REQUEST: Good aviation/military books

[Renegade One]

Both the VF-121 F-4 RAG, VX-4 and Top Gun...

Just for the sake of accuracy, Top Gun was a movie...TOPGUN (or Topgun...one word) is the Navy Fighter Weapons School.
Small anal shit, I know, I know...but I'm still bucking for a job as this site's "Syntax, grammar, proper use of the pluperfect past tense, acronym usage and 'everything else related' Jagdfuhrer."
Seven years of college...down the drain...

 

[BusyBee604]

Just for the sake of accuracy, Top Gun was a movie...TOPGUN (or Topgun...one word) is the Navy Fighter Weapons School...

For record purposes only... "TopGun" was USS RANGER's nickname long before the Fighter Weapons school was thought of!
BzB

 

[Renegade One]

For record purposes only... "TopGun" was USS RANGER's nickname long before the Fighter Weapons school was thought of!
BzB

Can't argue with that. Someday we're all going to figure out if this is really an old reference to early western movies, or something else...cuz I doesn't know!

 

[Catmando]

Just for the sake of accuracy, Top Gun was a movie...TOPGUN (or Topgun...one word) is the Navy Fighter Weapons School.
Small anal shit, I know, I know...but I'm still bucking for a job as this site's "Syntax, grammar, proper use of the pluperfect past tense, acronym usage and 'everything else related' Jagdfuhrer."
Seven years of college...down the drain...

A valid point. However, I will see your 'anality', and raise you one 'anality'.

Before TOPGUN was TOPGUN, and before there was ever a Navy Fighter Weapons School, there was as it was called in the vernacular back then, "Top Gun." Actually it was a spin-off of VF-121's F-4 Unit III syllabus. It really hadn't a name yet.

But it was like the Wild West. With the new tactics being introduced – indeed from some of the guys who flew against the 'types' in the desert in Have Drill/Doughnut – and with each engagement, everyone wanted to know, "Who won." IOW, who was the top gun? It was the talk in the O'Club of who were the best that week in ACM. And of what worked and what didn't. Who was the best gunslinger, the top gun of NKX?

As this Top Gun spin-off matured in its stolen borrowed trailer out back of the hangar, it later became an official detachment of the RAG for a year or two. Then finally it became a complete and separate command – NFWS in 1972.

Although the trailer they worked out of initially had TOPGUN in all caps above the door, in all their official correspondence at the time, it was spelled as "Top Gun." At least that is how it is spelled on my NFWS diploma.


Even the authoritative book on TOPGUN's origins spells it as two words rather than one.
So I think either spelling is correct, especially depending upon what timeframe one is talking about.

 

[Gatordev]

If you're interested, Stackpole Books is offering the Kindle version of The Men Who Killed the Luftwaffe for free on Amazon during the next few days.

Talk about flying below the radar... Welcome to the site. I remember reading your first book before going into ROTC. I think that makes one of us old, but not sure which one.

 

[Renegade One]

A valid point. However, I will see your 'anality', and raise you one 'anality'. ...and then some good stuff...

Ouch....hoist on my own petard with "actual, verifiable documentation". Well played! Range control sez: "That's a kill...knock it off, knock it off."

 

[Catmando]

Ouch....hoist on my own petard with "actual, verifiable documentation". Well played! Range control sez: "That's a kill...knock it off, knock it off."

No problem. Should we set up another? Or just RTB to the club for a cold one?

I have always wondered at what point in time everyone started to insist on TOPGUN being all one word and all caps. But it certainly did at some point become the only correct wording, as I have over the years found out. I have no problem with that. I just call it as I remember it, back in the day.

 

[Renegade One]

^^^ Yeah, I don't know either. Probably the first time they ordered ball caps and the vendor made 'em up as "one word". From such things, legends are made.
I'm definitely "up" for the cold one..maybe in Reno this year? Another AW get-together?

 

[BarrettRC8]

If you're interested, Stackpole Books is offering the Kindle version of The Men Who Killed the Luftwaffe for free on Amazon during the next few days.

Thank you Sir, downloading it now. I really enjoyed reading Hornets Over Kuwait while I was in Kingsville.

 

[707guy]

Thank you Sir, downloading it now.

+1 from me - just downloaded it as well.

 

[jayastout]

Thanks ;-).

There's another one just out by yours truly: Fighter Group: The 352nd "Blue-Nosed Bastards" in World War II. It covers one of the most successful USAAF groups ever. Based in England, they started out flying P-47s and later P-51s. Probably the most comprehensive work ever done on a single fighter group. It's written in a popular history style that crosses into scholarly without being boring. Follows a few of the guys pretty closely/personally.

400+ pages, bibliograpy, index, end notes and two photo sections.

S/F,
Guinness

 

[navyao]

Thank you Sir, downloading it now. I really enjoyed reading Hornets Over Kuwait while I was in Kingsville.

Love your quote, great movie!

 

[Flash]

I jus tgot finished reading Nomonhan, 1939 about the Battle of Nomonhan/Khalkhin Gol between the Soviet Union and Japan in the summer of 1939. I was aware of the battle before but this book not only goes into depth about the battle itself, overall a smaller part of the book, but also the larger strategic/geopolitical forces at play and how it may have affected not only the start of WWII but it's outcome as well. It was very illuminating that the Japanese really got their asses handed to them, an entire division was basically wiped out by the Soviets, and that they really weren't all that good at fighting against a 'modern' and mechanized enemy that was roughly of 'equal' competence on open terrain. Also interesting to see how good a job General Zhukov did and how he did it, provided good practice for later fighing ze Germans.

The only complaint was that it was a bit heavy on the details about the intrigue and politics surrounding the battle, while it was essential to the larger story I wanted more action! Overall a very good and informative book.

 

[MIDNJAC]

Thank you Sir, downloading it now. I really enjoyed reading Hornets Over Kuwait while I was in Kingsville.

+1.....read it while I was at -101. Great read, welcome to the site sir!

 

[Kaman]

I highly recommend "Rising Tide", especially for those that either took part in the Cold War, and in particular the ASW effort against the Soviet Navy.