Despite the use of “tanks” in the First World War, and their use in the opening stages of the Second World War in Poland, September 1939, it was in the Battle of France in May 1940 that these weapons were used for the first time on any large scale. The battles around the French towns of Stonne, Hannant, and Gembloux for the first time in history saw massive clashes, involving hundreds of tanks on both the French and German sides. And it was during these battles that actual “armored divisions” from both sides were involved. This book covers the two major armored vehicles of the Battle of France, the Wehrmacht’s Panzer IV, and the French Army’s massive Char B1 Bis. The author, Steven Zaloga, is a well known military historian of the Second World War, and also a keen modeler. He is also a very good writer, and the prose of this book flows very well.

“This is #177 in the New Vanguard Series which explores the design, development, operation and history of the machinery of warfare through the ages.”

So says the tag line of Osprey’s advertising copy, and it is a fair description of the contents of this volume. The author, Richard Doherty, has a number of books to his credit, the most notable of which are about the reconnaissance corps which used the Humber car during the Second World War.

First released in 1974, the Tamiya M8 Howitzer Motor Carriage still holds up reasonably well to more modern offerings by this company, as well as some of the new folks on the block. This is one of several 1/35 scale kits that Tamiya has decided to re-release this year, and I for one certainly enjoy having another opportunity to build some of the kits that I missed out on back when they were originally released, as I had not yet picked up the armor modeling bug. A few years ago, I recall seeing a photograph of an M8 built by another modeler, and I started a search that took me a little over a year to fulfill in finding one of the original kits. That one is still on a shelf (along with a Verlinden update set), but this was a great opportunity to build what is a very well designed kit, even by today’s standards.

HISTORY AND PERFORMANCE

The Pz. Kpfw. III Ausf. E was the first in the series to go into extended production. 96 vehicles were manufactured from December 1938 until October 1939. Additional armor was included, along with the standardization of six road wheels per side, while the main armament consisted of the 37 mm KwK L/46.5, along with two 7.92 mm MG34 mounted in the turret, plus a single 7.92 mm MG34 mounted in the front of the hull. This tank saw service in Poland, France, and Greece.

This kit consists of a set of 122mm ammunition and their transportation crates. Included in the kit are 6 identical sprues with one set of decals for the markings on both the ammo and the crates. You can make either a BR-471 APHE shell and its corresponding crate or OF-471 High Explosive fragmentation shell and its crate. You can make all of one type or a mixture of both. I built 3 of each type.

The construction of the crates is fairly straightforward. There are two sequences to follow according to which type of shell you want to build. I followed the instructions exactly on the first crate and found it was not as easy as I had expected. So I changed the sequence as follows: