The titanic struggles on the Eastern front in WWII hold a special fascination for many.  The largest and fiercest armoured battles ever fought were on the Russian front.  The gun–armour race kept a frantic pace in the east from ’42-’45 and this volume concentrates on the 3,564 T-34 chassis converted to assault guns to help stave off German technical superiority by providing the medium tanks with a heavier punch than their turreted brethren could.  Much has been written about the German beasts such as the Jagdpanther and Jagdtiger, but by late 1944 they had met their match in the form of SU-100.

Not a lot has been written about the SU series of vehicles and this volume is welcome indeed.  Although it is mostly Polish, all photos and illustrations are captioned in English, as is the brief but concise summary at the end.  4-view drawings of all 3 types (SU-85/100/122) are included in1/35 scale.  Many B&W photos of these guns are the meat of this book, and my favorites are the very clear SU-100 shots that I have never seen before.  Some are from the final battles in Berlin, but the postwar prints in action with T-54s and on parade in Moscow in May 1985 are interesting as well.  Sectioned views, tech manual illustrations, Polish and Russian unit organization tables and production figures round out the volume nicely.  The 26 colour plates (10 of the SU-100) and 8 colour shots of a very nice SU-85 in the Polish Army Museum are just frosting on the cake.

I highly recommend this book to all Russian armour aficionados.

April 4, 2006