Showing titles in Armed Forces

The incredible, untold story behind the rise of the P-51 Mustang, the World War II fighter plane that destroyed the Luftwaffe and made D-Day possible “Aviation buffs will cheer this high-flying saga.”—Publishers Weekly “[A] fascinating book about passion and innovation.”—Walter...

Vice Admiral Sir Peter Gretton's book is a brilliant account of his career in the navy through World War Two: fighting in the Second Battle of the Narvik and guarding convoys in the Mediterranean and the North Atlantic, before being placed in charge of Escort Group B7. Convoy Escort Commander demonstrates how Allied commanders searched for new methods to repel U-boat assaults, including using direction-finding radio and radar, employing special tactical formations, coordinating with air cover, and endeavoring to keep the convoy together and prevent straggling. 

There have been volumes of books written about the development of US airpower and the technological specifications of each American or Allied aircraft. This is not one of them. This book focuses on the young men who answered the call to duty and were literally transformed from “farm boys to fighter pilots.”

This classic in the field of ufology is filled with hard-hitting eyewitness testimony of one of the most important events of all time: the actual recovery of a UFO outside of Roswell, New Mexico, in 1947. For more than seventy years, government authorities have led us to believe the wreckage was merely a very conventional weather balloon - but the witnesses who were there continue to tell a different story. Witness to Roswell once again provides a "can't put down" written account of what really transpired in Roswell decades ago. 

The Royal Marine Commandos have become a byword for elite raiding skills and cutting-edge military operations. They are globally renowned, yet shrouded in mystery. With unique insight and authority, Commando captures the essence and heart of this revered military unit then and now, exploring their role patrolling the high seas and policing coastlines around the globe, and revealing their rich history and what it means to win and wear the legendary green beret. 

The period covered in this book is well known for its epic battles and grand campaigns of territorial conquest, but Hellenistic monarchies, Carthaginians, and the rapacious Roman Republic were scarcely less active at sea. Huge resources were poured into maintaining fleets not only as symbols of prestige but as means of projecting real military power across the Mediterranean arena.

Freedom of expression and individual enterprise have distinguished the societies of powers dominant at sea, and since supreme maritime nations have prevailed over their territorial rivals in the great wars of the modern era, it is they who have created today's world. In this final volume of his masterful trilogy, Padfield carries the theme through the terrible wars of the last century to the present, with vivid descriptions of the naval battles that have shaped our world.

Havoc-06 is the call sign of former Australian Combat Controller Troy Knight. As a Royal Australian Air Force Airfield Defence Guard, Troy had not found the military adventure he sought: combat operations. His thirst for overseas deployment saw him privately contract his services in Iraq and South East Asia, but when he got whiff that the Australian Defence Force was raising a new defence capability, he couldn’t help but want to be part of it.

The AC-130 gunship was quickly developed in 1968 to provide fire support for ground forces in Vietnam. Twenty-eight C-130 cargo aircraft were converted into AC-130s for night attack operations. The AC-130 was crude, ugly, ad hoc, and detested by many within the USAF...but it worked, and it worked well. Likewise, AC-130 crews were deemed unruly “biker gangs” but performed magnificently in every major US military operation from 1976 to 1995. Most of these combat operations were cloaked in secrecy, but records once classified for up to 20 years have now been opened.  

Brought to you by Penguin. FROM THE AUTHOR OF BRIDGE OF SPIES: A dramatic and colourful new account of the most daring British commando raid of World War Two In the darkest months of the Second World War, Churchill approved what seemed to many like a suicide mission. Under orders to attack the...

Paul Tremelling was just seven years old when he watched the Royal Navy's Sea Harriers leave their home base in Somerset to do battle against the Argentine Air Force in the Falklands War. Two decades later, he would join this exclusive club, one of an elite band of Fleet Air Arm fighter pilots, charged with standing in the way of Her Majesty's enemies. This is the story of what it takes to make it in the dog-eat-dog arena of fighter combat. In the cockpit or crew room, the pressure is relentless, the humour merciless. It's no place for the faint-hearted.

Antes da Segunda Guerra Mundial, muitos militares não acreditavam que o avião pudesse mudar os rumos de um conflito. Mas uma turma de aviadores idealistas, a Máfia dos Bombardeiros, levantou a questão: “E se o bombardeio de precisão destruísse pontos vitais na posição do inimigo e ainda tornasse a guerra menos letal?” Quando essa nova crença no poder aéreo é posta à prova, os resultados são muito diferentes do esperado. Mas a Máfia mantém sua convicção e a leva às últimas consequências na guerra no Pacífico.

Ghostriders: Mors De Caelis is a comprehensive history of AC-130 gunship combat operations in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia. The story begins with the first AC-130 in 1968, and ends in 1975 at the end of the war in Vietnam. It tells the life and death stories of Spectre crews, who faced extreme danger while hunting trucks on the Ho Chi Minh Trail and providing fire support for US and allied ground forces. 

1943. Major-General Orde Wingate startles the military world by commanding a daring raid in the heart of Japanese-occupied Burma. But this was just the beginning. In the following year, Wingate spearheaded an even more ambitious operation, flying 10,000 men and 1,000 animals behind Japanese lines to disrupt communications and harass the Japanese forces. With close tactical support from Colonel Philip Cochran, Chindit was the name given to these operations and the men who made them happen. This is their story, told by one man who was at the heart of it all. 

You do not have to be an aviation aficionado to enjoy Colonel Steve Ladd’s fascinating personal tale, woven around his 28-year career as a fighter pilot. This extremely engaging account follows a young man from basic pilot training to senior command through the narratives that define a unique ethos. From the United States to Southeast Asia; Europe to the Middle East; linking the amusing and tongue-in-cheek to the deadly serious and poignant, this is the lifelong journey of a fighter pilot.

In Maritime Power and the Struggle for Freedom, Peter Padfield presents a superb description and analysis of naval campaigns conducted between 1788 and 1851 that shaped the modern world. Winner of the Mountbatten Maritime Prize, this is the second of Padfield's masterful trilogy that traces the impact of naval power on modern history, and the means by which it has been enacted. 

Only a boy when World War II broke out, E. C. R. Baker was gripped by the stories he heard of heroism in the skies as the Allies defeated the mighty Luftwaffe. But in the years after the war, he was struck by how few of the RAF's legendary fighter aces could be named by the general public.

For four centuries the British realm depended on sea power to defend itself against a myriad of threats. The Royal Navy established itself as the "Sovereign of the Seas", helping transform a small island nation into the center of a global empire. But Britain's maritime services faced an unprecedented challenge during World War II, and the survival of the nation was at stake. The Longest Campaign tells the epic story of British sea power in the Second World War. 

A groundbreaking history of the Black Joke, the most famous member of the British Royal Navy’s anti-slavery squadron, and the long fight to end the transatlantic slave trade. Initially a slaving vessel itself, the Black Joke was captured in 1827 and repurposed by the Royal Navy to catch its former compatriots. Over the next five years, the vessel liberated more enslaved people than any other in Britain’s West Africa Squadron.

Never Mind, We'll Do It Ourselves is the character-driven story behind the origins of the Predator drone program and the dawn of unmanned warfare. A firsthand account told by an Air Force team leader and a CIA team leader, Never Mind, We'll Do It Ourselves takes the listener into the back offices and secret government hangars where the robotic revolution went from a mad scientist idea to a pivotal part of global air power.