Forgotten Tanks And Guns Of The 1920s 1930s And 1940s

History forgets. Files are lost and mislaid. But this book seeks to shine a light, offering a collection of cutting edge pieces of historical research detailing some of the most fascinating arms and armament projects from the 1920s to the end of the 1940s, nearly all of which had previously been lost to history.Included here are records from the UKs MI10 (the forerunner of GCHQ) which tell the story of the mighty Japanese heavy tanks and their service during the Second World War. Other chapters expand on the development of British armour, including the story of infantry tanks from the 1920s right through to the end of the Second World War and beyond.Other items placed beneath the microscope in this fascinating history include a wide variety of guns, rocket launchers, super heavy tanks and countless pieces of specialised armour. Previously overlooked, hidden under layers of dust in archives up and down the country, the histories of these objects has finally been uncovered.

A British tank historian sheds new light on the UK’s Cold War era research and development of cutting-edge military vehicles and anti-tank weaponry. In the thirty years after the Second World War, the British army entered a period of intense technological development. Yet, due to the lack of surviving documentation, comparatively little is known about this period. What does survive, however, reveals the British Army’s struggle to use cutting edge technology to create weapons that could crush the Soviet Union's armed forces, all the while fighting against the demands of Her Majesty's Treasury. On this journey, the Army entertained ideas such as massive 183mm anti-tank guns, devastating rocket artillery, colossal anti-tank guided missiles, and micro-tanks operable by crews of only two. At one point, they were on the cusp of building hover tanks. This book explores a time period of increasing importance in military engineering history and brings much-needed light to the dark age of British tanks.

Weapons of myth and scandal, that is the best way to describe the spigot weapons deployed by the British in the Second World War. Unlike conventional mortars, a spigot mortar does not have a barrel through with the round is fired. Instead, the general concept involves a steel rod – the ‘spigot’ – onto which the bomb is placed before it is fired. This design was, as David Lister reveals, the basis of a number of successful weapons used during the Second World War. The myth of the PIAT man-portable anti-tank weapon is, for example, tied closely to British paratroopers struggling in the ruins of Arnhem with an inadequate design, one inferior to the German equivalent. Similarly, the myth of the Blacker Bombard is of a useless weapon, one of dubious quality, that was dumped on the unsuspecting Home Guard. In reality, neither scenario is the case. Both weapons were devastating creations of war, often superior to any other nation’s counterpart. At sea, the Hedgehog anti-submarine weapon was another powerful spigot weapon. It was undoubtedly capable of sweeping the U-boats from the sea and even winning the Battle of the Atlantic before it had really begun. That it did not is one of the great scandals of the Second World War, one hidden by wartime secrecy until now. In Defeating the Panzer-Stuka Menace the author explores a large number of spigot weapons from the Second World War, many of which were created by the fertile mind of one of Britain’s great weapon inventors, Latham Valentine Stewart Blacker.

In the thirty years after the Second World War, the British army entered a period of intense technological development. Due to the lack of surviving documentation, this period is almost a second Dark Age. What survives shows the British Army's struggle to use cutting edge technology to create weapons that could crush the Soviet Union's armed forces, all the while fighting against the demands of Her Majesty's Treasury. On this journey, the Army entertained ideas such as micro-tanks of about 20 tons in weight with two-man crews, massive 183mm anti-tank guns, devastating rocket artillery, colossal anti-tank guided missiles and ended up on the cusp of building hover tanks. This book takes a look at the records from a time period of increasing importance to the tank historian and starts the process of illuminating the dark age of British tanks.

Recent books, many by Pen and Sword, such as Shot At Dawn have highlighted the shocking cases of young British soldiers in the Great War being executed by their own side. All too often their trials were cursory and the evidence flimsy. This scandal has appalled right-minded people of all political persuasions. This book examines in depth the case of a young Jewish boy, Aby Beverstein who enlisted in the Middlesex Regiment. Aby was wounded, hospitalized and on (possibly premature) release did not return to his battalion immediately. The authorities arrested and tried him.His execution was greeted with horror by his family and those who knew him and readers will feel equally outraged.

At the start of the campaign on the Eastern Front, in the earliest days of Operation Barbarossa, it was the German armour that swept all in front of it as the Wehrmacht drove eastwards in an unrelenting advance on Leningrad, Moscow and Stalingrad. The ill-prepared and under-resourced Russian forces were forced to retreat. Gradually, the balance of the war swung in favour of the Russian forces, whose strength both in numbers and equipment proved decisive in the ultimate defeat of the German forces in the east. Critical in the Soviet victory was its armour; tanks such as the T-34 proving the equal, if not better than, some of the tanks available to the Germans. This authoritative history of the Soviet forces before and during World War 2, reveals the development of their tactics in the early post-revolutionary era right through to the ultimate victory in Berlin in May 1945. The dramatic struggle of the tank crews against the German advance is told through some 200 contemporary photographs, many of which have never been seen before.The photographs include images of tank training in the 1920s and 1930s, on active service, and many compelling pictures from some of the major tank battles of the day. Over the past five years, aided by the opening up of archives in Russia previously closed to western experts, there has been a massive growth in interest in the events that occurred on the Eastern Front. Russian Tanks is an important addition to the literature currently available, exploring as it does, the vitally important Soviet armour of the period.

The Battle of Attu, which took place from 11-30 May 1943, was a battle fought between forces of the United States, aided by Canadian reconnaissance and fighter-bomber support, and the Empire of Japan on Attu Island off the coast of the Territory of Alaska as part of the Aleutian Islands Campaign during the American Theater and the Pacific Theater and was the only land battle of World War II fought on incorporated territory of the United States. It is also the only land battle in which Japanese and American forces fought in Arctic conditions. The more than two-week battle ended when most of the Japanese defenders were killed in brutal hand-to-hand combat after a final banzai charge broke through American lines. Related products: Aleutian Islands: The U.S. Army Campaigns of World War II is available here: https://bookstore.gpo.gov/products/aleutian-islands-us-army-campaigns-world-war-ii-pamphlet Aleutians, Historical Map can be found here: https://bookstore.gpo.gov/products/aleutians-historical-map-poster Other products produced by the U.S. Department of Interior, National Park Service can be found here: https://bookstore.gpo.gov/agency/national-park-service-nps World War II resources collection is available here: https://bookstore.gpo.gov/catalog/world-war-ii