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This is the latest in a long running series of books on the history of the Warship, and contains twelve articles, a series of book reviews and a gallery of photographs on the scraping of HMS Agincourt, New Zealand and Princess Royal.
The articles cover an impressive range of topics. We start with a look at the first Soviet destroyers designed and built after the revolution, a series of destroyer leaders where speed was the main objective. These had to be built against a background of the Stalinist terror, unrealistic targets, repeated changes in the organisation of the ship building industries and without most of the pre-revolution experts in naval construction, who had either fled or been killed.
After that we get a wide range of topics, covering the navies of the Soviet Union, Britain, Australia, Japan, France, Germany and Italy. One looks at the nineteenth century foundation of the Yokusuka Navy Yard in Japan. Two look at ships that served in the First World War, three cover the post-war period, five the inter-war and Second World War periods, so we get a good balance of periods. Most focus on ship designs, with only one (on British raids off the coast of Brittany in 1943-44) concentrating on these ships in action and one on infrastructure.
The quality of the chapters is high, and they are well illustrated. The range of topics covered means this will be of more value to people with an interest in naval history rather than any of the individual periods. Most of the chapters could easily be turned into a stand-alone Osprey, and the exceptions are those that focus in more detail on smaller topics (such as the unbuilt Soviet battleship designs of 1939-41, which do get a mention in a current Osprey)
Chapters
The Beginnings of Soviet Naval Power: The 1927 Flotilla Leaders, Przemyslaw Budzbon and Jan Radziemski
The Challenge of Operation ‘Tunnel’, September 1943-April 1944, Michael Whitby
The IJN Carriers Soryu and Hiryu, Kathrin Milanovich
The Development of the small cruiser in the Imperial German Navy Part III: The Gunboats, Dirk Nottelmann
The Battleship Jaureguiberry, Philippe Caresse
Postwar Radar Development in the Royal Navy, Peter Marland
After the Sovetskii Soiuz: Soviet Battleship Designs 1939-1941, Stephen McLaughlin
The Genesis of Yokosuka Navy Yard, Hans Lengerer
Esploratori of the Regia Marina, 1906-1939, Enrico Cernuschi
Modern European Frigates, Conrad Waters
The Australian Bathurst class minesweeper corvette, Mark Briggs
C 65 Aconit: France’s prototype ocean escort, John Jordan
Author: Various
Edition: Hardcover
Pages: 224
Publisher: Osprey
Year: 2022