Are there any definitive books that cover soft skin and armour for recognition purposes? Ideally one on armour and the other one on soft skin stuff. However if there is one book that covers them all and or French and German stuff to that's OK. Author and titles please
For pure 'spotting' try the Vanderveen HMVD from ATB: Amazon - Historic Military Vehicles Directory - Bart Vanderveen - ATB Other than that. George Forty's old books on tanks & Armoured Cars and the Chamberlain Encyclopedias are decent ready-reference, but there are some more modern books on Softskins - one written by a chap here, but my mind has gone completely blank on who (Sorry, person. It's my mind, not you.). I'd say the Vanderveen (Blessings be upon him) is your best general bet.
Les Freathy's 'British Military Trucks of WW2' is fantastic. It's not just 1940 of course but I can't think off-hand of any models where it doesn't also illustrate the early versions. British Military Trucks of World War 2 - TANKOGRAD Publishing - Verlag Jochen Vollert - Militärfahrzeug