B-24 Liberator: Combat Photographs of Mediterranean Theatre
Historic Military Aircraft Series, Vol. 33
(Key Publishing Ltd 2023) "coming soon"
by Bob Livingstone
96 pages - paperback
£16.99
"The B-24 Liberator served as the workhorse of the US armed forces and was used in every theater of war. Under the command of Colonel Halverson, a US task force known as HALPRO was sent to attack Japan, but was diverted en route and instead became embroiled in the Mediterranean theater, carrying out bombing raids to arrest the progress of Axis forces. Images of the early days of the RAF, HALPRO and the US’s 9th and 12th Air Forces illustrate the difficult sandy and dusty conditions in the North African desert, as well as the less sophisticated early model B-24s. The 15th Air Force, operating from Southern Italy, lived in tents through the particularly cold winter of 1944–45, and the sight of the snowy Alps that they crossed daily must have made crews wonder just how they would fare if their aircraft was brought down there. Crossing the Adriatic would have brought different challenges: the B-24 was not best regarded as a ditching platform, and so the Isle of Vis off Croatia beckoned to crews dealing with fuel shortages and battle damage once they left the Croatian coast and were bound for Italy. Unit photographers captured dramatic scenes as bombers were struck with flak and control was lost and many are included in this illustrated volume. With more than 150 images, this book presents a graphic account of the B-24 Liberator, its missions and crews against the backdrop of the Mediterranean theater of war."
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Published last year
B-24 Liberator: Combat Photographs from the European Theater of Operations
Historic Military Aircraft Series Vol. 21
(Key Publishing Ltd - 11 January 2022)
by Bob Livingstone
96 pages - paperback
£15.99
"This book examines one of the two heavy bombers produced by the United States' aviation industry during the Second World War. Prevailing theories of war, based on the outcome of World War One, which had only ended 25 years before, were focused on the ability of a nation to extend its military strength to the enemy's homeland through the use of precision daylight bombing, thus destroying the production of war material and shatter the morale of the people. The RAF decided to instead turn to mass night bombing for the destruction of entire cities, but the USAAF stayed with daylight bombing, relying on its Norden bombsight and its heavily armed aircraft bombers to protect its fighters. In that the bombing never achieved either of the aims against the enemy, it could be considered a failure, but that takes nothing from the courage and tenacity of the men and machines that fought the daylight bombing missions in the skies of Europe between 1942-1945. This beautifully illustrated book shows the B-24 in its various roles across World War Two and the results of a war where no quarter was given."