Jane's Tank Recognition Guide (Jane's Recognition Guides)

Great little reference book at a fraction of the full Jane's Armour and Artillery annual hardback book price. Granted it is 12 years since the last update, but the pace of AFV development has been relatively slow over the period. Most countries can't afford much more than upgrading what they already own or building older designs under license. Western countries are not actively pursuing any new models to replace the Cold War tanks from the 1980s and 1990s, so most of the information in the Recognition Guide is still current. If and when, Jane's decides to publish a new reference book this one is still useful. I picked up a nearly new copy very cheaply. So shop around, very reasonably priced for the information provided.

This is overall a good quality book with only a few sub standard pictures. There are inaccurate descriptions here and there. Example on page 485 under "key recognition features" it states a "short stubby barrel, no fume extractor or muzzle brake." Well the photo below that shows a muzzled 203mm barrel the length of a tree trunk. If however you are metric challenged as I am you should note the specs are in metric. This was a negative for me. It may or may not for you but you should be aware of this. Also on a series of vehicles most books go in chronological order oldest to most current.This goes from newest to oldest or no particular order. Example T-90/T-80/T-64/T-72/T-62/T-54/55. Again may or may not bother you.

Jane's is a recognition guide, and a fine one at that. It should be noted, however, that as a recognition guide, it is not a book about tanks and other fighting vehicles, so don't expect much text covering armored vehicle tactics, operations, capabilities, weapon systems, etc.As a recognition guide, this book does provide sillouettes, line drawings, multiple color photographs, lists of key recognition figures and basic vehicle statistics in order to aid the reader in recognizing various modern armored fighting vehicles. Aslo included are lists of nations who currently use each model.Surprisingly, not included in the latest version of the book are a handful of vehicles currently seeing extensive combat action and receiving a good deal of media coverage. These vehicles include the U.S. Army's Stryker wheeled APC (based on the Mowag Piranha and LAV-25), the Israeli Achzarit tracked "heavy" APC (based on the hull of the T-54 & T-55 MBT's), Puma tracked Engineer carrier, and low-instensity conflict tracked carriers Nakpadon and Nakpachon (all based on the chasis of the Centurion MBT).All of the above are derivatives of pre-existing models which are covered by the book but, as in the case of the Israeli APC's, the modifications are so extensive as to make the resulting vehicles almost completely new in terms of components, performance, AND appearance. You've probably seen all of these vehicles quite recently on the national news but you will not be able to find them in Jane's. The omission of these almost completely new vehicles is therefore quite surprising.Furthermore,the book does include other derivitive vehicles (many Chinese and eastern European vehicle entries are little more than locally manufactured variants of Soviet/Russian designed vehicles) so the above mentioned omission are rather difficult to justify. Therefore, I've given this edition four stars instead of five. Otherwise, it is a fine reference.Aside from the omissions discussed above at length, the current edition of Janes Tank Recognition Guide is chock full of information and color photos and is a must-have reference for any "tankspotter" or military gearhead.

A good smaller format reference book. Good photos and info.

Love Jane's, and book condition was pretty good.

Overall excellent guide with a ton of information and pictures. Does require a bit of an update to include North Korean vehicles. The title is a little misleading because it covers not only Tanks, but APCs and AFVs as well. Some pictures, including the USMC LAV-25 are incorrect and show the Canadian variant.

I "cut my teeth" on the M48A5 and completed my career as an M1A1 Abrams Tank Master Gunner/Platoon Sergeant. Jane's Recognition Guides were indispensable for studying vehicle recognition and being prepared to instantly distinguish friend from foe, because we were very rarely if ever able to access either. In the Coalition Forces of the PGW, the M1A1 of the US were operating in close proximity to British Centurion and Chieftain model tanks. To our eternal regret, poor communication or a land navigation error led to British tanks operating forward of US positions, and a vehicle identification error in the dark of night on the part of a US crew resulted in their mistakenly engaging the British with deadly effect. Slide projector images, photographs, diagrams, illustrations, operator manuals, 3-D computer modeling and even motion pictures of maneuvering vehicles don't compare to meeting "in the flesh" and hands on experience. The Jane's series are, however, an excellent place to figuratively touch the vehicles and their unique characteristics. In the shifting world of friends and foes who make use of the same or similar types of vehicles, Jane's is also an invaluable asset in knowing which nations employee each vehicle. One drawback to this volume is spreading some vehicle picture across two pages rather than rotating them ninety degrees so that they appear only on one page.

Very concise!

Not only does it portray tanks, it covers self propelled guns, armoured cars and lightly armoured 4 6 or 8 wheeled vehicles.Not bad for all that. I preferred the old format of the Jane's Recognition Guides with "landscape" orientated pages, black and white photos, silhouette AND a line drawing.Still happy I bought it though.

Some errors, in a Janes?

As with all Janes books very detailed information. Covers light & main battle tanks, APCs, 4X4s 6X6s, 8X8s and SPGs. Mostly colour photos 120MM X 190MM 495 pages. Good stocking filler.

Tells you all you need to know about every modern tank with superb photos and diagrams. Would highly recommended this book.

Comprehensive, good value.