Masters of the Air: America's Bomber Boys Who Fought the Air War Against Nazi Germany

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Fighting at 25,000 feet in thin, freezing air that no warriors had ever encountered before, bomber crews battled new kinds of assaults on body and mind. Air combat was deadly but intermittent: periods of inactivity and anxiety were followed by short bursts of fire and fear. Unlike infantrymen, bomber boys slept on clean sheets, drank beer in local pubs, and danced to the swing music of Glenn Miller's Air Force band, which toured U.S. air bases in England. But they had a much greater chance of dying than ground soldiers. In 1943, an American bomber crewman stood only a one-in-five chance of surviving his tour of duty, twenty-five missions. The Eighth Air Force lost more men in the war than the U.S. Marine Corps.

The bomber crews were an elite group of warriors who were a microcosm of America -- white America, anyway. (African-Americans could not serve in the Eighth Air Force except in a support capacity.) The actor Jimmy Stewart was a bomber boy, and so was the "King of Hollywood," Clark Gable. And the air war was filmed by Oscar-winning director William Wyler and covered by reporters like Andy Rooney and Walter Cronkite, all of whom flew combat missions with the men.The Anglo-American bombing campaign against Nazi Germany was the longest military campaign of World War II, a war within a war. Until Allied soldiers crossed into Germany in the final months of the war, it was the only battle fought inside the German homeland.

Strategic bombing did not win the war, but the war could not have been won without it. American airpower destroyed the rail facilities and oil refineries that supplied the German war machine. The bombing campaign was a shared enterprise: the British flew under the cover of night while American bombers attacked by day, a technique that British commanders thought was suicidal.

Masters of the Air is a story, as well, of life in wartime England and in the German prison camps, where tens of thousands of airmen spent part of the war. It ends with a vivid description of the grisly hunger marches captured airmen were forced to make near the end of the war through the country their bombs destroyed.

Drawn from recent interviews, oral histories, and American, British, German, and other archives, Masters of the Air is an authoritative, deeply moving account of the world's first and only bomber war.

What Customers Say About Masters of the Air: America's Bomber Boys Who Fought the Air War Against Nazi Germany:

This is not the case here. Its scope is truly amazing. If anyone is interested in the creation and growth of the Eighth Air Force in the European Theater during World War II, this is the book to read. I not only flew threw this book, but have recommended it to everyone I know. As an avid reader of non fiction/history one of the key things I look at is readability. I don't care how phenomenal a book can be if the writing drags. I even lent it to my sister-in-law so she could read it. For anyone interested in this period of WW2 I say buy this book, you won't be sorry.

For all military history buffs this is a must read. Exceedingly well researched, nicely written, this book contains little known anecdotes from those who were there. Do not be put off by the sheer size of this book -- it's hard to put down.Above review by retired USAF fighter pilot.

Masters of the Air presents a truly expansive perspective on the air war waged against the Third Reich by 8th Air Force. Insights into the reality of "pinpoint" bombing, the casualties on both sides, the window opening on Swiss "neutrality", the state of prisoners of war, the decisions to carpet bomb and fire bomb civilian populations, the thin line of demarcation between admitted British and American bombing strategies and the reality thereof. All combine to make this book a "can't put down" item. Exceptionally well researched and presented.

I think this is a very good book covering both the tactical level of the bomber boys and also the strategic level of Doolittle and up to Churchill. The book is very detailed and covers not only the well-known facts and aerial raids such as the Schweinfurt-Regenburg, but also about all sort of experience that an airman can expect to encounter on base and in midair. The only thing that is a little disappointing to me is the layout, which scattered articles all around the book, making it a little diffcult to follow. However, I believe this is a must read for general info about the aerial theater.

A friend of mine was returning this book to its owner when I intercepted it. I have always been fascinated with the air war of WW2 and this book promised to give me a lot of insight into the air war over Europe. It did that in spades, almost to the point that I began to wonder if I really wanted to learn about all that went on, as the real history of this period is seriously depressing when one looks at the ravages of war on the scale of WW2.At times, I wondered if Miller had an ulterior motive in writing this book to make it a definitive anti-war account, but I have come to the conclusion that war is often such disorganized Hell that it makes that point by itself without any prodding from an author that is trying to tell about it.It is easy from the distance of time to romanticize the "bomber boys" of WW2, but there is little in those years that is truly romantic while there is much to admire about the bravery of those on both sides who waged the war with little expectation that they would live to see it's end. This is a sobering a review of the madness that was the air war in Europe told both interestingly and frankly as you are likely to find and it should be required reading by all who seek knowledge from those times.