Dimensions
220 x 295 x 20mm
Between the World Wars, the Germans intensively studied ways and means of overcoming the deficiencies which had stopped their 1918 offensives just short of victory. They came to the conclusion that it was the tank that provided the answer to maintaining the momentum of a breakthrough. As a result of these studies, when the Second World War began the Germans were far ahead of any other country in tank doctrine. The tank became their supreme weapon: it was used to spearhead the Nazi march across Eastern Europe and into Russia. It was the power that forced the Allies back to Dunkirk, and which breached the Maginot Line. In the hands of commanders like Rommel and Guderian, it seemed that the German tank was invincible.
In this immensely readable account, Bob Caruthers describes the reasons behind the technical and tactical superiority of German tanks and commanders during the early stages of the war. Each of the major tank battles is described in detail, and illustrated with maps, line drawings, computer-generated graphics and over a hundred photographs of tanks in action on the battlefield that have never been published. And finally he shows how the German tank was in the end defeated, at Kursk and El Alamein, when the Allies at least learned how to counter-attack this most deadly of German weapons.
