The Illustrated History of the Air Forces of World War I & World War II

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The airplane was only a decade old when Europe was plunged into the First World War. Its potential military value was as yet untested, aerial warfare was in its infancy, and pilots had to learn by experience what their aircraft could do. The interwar years saw dramatic advances in aircraft design, performance and armament. During the 1920s and 1930s the major powers spent much money and effort building up their air forces. Even Germany, forbidden after the First World War to build any military aircraft, was secretly training the new Luftwaffe in Russia. This period also saw the crucial technological advance which made the biplane obsolete and introduced the all-metal, stressed-skin monoplane, including the two greatest combat aircraft in history - the Spitfire and the Messerschmitt BF109. In the Illustrated History of the Air Forces of World War 1 and World War II the author, Christopher Chant, traces the history of the world's air forces from the early days of Zeppelin attacks, heroic dogfights and the phenomenon of the aces, through the interwar years to the days of the Blitzkrieg and the strategic use of air power. He examines the growth and traditions of the air forces of Germany, britain, France, Russia, Japan, the United States and many of the minor air forces. He assesses the effectiveness of the men, machines and the decisive influence they had on the course of the two wars. Both the organizational and technical aspects of the air services are examined up to the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which prove that air power had finally evolved into a weapon of supreme strategic importance. This authoritative text is vividly bought to life by color and black and white photographs, and specially-commissioned color illustrations, maps and diagrams.