Combat Fleets of the World

Flottes de combat , translated as Combat Fleets of the World, is an almanac and reference book for the world's navies. Arranged by nation, listings include ship names, construction information, engineering characteristics, and armament specifications. Most listings include one or more photographs along with relevant observations. Sometimes there is an elevation to indicate particular characteristics. It is published in French and English. Paramilitary forces are included.

The original French edition was started by Commandant de Balincourt in 1897.^[1] The current publisher is Éditions Maritimes & d’Outre-Mer of Rennes, a subsidiary of Ouest-France. The English version, known as Combat Fleets of the World, has been published by Naval Institute Press in Annapolis (United States) since 1977. The latest English edition, the 16th, was published in 2013 . The latest French edition was published in 2018. The future of this publication is in some doubt.

The first editions were in the landscape format and quite small (16x12 cm). Line drawings with side and overhead elevations were provided for visual identification. There were no photographs. By 1915, and perhaps earlier, editions were a bit larger (18x13 cm). The 1927 edition carried some photographs. Major changes came with the 1929 edition. It was larger (14x22 cm), and the portrait format was introduced. Photographs and line drawings accompanied most of the listings. The format would revert to landscape, and have another dimension adjustment (21.5 x 21 cm), with the 1947 edition. The "Les" in the title was minimized beginning in 1960, and dropped altogether by 1972. The page count would be the next major change. It went from 449 in 1972, to 698 in 1980. This allowed for expanded coverage of individual ship classes, as well as additional, larger photographs and line drawings. In 1998, a section was devoted to color photographs. By 2004 color photographs were common throughout the book. Also, the page count was up to 1200, allowing for a more thorough examination of the fleets.