A Comprehensive Book on Armoured Mobility
Page 35
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ABOOK that may well be destined to rank as a motoring classic as well as a military one, is " War on Wheels," by Capt. C. R. Kutz of the Armoured Corps, U.S. Army. It gives a complete account of the development of protected moving fire-power, from the horsed-chariot to the 100-ton break-through Tank.
The story that it unfolds is fascinating; readers of this journal will be even more interested, possibly, in the adventures of the early armoured-car units, with their Rolls-Royces and Austirls and assorted American trucks, than in the rather more important account of how the Tank grew from a nebulous dream into a steel reality.
Of the Tanks, Capt. Kutz writes:— " . . . The saga of the heroes who had petrol in their blood, engine-oil on their faces and machine-gun smoke in their nostrihi, would fill more than one book. The tactical blunders committed by the traditional soldiers, who could not adapt themselves to new conditions, would fill another." The words typify the spirit that runs through the book, which is published by the Bodley Head at 7s. 6d. net. The work is more than a story. Its major value, indeed, is otherwise. It is a practical treatise on armoured mobility, and should be studied as such, not only by those serving with the Forces, but by civilians who, realizing the implications of total war, feel it as well to gain further knowledge of the blitzkreig.
The book, of course, was written prior to the publication of Lord Gort's Despatches, and before certain things in connection with the Tank equipment of the French Army had become generally known.