On 10 May 1940, the French possessed one of the largest air forces in the world. On paper, it was nearly as strong as the RAF. Six weeks later, France had been defeated. For a struggling French Army desperately looking for air support, the skies seemed empty of friendly planes. In the decades that followed, the debate raged. Were there unused ......

Since its first flight in May 1958, the McDonnell Douglas F-4 Phantom II proved to be a tough, rugged and excellent all-weather, air superiority fighter/bomber. From flying fleet defence missions during the Cuban Missile Crisis and performing as an air superiority fighter/bomber during the Vietnam War, to taking out Iraqi surface-to-air missile ......

First published in the 1970s, Military Aircraft Markings has become an indispensable annual publication for aircraft enthusiasts, historians and students of military aviation. At the heart of Military Aircraft Markings is the most complete listing of all the aircraft of the UK Armed Forces – the Royal Air Force, Royal Navy, ......

In warzones, ordinary commercially-available drones are used for extraordinary reconnaissance and information gathering. They can also be used for bombings - a drone carrying an explosive charge is potentially a powerful weapon. At the same time asymmetric warfare has become the norm - with large states increasingly fighting marginal terrorist ......

The battleship Yamato, of the Imperial Japanese Navy, was the most powerful warship of World War II and represented the climax, as it were, of the Japanese warrior traditions of the samurai-the ideals of honor, discipline, and self-sacrifice that had immemorially ennobled the Japanese national consciousness. Stoically poised for battle in the ......

The 8.8cm Flugzeugabwehrkanone 18/36/37/41 - more popularly known as the Flak 88 - was one of the most successful and influential artillery gun types in the German arsenal in the Second World War. Developed during the 1920s and 1930s, the gun combined accuracy, a high muzzle velocity and a rapid rate of fire (15-20rpm). Although at first ......

The iconic Hawker-Siddeley Harrier was designed to fight the Cold War from the fields of West Germany but won its battle spurs in the Falklands, Belize and Afghanistan. It was controversially scrapped by the British Government fifty years after entering service with the RAF and its loss raised serious questions over Royal Navy fleet protection. ......

The odds on Paul le Goupil living to see the end of the Second World War let alone the 21st Century were negligible in 1944\. Yet he did. As his extraordinary memoir describes, as a young man he found himself caught up in the maelstrom of the Second World War. Active resistance to, and defiance of, the German occupation came naturally to Paul ......

This meticulously researched biography of the controversial American commander Joe Stilwell presents an intimate account of his career and the complex story of the Burma campaign. Stilwell was stationed in Burma during the Second World War working as Chinese military leader Chiang Kai-shek s chief of staff, the commander of the Chinese ......

The golden boy of Australian swimming and captain of the lifeguards on Manly Beach, Cecil Healy was the poster-boy for all that was decent in Australia before World War I. Powerful, bronzed and daring, his fearlessness made him a leader in the embryonic surf-lifesaving movement, and his unique crawl stroke captured swimming records ......

Along with thousands of his compatriots, Wladyslaw Anders was imprisoned by the Soviets when they attacked Poland with their German allies in 1939\. They endured terrible treatment until the German invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941 suddenly put Stalin in the Allied camp, after which they were evacuated to Iran and formed into the Polish ......