This review covers volumes 1 and 2 of the Solomons Air War series by Michael Claringbould and Peter Ingman. Combined, both volumes offer a superbly detailed and richly illustrated look at the pivotal campaign in the air that defined the turning of the tide in the epic 1941-1945 war in the Pacific. This review will take each volume in turn.
Volume 1 of Solomons Air War focuses upon the aerial warfare in the August-September 1942 period of the war in the Solomons Islands theater as well as what happened earlier that spring and summer which led up to the campaign.
Few clashes of armor occuring in history have built up a mythology such as that surrounding what happened at Villers-Bocage following the June 1944 Allied invasion of France (Operation Overlord). If one were looking to understand this battle, what really happened, and how it all unfolded in the most accurate detail the general reader has access to today - then this is the book for you.
The July 1942 to February 1943 events in and around Stalingrad may have decided the outcome of the Second World War. Accounts from the perspective of German combatants are many and varied (as shown by my April book review). Not so much so from the Soviet side. If this book were merely after-the-battle memoirs it would be valuable. However, the nature of the accounts discovered by author Jochen Hellbeck are extroardinary, and this book is more than worth your time if you have any interest in at all in perhaps one of the most dramatic and important battles to have occured in recent history.
Survivors of Stalingrad by Reinhold Busch is really a must-read, and not just for those interested in the epic 1942-1943 Battle for Stalingrad. This book provides an engrossing look at the horrors of combat in an impossible situation.
The author's focus is on breaking down what it was like to be trapped with the German Sixth Army following the Red Army's brilliant encirclement of its previous tormentor. The author has studied hundreds of previously unpublished reports, interviews, diaries and newspaper accounts.
You may or may not be familiar with After The Battle Magazine. A quarterly publication that began in 1973, it ended its production history with issue 195 in May of 2022. Since acquired by Pen and Sword Books Ltd., many of its long-standing editors continue to run the company - with a new focus on updating past content and presenting it in book format.
The Battle of Stalingrad: Then and Now is one of several such publications that have since been released.
The Germans And The Dieppe Raid is a true gem, providing Second World War history enthusiasts with a unique look at how in August of 1942 a hardly imposing German defensive grouping defeated a far better trained and equipped Allied raiding force. What's more, the book offers excellent insight into how the course and outcome of this battle shaped the German approach to defending occupied France against the far more famous Allied invasion set to come in June of 1944.
The August 19, 1942 Dieppe Raid is pretty well known.
Today's Ukrainian-Russian war is dramatically reminding us all of the defensive power wielded by modern Surface to Air (SAM) missile systems and interceptors. Perhaps no military establishment in the world has more experience operating interceptors, ground-based radars, and surface to air missile systems than Russia.
However, creating world class combat aircraft such as the SU-57, and missile defense systems such as the S-400 (one of the best of its class fielded by any military today) didn't happen overnight. It took decades and enormous expense in an effort that began immediately following
The Normandy Campaign was one of the most important of the Second World War. The German inability to fend off the Allied invasion of France was most likely the final nail in the inevitable defeat of the Third Reich. The campaign also featured a dizzying array of combat operations, not least of which being some of the biggest tank battles fought between the Allies and Germany.
The largest armored battles took place on the eastern side of the Allied bridgehead.
The Long Range Desert Group is packed with tremendous detail for such a modestly sized book, and is one I very much recommend.
The book is organized into two parts (each broken down into easily digestible sections of six to twelve pages). Part One covers the formation of the Long Range Desert Group (LRDG), and the period of 1940-1943 when it operated in North Africa as part of the Allied forces then fighting the Axis armies in mostly Libya and Egypt. Part Two is a much briefer look at the author's 2012 retracing of the LRDG's patrol paths.
Eric Hammel's book Chosin was originally published during the Cold War. But it remains a must read, as shown by the recently released paper-back edition of the book reviewed here.
One of Hammel's goals in Chosin was to show what it was like to be there on the ground in a typically harsh Korean winter during one of the greatest military crisis in which the U.S. Marine Corps and Army was ever involved.
