Tiger Book Review

By David L. Veres

Review

Looking for a handy handbook on Nazi Germany's legendary Tiger tank?  Check Osprey's latest.

Largely tapping original German and Allied archival material, Thomas Anderson's hardbound Tiger comes packed with loads of historical, operational and technical details.

Contents concentrate on the two main combat versions – the PzKpfw VI Ausf E Tiger and PzKpfw VI Ausf B Tiger II.  And Anderson musters massive measures of minutiae – especially for modelers.

Planning a diorama depicting battlefield Tiger recovery?  Look here.  Want the exact track widths of Ausf E and Ausf B variants?  Check page 69.  How about details of Soviet tactics against Hitler's tracked behemoth for another vignette?  That, too.  Just don't look for camouflage & markings details.  No color plates in this one.

And don't look for extended notes on vehicle variants – like the Bergepanzer VI or Jagdtiger.  These and others appear, almost as afterthoughts, in Anderson's final chapter.  That "Conclusion" also lists surviving Tigers.

Coverage also regularly stresses the Tiger's technical superiority over Allied armor.  But as their enemies thankfully discovered, Nazi forces never received enough of them.  And that "reality" of late-war fighting, Anderson observes, left German armored forces "numerically too weak to defend the vast front line" – especially in the East.

Make this compact compendium your introduction to this historic vehicle.  Recommended.

My sincere thanks to Osprey Publishing for this review sample!