Jane's Warship Recognition Guide

Author: Keith Faulkner, Robert Hutchinson (Introduction), Richard Sharpe
512 pages Revised edition (May 1999)
Publisher: Harper Resource
ISBN: 0004722116
Dimensions (in inches): 1.45 x 4.96 x 7.44

Notes: Book pictures are in black and white. Statistical book, with drawings and picture of aircraft.

Decription:
The essential guide to all the world's fighting ships. Jane's Warship Recognition Guide shows you how to identify all the world's fighting ships. Fully updated since the 1996 edition, it is organized in a new way that makes it easier to look up ship types in service with more than one navy. Now you can directly compare how different fleets have armed and equipped warships from the same class. A comprehensive index has been added. Over 200 classes of warship are covered with: Class and ship names. Weapon systems and radars. Full page photographs of every warship. Detailed line diagrams. Key recognition features

Table of Contents:

Ed's Analysis:
Similar in desgin to all previous and future Jane's Recognition guides. The pictures, for the most part are of good quality, but some are of little value as they are bow-on or stern-on shots. Also, the author gets the California and Virginia class vessels of the USN (CGNs) mixed together when they are two distinct classes. However, as all vessels of both classes are (or soon will be) no longer in service it is not a big issue. With the rapid pace of naval events a newer edition is needed; say in 2000-2001. The key recognition features of each class is a good feature, allowing the reader to pick them up from the picture on the opposite page. It has a lot of detailed explainations on how to look for distinguishing features such as what type of mast a ship has, how many funnels, locations of weapon systems, what shape the forecastle is etc. It also gives detailed line drawings of the side view of each ship to make identification easy. So, if all you want to do is to be able to recognise the ships, then this is the guide for you. On the down side, it does lack some details a military buff might be interested in, such as how many missiles of each particular type are carried, range of the various electronic sensors onboard, range of the main armament and things like that. Therefore, if you want to know those kinds of details you will have to find another book. On the whole though, this is a very comprehensive book, which covers MOST of the ships in service today, so it's actually pretty useful.