Beutepanzers of World War II: Captured tanks and AFVs in German service: 332 (New Vanguard)

Story of captured AFVs in German services. In national order it is brief but good account nonetheless

This book by well-known author Steve Zaloga highlights vehicles captured and impressed into service by the forces of Nazi Germany and its allies during WW2. The book seems to concentrate (mostly) on vehicles captured from the Western Allies during the war, but also does feature some coverage of Soviet types also pressed into service by the Germans. The format of the work only allows for more of an overview of the subject, but even so, contains some lovely artwork and photographs I'd not seen before despite having considerable reference on the topic already in my library. This book does form an excellent starting point for those interested in an introduction to the topic. Recommended.

I'm very interested in Beutepanzers and already own quite a collection of books about this topic, so it was really a no-brainer to buy this book from Zaloga. Overall it's a good read although I think it focuses too heavily on French (excluding vehicles like the Char D2 though) and Italian Beutepanzers while almost omitting British and American ones (including lend and lease vehicles captured at the Ostfront in quite some numbers), literally stating that only limited numbers were captured! But the hundreds of British AFVs captured in France and Africa and subsequently reused by the Wehrmacht or those American ones captured en masse at Kasserine, during the early stages of Overlord or, especially, during Operation "Wacht am Rhein" speak of a totally different reality. The picture material about the use of captured British and American AFVs is literally vast.Yes, the Baukommando Becker chapter is good but was already dealt with by Scheibert decades ago, much more extensive and informative.The sources used to write this issue are also kind of old with none younger than 2015 and are heavily focusing on Scheiberts, Regenbergs and Jentz' works from the 80s and 90s! Sources like Tankograds fairly new book about T-34 Beutepanzers (including it's quite informative chapter about the use of captured lend and lease tanks by numerous units), Lüdekes 2 books about captured tanks or, quite surprisingly, Regenbergs book about AFVs in use by the Ordnungspolizei are lacking.I like it and it taught me some new things like the German designations for the French SA18 and SA38 tank guns, but imho it's a somewhat missed opportunity, that's why I can only give 3 stars.