Current Reading: April 2022

First up with Seaforth World Naval Review 2021, another good edition in a series I probably should be collecting.

... following on from last week, Volumes 2-5 of South Pacific Air War by Michael Claringbould and Peter Ingman arrived by post from Avonmore Books on Thursday morning, extremely well wrapped (cling filmed, inside bubble wrap, inside cardboard), which is a pretty fast turnaround via post from Adelaide, given I only ordered last weekend. I'm going to need a bit of time to get through them and give a thorough review, on top of Volume 1 that I already have. See if I can get it done by the end of the month.

Finished an excellent Waterloo: The History of Four Days, Three Armies, and Three Battles by Bernard Cornwell.

Currently I am reading Frontiersmen: Warfare in Africa since 1950 by Anthony Clayton

Part of the Routledge Warfare and History series. I have finally run to ground almost all of this series that interests me

>4 Macbeth:

Thanks for drawing this one to my attention. I've lived through two African wars in the last fifty years and been aware of several others in neighbouring countries or where friends and colleagues were involved, so I'd be interested in this book. I may wait and see if you post a review before ordering.

... or watching as the case may be. I've found in recent years the local Salvation Army Opp Shop is a great place to go hunting for DVD's, secondhand cheap in good condition. Yesterday I picked up Lancaster Voices being interviews with Lancaster crew, Target Germany, a bundle of 6 wartime films produced by USAAF on the strategic bombing campaign (confusingly the DVD cover features 83 Sqn RAF Bomber Command Lancaster), and finally the USAAF classic Target for Today - (again somewhat confusingly the DVD cover features a well known colour photo of RAF aircrew in front of a Fortress in Coastal Command livery! ... who knows... perhaps Cinderella tagged along on a raid with 8th for a bit of excitement!?) All these documentaries are probably on Youtube if you care to hunt them down, it's just nice to have a hard copy in the library.

>6 Bushwhacked: Hmm, I remember watching Target for Today and it was about the RAF. Maybe there were two films with that title... no, now that I think of it, the RAF one was titled Target for Tonight. But maybe whoever reissued it made that same mistake I did!

Speaking of unusual places to shop, I live on the east coast of Florida but several times a year we take a ride over to the other coast where the Goodwill organization has actual bookstores rather than just randomly putting their donated books onto shelves in one of their big stores. They are nicely organized and get a really eclectic selection, no doubt helped by the fact that so many people move to the area to retire and find they no longer have room for their book collections. Or, sadly, folks pass away and the relatives just don't know what to do with all their books and so they take them to Goodwill.

While you can't plan on walking into the store and getting a book you are looking for, often I'll walk out with a bag of books I'll think I might eventually want to read. For years I've had a copy of The Bourbons of Naples, 700+ pages, on my shelf that I picked up there because, I figure, I will eventually get around to reading it. Or not. And someday my relatives will have to figure out what to do with my collection, so it's the Great Circle of Life.

>7 jztemple: Directions will be left to my siblings about what books in my collection are worth real money and which ones can be dumped on charity; though my brother-in-law might be interested in the aviation-related stuff in the end.

>7 jztemple: Just going from memory, think you may be referring "Target for Tonight" which was '42/43 film about a Bomber Command Wellington crew (?)... will have to have a fossick on Youtube.

Opp shops (thrift stores) in Australia with regards books I find these days can more often be more trash than treasure, but it's always worth a look because you just never know, and I have picked up some good stuff over the years. I do know the Brotherhood of St Lawrence down here runs a pretty serious online bookstore: https://www.brotherhoodbooks.org.au/

>8 Shrike58: Yeh... I probably need to get organised in that department... I'm continually astonished these days at the secondhand valuations of some of the books in my library that I've accumulated over the years.

>7 jztemple: 149 Squadron RAF Wellingtons (1941!)...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PDTLeFl8cXU

>11 Bushwhacked: Thanks, that was the one I remember watching. I remember in one of the books I've read about the RAF Bomber Command in WW2 the author discussed the experience of the crews of the British bombers earlier in the war. He pointed out that for most crews, the experience of a bombing raid was fairly lonely. You took off and flew in the dark, out of sight of any other bombers. You might run into flak and searchlights at a target, but you might not (especially if you were off course!). You dropped your bombs at what you hoped was somewhat near the target and then headed home. If your navigator was reasonably good, you made it back and landed, finally actually seeing the other bombers that had been on the same mission. So much different than the daylight bombing experience.

And speaking of getting rid of books after you pass, my wife has informed me that if I go before her she intends to call book dealers and make a deal to have them all carted off en masse. Sadly I don't have a single relative who would enjoy my collection of history and other non-fiction books.

>12 jztemple: speaking of getting rid of books after you pass

I've asked that all my collection on Sudan (which includes papers as well as books) be donated to a particular British university which has a specialist archive on Sudan. I've also asked that my executors try to find a good home for my railway book collection, which includes quite a lot of rare African books, but that's not so easy as there isn't a single place like the university. There are specialist auction houses in UK for railway material. I don't have a large military collection.

>12 jztemple: In high school back in the '80's I had an english teacher who I learned had been in the RAF during the war. When I summoned the courage to ask him about it, he said he had been in Bomber Command as a tail gunner flying Halifaxes. (He appeared astonished I knew what a Halifax was.) He simply said of his experience "having survived all that, there wasn't much in life left to be fearful about anymore".

>13 John5918: Yes, I would like to give them away, otherwise I have a short list of secondhand dealers who have been good to me over the years that they can be bundled off to. No-one else has an interest.

>14 Bushwhacked:

We had a geography teacher in grammar school back in the sixties who had been in the RAF during the war and had lost a lung. Strangely enough none of us ever got round to asking him about it, even through he was a decent bloke who was quite approachable.

Knocked off Dornier Do 335: The Luftwaffe's Fastest Piston-Engine Fighter after owning it for something like a decade! Still a quality work but one would probably want the expanded reissue that came out in 2017.

>17 Shrike58: A few decades ago I had a fascination with WW2 aircraft and picked up many books about them, but I never did get a good book about the Do 335, which I considered one of the most interesting aircraft. I've added that book to my wishlists.

>18 jztemple: It appears the only remaining example is in the National Air and Space Museum, somewhat easier for you and Shrike58 to go and see than for some of the rest of us! The only push-me pull-you I've ever seen in flight is a Cessna Skymaster... someone used to fly one around here over Melbourne a fair bit, but I haven't seen it in some years.

>19 Bushwhacked: Ah, the Cessna Mixmaster! We have at least one that flies out of an airport near me. They have a warbird museum and so I get to see the odd old plane flying overhead occasionally.

Finished Operation Don's Left Wing, or it might be more accurate to say it finished with me. If nothing else one gets a certain grim amusement out of reading the constant stream of "helpful" memos that the Soviet operational command team received from Moscow, and then compares that with the shambles one sees in the current Russo-Ukrainian fight.

... and it's heartening to read in the news today the Russian Navy displaying similar levels of professional (in)competence to the Russian Army and Airforce.

>20 jztemple: We just had the Formula 1 Grand Prix here in Melbourne last week, not far from me, and they put on an air display - usually it's just the RAAF Roulettes and an F-18. This year no F-18, but I suddenly heard the unmistakable snarl of a Merlin... went out on the balcony and they were putting a P51 through its paces. Wish they did that every year!

Finished War and Society in Ancient Mesoamerica yesterday. Outdated in some respects, highly speculative in others, I still found it quite interesting.

Finished Bobs: Kipling's General: Life of Field-Marshal Earl Roberts of Kandahar, VC by W.H. Hannah. Rather hagiographic but interesting never the less.

>22 Bushwhacked: The Russian Big Push is now on in the South as of today (4/19), and we'll find out whether they have got their $#!+ together. My impression is that the goal is to take SOME city that the average Russian can identify on a map and call that a victory. We'll see if ten-thousand or so replacements, giving command to a general best known for slaughtering Syrian civilians, and open terrain really makes a difference. There may actually be more Ukrainian troops in the field than Russians at this stage of the game.

Second thought: Having actually seen a map of the current axis of attack, the "small solution" of annexing Luhansk and Donetsk seems to be the deal.

>26 Shrike58: Yes, I think the Russians are getting fairly desperate to salvage something out of this. In order for that to happen as a bare minimum they need to sort out their lines of supply and we will know fairly shortly whether they have done that. Secondly, I think they need to achieve local air superiority in the battlespace above their forward troops. From what we have seen to date they appear incapable of doing so. The use of drones to destroy armour and vehicles now makes that imperative. I suspect the use of the drones is so completely asymetric to Russian capabilities they have not figured out how to counter them. The main thing the Russians have going for them appears to be their artillery, and they probably have enough of it to cause a severe amount of pain to Ukrainian infantry if caught in the open. At the end of the day it will still, I believe, come down to the quality and quantity of the infantry. In that regard I'm satisfied the Ukrainian infantry will continue to have the better morale and motivation.

Considering the size and population of Russia, compared to Ukraine ... you might think they would have an easy time of it ... but why on earth do they want to take over Ukraine? If they continue to destroy everything in sight ...what will Putin be gaining except piles of rubble and angry Ukrainians. Doesn't make sense.

>28 Rood:

Most wars don't make sense when one stops and thinks about it!

>28 Rood: I've recently been following the Youtube channel of one of your fellow countrymen, a Mr Peter Zeihan ,who is a geopolitcs expert. He certainly appears to be making some interesting analysis of what is going on in Russia and the Ukraine and may be worth a look...

https://www.youtube.com/c/ZeihanonGeopolitics/videos

>28 Rood: Never underestimate lingering resentment over the dissolution of the Soviet Union; a lot of Russians of the older generation consider that turn of events a bad cosmic joke. In as much as Putin cares about public opinion, those are the people he's pandering to. My impression is the thought was that this would be easy; then again, if the military men advising Putin are all "yes men," you can draw your own conclusions. There were competent people trying to sort out the Russian military circa 2000-2010, but they got in the way of the graft so they were side-lined. It's rapidly becoming obsolete but Russia's Crony Capitalism is worth hunting down for background.

Finished up Cavalry of the American Revolution, which turned out to be a a quite good collection of essays from a conference on the topic.

Following on from last month I have been working my way through the South Pacific Air War series by Michael Claringbould and Peter Ingman.

South Pacific Air War Volume 1: The Fall of Rabaul December 1941-March 1942
South Pacific Air War Volume 2: The Struggle for Moresby March-April 1942
South Pacific Air War Volume 3: Coral Sea and Aftermath May-June 1942
South Pacific Air War Volume 4: Buna and Milne Bay June-September 1942
South Pacific Air War Volume 5: Crisis in Papua September-December 1942

This series of books started out as a trilogy, that has expanded out to five volumes so far for a total of over 1,000 pages covering the first 13 months of the air war over New Guinea and surrounds. Given we are only at the end of 1942 by the end of Volume 5 there is still potentially a long way to go, however it is noted the Solomon Islands campaign appears to have been spun off into a separate series. The books are a highly readable narrative history written from Australian, Japanese and US primary and secondary sources which are all referenced in the bibliography. The books are also indexed. They are liberally illustrated with black and white photos from the period which are most interesting, and most of which I had never seen before. The first three volumes contain colour profile sections of aircraft of all combatants, and these are really good. I was less thrilled with the maps, which are basic but at least included (I’m rarely satisfied with provided maps!). Also scattered among the pages is digital artwork, some quite good, some less so.

So… recommended? Yes, if you have a specific interest in this period. What I really valued was the all encompassing nature of the work covering all sides of the conflict, especially the realistic emphasis on American and Japanese forces and operational experiences as the campaign progresses. (I have plenty of books on the RAAF in the SWPA and don't need any more!). And it is all interesting and readable. I would strongly recommend you visit the publishers website for more information on which to form your own opinion. I ordered 4 of the 5 volumes direct from the Publisher and would recommend that route if you are in Australia, as dispatch was prompt and well wrapped. The publisher has been pretty liberal in making available samples of text, photos and artwork from each volume, and I would encourage you to check it out if you are interested:

avonmorebooks.com.au