Osprey 2027 - Air Campaign - Bodenplatte, Berlin Airlift, Philippines 1944-45 +

[Edward]

The Kuban 1943: The bloody struggle over the Caucasus
(21 January 2027)
By William E. Hiestand. Illustrated by Adam Tooby

"This is the first book to study the air campaign over the Kuban, the little-known turning point of the Eastern Front air war.

In April and May 1943, the Luftwaffe and Soviet Air Force (VVS) engaged in an intense battle for air superiority over the Kuban Peninsula. Both sides launched maximum efforts to support offensives by their ground forces as the Germans battled to destroy the small beachhead held by the Red Army, while the Soviets tried to drive them into the Kerch Straits. It was the focus of the Eastern Front air war in spring 1943.

Soviet military historian William E. Hiestand explores how this huge air campaign saw the balance of power shift away from the Luftwaffe. Thousands of aircraft fought to support the ground forces and to battle for air superiority. Although the Luftwaffe exacted heavy losses, the Soviets’ capabilities were vastly improved, and by the end of the struggle the VVS had for the first time had seized air superiority from its foes through offensive action. The Kuban also proved to be a ‘school’ for refining new offensive techniques, which would serve the Soviets well in the upcoming battle of Kursk, and through to victory.

Illustrated throughout with rare photos, original artwork, 3D diagrams and maps, this is a detailed study of the first campaign in which the Soviets could meet and match the Luftwaffe in direct battle."
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Berlin Airlift 1948–49: The opening battle of the Cold War
(29 April 2027)
By Mark Lardas. Illustrated by Edouard A. Groult

"Fully illustrated throughout, this is a focused study of how the greatest airlift of the 20th century was sparked, organized and flown, and why it succeeded.

The Berlin Airlift was the first battle of the Cold War, and arguably its most decisive operation. In the opening act as the Iron Curtain descended across Europe, the USSR blockaded free West Berlin to force its surrender. Its only chance was a Western airlift on a scale never attempted, to feed and heat a capital city through air power alone.

In this book, aviation historian Mark Lardas studies the Berlin Airlift on the strategic, technical, and operational levels. Berlin would starve if the campaign was not flown relentlessly and at maximum efficiency, eking the most out of World War II technology. Flown by US and British forces with French and local German assistance on the ground, the airlift was initially improvised, but its systems were rapidly streamlined to maximise capacity and speed at all costs, with one transport reaching Berlin every 30 seconds at its height, and it cost more than 100 fatalities.

This is the story of an operation that forged West Germany out of the rubble of occupied zones, led to the West banding together in NATO, proved the capability of Anglo-American air forces to flexibly project power, and saved the West Berliners from the grip of Stalin."
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Operation Bodenplatte 1945: Death ride of the Luftwaffe
(24 June 2027)
By Julian Hale. Illustrated by Adam Tooby

"A freshly researched, superbly illustrated assessment of Operation Bodenplatte, the Luftwaffe's desperate bid to support the Battle of the Bulge, and its last attempt at a major offensive.

With the Allies on Germany’s borders, Hitler’s Ardennes offensive – the Battle of the Bulge – was intended to split the advancing British and American armies. The Luftwaffe was to commit much of its remaining fighter strength to support the advance with air cover, preceded by a large-scale attack on the Allies’ airfields. Operation Bodenplatte would be launched on New Year’s Day, 1945.

Drawing upon primary sources including unit diaries, combat reports, and captured German documents, Julian Hale describes and analyses the strategy, tactics and operations of the Luftwaffe fighters and the Allied air defences on 1 January 1945, as the German fighter arm fought its last offensive of the war. He takes care to assess and explain the critical weaknesses which had long made the Luftwaffe's mission impossible, and he fully explains how Bodenplatte sat in the context of the Ardennes offensive.

Packed with archive photos, original artwork, maps and 3D diagrams, this is the story of how the Luftwaffe threw its last coherent units into the war in the West, and how the losses on New Year's Day 1945 sealed its fate."

The Author
"Julian Hale read History at Lancaster University and completed an MA on the RFC and RAF in the Middle East during World War I. In 2012, he joined the RAF Museum and catalogued the Jack Bruce Collection, an archive of World War I and inter-war aircraft and personnel images. He was the Assistant Curator for the Museum’s Centenary Programme until June 2018 and is the author of The RAF: 1918-2018 and Women in Aviation." and The Blitz 1940–41: The Luftwaffe's Biggest Strategic Bombing Campaign (Osprey 2023) and Normandy 1944: The 'Transportation Plan' to Cut D-Day Communications (Osprey 2025).
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Atlantic 1939–44: The Luftwaffe's great missed opportunity
(19 August 2027)
By Lawrence Paterson. Illustrated by Adam Tooby

"Fully illustrated, a thorough reassessment of Germany’s famous Atlantic air campaign, and how the Luftwaffe sabotaged its own chances to defeat the convoys.

To many, the Luftwaffe’s Atlantic campaign is synonymous with KG 40 and its Focke-Wulf Condors, the so-called Wolf of the Atlantic. However, the real story of Germany’s biggest and much-misunderstood maritime air campaign is much broader, and represents one of the great missed opportunities of the war.

In this book, Lawrence Paterson reassesses the whole of the Atlantic campaign from its first actions as the Battle of France still raged, with the tragic sinking of the Lancastria off Saint-Nazaire. From autumn 1940 the units detailed to the Atlantic fought a complex war both to guard their new coastline and strike at the Allied convoys. However, despite early successes, the campaign was devoid of strategic planning and commitment, and suffered from the Luftwaffe’s focus on personalities rather than military objectives, leaving the combat units often reliant on good luck. By 1943, the campaign had turned to the defensive, and the end was in sight.

Illustrated throughout with archive photos, maps and original artwork, and examining the full spectrum of the campaign, from the floatplanes, fighters and minelayers that defended the ports and peripheries to the legendary long-range Condors and flying boats, this is a thorough new analysis of how Germany lost the oceanic air war."
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Philippines 1944–45: Airpower leads MacArthur's reconquest
(23 December 2027)
By Mark Stille and John Rogers. Illustrated by Adam Tooby

"In the invasion of the Philippines, the last conquest of the Pacific War, the battle for air supremacy was led by the USAAF. Fully illustrated, this is the first study of the air campaign.

The role of air power during the battles for Leyte and Luzon, and for the entire Philippines campaign, has been largely overshadowed by the huge naval battle fought at the start of the campaign and then by the emergence of the kamikaze. Yet the invasion was built on achieving command of the air, and unusually for the Pacific War, the campaign to do so was led by the US Army Air Force.

In this book, airpower scholars Mark Stille and John Rogers examine this neglected air campaign, which drew on the lessons learned from the vicious fighting over New Guinea. For the Japanese, the defence of the Philippines was deemed utterly essential and worthy of Japan’s remaining strength in the air. But after a rough start, the USAAF succeeded in gaining and maintaining air supremacy, with a large assist from the US Navy, and forced the withdrawal of the last Japanese air forces.

Packed with archive photos, superb original artwork, maps and diagrams, this also detail the reasons for the Japanese failure and what allowed the Allies to win so convincingly, and discusses the impact of the Philippines air campaign on the remainder of the Pacific War."

https://www.ospreypublishing.com/ca/...-air-campaign/

[Edward]

Osprey Publishing Big Reveal 2027: Duel
Friday, July 24, 2026

Spitfire V vs Fw 190: Northwest Europe 1941–42
(21 January 2027)
By Andy Saunders. Illustrated by Gareth Hector and Jim Laurier

"An illustrated account of the challenge posed to RAF Fighter Command’s Spitfire V-equipped squadrons by the Luftwaffe’s Fw 190A, and the ways in which British and German pilots fought to control the skies on the Channel Front.

The introduction of Focke-Wulf’s Fw 190A to Luftwaffe service presented RAF Spitfire V pilots with a formidable new foe that could quite literally run rings around them. First encountered over France in September 1941, the Fw 190 – or ‘Butcher Bird’ – soon demonstrated its startling capabilities, taking RAF Fighter Command completely by surprise and forcing the swift development of new tactics and methods in an attempt to counter it. The actions that ensued were some of the most fiercely contested of the air war in northwest Europe, and would lead to the production and eventual fielding of the Spitfire IX.

In this new study, European air war expert Andy Saunders details how the RAF – having perhaps become complacent about the superiority of the Spitfire – found itself left behind with an inferior fighter. Covering the introduction to service of both the Spitfire V and the Fw 190, the fighters’ first encounters and the battles that shaped subsequent tactics and design, the volume combines combat reports and first-hand accounts with archive photographs and newly commissioned artwork and formation diagrams to convey what it was like to be a fighter pilot in both aircraft from 1941 to 1943."
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Typhoon vs German Flak Defences: Western Europe 1943–45
(29 April 2027)
By Matthew Bone. Illustrated by Gareth Hector and Jim Laurier

"An illustrated study of the evolving tactics that powered the deadly clashes between the RAF’s Typhoon Mk IB fighter-bomber and the Flakwaffe's defending anti-aircraft arsenal.

The Flakwaffe’s role was to protect the Wehrmacht’s men, machines and material from aerial attack. Arrayed against them was the RAF’s 2nd Tactical Air Force (TAF), whose fighter-bomber spear was tipped with the Typhoon Mk IB, a fighter modified beyond its original intent. The tactics and weaponry of both adversaries evolved as each sought to outdraw the other, with ‘Bombphoon’ and rocket Typhoon squadrons combining their efforts whilst the Flakwaffe laid deadly traps in fields and on trucks and railway wagons.

In this engrossing study, Typhoon expert Matthew Bone chronicles the exploits of the 2nd TAF’s fighter-bombers and the Flakwaffe arsenal into whose crosshairs they ventured. Drawing on contemporary records of Typhoon operations and historical details of Flak crews, this detailed account utilises newly commissioned artwork, maps and diagrams to shed fresh light on the tactical development of both sides, and the price the RAF ultimately paid for victory."
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G3M “Nell” and G4M “Betty” vs US Navy Warships: 1941–44
(30 September 2027)
By Mark Lardas. Illustrated by Jim Laurier

"An illustrated study of the land-based Imperial Japanese Naval Air Force (IJNAF) long-range twin-engined bomber and its fight against the US Navy for domination of the Pacific theater.

Developed as a means of compensating for the modest number of warships Japan was permitted to build under the strictures of interwar naval limitations treaties, the land-based attack bomber was the IJNAF’s response. Mitsubishi’s G3M "Nell" and G4M "Betty" demonstrated their effectiveness in this role during the first week of the Pacific War by sinking the Royal Navy battleship Prince of Wales and battlecruiser Repulse. Yet their main opponent proved to be the US Navy, in large part due to its greater numeric presence in the waters over which Japan fought.

In this eventful volume, Pacific War specialist Mark Lardas examines how the IJNAF employed its twin-engined bombers against US Navy warships in a series of engagements from 1942–44, and details how the Americans responded to these low-level, frequently nocturnal, attacks. Newly commissioned artwork, maps and tactical diagrams combine with specially selected photographs to bring to life clashes from during the Battle of Makassar Strait, the Battle of Rennell Island, and other key events, vividly demonstrating the strengths and weaknesses of both sets of combatants, aircraft, and warships."

https://www.ospreypublishing.com/ca/...eal-2027-duel/