Military Air

The Chamberlain Mandate... By the spring of 1941 Britain’s strategic situation was considerably improved, in no small part due to what sympathetic historians would call the ‘Chamberlain Mandate’. The Italians were heading for defeat in Africa, with their German allies distracted by their own preparations for Operation Barbarossa. The focus on Hitler’s dreams for a grand crusade in the east to sweep away Bolshevism and secure new lands for the Reich removed the threat of invasion from the British mainland for now, but threatened to magnify the power of Nazi Germany if the USSR proved...

From the author of Pacific Payback comes the gripping true story of the Cactus Air Force and how this rugged crew of dive bombers helped save Guadalcanal and won the war. November 1942: Japanese and American forces have been fighting for control of Guadalcanal, a small but pivotal island in Japan's expansion through the South Pacific.

Sixty-five thousand tons, 280 metres long. A flight deck the size of 60 tennis courts. A giant piece of Sovereign British territory that's home to up to 50 aircraft. HMS Queen Elizabeth in the biggest ship in the Royal Navy's history and one of the most ambitious and exacting engineering projects ever undertaken in the UK. But it's her ship's company of 700, alongside an air group of 900 air and ground crew, that are Big Lizzie's beating heart. And How to Build an Aircraft Carrier tells their story.

To Command the Sky is a scholarly record of the fight for domination of the skies over Western Europe during World War II. It also explains the technical details of the tactics used to defeat the Luftwaffe. This book is important for serious students of World War II or military aviation.

In the late 1920's Rolph Marben interviewed airship veterans of World War One and catalogued their stories. This translation includes maps, cultural commentary, and technical commentary to provide more insight for the reader. Proceeds from this book help fund the building of airships in our day.

Based on official American, French, and German documents, histories, personal memoirs, and the author's interviews with several of the story's key participants, Escape from Paris crosses the traditional lines of World War II history with tense drama of air combat over Europe, the intrigue of occupied Paris, and courageous American and Allied pilots and French resistance fighters pitted against Nazi thugs. All of this set in one of the world's most beautiful and captivating cities.

The story of the United States Air Force (USAF) stretches back to aerial operations prior to the First World War and looks forward to a new era of airpower in space. Fighting from Above presents a concise account of this history, offering a new perspective on how the air forces of the United States created an independent way of warfare over time.

This is the story of a pilot who flew the F-4, the F-105, the F-111, and the O-2 in defense of his country. In addition, he spent several years working on the ground with Army frontline forces as an air liaison officer, integrating airpower into the ground battle. Many people have asked what it feels like to fly jet fighters. In fact, most people have never flown in a small plane. With no relevant reference, it’s very hard to describe. They truly are missing the most incredible feeling of being airborne alone, among the clouds, looking down at the ground and feeling amazingly free.

During the early and most dangerous years of the cold war, a handful of Americans, led by President Dwight D. Eisenhower, revolutionized spying and warfare. In great secrecy and beyond the prying eyes of Congress and the press, they built exotic new machines that opened up the Soviet Union to surveillance and protected the United States from surprise nuclear attack. Secret Empire is the dramatic story of these men and their inventions, told in full for the first time.

The Berlin blockade brought former allies to the brink of war. Britain, France, the United States and the Soviet Union defeated and began their occupation of Germany in 1945, and within a few years, the Soviets and their Western partners were jockeying for control of their former foe. Attempting to thwart the Allied powers' plans to create a unified West German government, the Soviets blocked rail and road access to the western sectors of Berlin in June 1948.

Eddie Rickenbacker was a WWI fighter ace. He arrived in France as a fresh greenie who knew little about flying and less about air combat. He learned everything he needed while fighting against the German air force and the famous Flying Circus commanded by Manfred von Richthofen. In this biography of his wartime experiences, Eddie tells us of his midair adventures and battles as well as how he learned to "defeat the hun" and earned the title of Ace.

Alone, unprepared, and weak. These are generally the words used to describe Britain's position in 1940, part of a narrative that has been built up ever since the end of World War II. However, the reality is very different. On land, sea, and in the air, Britain was prepared. It had the most powerful navy in the world; the RAF was relatively strong, but more importantly, was operating as part of a plan and a joined-up group system that was in reality never in any real danger of being defeated; even the post-Dunkirk British Army was better armed than the post-war narrative tells us.

Cynthia feels the pressure, as every day reduces the time available to save a small sample of humanity. This time, Nibru will bring an Extinction Event, in less than five years. A breakthrough physics discovery offers a glimpse of an unknown world beyond a portal. She is directing a project that dwarfs the Manhattan Project, in scope and secrecy. The United States will attempt to launch, through an expanded portal, a group of its best and brightest young people into the unknown world. Will the clock reach midnight before Project Bolthole can be completed?

During the early years of World War II in the Pacific theatre, against overwhelming odds, young American airmen flew the longest and most perilous bombing missions of the war. They faced determined Japanese fighters without fighter escort, relentless anti-aircraft fire with no deviations from target, and thousands of miles of over-water flying with no alternative landing sites.

Near the end of World War II, in an attempt to attack the United States mainland, Japan launched its fu-go campaign, deploying thousands of high-altitude hydrogen balloons armed with incendiary and high-explosive bombs designed to follow the westerly winds of the upper atmosphere and drift to the west coast of North America. After reaching the mainland, these fu-go, the Japanese hoped, would terrorize American citizens and ignite devastating forest fires across the western states, ultimately causing the United States to divert wartime resources to deal with the domestic crisis.

Dunkirk, the Battle of Britain, the Channel Dash, North Africa, Sicily, Dieppe, D-Day, and the fight against the V1 menace—Group Captain Bobby Oxspring saw action in many of the most famous battles of the Second World War. His memoir, Spitfire Command, is a remarkable account of life as one of The Few, charting his journey through the war, flying all marks of the Spitfire—from the Mk I to the Mk XIV—right through to when he ended operational duty just a week before the war ended.

The first into combat and the last out, their advance jumps into enemy territory were considered suicide missions by those who sent them into action. World War Two's special operations commandos, the U.S. Army Pathfinders relied on their stealth, expert prowess, and matchless courage and audacity to set the stage for airborne drops and glider landings throughout Europe.

In August 1943, a highly classified US Army Air Force unit, code-named the "Wright Project," departed Langley Field for Guadalcanal in the South Pacific to join the fight against the Empire of Japan. Operating independently, under sealed orders drafted at the highest levels of Army Air Force, the Wright Project was unique, both in terms of the war-fighting capabilities provided by classified systems the ten B-24 Liberators of this small group of airmen brought to the war, and in the success these "crash-built" technologies allowed.

The third book in the series tells the amazing story of the most renowned bombers of World War II: America's B-17 - the "Flying Fortress" - and Britain's Lancaster Bomber. The B-17s of the "Mighty Eighth", with their unique, robust design, took flight across Europe in broad daylight, at the expense of horrific losses of men and aircraft. The star of the B-17 section was the Memphis Belle, the first UK-based B-17 to successfully complete 25 missions and return to the USA a true hero.

From best-selling author of Tail-End Charlie and Tornado Down comes this powerful and deeply moving account of Bomber Command’s 1944 Nuremberg Raid – the RAF’s bloodiest night of the Second World War.