MILITARY

A few quick notes about this section.  This section will mainly cover The Great War (WW I) and WW II.  Here you may find a little bit of everything from books on aviation, tactics, tanks, small arms, medieval warfare, etc..  When I have more time I will categorize this section a bit more carefully.  For now I hope you can forgive me for going 'alpha by title'.  There is a rudimentary ranking system for the books that I have adopted.  It is the usual four stars (ok, they are asterisks).   If a book is great or stinks I will explain further in the actual review of the books.  For the sake of convenience is the only reason I am including the ranking system.  Please, read the review even if the ranking is poor because we all have different tastes and you may like what I do not.  As a note the background is of a T-33 (circa 1948) trainer flown at an air show where I live.  You will find the actual photograph in the gallery section.  If you want to use the image feel free but please read here. 

The List:

Aircraft of World War II

There is not much to say about this book.  It is a basic field guide pure and simple.  Three hundred of the major aircraft produced during the years of 1939-1945 are featured.  There are nice spec charts under each aircraft stating country of origin, type, power plant, performance, weight, dimensions, and armament.  These specs are both in metric and English units for us Americans.  Along with the specs there are about one or two paragraphs giving a brief history of the planes production, function, and often a brief anecdote or two of planes flown on specific missions or by certain pilots.  The illustrations are nice but unfortunately are limited by the fact the book is about 8vol size.  Most of the planes you could imagine should be in this book are in this book.  

If you like to attend air shows this would be a nice little book to bring with you.  If you know of a younger person who has an interest in WW II or aviation in general it would probably help towards a school report or just to add a little knowledge.  I bought this book because, as I have stated many times, I am into modeling as a hobby and have found some interesting paint schemes for my planes and it gives a clearer idea of what the finished product should look like.  The only thing that keeps this book from gaining a higher mark is that the views are all from the side.  If the book had been made a little larger a top view or a front view thrown in would have been nice.  Then again if it was larger in size it would not make a very good pocket guide.  Trade offs...

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The Canvas Falcons

This is a pretty decent read.  It helps to have a little foreknowledge of the subject but if you don't you will pick it up as you go along.  There are two things which make this book one of my favorites and two things (sort of major) that cause it to fall short of the four star rating.  First the good news and then the bad.

What sets this book apart from most books on WW I aviation is that it only deals with planes in as much to give the reader a feel of how absolutely dangerous it was to even fly in that age of aviation.  Stories of wings falling off at their own whim and planes made of wood bursting into flames for no reason incinerating the pilot as he fell thousands of feet are a few of the items you will find.  It isn't so much as individual planes but how they all had something wrong with them and were continually produced with no real effort to fix the problems.  What the book really deals with are the pilots.  This book is the story of how they lived their life day to day and the games they played in their head as they killed their fellow man to keep themselves sane.  Most of the major players are present in this book such as Richthofen, Goering, Rickenbacker, McCudden, and several others.  Of course these people are not the true aim of this book.  They are only in it so much as to explain the life of the aviator during the war, how in time they forgot even why they were in the air except that they had to kill.

One of the characters you will meet in this book is named W. W. Windstaff (an assumed name) who explains, as an American in the RFC, the daily life of combat and leave to Paris.  I do not totally believe in this character as a real person but such things are possible.  I would like to hear an opinion on this from someone who has read the book.  Along with the cranky Windstaff there are letters and stories from people who never made the history books telling of the horror and fear of the plummet to earth or the burning of canvas, wood, and flesh.  The 'everyman' feel of anonymous pilots helps you relate with the people speaking of their lives.

The second thing I like about this book is that 'The Red Baron' is NOT the main theme.  He is prevalent of course, and well he should be since he was the man with the bloodiest hands in the end but there are hundreds if not thousands of books dedicated to his deeds/ misdeeds (strafing downed pilots and men parachuting from bombers -- yes, bomber crew had chutes) and I think I would burst if I had to read another one.  

Now onto what I do not like about this book.  The first thing is that it is not the most accurate thing in the world.  Last planes flown by killed aviators are a little shady at times.  It  is even rumored, though I do not remember reading it myself, that Longstreet says Richthofen was killed in an Alb.V.  When I have time I will go over the text a little more carefully and try to find it for myself though I believe that the person who claims this error is actually seeing when he was just shot down but not killed.  Dates and battles are also a little vague giving one the feel that the book may not be 100% genuine.  This does not detract from the readability, it probably enhances it somehow, just don't take this book as fully historical.

The second thing that I find as a hindrance to this book is the American aviator and the light the author sees all other pilots compared to them.  Reading this book with no other context in your head the author will try to convince you that the American aviator was the one who brought the German to his knees in the battle for the air.  Maybe this could be the case, but it was not through skill but sheer numbers.  The British and Germans are seen as insane or barbarous compared to the American pilot.  Maybe they were.  I cannot judge harshly since I have not had the privilege to know anyone who was in the war.  Being an American I like to think that somehow this should be the case but I think that everyone was on equal footing for non-civility at that time.  It is a minor annoyance and I am not trying to be unpatriotic but I feel the author is being a little unfair towards the other aviators who flew, fought and died to defend causes they believed in just as strongly.

Overall it is a decent read that should hold your attention for awhile and make you shake your head in wonder at the senselessness of the whole of WW I.  You will find horror and humor between the two covers and you probably will learn some things you never knew by just reading a history book.  Just take the more specifics with a grain of salt or at least with a little bit of caution and you should enjoy this book. 

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Classic World War II Aircraft Cutaways

This is a very nice book.  Featured with each illustration of a plane is the respective history of the production and the story behind how the particular plane was chosen for drawing or how the artist came about being able to draw often classified material.  A very interesting story in the book has to do with a particular artist drawing a newly captured Fw-190.  The plane could not be dissected because test flights were being done and obviously a member of an Allied nation would not be privy to the actual blue prints of the plane.  It is an interesting story of how it was done and how accurate the drawing actually was.

Now for the real heart of this book.  If you are interested in aviation, are an engineer or an aspiring engineer, a scratch-builder, or just plain curious to know what the things look like without the stressed metal cover you will love this book.  About every major detail you would care to see are in the illustrations of this book from the actual plane down to the various engines such as the Merlin for the Spitfire and Mustang or the Db 605 that powered the various Bf-109's (Messerschmitt).  The planes featured are the usual fare.  Such featured machines are the P-38 Lightning, the B-17 Flying Fortress, the B-24 Liberator, Fw-190, Bf-109, Bf-110, the Wellington, Hampden, Mosquito, P-51 Mustang and various others.  

I have no complaints with this book except that it can be a little anecdotal in its writing.  It is also a little light on the actual specs of the planes.  Some of the specs are on the drawings themselves and some are spread here and there in the text descriptions of the planes.  Of course the real reason for buying this book is for the drawings themselves which, for the price, are among the nicest I have ever seen.  Overall, a first class book if you want some top-notch illustrations and the basics of the planes.

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The Encyclopedia of Weapons of World War II

This is a very nice book.  I am a scale modeler in my spare time and this book has some nice pictures and descriptions that have helped me form a clearer picture of the history and look of the items that I am recreating.  For those of you interested in military history it is a nice, clean reference book where you can quickly locate descriptions and images of items you read about.  I have often read history books and wondered what the equipment the men used looked like and this book has answered many of those questions.  It would also make a nice book for history teachers to bring into class to give students a clearer idea of World War II.  For all of the items listed there is a picture or pictures displayed.  There is a nice description of the items as well as a decent history.  The descriptions and history of the items is brief enough where you can answer the basic questions quickly but long enough not to leave you scratching your head over what you just read. 

Some of the things in the book include bombers, fighters, small arms, flame-throwers, bombs, rockets, tanks, ships, submarines, and other assorted weapons and vehicles. 

This is a very nice book but there is a small detractor.  All of the copies of this book have REALLY crummy dust-jackets.  For some reason they are just really thin and poorly folded around the actual cover of the book.  I had to search through a pile of them to find one that was not totally trashed (the DJ not the book).  Though this is a small point to make, for $25 I want to be the one who frazzles the dust-jacket and not have purchased it that way.  Other than that it is a nice book and would make a nice gift for students, history buffs, the curios, and modelers alike. 

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The Face of Battle

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The First Air War:  A Pictorial History 1914-1919

At this time I do not have a copy of the book around so some of the particulars are missing but will be added once I find it.  That is if I want to bother.  Let me tell it to you straight, this book is poor.  From start to finish it is a total mishmash of garbage.  Unless you are well versed in WW I aviation you will become lost in this book.  If you are well versed in WW I aviation you will not want this book anyway.  I unfortunately was caught by the cover and the illustrations.  As for a pictorial I could count almost all of the pictures on my fingers and toes with a few spares provided by my wife.  The book reads like you took the captions for a lot of pictures and put them on paper without the pictures themselves.  One paragraph the authors are talking about Zeppelins then the next they are talking about scout planes then they jump to aerodrome life then over to bombs.  It is confusing to say the least.  There is nothing to connect anything together in this book.  I managed to read everything in it in a matter of about one hour.  Granted a few of the pictures are interesting and I have not seen them in any other book such as a Handley-Paige 400 with some pretty nasty flak damage but who wants to pay $14 for a book with only a handful of unique (at least to my knowledge) pictures.  Avoid this book unless you really want to be aggravated or want to give a really exasperating gift to one of your friends.  This book was a case where if I had sat myself down in a chair for about ten minutes I would have walked out with something else (such as $14).

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"The Good Old Days"

The premise of this book is simple.  The editors have compiled the written records of bystanders and perpetrators of the holocaust.  The records take the form of official reports, diary entries, and letters to family and friends.  In its simplicity lies the true horror of this book.  There is no innocence.  Everyone is guilty.  There is no one in this book who can be considered untainted.  Those who did the crime and wrote about it often try to pass the blame onto others and yet somehow direct the most blame towards themselves.  Those who witnessed the atrocities implicate themselves through their inaction.  

When I started to read this book it was late at night.  As great as the need for sleep was I could not put the book down.  Page after page fled by leaving me feeling cold.  When at last I had to put the book down I was far more exhausted than any lack of sleep could have produced.  Reading of the atrocities in this fashion makes them seem more real than any analytical text book could ever hope to do.  Feelings of emptiness, rage, sadness and disgust all fought in my head.  When I attempted to pick the book up the next day I found I could not because of the sheer anguish it causes.  It took many days to bring myself to open the covers again and finish the book.  When I finally did finish the book I had dreams of vengeance upon the criminals and nightmares of being in front of the firing squads.  

This book is not for the faint of heart or the very young.  If you are a parent and want to teach your child of the Holocaust I would suggest you read the book first and be prepared to answer a million questions.  It is not so much the violence and murder that is disturbing as it is the response of people towards it.  Most view it as a job well done and deserving of special favors for doing it.  For those who did not partake there is a show of disgust but it never goes further.  I feel younger readers may miss out on this point and it should be explained to them.   If you are into history or sociology this book would be of great use in that it gives a different view, though a rather twisted one.

The photographs selected for this book are powerful.  Time elapsed sequences of firing squads and the mass graves are hard to look at but scream for your attention and remembrance of those who were victims.  Probably for me the most horrific of the pictures is the top one on page 132.  I have a child and thinking of what the child is experiencing and seeing before the final moment is heart-breaking.  Overall I recommend this book.  I have no complaints or problems with it.  It is a solid work and I feel it is well worth the time and effort to read.  

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The Great War (PBS companion book)

as of this date this book has not been read

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The World's Great Tanks

I picked this book up mainly for the WW I tanks in the first chapter.  The coverage is sparse in this area but that is to be expected.  There are some nice photos of the Mark IV's and Whippets as well as some color artwork and specs of the tanks.  The failure of a tank produced by the Germans is present as well.  

The descriptions of the tanks are well done and for a basic reference tool this book excels.  For the artwork and photographs there are some nice examples of the various tanks as well as explanations of what makes a tank a light, heavy, infantry tank, etc..  Explanations of what made a tank a success or a failure are well written and it is a smooth read.  What is most interesting about this book are the tanks produced between WW I and WW II.  Some of which I and my friends had never heard of.  The running story of disaster of the American and British efforts at tank production during WW II is interesting and kind of makes your stomach turn at how inept and shortsighted people can be.  The story of the competition between the Soviets and the United States after the war is interesting to read though not as well written as the section of WW II tanks.

I would give this book a higher rating except for one problem.  Unless you are capable of reading German sections of this book will be lost on you.  In the Cold War section of the book the text switches between English and German.  If you can do without the descriptions for various tanks that were produced during the Cold War period this book will be just fine.  If you are like myself you will find this a pretty big annoyance.  

Some of the tanks included in this book are the Renault FT-17, Whippet Mk. A, the Mk. IV, Christie M1928, M2A3, Panzer III, IV, and V, the Cromwell, M3 Stuart, M4 Sherman, M5 Grant, the Sheridan, T54, T72, M1A1, Challenger, Merkava, and the Leopard.  So, there you have it.  For a grade school to high-school reference tool this book is well suited.  If you want a reference tool for the making of models or for basic education on the subject it is adequate.  I recommend this book if only for the sake of the very nice artwork inside.

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