This is the second volume of Dr. Price's superb history of the bombing campaign against Germany. This one covers 1943 to the end of the war and like the first volume, it is chocked full of personal stories, superb photos and excellent profiles. Some of the material is shared with other Classic books, but much of it is germane to this volume alone.

Covered in this edition is the finest hours of the Luftwaffe night fighter force, the ascendancy of the Allied escort fighters and the ever increasing numbers of bombers. After the Normandy landings, things just got worse for the Luftwaffe as bombing campaigns switched to eliminating the fuel supply for the Wehrmact. It is somewhat ironic that maximum fighter production came at a time when fuel was so scarce that many new aircraft sat at fields across Germany with tanks empty of gasoline.

As always in warfare, there was an electronic war being waged at night between the RAF and night fighters. When one side gained an advantage, that would be countered by the other side and so it went. Eventually, sheer numbers and improved electronics were on the side of the Allies, but the Germans kept trying up until the very end.

This volume also introduces us to the jet and rocket fighters used in the last days of the war. Their numbers were too small to make any sort of dent in the Allied armada, and while we always wonder what might have been, it is pointed out that had the war in Europe lasted into the fall of 1945, one of the atomic bombs used on the Japanese would probably have fallen on a German city.

Overall, an excellent book and one that I can most highly recommend along with the previous volume.

April 2006

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