Warship 2018

by John Jordan (Editor)

Warship 2018 is devoted to the design, development, and service history of the world's combat ships. Featuring a broad range of articles from a select panel of distinguished international contributors, this latest volume combines original research, new book reviews, warship notes, an image gallery, and much more to maintain the impressive standards of scholarship and research from the field of warship history.

This 40th edition features the usual range of diverse articles spanning the subject by an international array of expert authors.

Genres: Naval History

224 pages, Hardcover

Published May 22, 2018

About the author

John Jordan is a former teacher of modern languages. He is the author of two major books on the Soviet Navy, and has coauthored a series of books on the French Navy.

Reviews

[Bobble Hat]

I’ve somehow danced around both the Warship annuals and Warship International quarterly for many years without ever actually buying either. Now lockdown has resulted in me collecting the former and subscribed to the latter.

Warship 2018 is a well produced and plentifully illustrated 224 page hardback. All of the articles are well written and researched with exhaustive bibliography, including a majority of primary sources. Of the eleven main articles, five are by authors I am familiar with and most of the others I have at least heard of.

I find the length of articles to be a good compromise between detail and readability. Sometimes with a book dedicated to a single subject- even one I am deeply invested in-the second 200 pages can be hard going. With this format you are transported to some totally different, but equally fascinating subject every half hour or so.

I am impressed by the manner in which the differing submissions have been given a common style. This is partly through the same formatting being used throughout for tables, and partly by the many ship plans and elevations provided by John Jordan as editor. The clear style of these will be instantly recognisable to anyone who has read his own works.

As shown below there is a good range of nationalities covered (8) in the subject matter. There are articles covering ships and actions from 1890 to the present day. These are:-

The Danish warship Neils Iuel (1918)- Tom Wismann, 20 pages.

Battle of River Plate (1939) Tactical Analysis- Alan Zimm, 17 pages

Battle damage to Graf Spee (1939)- William Jurens, 22 pages

The French warship Jeanne d’Arc (1899)- Luc Feron & Jean Roche, 18 pages

Italian naval intelligence vs Britain (WW2)- Enrico Ceruschi, 13 pages

The Japanese warship Oyodo (1942)- Hans Lengerer, 17 pages

Russian monitor designs (WW1)- Stephen McLaughlin, 21 pages

Modern naval replenishment vessels- Conrad Waters, 16 pages

British trade protection cruiser design (1905-20)- David Murfin, 22 pages

Late career of Japanese warship Amatsukaze (WW2)- Michael Williams, 16 pages.

The US warship Huntington (1903)- AD Baker, 5 pages.

There are then three short articles on the Japanese 6.1”/ 60 gun by Hans Lengerer, the loss of U-56 in 1916 by Stephen McLaughlin and the naming conventions (or sometimes lack of ) of US warships by Kenneth Fraser, totalling 9 pages.

The book review section covers 24 volumes, mainly published in the UK.

Finally there is a 5 page warship gallery on the dismantling of surrendered WW1 U-boats taken by the Japanese.

I really can’t fault this- it’s a pity I took so long to get here.

[Dave]

Another high-quality edition of what is, in my view, comfortably the premier periodical on warship design and history. The quality of writing and editing is excellent (and as best I can tell the quality of scholarship as well, although I’m less well-placed to comment), with all of the articles well illustrated with diagrams and/or photographs as appropriate. Contents include:

- An insightful and enjoyable article about the Niels Iuel by Tom Wismann.
- Alan Zimm’s article on the Battle of the River Plate (a tactical analysis) is interesting and insightful.
- William Jurens’ article on the damage received by Graf Spee is detailed and comprehensive, and particularly well illustrated with diagrams.
- Luc Feron and Jean Roche tell the story of the armoured cruiser Jeanne D’Arc.
- Enrico Cernuschi provides an entertainingly-written (if slightly unfocussed/over-ambitious) discussion of Ultra/codebreaking in the Mediterranean theatre and Italy’s chance discovery of its existence.
- The Oyodo is profiled by Hans Lengerer in a characteristically thorough discussion.
- Stephen McLaughlin investigates the numerous and varied monitor designs considered by the Russian Navy before and during WW1 (including one with submerged torpedo tubes!)
- Readers are given a tour through Modern Naval Replenishment Vessels by the ever-excellent Conrad Waters.
- British trade protection cruiser designs between 1905 and 1920 are well-discussed by David Murfin.
- The later life of the Japanese destroyer Amatsukaze (which lost its bow and had to make do with a temporary replacement during a harrowing journey from Singapore through the South China Sea), as told by Michael Williams.
- AD Baker III tells the story of the USN armoured cruiser USS Huntington (ex-West Virginia).
- A fifteen-page section reviewing key naval books in recent years (always a valuable read).

Warship remains one of my firm favourites. As ever, it’s pitched at an audience already familiar with naval history and ships (ie, it would have a significant learning curve for those new to the subject), but for that audience it’s highly recommended.

[Craig Pearson]

Thank you to NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review this book. This book was not what I was hoping for. I should not have expected a mini-Janes but the articles were interesting. None of the charts made it through my kindle reader due to formatting issues. What photos that i did see were very fascinating and, for me, never seen before. Most of the articles were based on statistical data concerning the ships or battles which can be very dry. The printed version would probably be much more readable but the scope of the articles covering just a few historical ships and battles would mach the value of a purchase problematical.

[Shrike58]

Frankly, this is the best edition of this annual in awhile as Osprey/Bloomsbury has given the editorial team more pages to work with and they seem to have made good use of said pages. To me, the best articles related to the battle of the River Plate, whereas the battle is analyzed from the perspective of how the period U.S. and Royal navies would have war-gamed the engagement; followed up by a detailed examination of just what damage the "Graf Spee" took. Other stand-outs include examinations of the Danish training cruiser "Niels Iuel," the Japanese light cruiser "Oyodo," and Italian adventures in signal intelligence during the Fascist period.

Originally written: March 15, 2020.

[Norman]

Excellent series of articles, I really loved the two articles on the Battle of the River Plate.