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Richard K. Smith - Five Down, No Glory, Inbunden

Inbunden, Engelska, 2011

Five Down, No Glory

Frank G. Tinker, Mercenary Ace in the Spanish Civil War

Av Richard K. Smith

370 kr

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Beskrivning
This complete biography of a most colourful and uncommon young man is based not only on his memoir, but on Tinker family papers and his own personal records. Through sheer perseverance, he rose from a teenage enlisted seaman, through the U.S. Naval Academy, to the officer’s wardroom and then pressed on to claim the wings of a naval aviator and become a superlative fighter pilot and a published author. More unusual still, he possessed extraordinary people skills that allowed him to deal and move with relative ease among Navy compatriots, foreign combat pilots, left-wing literati in Madrid and Paris, and the rural folk of Arkansas, Mississippi, and Louisiana, who embraced him as “one of their own.” The book also focuses on the aerial tactics introduced in the Spanish Civil War that became standard military practice a few years later in World War II. Included are descriptions of the German introduction of the“Finger Four” fighter formation that replaced the “V of three or four” formation then in vogue; the first use of military airlift to move large numbers of troops and equipment into combat; the greater accuracy and destructiveness of dive bombers versus high altitude bombers; perfection of the “silent approach” used by high altitude bombers before the introduction of radar early warning; and air intelligence reports that asserted daylight high altitude bombers could not “get through” and return from enemy territory successfully without the protection of fighter cover. About the AuthorRichard K. Smith received his undergraduate degrees from the University of Illinois and his Ph.D. from the University of Chicago. He died before completing the manuscript of Five Down, No Glory, which was completed by R. Cargill Hall.
Produktinformation
  • Utgivningsdatum: 2011-12-01
  • Mått: 165 x 242 x undefined mm
  • Vikt: 682 g
  • Format: Inbunden
  • Språk: Engelska
  • Antal sidor: 384
  • Förlag: Naval Institute Press
  • ISBN: 9781612510545
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Richard K. Smith received his undergraduate degrees from the University of Illinois and his Ph.D. from the University of Chicago. He is the author of The Airships Akron and Macon: Flying Aircraft Carriers of the United States Navy, the award-winning First Across! The U.S. Navy’s Transatlantic Flight of 1919 and numerous articles on the history of aeronautics. He died before completing the manuscript of Five Down, No Glory.R. Cargill Hall is Emeritus Chief Historian of the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO), an intelligence arm of the Department of Defense. Previously he served in various history positions for the Air Force History and Museums Program. Still earlier he served as historian at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. He lives in Arlington, TX.

Recensioner i media

Frank Tinker, had an odd background for an ace in the Spanish Republican Air Force: a product of the U.S. Naval Academy (class of 1933), the Army Aviation Cadet program and Navy flight training, he resigned his commission when off-duty indiscretions made his future in the Navy problematic. Utterly apolitical, he found employment with the Spanish Republic where he put his flying skills to good use, racking up eight kills against the best the Nationalists had to offer. Richard Smith and R. Cargill Hall relate Tinker’s colorful—some would say bizarre—story with panache, using it as to illuminate the Spanish Civil War and the history of aerial warfare during a period of portentous change. The story is filled with larger than life characters, including Ernest Hemingway, American aviators “Whitey” Dahl and “Ajax” Baumler, and Soviet pilots who went on to general officer rank in the Red Air Force… or death in the Gulag. It is also packed with informed commentary on the aircraft Tinker flew and fought against. This is aviation history at its best, and with a human touch!

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