Mark Rolfe – Illustratör

It could be argued that the heyday of British military aircraft flight testing began in the 1940s, and continued throughout the three decades that followed, during the so-called Cold War period, and as such, the authors have purposely chosen the first 30 years, The Golden Years, 1945 to 1975, from the end of World War Two until the mid-1970s, as this was arguably the most exciting period with many wonderful and new types rubbing shoulders with wartime and immediate post-war designs that were utilised for development purposes, making for an eclectic mix of shapes and colour schemes.Alongside the technical aspects of military testing and development, are the many and varied colour schemes and markings carried by the aircraft themselves - not only by the brand-new experimental designs, but by existing production machines, suitably modified, to greater or lesser degrees, to develop the technical advances in systems and weaponry.Scores of different aircraft types are covered in _British Military Test & Evaluation Aircraft The Golden Years 1945 - 1975_, with over 65 rarely seen contemporary photographs from private collections, and, differing slightly from previous _Flight Craft_ book formats, over 50 pages of specially commissioned full colour profiles and plan views, visually chronicling the diverse range of colour schemes and markings applied to these fascinating aeroplanes.Compiled by Neil Robinson and Martin Derry, who have authored several other _Flight Craft_ books, with informative background text by well known aviation historian Malcolm V Lowe and superbly executed illustrations by Mark Rolfe. As with other books in the _Flight Craft_ series, although published with aircraft modellers in mind, it is hoped that most aviation enthusiasts will find something of interest here too.

The sterling work of the Fifteenth Air Force is often overshadowed by the glamorous 'Mighty Eighth', yet the men flying the B-24 fought ceaselessly right through to VE Day.The B-24 was heavily utilised in the North African and Mediterranean theatres by the USAAF's Fifteenth Air Force, with operations over the Ploesti oilfields in Rumania being some of the most famous missions undertaken by the big American 'heavy' in World War 2.This is the third of five titles charting the operational history of the Consolidated heavy bomber, and is the first single volume to exclusively cover the Fifteenth Air Force's B-24 units.

The most produced Japanese bomber of the war, the G4M saw action on every front from the first day of the Pacific conflict through to VJ-Day.The 'Betty's' very long range made it a key weapon during the opening year of the war. However, to achieve this, the aircraft was built with very little protective armour for its crew or fuel tanks, and Allied pilots soon exposed its extreme vulnerability.In the first in a series of volumes examining the key Japanese aircraft of WW2, Dr Osamu Tagaya details the G4M's extensive combat history, and lists all the units which operated the bomber.

Exposing the true scale and significance of the deployment of air power in the Balkans, this book details the activities of NATO and UN aircraft as well as local pilots in the former Yugoslavia.From bombing by B-2 stealth bombers to air-to-air combat; from moving ground troops by helicopter to 'food-bombing' for refugees, air power played a vital role in 'Europe's Vietnam', and there is little sign that the fires of conflict are being extinguished. As this book discusses alongside detailed illustrations, debate amongst air power practitioners has yielded little agreement as to the degree of damage inflicted on the Yugoslav 3rd Army in Kosovo, and the Balkans continue to be a region of conflict and ethnic hatred.

The war fought between the United Kingdom and Argentina in 1982, for the possession of the Falkland Islands, was probably the last 'colonial' war that will ever be undertaken by the British.This book shows how the key to British success was the speed with which the British gained and then maintained air superiority over the islands and the waters around then with their small force of Sea Harrier STOVL warplanes, which operated from two aircraft carriers. Though subsonic, the Sea Harrier and its Sidewinder AAM were a combination altogether superior to Argentina's mix of supersonic and subsonic warplanes with older weapons, and this advantage was emphasised by the significantly greater tactical acuity of the British pilots.Alongside stunning illustrations, this book explains how, although the Argentine pilots fought with considerable piloting skill and enormous courage, and scored a number of stunning successes against British warships, ultimately they could not prevent the British landing and the following land campaign that resulted in complete Argentine defeat.

When the UN called for the end of the British mandate and the partition of Palestine into two independent states, the RAF found itself under attack from both sides.Tracing the development of hostilities in the Middle East, this book covers the period from the establishment of the first proper Israeli Air Force in 1948 to the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982. Israel's War of Independence against its Arab neighbours, the inevitable 'round two', the Suez Crisis of 1956, the Six Day War of 1967, the Yom Kippur wars of 1973 and the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982 are all detailed in this fascinating chronicle of war in the Middle East.

In August 1990 Saddam Hussein's Iraqi forces invaded and occupied the small Arab state of Kuwait.This book analyses the ensuing Gulf War (16 January - 28 February 1991) - a war fought to expel Iraq and restore Kuwaiti independence if not, as one British MP tartly observed, to defend democracy. The allies under General Schwarzkopf launched five weeks of air attacks, deploying 1,800 technologically highly advanced aircraft from the US, British, French and Saudi air forces.Many of these machines, including the British Tornadoes and US F-117A Stealth fighters, had never before engaged in combat, and their combined assault, watched by millions on TV, combined impressive accuracy with firepower to which the Iraqi forces had no answer.

Featuring illustrations throughout, a detailed exploration of the unlikely aces among the Austro-Hungarians.Starting the war with only 35 aircraft, Austro-Hungarian industry went on to produce only moderate numbers of poor quality aircraft. The fliers of the Austro-Hungarian Empire operating on the Serbian and Russian fronts were fortunate at first, finding themselves faced by small numbers of aircraft yet more obsolescent than their own. Serbia fell in 1915, but when Italy declared war the Austro-Hungarians were still faced with a two-front war – a static front against Italy, and a far more fluid one against Russia.As Christopher Chant explains in this compact volume, Austro-Hungarian fighter pilots performed bravely and often very effectively under extremely difficult geographic, climatic and operational conditions.

An illustrated history of how the British fighter developed, both single- and two-seaters.At the outset of World War I the British had some 110 assorted aircraft, used mostly for the visual reconnaissance role. With the advent of faster and more agile single-seaters, the Allies and their adversaries raced to outdo each other in the creation of genuinely effective fighters with fixed forward-firing machine gun armament. It was not until 1917 that the British developed a truly effective interrupter gear, which paved the way for excellent single seaters such as the Sopwith Triplane Camel and the RAF S.E.5., later joined by the Bristol F.2B - the war's best two-seat fighter.This volume traces the rapid development of the fighter in World War I and the amazing exploits of the British and Empire aces who flew them.

Although the Spitfire is undoubtedly best known for its exploits against the Luftwaffe during the Battle of Britain, its later war service with Fighter Command on all fronts against the Axis alliance was equally as important.This volume features the exploits of pilots who turned the tide against the Luftwaffe on the Western European and Mediterranean fronts, as well as the Japanese in the Far East, flying Spitfire Mk VIs, VIIs, VIIIs, IXs XIIs and XIVs. Names like Johnnie Johnson, Neville Duke and Donald Kingaby, plus a myriad of lesser known British, Polish, Canadian, American, Australian, Czech, Free French, New Zealand and Norwegian pilots, and their aircraft, are all covered in this book.

Spitfire Mk Is and IIs served only briefly in the frontline with the RAF, but their pilots were responsible for achieving impressive scores against the Luftwaffe during 1940/41.This volume details the RAF's first aces of World War 2 who helped stem the German tide during Britain's struggle for survival in the bitter years between 1939 and 1941. Early-mark Spitfires were notorious for their light armament, overheating engines and short range, but during the dogfights over Dunkirk and south-east England, then the first tentative sweeps across France, many pilots achieved scores of note.

Ever present in the Pacific from Pearl Harbor to VJ-Day, the B-24 Liberator proved to be the staple heavy bomber of the campaign.From its ignominious beginnings in the Allied rout in the Philippines and the Dutch East Indies, this illustrated volume explores how the bomber weathered the Japanese storm with a handful of bomb groups, which played a crucial role in checking the enemy's progress firstly in New Guinea, and then actively participating in the 'island hopping' campaign through the south-west Pacific.