Customer Reviews

A History of Army Aviation: From Its Beginnings to the War on Terror

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

The definitive history of Army Aviation from the beginning to present operations in Afghanistan and Iraq. If you like aviation history this is a wonderful resource. Should be in every library collection. A great gift for anyone interested in aviation.

This book covers a lot of ground, but suffers a bit from the sheer amount of detail. The organizational changes in Army Aviation are highlighted, and it is useful to know what organizational structures have been implemented at various times, but the cohesiveness of the story is often sidetracked. It is always a struggle to produce an exhaustive history while explaining how these details relate to the bigger picture, so I sympathize with the author.

Unfortunately, it felt as though a large portion of the book was spent slogging through minutiae, and chronological progression was interspersed with thematic progression. I would give the content 4 stars, principally because the applications of aviation in particular engagements was given limited treatment, as were the advances in technology.

I think that the best insight that I found in the book was the discussion of the particular difficulties encountered by the Army in providing for equivalent career development for soldiers in Aviation. In this regard, the author recounted the events as a continuing theme, and developed it into a cohesive story.

I don't think that I could reconcile the desire to document all of the events covered in this book with a cohesive and engaging story without adding at least 50% to its length, so maybe that is the constraint that prevailed.

The readability of the book makes it overall 3 stars in my opinion. As a reference, this book could be useful, but the astounding detail of the book makes the whole volume a giant index, and finding particular discussions requires knowing a priori where to look chronologically and thematically.

This book is a must read for ALL Army aviators. All you Warrant Officers will be surprised to find out that the Commissioned Officers did most of the flying in Vietnam.