I'm sure that most of you by now are aware of the outstanding Finnish AF history books in the Suomen Ilmavoimien Historia series. Without a doubt, the Finnish Air Force is one of the best researched subjects, much of it thanks to the authors and publishers of this series.

This particular edition is a reprint/update of an earlier edition that has been long out of print. It covers the Hawk 75 with a small section on the P-40M. The Hawk 75 was not originally delivered to the Finnish AF by Curtiss, but came as a result of the fall of France and the sales of war booty by the Germans in 1940. By early 1941, delivery had started, first with  seven Wright Cyclone powered aircraft and twelve Pratt & Whitney Twin Wasp powered planes as well. All later deliveries were of the P&W powered Hawk 75s. The Hawk 75 gave good service against Soviet forces, producing a number of aces. Survivors continued in through the late 1940s and they were still visible in scrap yards and technical schools of the early 1950s.

The book also covers the lone P-40M that was captured from the Russians. It was not flown in combat and thanks to a lack of spares, was flown sporadically. However, over 60 hours was put on it before it was broken up as scrap in 1950.

Typical of all books in this series, the photographs are superb with as many aircraft as possible being shown. There is an outstanding section of profiles on the covers and an individual aircraft history is also provided. I'd hoped that this book would use the combined Finnish/Engish that was used in their most recent publication, but being a reprint, that was not done, the English narrative confined to barely two pages at the back of the book. All the captions are in both Finnish and English so one can glean a lot of information from that source.

Overall, a truly outstanding book and one that enthusiasts of the subject must have on their shelves.

October 2004

Review book courtesy of  Kari Stenman Publishing, where you can order your copy of this and several other superb books on the Finnish AF.

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