the most critical, is the reliability of the vehicles represented by the number of man hours needed per hour of use. Again a general estimate would be appreciated.

In general, this is a good book since it included some new such as armoured vehicles from countries such as Iran, Croatia, and Singapore, in addition to items from the first edition. The only drawback was the section on Self Propelled Air Defense System such as Self Propelled Anti-Aircraft Guns and Self Propelled Land Based Air Defense System was deleted.

Good stuff, but some Combat Vehicles are missing: no Anti Aircraft vehicles, no tracked self-propelled artillery, like the USA MLRS system. Pity.

This is one of the most complete books on modern AFVs that I have ever read - also one of the best. It deals with almost all of the AFVs in service today, and although it does give some rather superflous details and leave out some others (for example, rate-of-fire for the main armament), it is just about the best low-cost option for anyone wanting a book on modern AFVs. For those who can afford to buy Jane's Armour and Artillery this may seem a little short on content, but for most of us (myself included) who can't afford it, this guide is plenty good enough. On the whole, Jane's Recognition guides are really high quality. In fact, I also bought the warship and gun recognition guides.

The book has very many detailed descriptions of tanks than any other of its type. It has great pictures in the book. Best of all it is cleanly written the english is very simple. Overall the book Jane's Tank Recognition guide is wonderfully organizied.