In the Skies of Nomonhan: Japan Versus Russia May-September 1939 (Crecy Classic) (A Crecy Classic)
593634
Book is well written, lots of technical data as well as lead-in and other information to present well rounded, if Soviet slanted view.  Of course they did win, so it is what it is!  Good presentation of data on little known, but seemingly decisive action in lead up to WWII.  Best if read with companian book, many titles available, on ground portion.  Interesting how well Soviets did here versus action in Finland.
29751
I love this book. I learned so much about the ye152m-the big mig21! It is one of my favorite aircraft of all time. Lots of performance data, black and white and color photos-drawings too! Anyone wanting data on obscure russian heavy interceptors should get this book!
649375
This is an excellent look at the MiG pilots who flew aircraft marked as PLA and North Korean fighters. During the Cold War the USSR never acknowledged the involvement of its pilots in Korea (despite the fact that Russian voice intercepts were monitored during aerial combat) and public acknoeledgement of their accomplishments were not made. Many of these pilots were WWII veterans who had gained notoriety fighting the Luftwaffe.

For the first time we learn the names of many of these pilots, we see their pictures and we learn what units they were assigned to. The artwork illustrating the paint schemes on the MiG-15s flown during the war is very well done as well. It's a pity that no map is included to outline the operational areas where the MiGs flew.

Also, the Russian author never discusses the REASON for the secrecy surrounding these pilots or the great lengths the Soviets went to perpetuate the cover story that North Korean and Chinese pilots against UN forces. Political constraints put artificial limitations on the Soviet pilots, preventing them from flying over areas in which they might be captured if shot down. I would have liked to have learned what the pilots thought of all this.

Nevertheless, a very good book.
2507808
In the spring of 1960, I found this book among my father's old books in our attic, and for the following week or two was completely unable to put in down. Reading it a second time in 2007, with an adult's judgment, I still say it has lost none of its power to grip the reader's attention.
Reportedly it sold a million and a half copies in Russia, and was awarded a Stalin prize.

This is an eyewitness account of the 1905 sea battle of Tsushima, where the Russian 2nd Pacific squadron, under vice-admiral Rozhdestvenski, was decisively defeated by a Japanese fleet. The author's narrative is based on manuscripts and testimonies contributed by fellow seamen who also took part in the battle, and was first drafted in a Japanese prisoner-of-war camp.

After rounding the Cape of Good Hope on the 9-month voyage from Russia to engage the Japanese, the Russians learn that Port Arthur has fallen to the enemy. Further news indicates that the Japanese fleet, counting modern, effective units, is superior in numbers. Target practices, cut short to conserve ammunition, reveal the woefully inadequate preparation and gunnery of the Russian force. The author's portrayal of Rozhdestvenski himself is sharply critical. While his iron will and "firmness of character" might impress those who did not know him, the author charges that he developed no strategy, did not consult even with his rear-admirals, and regarded advice as an infringement on his prerogatives. Consequently, when his flagship is battered and disabled at an early stage, the Russian fleet is left with in action without orders. By contrast, rear-admiral Nebogatoff  "treated his men as human beings .. and knew how to get the best out of subordinates without continual tongue-lashings".

The Japanese force is superior is quality of command, and in intelligence, manoeuvring,  and gunnery, and there is great disparity in the effectiveness of the Russian and Japanese explosive shells (see the eye-opening "Epilogue".). Several of the Russian ironclads are sunk, taking trapped men down with them to die of asphyxiation, while red hot coal falls out of furnaces as they turn turtle. There is no retreat in a sea battle.

The introduction, "How this book came to be written", is an extraordinary story in itself. Notes and papers were smuggled back to Russia, had to be hidden from police searches as the author became a fugitive in the reaction to the "1905 revolution", and went missing for 22 years before this book eventually saw the light of day. Five stars!
167443
Walter Boyne, at one time the curator of the famous Air and Space Museum in Washington DC, spins an engrossing tale of the evolution of air power over the course of World War II.  From the Japanese overreach and over reliance on a small cadre of irreplaceable carrier pilots--who demise spelled certain doom for their overextended empire--to the fulfilling of FDR's prescient claim of America's intent to build 100,00 aircraft, Boyne lays out a vast canvass that touches on many aspects of the aerial WWII.  Russian aircraft are also given proper attention, including their redoubtable ground support aircraft the Sturmovik--a sort of armored flying bathtub that gained the enemy's respect as evidenced by its German nickname "Schwarz Tod" (i.e. Black Death).

Other surprising revelations include the fact that the B-29 Superfortresses, which dropped the atomic bombs that annihilated Hiroshima and Nagasaki, were actually more expensive to develop than the atomic bombs themselves.  Also interesting was the strategic decision of General Curtis LeMay (the model for George C. Scott's character in "Dr. Strangelove") to use the B-29 in the incendiary bombing of Japanese cities because conventional bombing required low-level flying that resulted in the downing of too many American aircraft.

German aircraft like the Stuka and the Me 109 are seen to have given Germany an early advantage, but were soon to be matched and then overtaken by American and British efforts that resulted in the Spitfire, P-51, and P-47--with allied long range bombers making their German counterparts seem like mere toys by comparison.  Later German efforts such as the Folkwulf 190 fighter and the Me 262 jet aircraft are shown to be too little to late.  German complacency early in the war idled German aircraft production while the British, American, and Russian factories were working 24-7 to churn out the fighters and bombers that blackened the skies of the Axis with their ever-increasing numbers.  Likewise, the all-too-flammable Japanese Zero (later dubbed "The Flying Cigarette Lighter" by its own beleaguered pilots) was eventually undone by the American carrier-born Hellcat and Corsair.  Nor were the Russians shown to slackers--as their fielding of excellent fighter aircraft drove the Germans from their skies--despite that fact that much of the superstructure of such aircraft relied on plywood construction.
1705764
It was Churchill who described Russia as "a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma".  This vast often frozen country that has defied conquerors over time has also been unwilling to undergo liberal democratic progress.  Russia has truly been a mystery.

It was Napoleon's view that Russia could be beaten.  It was inevitable that this huge but primitive country would be no match for his Grand Armee.  His victory would act as a spur for still greater future victories.

However, Russia could not be broken.  In fact, even though Napoleon actually reached Moscow, the actions of scorched earth plus the horrors of a Russian winter could not be overcome.

Adam Zamoyski succeeds admirably in bringing the horrors of Napoleon's initial victories then subsequent defeats to the stark attention of the reader.  War is never pleasant but the winter of 1812 must have been plumbing new depths.  Zamoyski is a fine historian.

It is perhaps inevitable that Zamoyski's work will be compared with Antony Beevor's work on the German defeat at Stalingrad.  Personally, if it is possible to compare, then I recommend the latter.  However, the two books perform a similar task in explaining why Russia has not bowed to conquerors nor yield many clues to its mystery.
533001
Finally a book that contains something about Rece and the 14 TRS.  Thanks to Col Polifka for filling the gap.  Re the weather recce, I recall the time Wally Cox got jumped by a MiG and had to fly on the escort's wing as they chased it. The Wing CC then directed the nose camera be pointed in case it happened again.  It never did.
3179463
I bought this on impulse at a bricks and mortar store.
Why?  It had a passage on Lilya Litviak, the Russian female ace of WWII.  Fighter jock.
The bibliography cited many of the books I had tracking Lily and her compatriots.
Interestingly the female writers about Litvak gang up on the male writers about Litvak
but overall she was a fighter jock that could fly rings around me and most of us jocks on our best day.
The fact that anyone includes the incredible Russian Women WWII Combat Pilots is exemplary.

Yes I saw some editing errors and detected some flying errors in the book.  Yes there were omissions, the P-47, John Boyd, where
the Ho Chi Minh Trail really is, and others, but pleasing the purists is not the goal.  The goal is to get the combat innocent
to read and respect the uniqueness of air war, how it connects to ground war and how it succeeds and fails. This book does a
nice job with a historical narrative and vignettes.

I liked the inclusion of the land war issues to put context to the air war.
I also liked the documentation of the relentless presence of internecine intra and inter-service rivalries, competition, egos and
the foolishness between nations that put the line pilots at greater risk over and over for 100 years.

1962 1st year at USAF Academy someone included Lily Litvak in the Aces Chapter of my little book of knowledge, "Contrails".
We were supposed to memorize most and be familiar with all of it.  Most of my classmates don't remember Lily Litvak.
When Kara Hultgren went down 1994 and all the hate mail regarding female fighter pilots was pouring in, I found "Night Witches" by Bruce Myers and went on from there.  There was a whole untold aspect of combat flying.

In summary Lords of the Sky is a good read with a bibliography to digest if you want to.  It's also a good read for the air combat innocent.  And if you are female or even male, the Lilya Litviak passage will water your eyes, air to air.  Try "Red Sky, Black Death" by Anna Yergerova for Russian Women WWII air to ground.
3137499
True cold war story with motorcycle history as the subject.  History while it was in the making!  Secrets of 2-stroke desoign stolen from Europe allow Japan to expand and dominate in the 60s.
4307656
All Up  Odyssey of the Rocketmen

I have just finished reading All Up, J. W. Rinzlers new book about the first space age.  He is a talented writer and everything he has written has been a pleasure to read.  Here he tells the stories of early rocket tests that were more astounding than fiction, beginning before World War II and running all the way to Apollo 11.  Some were successes but many were failures; still with the single-minded determination of those behind the efforts, work continued.  Most of it describes events I didn't know about.  I thought I was up on this but I had missed a lot.  How could I have overlooked these fascinating early events? My understanding of rocket development was mainly limited to black and white T.V. documentaries, news coverage after 1960 and mostly stories of what happened in the United States.  This book told me more of the people who dreamed the dream and built the devices.  Some were in the U.S. but many were in the Soviet Union and Germany.  I suppose the information has always been there, it is just that no one bothered to gather it together and write one book of it. Thanks to Rinzler, a lot of it is now in print.

  I would recommend this to anyone curious about how we are evolving as species and how technology evolves; from the imagination of passionate dreamers like Jules Verne to a national priority inspired by a young American president who wanted to get to the Moon before the Soviets did.
2674012
This is a 500+ page comic that is volume 3 out of 4. The title is the name of the period of Emperor Hirohito's rule and the first volume covered Japan from 1926 to 1939 (and all the pre-war fervor). The second volume covers a majority of the Pacific War, but also wonderfully weaves in the personal experiences of the author/artist. This volume covers the end of the war, the desolation and rebuilding of Japan (through several economic crises and starts and stops), and the outbreak of the Korean War (and how it jumpstarted the Japanese economy). It never goes into any incident with depth, but it is a strong survey text that gives the reader a bit of passing knowledge on the times. Food, art, entertainment, songs, and news outside of politics are covered as well. As in the previous volumes, Mr. Mizuki's life and struggles makes up about 40% of the book. Despite how well the art and history are covered, it is the story of Mr. Mizuki within the context of Japanese history that causes this volume (and series to shine).
1388589
John Toland's book was first published in 1970. At the time, there were few if any English-language books on the Pacific War which focused on the Japanese perspective. THE RISING SUN was therefore one of, if not the, first book to do so. The book therefore has an important place in the study of the Pacific War, and many more modern histories cite to Toland's book.

Unfortunately, Toland's book is also a product of its time. The West tended to look upon the Japanese as incomprehensible barbarians during the war. Japanese people and culture were alien and abhorrent. Toland tries to explain this culture and how it affected Japanese decision-making and attitudes leading up to and during the war. But like the earlier views, Toland's characterizations are filled with exoticism and stereotypes, albeit more admiring and positive.

For example, Toland devotes on the earlier chapter's into the book to explaining Japanese culture and attitudes. Like Allied war-time narrative, Toland's admiring descriptions gives you a sense that the Japanese were some kind of mystical creatures which were innately alien to the Westerner. However, in 2015, there is no lack of English translation of Japanese works on the war, including some first-hand accounts. One can see that there were indeed cultural differences, but underneath there were some very recognizable human impulses, strengths, and weaknesses which shaped the war for Japan.

Toland's attempt to write a more sympathetic, non-judgmental narrative also means the book strays into the realm of apologism at times. Japanese decision-makers like Prince Konoe, and some of the militaristic firebrands of the 1930's, were portrayed with a certain hazy romanticism. I can't comment as to whether Toland may have had some degree of bias given that his wife of Japanese. But one wonders.

Although Toland sticks to narrating the events and avoid commentary for the most part, there are a few bits of apologism that are particularly difficult to swallow. For example, Toland states at one point that Japan's aspirations were that of all of the Asian people of the time - which was to escape Western domination. That is a tough one to swallow, given that Japan's aspirations led it to conquer and enslave other Asian countries, and the scars of those events linger to this day. Toland also claims Japan was constantly menaced by the Soviet Union, which accounted for its ultra-right wing attitudes. This is certainly inaccurate. Finally, Toland goes out of his way to distance Japan from Nazi Germany, but I found most of his assertions unconvincing.

Toland's book may have been the only one of its kind in 1970. But in 2015, I think there are better books on the subject. If you want a Japanese perspective, there are Japanese historians whose works have been translated into English. For example, Saburo Ienaga's "The Pacific War, 1931-1945."

For more modern works drawing on Japanese sources, I suggest Nemesis: The Battle for Japan 1944-1945 by Max Hastings for a more modern, and also balanced, account, even though it is more narrowly focused on the final year of the war. It does a better job of humanizing without exoticizing or romanticizing the Japanese.
861272
"Soviet Combat Aircraft of the Second World War:  Volume One - Single Engined Fighters" by Yefim Gordon and Dmitri Khazanov offers an unparalleled look at the Voyenno-Vozdushniye Sily (VVS), or Soviet Air Forces, fighters of World War II.  The book is highly detailed, and draws on archival material newly made available following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991.  The book starts with an introduction by Bill Gunston, a glossary, and notes.  It then moves on to discuss the fighters arranged by design bureau, including:  Bereznyak-Isaev; Bisnovat; Borovkov-Frolov; Gudkov; Ilyushin; Kozlov; Lavochkin; Mikoyan-Gurevich; Nikitin; Pashinin; Polikarpov; Silvansky; Sukhoi; Tomashevich; Yakovlev; and Yatsenko.  As one can tell from the design bureaus listed, it covers experimental aircraft as well as those that made it to operational service.  The book concludes with data tables on Lavochkin, MiG, Polikarpov, and Yakovlev fighters.  It is loaded with photographs, three-view line drawings, and has a section of color plates.  Overall this book is a "must have" for those interested in Soviet World War II military aviation.
4630681
This is the new enlarged version of the 1996 edition of  OKB Sukhoi  publication by Yefim Gordon and is full of drawings, photos, and discussion. It is undoubtedly the last word (as 0f 2010) on the Sukhoi aircraft and design bureaus. There is an unbelievable amount of information which I admit that I  have not completely read - almost 600 pages. It is part of Yefim Gordon's series of publications on aircraft designers and bureaus of the USSR and the CIS. For those of you who remember the Putnam series of books covering aviation manufactures, etc., which are excellent, these appear to be Putnam on steroids. Gordon produces books covering aviation topics  that are really unavailable elsewhere in English- and is extending his coverage to Chinese aircraft in one of his other new publications. If you are interested in Russian military and/or aviation, this book will be a valuable addition to your library
605582
The book focuses on the naval battles that occurred at Narvik, Norway, on April 10th and 13th, 1940, between German and British forces.  Narvik is the ice-free far northern port from which Swedish iron ore was exported -- I believe year-round -- but principally when the Baltic was ice-bound during the winter months.  That high-grade ore was vitally important to the German war economy and a tempting target for British interdiction.  Germany had invaded Denmark and Norway on April 9th, 1940.  This caught the British, the world's leading naval power at that time, unprepared though they had intelligence about heightened German activity and were misled by numerous faulty assumptions about German intentions and capabilities.  The invasion of the Low Countries and France did not start until May 10th and for a brief few months Britain and France contested German control of central and northern Norway.

The author is a retired officer of the Royal Navy and the grandson of Charles Dickens.  He was an active combatant in the war and a captain of several ships including destroyers.  Captain Dickens is a skillful writer and researcher and applies his talents in a masterful manner -- this book illustrates how it can and should be done!!  The archival research and interviews with British and German participants enhance the meticulous reconstruction of events.

Not a weakness but rather indicative of the very narrow scope of the book -- the land and air battles that occurred in northern Norway in the following two months are not covered.  For that there are many other satisfactory books.  One that I have read and especially recommend is Francois Kersaudy's "Norway 1940".  New books on the German invasion and battle for Norway by Geirr H. Haarr recently became available though I have not yet read them -- they look to be splendid histories.
1667903
"Thunder in the East: The Nazi-Soviet War 1941-1945", by Historian Evan Mawdsley, is a one-volume history of the war on the Eastern Front during World War II.  Mr Mawdsley is a Professor of International History at the University of Glascow, specializing in Russian History, and was able to take advantage of new studies and source material from the former Soviet Union when writing this book.

I'm somewhat of an amateur historian and own over 500 books on World War II.  Most of the books I've read about the Eastern Front tend to have a "German" slant, because until the last 15-20 years, the Soviet archives were not assessable to historians and what was released was highly censored, so German sources and accounts were primarily used.  In recent years, though, western historians such as David Glantz (as well as a younger generation of Russian historians) have been able to examine and incorporate newly released material into fresh examinations of the Soviet role in World War II and publish new accounts and analyses in English.

In this book, Mr Mawdsley examines the Soviet positions (and to a lesser extent the Germans ones) ... economically, militarily, politically ... and explains why the war unfolded as it did, and how things changed as time when on.  He gives overviews of the major battles, but in a refreshing change, he covers all of the Soviet offensives as well as the German ones.  (There were a lot of Soviet offensives that were dismal failures, which were officially "forgotten" on the Soviet side, and not really covered on the German side as they didn't result in major changes to their front.)  He also shows how each side's strategy evolved as the war went on, and what impact those changes had on the fighting.  This work is written more from the Soviet perspective rather than the German perspective, which is fine by me, as I already own a multitude of books from the German point-of-view.

This is the first book I've read that ties all aspects of the Soviet side of the war together in such a logical, compact, and yet complete manner.  It does not go into great depth on the battles themselves ... the book would have to be triple its length to even begin to provide that level of detail ... but it gives an outstanding overview, explanation, analysis, and summary of the war on the Eastern Front.  The only nit I have is that the book probably needs a few more maps.

I'm not given to gushing, but I've enjoyed this book as much as any I've read all year, and it's earned a place on my top shelf.  Mr Mawdsley's writing style is crisp and easy to digest, and he organized his material very well.  As I mentioned above, while this book is written more from the Soviet perspective, it was not biased toward either side in my opinion.  I highly recommend this book to anyone with an interest in the Eastern Front of World War II.
1062906
For a book written in 1939 it is pretty relevant to today's pilots.  Anyone who appreciates a rather romantic view of the world will also like the writing style.  For history buffs, this is a priceless glimpse into the bygone days of aviation in it's infancy.