It is a secret to few who know me that I consider the F-4 Phantom the finest combat jet of the last 50 years since its first flight in 1958. It is also true that the Phantom is disappearing from the skies of many nations that have bought and flown them. The US retired its last active unit in the mid-1990 and now flies only drones. The UK retired theirs in the early 90's and I believe that Israel may also have retired theirs or at least they are nearing retirement. The Iranians may still fly some as well. The Rhino is nearly extinct with the South Koreans, has disappeared from Spanish skies and  almost gone from the Luftwaffe. This leaves only Turkey, Greece, and Japan flying them regularly and perhaps Egypt might have a few left in operation, but I doubt it.

This book is basically a picture book of those Phantoms still being flown by their last operators. This means lots of photos of Greek, Turk, German and Japanese F-4s. There is a small section on the Egyptian, South Korean, and Iranian planes as well. For the US, only those drones operating out of Tyndall are really covered with a single shot of the Holloman based planes. All of this is listed in alphabetical order based on the country in which it is flying.

Photos are very nicely done and provided by a variety of photographers. There is little verbiage aside from what is provided in the photo captions and that is perfectly fine for a book like this. To say that I like it would be a bit of an understatement as it is difficult in my eyes to do a bad book on the original Rhino!

However, my personal feelings aside, this is a superlative book on the last years of the type and one that you really should not be without.

December 2007

Review book courtesy of Specialty Press , where you can order your copy of this and many other superb aviation and modeling books. Visit their website at the link above or call them at 1-800-895-4585

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