Author : Daniel J. March
Publisher :
Page : 256 pages
File Size : 29,81 MB
Release : 2000
Category : Airplanes, Military
ISBN : 9781840133912
Fully illustrated analysis of all World War II aircraft in British military service, including full descriptions and specifications, hundreds of action photos and highly accurate, full-color artwork.
Author : Arthur Harris
Publisher : Pen and Sword
Page : 288 pages
File Size : 38,16 MB
Release : 2005-03-01
Category : History
ISBN : 1844152103
Sir Arthur Harris - Bomber Harris - remains the target of criticism and vilification by many, while others believe the contribution he and his men made to victory is grossly undervalued. He led the men of Bomber Command in the face of appalling casualties, had fierce disagreements with higher authority and enjoyed a complicated relationship with Winston Churchill. Written soon after the close of World War 2, this collection of Sir Arthur Harris's memoirs reveals the man behind the Allied bombing offensive that culminated in the destruction of the Nazi war machine but also many beautiful cities, including Dresden.
Author : Dr. Christopher C. Harmon
Publisher : Pickle Partners Publishing
Page : 57 pages
File Size : 36,21 MB
Release : 2014-08-15
Category : History
ISBN : 1782897291
This historical reassessment of the World War II British bombing campaign notes that though in 1940 Churchill declared that he was waging “a military and not a civilian war” to destroy “military objectives” and not “women and children,” within eighteen months both types of targets would be struck by Bomber Command. The author searches for the reasons in “three contiguous realms” of strategic influence: moral (and legal), political, and military. The study concludes that although for much of the war “area bombing” of cities was a “tragic necessity” meeting the ‘reasonable man’s’ standard of what was decently allowable given the blunt weapons the Allies had” and the evils they faced, nonetheless Allied leaders could have and should have abandoned indiscriminate bombing in the last phases of the conflict, when more precise means were at hand and “Nazi power had been overmatched.”
Author : Richard Overy
Publisher : Penguin
Page : 609 pages
File Size : 45,23 MB
Release : 2015-04-28
Category : History
ISBN : 0143126245
“An essential part of the literature of World War II.” —Jonathan Yardley, The Washington Post From acclaimed World War II historian Richard Overy comes this startling new history of the controversial Allied bombing war against Germany and German-occupied Europe. In the fullest account yet of the campaign and its consequences, Overy assesses not just the bombing strategies and pattern of operations, but also how the bombed communities coped with the devastation. This book presents a unique history of the bombing offensive from below as well as from above, and engages with moral questions that still resonate today.
Author : Stewart Halsey Ross
Publisher : McFarland
Page : 255 pages
File Size : 21,10 MB
Release : 2015-10-03
Category : History
ISBN : 1476616116
The United States relied heavily on bombing to defeat the Germans and the Japanese in World War II, and air raids were touted as "precision" bombing in American propaganda. But was precision possible over cloud-covered Europe or a darkened Japanese countryside? Could the vaunted Norden optical bombsight in fact "drop bombs into pickle barrels" as advertised? Were the American aircrews well trained and well protected? How good were their airplanes? What were the results of the costly raids? This work sets suppositions against facts surrounding the United States' use of strategic bombing in World War II. Chapters cover the events leading up to World War II; the start of the war; the seers and the planners; the airplanes, bombs, bombsights, and aircrews; the planes Germany used to defend itself against American planes; the five cities (Hamburg, Dresden, Tokyo, Hiroshima, and Nagasaki) that experienced the most destruction; and the U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey of the damage done by aerial bombing. The book also probes the government's myth-building statements that supported America's view of itself as a uniquely humanitarian nation, and analyzes the role played by interservice rivalry--"battleship admirals" against "bomber generals."
Author : Maurer Maurer
Publisher : DIANE Publishing
Page : 520 pages
File Size : 14,89 MB
Release : 1961
Category : United States
ISBN : 1428915850
Author : Randall Hansen
Publisher : Anchor Canada
Page : 386 pages
File Size : 14,98 MB
Release : 2009-09-15
Category : History
ISBN : 0307372383
National Bestseller An enlightening and utterly convincing re-examination of the allied aerial bombing campaign and of civilian German suffering during World War II–an essential addition to our understanding of world history. During the Second World War, Allied air forces dropped nearly two million tons of bombs on Germany, destroying some 60 cities, killing more than half a million German citizens, and leaving 80,000 pilots dead. Much of the bombing was carried out against the expressed demands of the Allied military leadership. Hundreds of thousands of people died needlessly. Focusing on the crucial period from 1942 to 1945, and using a compelling narrative approach, Fire and Fury tells the story of the American and British bombing campaign through the eyes of those involved: military and civilian command in America, Britain, and Germany, aircrew in the sky, and civilians on the ground. Acclaimed historian Randall Hansen shows that the Commander-in-Chief of Bomber Command, Arthur Harris, was wedded to an outdated strategy whose success had never been proven; how area bombing not only failed to win the war, it probably prolonged it; and that the US campaign, which was driven by a particularly American fusion of optimism and morality, played an important and largely unrecognized role in delivering Allied victory.
Author : Tony Buttler
Publisher : Anchor Books
Page : 0 pages
File Size : 20,12 MB
Release : 2012
Category : Airplanes, Military
ISBN : 9781902109244
This new book by Tony Buttler, a first of its kind, describes the British fighter, bomber, and research aircraft produced in the run up to and during World War II. Detailed coverage of aircraft that were built and flown as prototypes only, combine with others such as the Westland Welkin which entered production but never reached a squadron. Un-built design projects are explained and all types are covered separately, along with a large selection of photographs, some of which have rarely been seen before. This book covers basic short-term insurance fighters such as the Miles M.20, the Martin-Baker M.B.5, and Supermarine Spitfire, which represented the ultimate in piston fighter development, the Fairey Spearfish torpedo bomber and the four engine Vickers Windsor, oddities like the Blackburn B.20 flying boat, and Britain's first jet aircraft, the Gloster E.28/39. A comprehensive appendix, with the use of photographs and brief details, examines one-off examples of standard production types that were fitted with non-standard features. Gathered from archival sources, renowned author Tony Buttler presents a wealth of information on these historic aircraft.
Author : Philip J. R. Moyes
Publisher :
Page : 72 pages
File Size : 19,69 MB
Release : 1969
Category : Bombers
ISBN :
Author : Bill Norton
Publisher : Crecy Publishing
Page : 0 pages
File Size : 15,31 MB
Release : 2012
Category : History
ISBN : 9781857803303
This title gives a new perspective on the development of US bomber aircraft during World War 2. It reveals how the intense combat pressures of the war accelerated the scientific and technological advances of aeronautics, propulsion, aircraft systems, avionics and ordnance. Extensively researched, this detailed study of both the US Army and Naval air forces is packed with three-view drawings and rare photographs including many little-known experimental aircraft plus unusual variants, with every aircraft illustrated. The book follows a logical path to show how projects were selected from the multitude of design concepts and proposals put forward at the time. This enables the author to give detailed coverage of the programmes that advanced beyond the preliminary stages and contributed to the rapid developments in all aspects of bomber design during the war. The author discusses the technological maturation of US bombers with emphasis on high technology and experimental models. The war years were particularly noted for the rapid advance of electronic navigation, communications, radar, and electronic warfare that greatly aided mission success. The bold moves to long-range heavy bombers and super-heavy intercontinental bombers (the latter solely an American undertaking) further spurred system-intensive aircraft that were important transitions to the jet bombers that followed. How all this work contributed to actual fielded weapon systems is of particular note, with discussions of failures, course changes, and close-run competitions. The effects of interaction with other Allies, knowledge of enemy systems and the reaction by the US and Allied forces to their introduction, and the effect of mobilizing the nation's industries for total war are also examined. The book concludes with an examination of the ultimate achievement of Allied air superiority in the war and its dependence on all of these factors, together with consideration of the effects of emergency measures, haste, budgets, resources, evolving doctrine and strategy, the general course of the war and leadership biases.
