Air War

The first-ever inside look at the US military’s secretive Remotely Piloted Aircraft program—equal parts techno-thriller, historical account, and war memoir Remotely piloted aircraft (RPA), commonly referred to by the media as drones, are a mysterious and headline-making tool in the...

Thunderbolt is the incredible true life story of Robert S. Johnson, one of America’s leading fighter pilot aces in World War II. His memoir is an action-packed account of how a young man from Lawton, Oklahoma went on to amass 28 enemy kills, the first US Army Air Force pilot in the European theater to surpass Eddie Rickenbacker's World War I tally of 26 enemy planes destroyed.

From August 7th 1942 until February 24th 1944, the US Navy fought the most difficult campaign in its history. Between the landing of the 1st Marine Division on Guadalcanal and the final withdrawal of the Imperial Japanese Navy from its main South Pacific base at Rabaul, the US Navy suffered such high personnel losses that for years it refused to publicly release total casualty figures.

The War in the Air: And Particularly How Mr. Bert Smallways Fared While It Lasted is a military science fiction novel written by H. G. Wells. It is (like many of Wells's works) notable for its prophetic ideas, images, and concepts - particularly the use of aircraft for the purpose of warfare - as well as conceptualizing and anticipating events related to World War I. The novel's hero and main character is Bert Smallways, who is described as "a forward-thinking young man" and a "kind of bicycle engineer of the let's-'ave-a-look-at-it and enamel-chipping variety."

The loss of British bombers over Occupied Europe began to reach alarming levels in 1941. Could it be that the Germans were using a sophisticated form of radar to direct their night fighters and anti-aircraft guns at the British bombers? British aerial reconnaissance discovered what seemed to be a rotating radar tower on a clifftop at Bruneval, near Le Havre. The truth must be revealed. The decision was taken to launch a daring raid on the Bruneval site to try and capture the technology for further examination.

In this book, historian Robert C. Stern analyzes the Battle of the Coral Sea, the first major fleet engagement where the warships were never in sight of each other. Unlike the Battle of Midway, the Battle of the Coral Sea has received remarkably little study. Stern covers not only the action of the ships and their air groups but also describes the impact of this pivotal engagement.

The best way for today's sailors to learn about a battle is from those who fought it. The Battle of Midway, commemorated annually in the US Navy, warrants close attention. This Naval Institute guide includes some of the most vibrant and informed accounts by individuals who fought on both sides of the June 1942 battle. The anthology pulls together memoirs, articles, excerpts from other Naval Institute books, and relevant government documents to help listeners understand what happened and explain why the battle was so significant to the naval service.

As the Imperial Japanese Army and Navy rolls south to the oil-rich Netherlands East Indies, a handful of Allied airmen and sailors stand in their way. Two brothers, Jack and Charlie Davis, pilots in the US Army Air Forces, are among that handful who face overwhelming odds to buy time for America to gear up to fight the war in the Pacific.

On September 6, 1943, 338 B-17 "Flying Fortresses" of the American Eighth Air Force took off from England, bound for Stuttgart, Germany, to bomb Nazi weapons factories. Dense clouds obscured the targets, and one commander's critical decision to circle three times over the city---and its deadly flak---would prove disastrous. Forty-five planes went down that day, and hundreds of men were lost or missing.

From May 1941 to the end of night raids in 1943, Luftwaffe bombers attacked provincial cities across England, Scotland, and Wales. However, these air raids are not considered part of the Blitz—at least, not according to the British Official History. The official historiography maintains that the Blitz on the United Kingdom ended when aircraft were redeployed to support the invasion of the Soviet Union in June 1941, after the final major raid against London that May.

Ultimate soldier. Ultimate mission. But can just three members of the SAS quell a rebel uprising? July 1981: while Gambian President Jawara attends a royal wedding in London, Marxist rebels seize power. Fearing armed intervention from neighbouring Senegal, they take hostages – including one of...

Ultimate soldier. Ultimate mission. But can the SAS lead a civilian population out of war-ravaged Bosnia to safety? Bosnia, 1993. A small army of Serbs, Muslims and Croats, formed to defend the isolated mountain town of Zavik and under the command of Reeve, a renegade Briton, has begun mounting...

Ultimate soldier. Ultimate mission. But can the SAS storm a fortress prison held by Muslim terrorists to rescue a group of British tourists? In 1994, in the newly independent state of Uzbekistan, a party of mostly British tourists is on a day excursion from the fabled city of Samarkand when...

Ultimate soldier. Ultimate mission. But can the SAS prevent the launch of Exocet missiles at the British Task Force? May 1982: as the British Task Force prepares to retake the Falkland Islands, a lone Sea King helicopter makes an apparently forced landing in the southernmost reaches of Chile...

Ultimate soldier. Ultimate mission. But will the SAS be able to defeat what awaits them inside a top secret Nazi research facility? In the 1990s, sketchy reports of an accident in a high-security research facility deep within the remote, mountainous region of Kazakhstan filter through to...

James "Jim" Davis lived what he considered "an impossible dream" as he piloted a B-24, as part of the 8th Air Force, on nearly 30 missions in the European Theatre during World War II. In this memoir, Davis offers heart-wrenching detail concerning the difficulties of qualifying for the U.S. Army Air Forces pilot program, the strenuous nature of the pilot training program, the anxiety caused by a wartime marriage, and the dangers of flying combat missions over Nazi Germany.

The New York Times bestselling author of Viper Pilot delivers an electrifying narrative account of the top-secret U.S. mission to kill Isoroku Yamamoto, the Japanese commander who masterminded Pearl Harbor. ""Operation Vengeance is colorful, intimate, eye-popping history, delivered at a...

This story is a chronicle of the year 1968 as seen through the eyes of the author while serving at Takhli Royal Thai Air Force Base in Thailand, supporting the air war in Vietnam. It was an odd juxtaposition, repairing the fire-control systems on F-105s that were making twice-daily bombing runs over North Vietnam, while living in relative comfort and safety.

The downing of Extortion 17 spurred a number of conspiracy theories, such as the idea that the shootdown was revenge for bin Laden's death. In The Final Mission of Extortion 17, Ed Darack debunks this theory and others and uncovers the truth behind this mysterious tragedy. His account of the brave pilots, crew, and passengers of Extortion 17 and the events of that fateful day is interwoven into a rich, complex narrative that also discusses modern joint combat operations and the history of the Afghan war to that date.

Ultimate soldier. Ultimate mission. But can the SAS face the might of Rommel’s army and win? In the North African desert in 1941 the war is being won by the brilliant German commander General Rommel, and the British are in retreat on all fronts. A young British army lieutenant, David Stirling...