World War II Infantry Assault Tactics is one of the latest Osprey Elite series books. The author, Rottman, is a veteran who entered service in 1967 (a year before the Tet Offensive) and served in Vietnam in the 5th Special Forces Group. He also worked for the Army at the Readiness Training Center as a scenario writer. His resume indicates that he is well grounded in what he is talking about in this book and his experience comes through. In many places, the book reads similar to a Field Manual and I found myself transported back in my mind to Army classes as a junior officer listening to people describe tactical scenarios in detail.

• Introduction to the Rifle Platoon
• The Objective
• Breaching Obstacles
• Demolition Materials
• Assault Tactics Applied
• Notes on National Practice

Descriptions of procedures and items (such as pole-charges) is necessarily brief in a book of this length but Rottman does a good job in covering the field. There are snapshots of doctrines from each of the major powers.

Although Rottman was described as a weapons specialist, I'd be willing to bet he also was a demolitions expert as seven pages of the sixty-three available describe explosives and demolitions in use by the major powers in tendentious detail. This is the only quibble I have with the book. I think the pages devoted to this would have been better used to describe historical examples of the doctrine he presents.

His descriptions of what soldiers faced in assaulting prepared positions is right on the mark. Take this as an example:

"The preferred method of breaching wire was demolitions. Attaching individual charges to stakes was too time-consuming and difficult, and simply throwing in large satchel charges was only marginally effective. To destroy dense barriers with artillery and heavy mortars required the infantry to be pulled well back for safety, a high degree of accuracy, and heavy expenditure of ammunition that could be better spent on higher-value targets. Artillery also created craters and a tangle of chopped-up wire and uprooted stakes that were still difficult for infantry to negotiate.

The `bangalore torpedo' was the wire-breaching charge of choice; typically, these were light-gauge steel tubes 4ft-6ft long and 1 1/2 in-2in in diameter, filled with 1 1/2 lb-21b of explosive per foot of length. A number of tubes could be linked together end-to-end into a string by means of locking collars...."

There are numerous diagrams scattered throughout the book that show how defensive positions were designed as well as accompanying sketches as to how these positions could be overcome. The majority of the techniques he discusses could apply to both deliberate and hasty assaults.

The book does not add much new to discussions on tactics at this level but it puts the major powers' concepts into one place and so makes a good book for beginners and a passable reference for oldsters.