# Most outdated book on ww2 aviation



## Just Schmidt (May 31, 2022)

This is meant as a curiosum, but for the historiographically minded it can also be rather interesting.

I inherited this book from my grandfather who was a farmer, I think the correct English term is smallholder. He had a dream of becoming a pilote, and was quite ridiculed for this, but from early childhood I would pick up this book when visiting, already then it was well used. It is in Danish, by a John Foltman, and the title is "Flyviningens eventyr", literally "The adventure of flying".

What is so interesting about it is that it was published in german occupied denmark in 1944, and it is rather fun to see what information was available to civil society, and what it was allowed to publish. Though the Danish government had in the autumn broken with the policy of cooperation with the German occupiers, the civil service was still working with them, and Denmark was in quite a special position amongst the occupied countries. In fact we were barely accepted as an allied nation after the war. From the text in the book it is apparant that it was written after the Invasion of Sicily, as it is the last campaign mentioned.

It is not a book solely about the war, in fact it covers all aspects of flying up to then. But when it comes to the war, it comments on the major air campaigns, in a not very propagandistic way, not hiding the fact that the bob didn't turn out the way the Germans had hoped. One thing is that the sinking of Repulse and Prince of Wales has the bombers move in first, disabling the AA, and only then the torpedo bombers are attacking. Doubtless that is how it had been presented then.

I find the tables about aircraft types and performance instructive. Though the legends are in Danish, I expect everybody here to be able to see what is going on. It may be helpful to know that the table is labelled the best known aircraft, it does not pretend to be exhaustive. I would also note that, in common with German usage, fighter is jager, litterally hunter. You will note that the Il 2 is thus labelled, and that its top speed is rather generous. Finally the B-17 is the only one with nickname given, it does seem that flying fortress was in genuine use during the war. It's also interesting that the only Italian fighter listed is the Re 2001. I'll let anyone who is interested go through the list themselves, you might have fun doing so.

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## Milosh (May 31, 2022)

Interesting JS.

A series of books about WW2 a/c by William Green written in the '50s is dated.


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## Dr. Odendahl (Jun 6, 2022)

Milosh said:


> Interesting JS.
> 
> A series of books about WW2 a/c by William Green written in the '50s is dated.


As a kid (between 7 and 12), William Green's books were the most authentic I could find in our library. Not arguing on his behalf, just would like to know where Mr. Green let me down.


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## Howard Gibson (Jun 6, 2022)

Victory Through Air Power, by Alexander De Seversky.

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## nuuumannn (Jun 6, 2022)

Dr. Odendahl said:


> As a kid (between 7 and 12), William Green's books were the most authentic I could find in our library. Not arguing on his behalf, just would like to know where Mr. Green let me down.



Green often gets held up for inaccuracies, but the reality was his books were a very good and informative examination of WW2 aircraft technology for the time. He certainly didn't have access to archival material - there was no RAF Museum archive, Bundesarchiv or other official sources available for that kind of stuff and manufacturers were certainly not about to make available for publishing information on their products, especially since many of the WW2 types were still in service in the 1950s. so poor Green and other authors who dared publish this stuff get criticised these days, but their efforts were certainly welcome and definitely formed the foundations of what we know today.

On the subject of manufacturers, I remember reading an anecdote about an illustrator for Flight International who was sent to the USA to view a particular manufacturer's products under construction with the aim of making a cutaway drawing of the type. When his drawing appeared the Americans were astonished and he was accused of being a foreign spy because of the detail. When he explained that he wasn't a spy and there had been no espionage in his illustration, the Americans didn't believe him, but it turns out he had an eye for noticing things like rivet lines and based on his knowledge of aircraft construction guesstimated the rest, which turned out to be remarkably accurate. I can't remember the aircraft or the manufacturer in question...

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## Snautzer01 (Jun 7, 2022)

nuuumannn said:


> but their efforts were certainly welcome and definitely formed the foundations of what we know today.


Very true. They were pioneers.

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## Just Schmidt (Jun 7, 2022)

That a historical work is dated dosn't imply that it is dishonest, superficial, sloppy or fraudulent, just that better sources or more relevant research has become available after it was written. Possibly also that a wider range of questions are being asked.

That said, we all make mistakes and misinterpret the available information.

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## Dr. Odendahl (Jun 7, 2022)

nuuumannn said:


> Green often gets held up for inaccuracies, but the reality was his books were a very good and informative examination of WW2 aircraft technology for the time. He certainly didn't have access to archival material - there was no RAF Museum archive, Bundesarchiv or other official sources available for that kind of stuff and manufacturers were certainly not about to make available for publishing information on their products, especially since many of the WW2 types were still in service in the 1950s. so poor Green and other authors who dared publish this stuff get criticised these days, but their efforts were certainly welcome and definitely formed the foundations of what we know today.
> 
> On the subject of manufacturers, I remember reading an anecdote about an illustrator for Flight International who was sent to the USA to view a particular manufacturer's products under construction with the aim of making a cutaway drawing of the type. When his drawing appeared the Americans were astonished and he was accused of being a foreign spy because of the detail. When he explained that he wasn't a spy and there had been no espionage in his illustration, the Americans didn't believe him, but it turns out he had an eye for noticing things like rivet lines and based on his knowledge of aircraft construction guesstimated the rest, which turned out to be remarkably accurate. I can't remember the aircraft or the manufacturer in question...


Thanks. I'm nowhere near as informed as most that I read in this site, but i love aviation and history, and thse posts are a pleasure for me. Thanks for all the good work.

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## nuuumannn (Jun 7, 2022)

Dr. Odendahl said:


> Thanks for all the good work.



No worries, Kenneth Munson was another who produced reference books that haven't really dated well, but were a great insight for their time.

Out of modern publishers, Osprey and its monographs get quite a bit of flak, but I bet every aircraft enthusiast on this forum has at least one Osprey book. Being a publisher, Osprey produces books, it doesn't write or edit them, it employs different authors to do this, so the quality varies. Some authors are very good and know their subject, others, not so much, so it's up to us to separate the wheat from the chaff.

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