Customer Reviews

Tank War-Central Front (Elite Series No. 26)

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

 

 

Excellent book.Great color plates of the Tanks.Good book for understanding the Armored combat possible during the latter part of the cold war.

ok,overall this is a good book with detail breakdown of figur and number of total number of tanks and AFV for both side. couple things to watch out through:

1.the author have not read (or had access) to all the tech the soviet had. book repeat point out that reactive amor do not work vs APFSDS round, which is not true as US latter find out after could war. (To be effective against kinetic energy projectiles, ERA must use much thicker and heavier plates and a correspondingly thicker explosive layer. Such "heavy ERA," such as the Soviet-developed Kontakt-5, can break apart a penetrating rod that is longer than the ERA is deep, again significantly reducing penetration capability.)Introduced on the T-80U tank in 1985 the Kontakt-5 are one of such armor.

The effectiveness of Kontakt-5 ERA was confirmed by tests run by the German Bundeswehr and the US Army.The Germans tested the K-5, mounted on older T-72 tanks, and in the US, Jane's IDR's Pentagon correspondent Leland Ness confirmed that "when fitted to T-72 tanks, the 'heavy' ERA made them immune to the depleted uranium penetrators of M829 APFSDS, fired by the 120 mm guns of the US M1 Abrams tanks, which were among the most formidable tank gun projectiles at the time." the the book point that use of reative amor as a sign of soviet tank loss it's effective is at best questionable.

So the Fictional battle is highly unlikely to play out before like the book wrote, as in 1990-2000 fictional time line the soviet will most likely have kontakt-5 ERA
on not just all it's T-72 tank (t-72BM it's now call t-90) even newer ERA would have been build into the T-80 Tank (As a response to the M829A3, the Russian army have designed Relikt, the most modern Russian ERA, which is claimed to be twice as effective as Kontakt-5 It detonates on command before the round hits based on information from radar.) so just to be note on this when read the book.

I bought this book because I served in M-1 tanks in Germany 83-86. Back then, we knew we were going to fight outnumbered. We expected to win. We knew we had better training, a better tank (better gun, the M-1 can fire accurately on the move, has better firepower and protection). Oh, and better tactics, command and control.

I agree the fictional war scenario in the beginning is silly. That is only a few pages, and was popular writing style back then (this was first published in 1989 before Gulf 1).

The author Steven Zaloga is an armor expert, especially on Soviet equipment. We know now that everything the Soviets put out in the field is junk. The T-72 is vastly inferior to the NATO tanks. Hit it and watch the turret fly 50 feet in the air. It does not have good night vision and cannot fire accurately on the move. US tankers are better trained and can fire more rounds per minute. The book captures these facts, outlines numbers of each country that would have fought.

The book addresses all of the critical factors in a "what if" war with NATO and Warsaw pact. Numbers of tanks, tranining, equipment. The US Army has professional soldiers, officer and NCO corps. That leads to a better army. We trained more in the field than any other army.

The NTC? Every tanker who visits there will tell you the same thing. The "OPFOR" (bad guys) are the best trained tankers in the world, have "home field" advantage. They know the terrain. And, no one, not even the Soviets, uses reconaissance as well as the OPFOR. US and Isreali tankers who have been to the National Training Center all say it is tougher than war. It's supposed to be. Better to learn in peace than the hard way. Ask the Iraqi's. Or anyone the Isreali's fought against.

There are many excellent color diagrams showing the camoflague schemes of the tanks and uniforms of the soldiers as well.

This is an overview of the facts, but at 64 pages, that's all it's supposed to be. I enjoyed this book, especially looking back at the opinions that were being written 20 years ago. Recommended for those just getting into armor history or collecters who want to add something different to the libray.

As usual, the color plates are very good and the photos of equipment are plentiful. It's what one could expect from an Osprey title.

However, I must state for the record that a small unit of American M1A1 Abrams tanks decimating a much larger Soviet unit is simply not credible. At NTC (Fort Irwin), the units simulating the Soviets and using simulated Soviet equipment and Soviet tactics usually win. They do so even though outnumbered and with exercises always scripted to the advantage of the blue forces.

Methinks the author needed to be a little more objective lest his view of the Soviets/Russians become "All we have to do is kick in the front door and the whole rotten ediface will fall in!" I wonder who said that and how it turned out for him?

The book starts off with a 'very' fictional scenario, which depicts an army of USSR's elite tanks being destroyed by three Western MBT's. Totally discarding that T-80, has the most powerful gun fitted to any tank, and that it has the capability to fire an anti-tank missile at ranges well beyond those achieved by The Abrams or the Challenger. The whole book is structured to expose USSR's armoured weaknesses, some of which are quite fictional, while not even mentioning the setbacks the "Western" armies have. Steven Zaloga's reference to Russian people as "Russkis" is quite symbolic of the tone in which the entire book was written. Drawings by Simon McCouaig are of high quality, especially the detailed look at the Tanks from Top, Side and Rear viewpoints. Also note how the "Russian observer" looks, compared to all the other people drawn in the "colour" plates.

An excellent book that outlines the equipment of the armies that may have fought a cold-war type conventional battle. Zaloga is a straight-shooter. Accurate and true!