Generally, one doesn't think much about tanks when thinking of the Japanese in WWII. Perhaps that is because most of the war from the outlook of Americans and their Allies was on the island campaigns and much of the fighting did not involve a lot of armor use. After all, where on a small atoll can one have room for a tank. Yet we often tend to overlook that the main area of operations of the Japanese Army was China, with lots of room for armor.

Prior to the start of the Pacific War, Japan had the fourth largest armor program in the world, led only by the Russians, Germans and British. Yet for some reason, tank development stagnated after 1939. It was felt that it was more important to spend the time and resources on things like aircraft and ships. Therefore, when the Allies did finally begin pushing back, the tanks they encountered were easily dealt with by weapons that were considered obsolescent or obsolete for use in the European and North African theater. When development did get underway, all the 'good stuff' was kept on the home islands in anticipation of an invasion and never saw combat.

Author Steven J. Zaloga is widely acknowledged as one of the foremost authorities on armor and has put his expertise to use in this book. Each type of tank is detailed along with modifications and variants. An overview on tank use in various battles is also provided. To many Westerners, Japanese tank development is still a mystery, though there are reams written about these vehicles; most of it in Japanese!

When you add to it the quality period photographs and the superb artwork of illustrator Peter Bull, you have an excellent quick reference on a most intriguing subject. I should note that my book has several pages printed out of sequence that make it a bit difficult to read. I would hope this is a small glitch and hasn't made it into all of the production run. Regardless, it is a book that I can most highly recommend to the enthusiast and modeler alike.

August 2007

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