Michael Green’s companion to the Allied Tanks volume offers a similarly comprehensive history of Axis armor, with text to explain the concepts and photos to provide micro-detail. Like many of us military history enthusiasts, when I think of “Axis tanks” I immediately think mostly of German behemoths like the Tigers and Panthers — and, indeed, the majority of the book does provide great detail about German tanks — but one of this book’s welcome strengths is its extensive coverage of all Axis tanks, including Czech, Italian, Japanese and Hungarian vehicles.

One surprise for me was to learn about Japanese late-war tanks with high-velocity 75mm anti-tank guns — all of which were held in reserve for the defense of the Home Islands that (thankfully) never occurred.

Read the complete review online here.

Schopenhauer's Workshop

I strongly recommend this book to anyone who wants to enrich his or her collection of WW2 tank photographs.

Kunwon Saw, Freelance

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War History Online

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The Armourer, January 2018

This latest work by established author and subject expert Mike Green, will enlighten and inform historians, engineers, modellers and war gamers.

Classic Military Vehicle, December 2017

Among the publications of the "Images of War" series is the book "Axis Tanks of the Second World War" by Michael Green. In our previous issues, we have reviewed already some of his books. This new book covers the tanks designed and produced by Nazi Germany and by the other Axis powers. One of the pros of this publication noticed right away is that this book also covers the tanks that were captured and given a new life.

The book consists of four chapters. To organize the content, the chapters are not broken by the time period or the country, but by their classification: the first chapter is dedicated to the light tanks; the next two chapters are given to the medium tanks dividing them into the Early-War Medium Tanks {Chapter Two) and theLate-War Medium Tanks {Chapter Three). Chapter Four is dedicated to the category of the heavy tanks. Each chapter looks into what kind of tanks were available to all countries of the Axis, which includes not only Germany, Italy and Japan, but also such rarely mentioned countries as Hungary and Romania, who designed and produced their own tanks.

Although these countries designed and produced tanks that were inferior to the more advanced German armored vehicles, they were able to do their intended job. Not to forget some of the interesting design ideas implemented in those tanks. And speaking of "inferior tanks," as outdated as they were, the Italian tanks were able to hold their own in Africa for quite some time, and even served with Allies after being captured. Even the lightly armed and armored Japanese tanks were able to support the rapid conquests of a big portion of China and British and Dutch colonies in the Pacific.

In the global war on such a large scale, as was the Second World War, everything was put to use. The tanks captured from the conquered countries and Allies were often used without major modifications. Such worthy opponents as the Soviet T-34, American M4 Sherman or French B1 bis were able to find their role with the new owners or were modified which gave them a completely new purpose.

In the conclusion of this short review, I would like to add that it is a well researched and illustrated book. I find this a very good addition to my personal library and would definitely recommend it to anyone interested in the subject.

The Armor Journal

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Digital Digging

his book is full of interesting photographs and should be on the bookshelf of any AFV petrol or diesel heads. Best of all, it is currently on sale (October 2017).

Read the complete review here.

Thomo's Hole - reviewed by Ian Thompson

The photo collection in this one is a bit different to most of the books in the Images of War series is that a high proportion of the photographs this time are modern day images from examples preserved in various museums around the world.

Read the complete review here.

Military Model Scene, Robin Buckland