Armoured Warfare in the Korean War

Book excerpt: This fully illustrated history explores the unique role of armored vehicles in the Korean War with more than 180 wartime photographs. After World War II, military analysts thought that the only place significant armored forces were ever likely to confront each other again was in central Europe where the NATO alliance would fend off the Soviet Red Army. But then during the Korean War of 1950-53, large numbers of armored fighting vehicles were deployed by both sides. This neglected aspect of the conflict is the subject of Anthony Tucker-Jones’s photographic history. Korea, with its rugged mountains, narrow passes, steep valleys and waterlogged fields. was not ideal tank country so the armor mainly supported the infantry and rarely engaged in battles of maneuver. Yet the wide variety of armor supporting UN and North Korean forces played a vital if unorthodox role in the swiftly moving campaigns. More than 180 contemporary photographs have been selected to show Soviet-built T-34/85s and Su-76s, American M4 Shermans, M26 Pershings and M46 Pattons, as well as British Cromwells and Centurions in one of the defining conflicts of the Cold War.