Air War

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.

On July 17th 1939, Eileen Alexander, a bright young woman recently graduated from Girton College, Cambridge, begins a brilliant correspondence with fellow Cambridge student Gershon Ellenbogen that lasts five years and spans many hundreds of letters. But as Eileen and Gershon’s relationship...

This book provides young listeners with exciting information on the most modern US military aircraft.

This is the nonfiction memoir of a young pilot, Bert Stiles, who flew 35 missions in the B-17 Flying Fortress over Germany and Italy during World War II. At 22 years of age, Stiles left college and joined the American Air Force. The next year he began his tour of duty as a copilot of a B-17, flying missions high over Germany, Italy, and other European targets, bombing cities far below.

When the US president, Harry S Truman, declared the Truman Doctrine in March 1947, he could not have known that the resultant Cold War would persist for over forty years until the dissolution of the Soviet Union in December 1991. In addition to nuclear and conventional military friction between the Eastern and Western blocs, the struggle for dominance involved a remarkable range of activities including the space race, psychological efforts, espionage, even rivalry at sporting functions and technological events.

On an August morning in England in 1943, a group of American airmen were told that before the day was out they would deliver the blow that would win the war. Flying the legendary B-17 Flying Fortress, their mission was to destroy the industrial facilities that kept the Nazi war machine in business-Schweinfurt's ball-bearing factories. But a determined and ferocious defense awaited the bomber crews of the USAAF's Mighty Eighth. Somehow, navigator Elmer Bendiner and his crew survived, their faithful B-17, Tondelayo, carrying them home. Hundreds of their young compatriots did not.

This insightful chronicle takes listeners inside the experiences of America's fighter pilots and bomber crews, an incredible assortment of men who, in nearly four years of warfare all over the globe, suffered over 120,000 casualties, with over 40,000 killed. Their stories span the Earth, into every corner of the combat theaters in both Europe and the Pacific. And the aircraft explored are as varied, tough, and legendary as the men who flew them.

A comprehensive history of Britain's greatest bomber plane. The Spitfire and the Lancaster were the two RAF weapons of victory in the Second World War, but the glamour of the fighter has tended to overshadow the performance of the heavy bomber. Yet without the Lancaster, Britain would never have been able to take the fight to the German homeland. Highlights the scale of the bomber's achievements, including the famous Dambusters attacks. With its vast bomb bay, ease of handling and surprising speed, the mighty Lancaster transformed the effectiveness of the Bomber Command.

The OH-58D Kiowa Warrior—a deep reconnaissance scout and attack aircraft—was legendary to those it supported. Regularly flying mere feet off of the ground while intentionally drawing enemy fire, almost everyone called Kiowa pilots crazy. Responsible for hunting elusive enemy fighters and protecting those under their charge, Kiowa crews displayed a fierce and intense devotion that was unparalleled.

Sometimes you do everything right, but it just isn't your day. A part fails and your helicopter comes apart in flight, or, another aircraft runs into you and the pieces of both fall to the ground below, or the enemy gunner pulls the trigger at just the right moment and his rounds find your aircraft in exactly the right spot to take it out of the sky. Whichever way it happens, it wasn't your day.

With strong insight into the characters of Ernest Bevin, General Clay, Dean Acheson, and Robert Schumann, and now with a foreword by former British minister to Berlin Sir Michael Burton, this a story of individual heroism and high brinkmanship politics, of daily life under appalling circumstances, and great achievements against all odds.

The summer of 1940 and the Battle of Britain - the darkest days of World War II. France, Poland, Denmark, Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg and Norway had all been crushed by the powerful Nazi German war machine. Great Britain stood alone, fighting for its life. Award-winning 303 Squadron is the thrilling story of the celebrated squadron of Polish fighter pilots whose superb skill in the air helped save England during its most desperate hours.

Valerie Andre was born in Strasbourg, France, in 1922. From an early age, she wanted to fly, but as a woman, she faced challenges. While boys could receive government-funded flight lessons, Andre had to pay for hers by tutoring. During World War II, she left Strasbourg against German prohibitions in order to study medicine in Paris, where she completed her studies under threat of arrest by the Gestapo. Assigned to an army hospital in Saigon in French Indochina in the late 1940s, Andre trained as a neurosurgeon.

July 1967: At the Moscow Air Show, the Soviets unveiled six new state-of-the-art aircraft. From among this lineup of new fighters and interceptors stood the Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-25 - purportedly capable of outrunning and outmaneuvering any aircraft in NATO’s inventory. Yet even before its public appearance in Moscow, the MiG-25 had been a grave concern for Western analysts.

The inspiration for this brilliant anthology is the "I Learnt About Flying from That" articles that first appeared in the RAF flight safety magazine Air Clues in the 1940s and continue to feature in the magazine to this day. Flying Through the Ranks gets a five-star start with an extraordinary tale from a marshal of the Royal Air Force and continues in the same vein. Men and women of every rank—pilots, navigators, engineers, a RAF regiment officer, and airmen too—reveal similar intriguing experiences in both war and peace.

At the beginning of 1918, the great aces seemed invincible. Flying above the battlefields of the Western Front, they cut a deadly swathe through the ranks of their enemies, as each side struggled to keep control of the air. This audiobook charts the rise and fall of the WWI aces in the context of the vast battles that were taking place in 1918. It shows the vital importance of reconnaissance, and how large formations of aircraft became the norm - bringing an end to the era of the old, heroic 'lone wolves'.

By July 1, 1942, the United States has been fighting in the Pacific for nearly seven months. The Japanese advance halted west of Australia at the island of Timor, and from Timor the Japanese stage bombing raids on Darwin. In the north, the Japanese hold the former Australian possessions of New Ireland and New Britain, including the town of Rabaul in the north of New Britain. Holding Rabaul gives the Japanese possession of Simpson Harbor, a deep-water port that the Japanese turn into a formidable forward base, swarming with Zeros and antiaircraft weapons.

NATIONAL BESTSELLER The definitive history of combat aviation and fighter aircraft, from World War I to present INCLUDES 32 PAGES OF PHOTOGRAPHS AND 12 MAPS Lords of the Sky is the “dramatic, fast-paced, and definitive"" (Michael Korda) history of fighter pilots and aircraft and their...

You hear them first, the whop whop sound of rotor blades chopping through the humid Vietnam air. Suddenly they appear, screaming toward the landing zone at treetop level. When one helicopter crashes in flames, the pilots in the others maintain formation and push ahead. Nothing deters these warriors, volunteers all, from flying on with the tenaciousness of zealots. Mended Wings is their story. Follow the lives of ten Purple Heart heroes as they relate the Vietnam War experience from the perspective of the helicopter cockpit.

While the Marine Corps island-hopped across the Pacific from Guadalcanal to Saipan to Iwo Jima, the U.S. Army was locked in a grueling, multiyear fight for the jungle island of New Guinea, which in Japanese hands threatened both Australia and the vital supply lines stretching to the United States. Forces under Douglas MacArthur intended to deny the Japanese this opportunity and use New Guinea as a stepping stone on the road back to the Philippines and, beyond it, Japan.