Air History Military

Award-winning investigative journalist Chris Woods explores the secretive history of the United States' use of armed drones and their key role not only on today's battlefields but also in a covert targeted killing project that has led to the deaths of thousands.

Sliding out of the shadows of World War Two, the de Havilland Vampire—accompanied by the distinctive whine of its Goblin engine—quickly proved itself an effective alternative to piston-powered fighters. After entering operational service with the RAF (as the service's first single-engine jet) in 1946, the Vampire—sought by air forces the world over—held a number of notable records: the first fighter to exceed 500 mph, the first to set a world altitude record of almost 60,000 feet, the first jet to take off and land from an aircraft carrier, and the first jet to cross the Atlantic Ocean.

Chris Burwell charts one man's career in aviation from joining the RAF in 1969 aged eighteen, to having responsibility for training pilots for the world's major airlines nearly fifty years later. After training at RAF Cranwell and RAF Valley and a tour as a flying instructor on Jet Provosts, he joined the Harrier Force, flying on front-line squadrons in the United Kingdom and Germany during the Cold War and as an instructor on the Harrier Conversion Unit.

Experience the exciting combat tales of both Allied and Axis pilots around the world during World War II. Wings of War encompasses the World War II air war from late 1939 through 1945 and provides a chronological snapshot not only of famous and significant events from the global air war, but also of other lesser-known events that are equally thrilling and important. Over three dozen different Allied and Axis airplanes are featured, giving you a unique experience at the controls of a variety of World War II’s famed fighters, bombers, liaison, and jet airplanes.

Early Alaskan military and bush pilots navigated some of the highest and most rugged terrain on earth, taking off and landing on glaciers, mudflats, and active volcanoes. Although they were consistently portrayed by industry leaders and lawmakers alike as cowboys—and their planes compared to settlers’ covered wagons—the reality was that aviation catapulted Alaska onto a modern, global stage; the federal government subsidized aviation’s growth in the territory as part of the Cold War defense against the Soviet Union.

In February 1942, a reconnaissance party of US Army Air Force officers arrived in England. Firmly wedded to the doctrine of daylight precision bombing, they believed they could help turn the tide of the war in Europe. In the months that followed, they formed the Eighth Air Force—an organization that grew at an astonishing rate. To accommodate it, almost seventy airfields were built across the eastern counties of England. At the heart of the Eighth Air Force was its bombardment groups, each equipped with scores of heavily armed, four-engine bombers. This is the story of just one "Bomb Group".

Late in 1944, 13 U.S. B-24 bomber crews bailed from their cabins over the Yugoslavian wilderness. Bloodied and disoriented after a harrowing strike against the Third Reich, the pilots took refuge with the Partisan underground. But the Americans were far from safe.

The growing buzz of aircraft engines disturbed the Japanese military construction personnel hauling equipment ashore on the beige coral sand of Tulagi Island at 8:20 AM on May 4, 1942. Offshore, the large IJN (Imperial Japanese Navy) minelayer Okinoshima, flagship of Admiral Shima Kiyohide, lay at anchor, along with two destroyers, Kikuzuki and Yutsuki, and transport ships. Six Japanese Mitsubishi F1M2 floatplanes also rested on the gentle, deep blue swell, marking Tulagi's future as an IJN floatplane base.

In 1924, three years before Lindbergh flew to Paris, four young army airmen answered the call of General Billy Mitchell to save US aviation from destruction by the politicians by winning the race with a dozen other nations to make the first flight around the world. In primitive open-cockpit biplanes powered by unreliable engines and few airfields, they were given little chance of success or even survival.

Immediately after Japan's December 7, 1941, attack on Pearl Harbor, President Roosevelt sought to restore the honor of the United States with a dramatic act of vengeance: a retaliatory bombing raid on Tokyo itself. In those early days of World War II, America was ill-prepared for any sort of warfare. But FDR was not to be dissuaded, and at his bidding a squadron of scarcely trained army fliers, led by the famous daredevil Jimmy Doolittle, set forth on what everyone regarded as a suicide mission.

Nine thousand men of the First British Airborne Division were parachuted into the peaceful countryside that surrounded Arnhem. Their objective was to capture and hold the bridge over the Rhine ahead of the advancing British Second Army. Nine days later, after some of the fiercest street-fighting of the war, 2,000 paratroopers managed to escape to safety.

In this dramatic story of World War II, Jay A. Stout describes how the US built an air force of 2.3 million men after starting with 45,000 and defeated the world's best air force. In order to defeat Germany in World War II, the Allies needed to destroy the Third Reich's industry and invade its territory, but before they could effectively do either, they had to defeat the Luftwaffe, whose state-of-the-art aircraft and experienced pilots protected German industry and would batter any attempted invasion.

Antes da Segunda Guerra Mundial, muitos militares não acreditavam que o avião pudesse mudar os rumos de um conflito. Mas uma turma de aviadores idealistas, a Máfia dos Bombardeiros, levantou a questão: “E se o bombardeio de precisão destruísse pontos vitais na posição do inimigo e ainda tornasse a guerra menos letal?” Quando essa nova crença no poder aéreo é posta à prova, os resultados são muito diferentes do esperado. Mas a Máfia mantém sua convicção e a leva às últimas consequências na guerra no Pacífico.

As this fascinating memoir unfolds, moving backwards and forwards through time, two parallel stories emerge: one of a Second World War Spitfire ace whose flying career comes to a premature end when he’s shot down and loses an eye, the other of his progeny, a second generation fighter pilot who eventually reaches the rank of air marshal.

On the morning of December 7, 1941, Chief Aviation Ordnanceman John W. Finn, though suffering multiple wounds, continued to man his machine gun against waves of Japanese aircraft attacking the Kaneohe Bay Naval Station during the infamous Pearl Harbor raid. Just over three years later, as World War II struggled into its final months, a B-29 radioman named Red Erwin lingered near death after suffering horrific burns to save his air crew in the skies off Japan.

At the height of World War II, a B-24 Liberator bomber vanished with its crew while on a training mission over upstate New York. The final hours and ultimate resting place of pilot Keith Ponder and seven other US aviators aboard the plane remain mysteries to this day. The tale is at once a compelling instance of loss on the World War II American home front and a more extensive, largely unreported history.

August 1990: Iraqi forces under the command of Saddam Hussein invaded the tiny emirate of Kuwait. In response, the US military led a coalition of thirty-four nations in what became known as Operation Desert Storm—a violent air and ground campaign to eject the Iraqis from Kuwait. At the tip of the spear were the men of the US Air Force’s 58th Fighter Squadron. Based on hours of interviews and archival research by author Mike Guardia, this book reveals an intimate, no-holds-barred account of modern aerial combat…as told by the men who lived it.

Holding the Line chronicles the carrier war in Korea from the first day of the war to the last, focusing on frontline combat while also describing the technical development of aircraft and shipboard operations and how these all affected the broader strategic situation on the Korean Peninsula.

This was the first book to cover all of Cold War air combat in the words of the men who waged it. In I Always Wanted to Fly, retired United States Air Force Colonel Wolfgang W. E. Samuel has gathered first-person memories from heroes of the cockpits and airstrips. Battling in dogfights when jets were novelties, saving lives in grueling airlifts, or flying covert and dangerous reconnaissance missions deep into Soviet and Chinese airspace, these flyers waged America's longest and most secretively conducted air war.

For the soldiers and officers of Australia's Special Air Service (SAS) Regimentâ¿¿ this is not just their professional mottoâ¿¿ but a creed that shapes their lives. The SAS is among the world's most respected special forces unitsâ¿¿ a crack team of men from the Australian Defence Force who can be relied upon to handle the most difficultâ¿¿ strategically sensitive and dangerous of military tasks.