Air Power at Sea 1939-45

Ref: 4412

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{detailed description}Nobody really knew in 1939 what aircraft would do in the coming war at sea. By 1945 there was no doubt about it. The aircraft had proved itself the most powerful, most flexible, longest-ranging weapon ever used at sea. This book is the first to examine in detail the influence of the aircraft, its successes and its failures. over the whole span of the Second World War at sea — from the first tentative manoeuvrings of the British Home Fleet carriers in 1939 to the final triumphant strikes of the U.S. Fast Carrier Task Force against the mainland of Japan in 1945.
Illustrated by some of the most dramatic war pictures ever published. Air Power at Sea highlights the part aircraft played in all the great actions of the war: in the long and bitter struggle against the Atlantic U-boats, in the daring night attack on the Italian battle fleet at Taranto, the pursuit and destruction of the Bismarck, the blood and sacrifice off Norway. Crete and Guadalcanal. Pearl Harbor, the fate of Prince of Wales and Repulse. the defence of Malta, the life and death of the Tirpitz, the crucial battles of the Coral Sea and Midway, and in the great Allied advance across the remote islands of the Pacific.
There seemed no end to the roles aircraft could play : torpedo strike, fighter defence above fleet and convoy, close support to the assault troops in an amphibious landing, long-range reconnaissance, mine-laying, air-sea rescue, and weather reporting. The art of flying was constantly being refined. There were new aircraft. new weapons. new techniques — and there were new personalities. The Second World War produced a different type of sea captain, one who fully understood the power of aircraft at sea.
As John Winton points out, it was symbolically appropriate that the aircraft carriers, who had so often held the ring in war, stayed at sea, off Japan, while the final Japanese surrender was signed in Tokyo Bay.
{Author / Publisher / Date}by John Winton
Published by BCA/Sidgwick and Jackson 1977 BCA edn. 187pp profusely illustrated, index, bibliography. 19x26
{condition}end papers slightly marked, otherwise good, including d/j.
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