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Sharkmouth

The Hard Ride, Vietnam Gun Trucks; Part Two

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Many years ago, my uncle told me of his time in Vietnam.  He explained to me about the gun trucks and the convoys with hot rod armored cars.  I always wondered about the waxed and pin striped armored car until I saw Squadron Signal's Armor in Vietnam book in 1982.
 

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It was over fourteen years later that the next installment, Gun Trucks, appeared in Squadron publication's catalog.  When AFV Club released their M35A1 Quad 50 Gun Truck, I thought I had all the references needed.  Until 2003 when “The Hard Ride, Vietnam Gun Trucks; Part One,” by James Lyles was released.  Now Part Two has finally been released in color as was always intended.

As a previous customer, James Lyles offered one of the new books for review.  The book arrived in  perfect condition within a sturdy package and I dove into it.  As with Part One, I noticed the sheer amount of color photographs with only a few portraits and weapon recognition photos in black in white.

There are a whopping 300 photos and one map.  While I wished they were bigger, I noted that the publisher tried to put as many as six photos per page.  The photos cover everything from the M54 series 5 Ton gun trucks with M113 APC Body Shells (50 photos), M35 and M54 series gun truck crews with M55 Maxon Quad Fifty turrets (63 photos), gn trucks with multi-angled armor (7 photos), an M52 with M35 bed and armor (1 photo), M37 ¾ gun trucks (gun beeps) (22 photos), M151 and M151A2 ¼ ton gun jeeps (19 photos), women on gun trucks (?) (2 photos), captured enemy equipment (3 photos), captured enemy gun truck (4 photos), 1 map, phots during convoys including ambushes (85 photos), weapons used during the convoy battles in Vietnam (37 photos), and dead enemy (2 photos).  There also is a current photo of Eve of Destruction as she appears in Fort Eustis and five images of gun truck related art.

As for the text, they cover the vehicles used (as listed above) crews and then it is followed by the first hand stories.  I was hoping to find more information on The Coyote Dusters, an M328 bridge transporting stake truck with an M113 APC body shell.  Most people think of the M139 which was the chassis used on the M328.

Some highlights are the humorous stories found within as they are enjoyable and give a sense of the camaraderie that the gun truck crews enjoyed.  Another is a list of mis-named gun trucks which can be used to properly name vehicles seen in photographs.

Now back to the photographs.  These were culled from the crews themselves and show many of the vehicles at different times of their service life.  The captions are quite informative and it helps that the author is a modeler since he conveys the details that would matter most to a modeler.

This book is highly recommended reading and an excellent source of inspiration to the gun truck modeler.  My sincerest thanks to James Lyles for the review sample!  Order directly from the author for $39.95USD plus shipping; James Lyles.
 
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Sharkmouth
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