John Stanaway – författare

The story of the highest-scoring P-38 aces of the war, who had claimed approximately half of their total victories by the end of 1943 flying Lightning models ranging from the F-1 through to the H-5. The first P-38s became operational with the 1st Fighter Group in April 1941, and the initial combat deployments were made in Alaska, the Southwest Pacific and North Africa during the latter part of 1942. Photographic reconnaissance versions of the P-38 were in action even sooner when F-4 (P-38E) models were rushed to frontline units a few months after Pearl Harbor.Often using modified field measures to equip aircraft and train pilots in this demanding fighter, early pilots wrote a remarkable record of accomplishments that displayed a high degree of courage and innovation. Every theatre in which the United States was involved saw deployment of the P-38, and more than 60 Lightning pilots were credited with at least five victories by the end of 1943.Featuring illustrations depicting P-38 models from the E to the H-5 previously not known to the general public, unpublished photographs and new data, this volume presents a comprehensive and innovative account of some of these lesser known aces.

The first American fighter fitted with a tricyle undercarriage and mid-mounted engine, the P-39 proved less than successful in the hands of its launch customer, the US Army Air Force (AAF).Hampered by unreliabilty and poor engine performance at high altitude, the P-39 nevertheless served alongside the P-40 and P-38 in the bitter struggle to capture Guadalcanal in 1942/43, as well as seeing much action over the jungles of New Guinea.This book tells the story of around a dozen AAF aces who scored five kills with the P-39, although this total was far outstripped by the Soviet Red Air Force, whose pilots rated the Airacobra as one of the best lend-lease fighters of the war.

Formed with the best available fighter pilots in the Southwest Pacific, the 475th Fighter Group was the pet project of Fifth Air Force chief, General George C Kenney.From the time the group entered combat in August 1943 until the end of the war it was the fastest scoring group in the Pacific and remained one of the crack fighter units in the entire US Army Air Forces with a final total of some 550 credited aerial victories. Amongst its pilots were the leading American aces of all time, Dick Bong and Tom McGuire, with high-scoring pilots Danny Roberts and John Loisel also serving with the 475th.This book details these pilots, the planes they flew and the campaigns and battles they fought in including such famous names as Dobodura, the Huon Gulf, Oro Bay, Rabaul, Hollandia, the Philippines and Luzon.

The P-38 was used on virtually every front to which the USAAF were committed, but enjoyed its greatest successes in the Pacific and China-Burma-India (CBI) theatres.The speed, range and firepower of the P-38 made it the favourite of nearly all aircrew fighting in the Solomons, New Guinea and the Philippines, and over 1800 Japanese aircraft fell to its guns. From the first encounters at the end of 1942 until the Lightning scored the final Fifth Air force victories in August 1945, this book tells the story of the pilots who made the Pacific skies very much their own battleground.

The P-38 made its combat debut in Europe in mid-1942, the first American fighters being flown to the UK before heading further east to Twelfth Air Force units in North Africa.Its service in this theatre, and later over the heartland of Germany itself, earned the P-38 the nickname 'der gabelschwanzer Teufel' (the 'fork-tailed' devil). This volume traces the careers of many previously unknown aces within the USAAF in Europe, and helps redress the balance which has in the past seen all the 'glory' for the fighter victories in this theatre shared between the pilots of the P-47 and P-51. Some 17 pilots scored 7 or more kills on the P-38 in the ETO/MTO.