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Books about the European air war - 8/25/2009 11:13:17 PM

kingwanabee

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I'm looking for the best book or two about the WW2 air war in Europe. I'm mostly interested in the allied bombing campaign. At Borders today I saw "Masters of the Air" about the 8th Air Force, and "Fire and Fury" about the overall allied campaign. Has anyone read these or anything else they can recommend?

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RE: Books about the European air war - 8/25/2009 11:41:37 PM

greg_slith

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I just finished "Fire and Fury". It was not very kind to Bomber Harris. It gave some nice insight for the "Big Picture" types. I would have like more detail about the raids themselves but this wasn't the scope the auther had in mind. Basically he felt the area bombing was a HUGE waste of men, money and material. Not to mention morally questionable. This was one of the (very) few books that I have read which suggested that the 8th AF was actually successful by going the precision route. There were some very moving stories about German civilians living through the attacks The book "The Bomber War" by Robin Neillands was pretty good. More action if you will.

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RE: Books about the European air war - 8/26/2009 5:28:03 PM

TechSgt

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King;

There was a two volume set -- decades ago -- called "The AirWar", author was Jablonski (sp?) I've never found a "really good" one that covered everything.

8th AF=> "Mighty Eighth" R. Freeman
Bomber Cmd=> "Bomber Offensive", A. Harris
Luftwaffe=>"First and Last", A. Galland

I've not found anything good for the other major commands.
But there are some good individual Unit Histories, Battles, and personal accounts.

My favorite is probably the novel, "Twelve O'Clock High!", B. Lay

TS

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RE: Books about the European air war - 8/27/2009 1:52:20 PM

sprior

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Martin Middlebrook wrote some good books about both Bomber Command and 8th AF. He covers the raids from both sides so you get the LW pov too.

A very good novel is Deighton's Bomber

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RE: Books about the European air war - 8/27/2009 5:15:58 PM

AndyG1

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Don't know if it's still available, but I have a book I constantly refer to - great read. "Escort to Berlin" (4th fighter group in WWII) by Garry L. Fry & Jeffrey L. Ethell. Publisher ARCO Publishing Inc, 219 Park Avenue South, New York, ISBN 0-668-04768-2.

Now the book I have in my hand was published in 1980 in the US. I got it 2nd hand in a UK bookshop, and it now resides with me in Australia!!! More a unit operational diary/history, but gives some excellent first hand accounts and a real feel for those bombing raids into Europe!

An excellent publisher of war related books is Grub Street. Check out their website:-

http://www.grubstreet.co.uk/

They have distributors around the world.

< Message edited by AndyG1 -- 8/27/2009 5:22:57 PM >

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RE: Books about the European air war - 8/27/2009 5:21:14 PM

Nikademus

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I'd recommend:

"Bomber Command" Max Hastings
"The Bomber War" Robin Neillands
"Masters of the Air" Donald Miller

For a day to day look at tactical ops, Christopher Shores has a 3 volume series on the 2nd Tactical AF, and also has an interesting book on the air war on the West Front and Norway prior to the Blitzkrieg, "Fledgling Eagles"

< Message edited by Nikademus -- 8/27/2009 5:23:09 PM >

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RE: Books about the European air war - 8/27/2009 6:20:22 PM

Hard Sarge

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4 vol now :)

anything by Shores is good, but more for the details, then the overall doings

most of what I have been getting lately is detail/unit stuff, but there are alot of good general books out there too

(oboy, speaking of, just got my copy of Lornant/Goyat's book on JG 300)

(and my copy of Rocky Horror pitcher show DVD !)

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RE: Books about the European air war - 8/28/2009 7:31:44 AM

TechSgt

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Kingwanabee;

A good thing about BoB/BtR is if you read some of the operational level books, it gives you something to try in the game, too!
Middlebrook's description about standard night ops in "The Nuremberg Raid" has become my standard in BtR.

Now, if someone knows a good book on the Tactical AF's.
It's been two weeks since the invasion, and I've had nothing but crap weather!
The Germans have had a free ride in getting to Normandy, and the wall is well built.

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RE: Books about the European air war - 8/28/2009 9:20:07 AM

JamesM

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Try the "Right of the Line" by John Terraine for an overall history of the RAF in World War 2.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Right-Line-Wordsworth-Military-Library/dp/1853266833

< Message edited by jamesm -- 8/28/2009 9:24:55 AM >

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RE: Books about the European air war - 8/28/2009 1:29:29 PM

tblersch

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One of my favorites is Peter Hinchliffe's "The Other Battle" (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0760302650/danielosterma-20). Although it's focused more on the Nachtjagd, it's well-balanced and gives a good portrayal of the overall ebb and flow of the night bombing campaign from both sides. And as somebody already mentioned, you can't really go wrong with Middlebrook.

TechSgt mentioned Galland's "The First and The Last"...I've read it, good book, but I caution people to approach it with a grain of salt, as like almost all post-war memoirs (Harris' "Bomber Command" as well) it's occasionally more self-serving than accurate.

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RE: Books about the European air war - 8/28/2009 8:08:37 PM

Nikademus

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Hard Sarge

4 vol now :)

anything by Shores is good, but more for the details, then the overall doings

most of what I have been getting lately is detail/unit stuff, but there are alot of good general books out there too

(oboy, speaking of, just got my copy of Lornant/Goyat's book on JG 300)

(and my copy of Rocky Horror pitcher show DVD !)

four now? well guess that makes it 3 books to go to complete my Shores collection

Black Cross/Red Star vol's 2-4 first though.

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RE: Books about the European air war - 8/28/2009 11:28:35 PM

Hard Sarge

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the 4th is not like the others, it is camo and unit data stuff, good to have, but the first 3 tell the story

those Cross/Star can be HARD to find, and if you do, going to cost you, the main writer has a new set of books out, using alot of the info from them

the books from Prien and Lorant are great for detail and inside info on the units

of course it depends on what info you are looking for or want to read

I got a book, that lists all of the crew losses from BC, nothing but pages of names, great book for what it is, but very depressing to open up and look at

something like 57,000 dead crew members listed

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RE: Books about the European air war - 9/1/2009 6:58:45 AM

menik

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I hope it can help:

1) Andreews Brokes, Air War over Italy, 43-45. Ian Allan Ed, 2000
2) Alfred Price, Battle over the Reich, vol. 1 and 2; Ian Allan Ed, 2005-6
3) Chris Dunning, Courage Alone, Italian Air Force 40-43, Hikoky, 1998
4) Murray, Strategy for defeat: Luftwaffe 39-45, Air Univ. Press, 1983
5) David Wragg, Raf handbook, 39-45; Sutton Publ., 2007
6) Lake, The Battle of Britain, Armeer Book, 2000
7) Murray, War in the Air 14-45; Cassel, 1999

ht.

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RE: Books about the European air war - 9/1/2009 9:17:00 AM

Crocky

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Rocky Horror Picture Show .... I remember going to that 25 yrs ago when i was a teenager a little botique theatre used to run late shows , When they drank a toast everybody threw burnt toast when it was raining the water bottles went and so did the newspapers over the head and evrybody did the time warp .... a hell of a lot of fun

Who was in it ...... Susan Sarandon .... Barry Bosworth the mayor of that comedy show .... Meatloaf who else

All in all good clean fun ....great movie

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RE: Books about the European air war - 9/1/2009 1:01:53 PM

Hard Sarge

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Crocky

Rocky Horror Picture Show .... I remember going to that 25 yrs ago when i was a teenager a little botique theatre used to run late shows , When they drank a toast everybody threw burnt toast when it was raining the water bottles went and so did the newspapers over the head and evrybody did the time warp .... a hell of a lot of fun

Who was in it ...... Susan Sarandon .... Barry Bosworth the mayor of that comedy show .... Meatloaf who else

All in all good clean fun ....great movie

you missing the main one Tim Curry !
(and strangely, I think it ruined his career)

I seen it father back then that, before it got into that cult thing, LOL, 3 Marines and we are not sure what the heck is going on, your not sure if you should try and slip out the side door, or sit there and watch it

maybe I will even get a chance to watch it

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RE: Books about the European air war - 9/2/2009 3:59:05 PM

Nikademus

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Hard Sarge

the 4th is not like the others, it is camo and unit data stuff, good to have, but the first 3 tell the story

those Cross/Star can be HARD to find, and if you do, going to cost you, the main writer has a new set of books out, using alot of the info from them

Tell me about it. Vol one of cross/star holds the record of most expensive book purchase thus far, even beating out the rare Shores out of print books.

ah well. was worth it. Did check out his new set of books but they were reputed to be more snapshot based and i wanted the detail.

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RE: Books about the European air war - 9/2/2009 4:32:28 PM

Hard Sarge

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one forum I go to, a lot of the writers post there, was asking about one book, and how much it costs when I could find it, the guy who wrote it came up and said, it was worth every penny !, I tried to keep him talking to see if he had any of his own, he could sell, 350, buying it from Enland wasn't going to get it (I did end up finding it by chance, and for around 35, good book)

still, I think the best story, I was looking for Aces, and one pilot showed he was a Ace with a set number of kills, but he only had so many while flying with the HQs, but none with any of the squadrons

so asked politely what the story was, did he get some kills someplace else or what ?

somebody came back and pretty much gave me his whole life's history, much more detailed then you would expect, then noticed that the guys name was the same, it was his son, he then send me some info on his father and some others in the FG and mentioned he had wrote a book, if I wanted more details, found it and ordered it, very good, very detailed about the 355th fG

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RE: Books about the European air war - 9/2/2009 4:34:54 PM

Hard Sarge

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ahh great, thanks for posting, I had lost that forum when my computer crashed and didn't remember the name of it, you got me to go hunting for it

:)

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RE: Books about the European air war - 9/2/2009 5:16:12 PM

Nikademus

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i kind of shy away from books dedicated only to a specific group (otherwise my library would need a new condo!) so hopefully the books i've collected thus far suffice in terms of reletive accuracy. Couple of exceptions of course......have the bio on JG26 and was amazed to verify in Shores that one of their Staffels really did do what the book claimed they did during a four month period over Malta.

I could imagine the hoots it would have produced had i quoted it alone on a forum.

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RE: Books about the European air war - 9/2/2009 8:04:40 PM

krishub1492

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I would recommend "Air War Europa" by Eric Hammel and "Carl A. Spaatz and the Air War in Europe" by Richard G. Davis.

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RE: Books about the European air war - 9/2/2009 9:50:13 PM

Hard Sarge

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I know what you mean Nik, on both statements :)

I do have a number of books on units (I need Pilot details)

on a reseach side, can be a royal pain, how many books just copy what was already stated someplace else (W. Green is simi Hated for this, he was respected, he had the info, he wrote his books, then alot of other writers just assumed that he knew what he was saying, and copied what he wrote, so a lot of misinfo has been taken as true for decades, and the bad part is, it wasn't all his "fault")

something like the top speed of the Bf 109K-4 (IIRC is 454) but late after the war, it was found out, that the LW never tested it, they did a wind tunnel test, said this is what it should be able to do, wrote up the report and handed it in to HQ, all of the work and tests with the wide blade prop, the late war fighters, the jets, none of it was tested in the field, it was wind tunnel and office reports on what it should be able to do

most after war testing, showed something wasn't right, the K was fast, but not as fast as the LW reports stated, the 335, was fast, maybe even faster then the reports thought

(side story, after war, the US wanted a 335 moved to another base for shipment to the states, they assigned a Squadron, to escourt a German pilot who was asked to fly it, when the squadron came in, and landed, they were pretty cocky and rude to the German pilot, the guy who had been in charge of getting the planes ready and what not, told the pilot, to go ahead and show what it could of done, when they took off, the 335 left the 51s in the dust and never looked back, he landed and went to the Lounge and got a beer while he waited for the 51s to show up, they were alittle upset, but knew they had been shown up)

(one story I liked, one of the FGs was ordered to do some flying after the war, formation stuff, there was to be a get togeather of US and USSR bigwigs, and they wanted the FG to over fly, and show off, think they had to fly in formation, first pass would be USA, the second pass would be USSR (CCCP ?) and High Command was pretty HARD on these guys and put a lot of pressure on them not to screw up, they did there training, and flew the mission, but, made a 3rd pass, SH.., the US bigwigs were shocked, and later the Russians all admitted that they didn't know what the last pass meant, but the Main Russian BigWig had a large grin on his face when it was going on)

(of course there is the story of Anderson and Yeager, both Aces with the 357th, some restorers, had rebuilt some P-51s, one repainted his as Yeagers Glamorous Glen, and the other as Andersons Old Crow, they were going to show them off at the big airshow, so asked the two if they would show up for the event, both were in the late 60's early 70's, so the owners asked if they would like to fly there planes one last time, they grinned and said sure, the owners figured they would take off, circle the field a time or two and come back in to land, nope, they took off and decided to put on a show, buzzing the field at 400 mph, and doing rolls across the field, the owners had a fit, over 1 million dollars worth of work in them two planes, not to mention what would happen if these two got killed in there planes)

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RE: Books about the European air war - 9/2/2009 10:27:58 PM

Nikademus

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Hard Sarge

I know what you mean Nik, on both statements :)

I do have a number of books on units (I need Pilot details)

on a reseach side, can be a royal pain, how many books just copy what was already stated someplace else (W. Green is simi Hated for this, he was respected, he had the info, he wrote his books, then alot of other writers just assumed that he knew what he was saying, and copied what he wrote, so a lot of misinfo has been taken as true for decades, and the bad part is, it wasn't all his "fault")

lol on the 51 story. Your comment above is all too true and reminded me of an annoying but amusing incident that occured on another forum board a while ago. A querry had come up about such and such event (think it was Torch landings) and how many planes were lost by all sides etc etc. Well, having just completed Shores' Fighters over Tunisia, i posted what i had since it was nice to be able to utilize all the research i was doing on day to day air ops in multiple theaters. I made sure to mention that it was based on my research using such and such source therefore any errors are mine not the authors.

What i didn't know however was that this particular forum in question already had a resident "expert" on kill ratios and he didn't take kindly to my butting in on his territory. A silly nitpick began with specific kills disputed etc etc based on so and so source. Long and short of it....it eventually came down to my data being "dismissed" based simply on the fact that i had derived the info from a single (if credible) source and was lectured by the resident expert that serious research requires multiple sources.

No....really?? I never would have thought of that.

. Only problem with that blanket statement was just what you wrote. Just because another source says something, and might be repeated in another source doesn't make it more correct than another reputable source. For all he knew it might have simply been paroted info derived from another source material which in turn was pulled from yet another source. Too funny. I eventually just smiled and nodded since the nitpick came down to about 1 or 2 kills which changed the ratio from 0.x to 0.y. I wasn't about to get all bent out of shape on such a thing.

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RE: Books about the European air war - 9/3/2009 12:04:09 AM

Hard Sarge

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roger that

one that I always liked, was how the RAF/English, always dismissed Yellow 14's claims in the desert, saying they were made up, and since they knew that they did not lose 14 planes on that day, there is no way that Yellow 14 shot down 14 planes

but..., his wingman's job was to take down all the info he could while the leader got the kills, just so they could be confirmed, and while he was knocking down the planes, the rest of the Staffel was in the area watching, so too many people seen it and confirmed the kills

(the Tomahawks used to go into defencive circles when they spotted 109s, very dangerous to attack, but old Yellow 14 would dive down in the middle of them, pass them up, pull his nose up, climb into a stall, fire just as the stall was able to hit, then fall off into the stall, if you broke the circle to chase him, the others would pick you off, so a damned if you damned if you don't)

and I think it is Shores who ended up proving he may of done it, the RAF claim was always, they didn't lose 14 planes that day, he found out that the SA's and Aussies got hammered that day, badly, a Tomahawk, with English Roundels, who knows if it is English or Aussies, or SA

the English also play fancy with losses during BoB, the LW would report that they had shot down 70 planes yesterday, and the English would laff and say, hey we only lost 36 fighters yesterday, the LW is just bragging and overclaiming, but when you read the days action, BC ran raids during the night and also was hitting the ports, and lost heavy with the bombers, so, yes, the LW may of overclaimed, but, they had something to claim, while the English were only telling part of the story

Currently, I am back to looking at some Ranges, found one interesting site, they base there info on 3 books, and right there shows you the hassle, ranges for this bomber, 1180, 1240, 1648, same plane

which of course, for me, ranges don't mean a thing, I need combat ranges, or combat radius with load

(I like the one, it tells range, being some 1020 miles, range with full bomb load 580, now reading between the lines, full range is 1020, range to target is 580, since you have to fly back, but, since you going to be a lot lighter after the target, you can fly deeper with the bombs !)

I remember one set of info someone was giving me, based on training records in the states, a shame, but all of that is useless, combat cruise and training cruise are not the same thing, and during training, they had to return to base with at least 30 minutes of reserve fuel

ahhhh, range and fuel is a pain, in a game, it is so simple, hey this plane could fly 1400 miles, yea, at what alt, with what load, at what speed ? does it have a head wind or a tail wind blowing this day, are you doing a steep climb to alt, or are you going to go slow and lower, and then pop up to alt when you get close to target

oh well, got work to do :)

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RE: Books about the European air war - 9/3/2009 12:11:30 AM

Hard Sarge

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just in case last statement, there was a lot of debate in the BG's what was the best way to get to alt

a steep climb, get to alt before you crossed the channel, you burned alot of fuel in the climb, but should get better range once at alt and don't have to do anything fancy

the other line of thought was to take your time climbing, less fuel burn, so more fuel for range, so, instead of rushing to 25 K, you would take your time to 20 K, and then when you got close to target, rush climb to 25 K

one hassle they found out, on the first set up, bad planes, broke out of formation early, and returned to base while still close to England, the 2nd, planes that could handle the easy climb, would break down on the rush, but now you are 200-300 miles away from home, with a blown blower or a dead engine

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RE: Books about the European air war - 9/3/2009 2:38:32 AM

pompack

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Rather a specialist work on EW and Bomber Command, but I highly recommend

Instruments of Darkness, Alfred Price

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RE: Books about the European air war - 9/3/2009 6:01:15 PM

Nikademus

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Hard Sarge

roger that

one that I always liked, was how the RAF/English, always dismissed Yellow 14's claims in the desert, saying they were made up, and since they knew that they did not lose 14 planes on that day, there is no way that Yellow 14 shot down 14 planes

I have to admit that when I read in the JG-26 bio that over Malta 7 Staffel (IIRC...(at work!)) claimed something like 43 Hurricanes for no losses of their own, i was skeptical. It was a profound shock to have, as mentioned confirmed it once I got Shores' "Malta: The Hurricane Years". The exact number was off a little, but not by much. IIRC from my research, 7 Staffel, in a four month period from 2/41 - 5/41, shot down approx 35 Hurricanes for no losses.....not even an operational loss. As Shores put it, no finer example of air supremency based on good exp, tactics, equipment and morale exists anywhere, nor was it repeated by the members of 7 Staffel. Conditions over Malta helped of course but ultimately credit had to be given where credit was due.

quote:

(the Tomahawks used to go into defencive circles when they spotted 109s, very dangerous to attack, but old Yellow 14 would dive down in the middle of them, pass them up, pull his nose up, climb into a stall, fire just as the stall was able to hit, then fall off into the stall, if you broke the circle to chase him, the others would pick you off, so a damned if you damned if you don't)

and I think it is Shores who ended up proving he may of done it, the RAF claim was always, they didn't lose 14 planes that day, he found out that the SA's and Aussies got hammered that day, badly, a Tomahawk, with English Roundels, who knows if it is English or Aussies, or SA

Your correct. that reminds me of amusing incident #2 at that same web forum. There was a a discussion thread about P40/Tomahawk vs 109 and i'd mentioned some comments gleaned from Shores' Fighters over the Desert. I was then rebutted by another forum 'regular' who insisted that the 109 could run rings around a Tomahawk at any altitude or speed and based it on what you wrote above.

I politely stuck to my earlier assertations and told him that the incident he was using as an example was an exceptional case, that being of the German Ace of Aces, Hans-Joachim Marseille who was one of the few 'Experten' who could pull off getting into a RAF defensive circle and out-turn/manuever a Hurricane or Tomahawk long enough to get in a shot/kill, then escape. This was all in Shores, but also included was the 'general' commentary by other Experten that it was very dangerous to try turning with a Tomahawk at low altitude. 109's were in their element using slashing vertical maneuvers and that was the tactic that led to most of their successes while doing Frie Jagd missions

quote:

the English also play fancy with losses during BoB, the LW would report that they had shot down 70 planes yesterday, and the English would laff and say, hey we only lost 36 fighters yesterday, the LW is just bragging and overclaiming, but when you read the days action, BC ran raids during the night and also was hitting the ports, and lost heavy with the bombers, so, yes, the LW may of overclaimed, but, they had something to claim, while the English were only telling part of the story

Yes. I wish Shores would do a book on the BoB. As it stands i've collected 5 books on it and one of them at least gave me a good summary of the losses. It was enough for my research. Still, i'd like to get an accurate day by day sometime.

< Message edited by Nikademus -- 9/3/2009 6:05:44 PM >

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RE: Books about the European air war - 9/3/2009 6:26:05 PM

Hard Sarge

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Roger, agree, the P-40 was a little better then most people seem to think, the Yanks show it off over Sardina, as long the Axis stuck with energy fighting, the 109 was the much better plane, but get into a twist and turn fight, you could get hurt

but...

for what ever reason, the LW seemed to be much more of a one on one, style of fighting, if 4 planes spotted one spitfire, the leader went after it, and the other 3 hung off, Yanks and CW wern't going to fight that way

of course, you may have to take that with a grain of salt, as those are from pilots who got away from combat, when they thought they wouldn't, who knows how many didn't come back when they were gangbanged

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Post #: 27

RE: Books about the European air war - 9/3/2009 7:37:12 PM

Nikademus

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Joined: 5/27/2000
From: Alien spacecraft
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quote:

ORIGINAL: Hard Sarge

Roger, agree, the P-40 was a little better then most people seem to think, the Yanks show it off over Sardina, as long the Axis stuck with energy fighting, the 109 was the much better plane, but get into a twist and turn fight, you could get hurt

Yes. Problem with the P-40 was that it was basically a good workhorse plane and was overshadowed by it's far glitzier successors. Ultimately though, it was a "good" plane that had strengths and if you didn't respect it, watch out. Its main failing was that most models were at their best at lower altitudes which coupled with RAF tactics of the time played into the German strengths. Ultimately when the USAAF P40's arrived in Tunisia they didn't have nearly as hard a time. Per Shores, the RAF considered USAAF basic training better which helped. Alot of UK newbies learned the hard way. The Germans felt each successive model of the "Curtiss" fighter were better and better (Tomahawk to Kittyhawk) but not quite a match for their 109's.

quote:

but...

for what ever reason, the LW seemed to be much more of a one on one, style of fighting, if 4 planes spotted one spitfire, the leader went after it, and the other 3 hung off, Yanks and CW wern't going to fight that way

of course, you may have to take that with a grain of salt, as those are from pilots who got away from combat, when they thought they wouldn't, who knows how many didn't come back when they were gangbanged

There is merit to it. Shores summary at the end of "FotD" was very interesting. (I can share passages with you if your interested as well as loss data) In a nutshell, he commented that during the Desert fighter, a reletively small minority of Experten had their way with the RAF in terms of running up their personal scores, but that the downside of this was that in effect, these men were fighting a private war vs. being part of an overall war effort. This also crimped the development of inexperienced pilots as they ran up their scores. As far as the Desert fighting went up through 42, The germans never truely achieved any real air supremecy as the major tactic employed by the Jagdwaffe was to snipe at the RAF escort fighters who were often tied at low altitude to the bombers. Thus while a great number of RAF fighters were lost, only a small number of bombers were brought down. This ultimately didn't help the Germans on the ground. The Jagdwaffe would do much better in this regards in Tunisia.

The grain of salt comment is all the more true when one turns to BC/RS volume one. Here the story was different even though the tactics were similar. The situation was however not similar and here the air effort had a big impact overall on operations thx to the Jagdwaffe's efforts which included the ever popular Frie Jagd. Again it comes down in part to the merging of both sides tactics and the situation. On the Eastern Front, the Russians quickly lost a great # of their fighters in the initial attack and coupled with a rigid and fear driven adherence to orders from above, they sent in their bombers largely unescorted...a tactic which especially in the case of vulnerable planes like the SB....led to slaughter. Thus the situation was different.....while the Experten still tended to fight their "private war", their efforts and skill led directly to the overall success of the invasion through sweeps, patrols, escort missions, ground attack and air superiority/interdiction missions.

< Message edited by Nikademus -- 9/3/2009 7:39:41 PM >

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(in reply to Hard Sarge)

Post #: 28

RE: Books about the European air war - 9/3/2009 8:36:17 PM

Hard Sarge

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Joined: 10/1/2000
From: garfield hts ohio usa
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roger

yes, I have that book, it was the first one I got from Shores, heck, I think I was a youngen when I got it (how old is Shores ?)(ahhh, maybe I got it once I got of the Marines, but, it is a "old" book)

yes, one hassle with the LW, they made a "few" to be heroes, while the rest watched, the loss of which, shattered the morale of the rest

with the LW, you don't really read about ideas or training to make a Mowing machine, or teams like Goddard and Godfrey

in the east, you did have teams and units that flew togeather and did well, but I still think it was more, taking turns, then what we would see as teamwork

(lol, off topic type, back to flight simming, one of my squadron mates, was in the room, and got a kill or two, and as we were on a chat program, he mentioned that he had never gotten a "ace" while playing the game, now I was kind of a hotshot and all, but, it was like, your kidding ?, well, we can take care of that right now, I went out and became the bait, I would set him up, have him where I wanted him, dive and attack someone, then break and get into a turn fight with them, then when I felt it was good, make a move to set up my mate, and tell him, now, get him, and down he would come and get a easy kill, got him 10 kills in a row, he was tickled pink, it made him happy, so it made me happy, but, later on, if I ever got into a fight, I had somebody who wasn't going to break away, he would stick with me, no matter what)

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(in reply to Nikademus)

Post #: 29

RE: Books about the European air war - 9/3/2009 9:28:55 PM

Nikademus

Posts: 25684
Joined: 5/27/2000
From: Alien spacecraft
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quote:

ORIGINAL: Hard Sarge

roger

yes, I have that book, it was the first one I got from Shores, heck, I think I was a youngen when I got it (how old is Shores ?)(ahhh, maybe I got it once I got of the Marines, but, it is a "old" book)

oh! lol....your the first i've chatted with who does. If it was a while ago you probably paid alot less for it than i did. Shores is like in his 80's at this point....i hope he can still get the gumption to keep working! FotD is as old as me!

it was supposed to be a triology but i'm assuming the third book was never published. ??

quote:

yes, one hassle with the LW, they made a "few" to be heroes, while the rest watched, the loss of which, shattered the morale of the rest

with the LW, you don't really read about ideas or training to make a Mowing machine, or teams like Goddard and Godfrey

Have you by chance read the book The Luftwaffe: Creating the Operational Air War, 1918-1940 by James Corum? Great read. Dispelled alot of perceptions about the Luftwaffe by using german language material as the primary source.

quote:

in the east, you did have teams and units that flew togeather and did well, but I still think it was more, taking turns, then what we would see as teamwork

lol....well i'd say in the East it was more a case of everyone got a turn.....and then some. According to RC/BS, despite the kill ratio and successes, the morale of the Jagdwaffe and Luftwaffe in general was suffering seriously several months into the campaign because of the workload coupled with the unflagging aggressiveness of the Red Airforce!

quote:

(lol, off topic type, back to flight simming, one of my squadron mates, was in the room, and got a kill or two, and as we were on a chat program, he mentioned that he had never gotten a "ace" while playing the game, now I was kind of a hotshot and all, but, it was like, your kidding ?, well, we can take care of that right now, I went out and became the bait, I would set him up, have him where I wanted him, dive and attack someone, then break and get into a turn fight with them, then when I felt it was good, make a move to set up my mate, and tell him, now, get him, and down he would come and get a easy kill, got him 10 kills in a row, he was tickled pink, it made him happy, so it made me happy, but, later on, if I ever got into a fight, I had somebody who wasn't going to break away, he would stick with me, no matter what)

You want amusement.....amusement is me trying to fly a plane in a sim period much less shoot someone down. I think i still hold the record for most Lawn Darts in a 109, most of them without being aided by the enemy.

< Message edited by Nikademus -- 9/3/2009 9:30:22 PM >

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