Customer Reviews

Luftwaffe Fighter Aces: The Jagdflieger and Their Combat Tactics and Techniques

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I'm the guy that recommended this book to Bowhunter0. If you're 'into' PC flight simulators, aviation, history, or combat stories, you'll enjoy this book. Mike Spick uses diagrams and photographs to illustrate his points, and in the world of air combat a diagram of two airplanes with dashed lines showing their flight paths can go a long way to explaining energy states, relative attitudes, and shot opportunities. He also covers the basic maneuvers, terminology, and the history of the combat aircraft utilized by the aces. One particular section even has a brief talk-through of the steps a Luftwaffe pilot took to launch a 109, fly it, and land it in one piece.

Mr. Spick has written another book about Allied aces and their tactics, which I would consider to be a companion piece to this book. He's also written several other books about military aviation which I've found to be very entertaining and plain ol' good reading.

If you're serious about your PC flight simulators then you'll get a lot of benefit from Mike Spick's two books. If you don't read his books, well, I guess you'll just spend a lot of your time back at the hangar trying to figure out how that 109 pilot managed to shoot you down yet again.

Micke Spick's book was a disapointment. It is not very well researched and I found a lot of stories in it, which other books described better and more in depth. Some facts about the pilots are myths and have been shown to be wrong. The comments about the radar in the book are so brief that it gives you the wrong impression about the different approaches the germans and british had to this new technology. The tactics of the german pilots are only described briefly. Yes, we already know that the germans invented the "rotte" and the book goes tell you about "schräge musik", that the germans tried to shoot at very close range and so on and so on. There are no new facts in this book. For anyone who already read a few book about the airwar in europe, this book can't be recommended. It gets two stars because it is a fair introductory book at at low price.

Sometime studying the opponent is much more instructive than glorifying the victor. As long as this book is concerned, the riveting description of German training, tactics and traditions is really exhaustive.

It is surprising to see how long the duty tour was for a German pilot and how dedicated they were to their job, under the word of honor and chilvary that permeated the Luftwaffe tradition. Notwithstanding this credit and a self taught decency, despite the terrible strain of combat, the portrait of their character and lifestyle is really vivid. But even if this psychological trait is instrumental to understand the German aces achievement in battle, the most interesting feature of the volume is the comprehensive examination of pilot training practices, mental preparation and flying skills. A large discussion of combat tactics and fighting methods is presented for each ace, well depicted in the contest of climate, theater of war and available equipment.

Beautifully researched, the book is quite easy to read and each chapter is a clearcut account of all threads leading to a conclusive analysis of how German aces outscored the Allied by a wide margin.

The book shows the history of the Luftwaffe during World War 2, and a little about the origins of it. Also it elaborates on a number of the top Experten (Aces) of the German air force of that time.

It shows a number of tactics and maneuvers in simple but clear drawings, but is not covering this in-depth.

However, it is clear enough to show you how the German flyers could ammass the number of air-victories they had, and what difficulties and advantages they had over their opponents.

The book is very readable, offering once in a while statistical/technical information to provide a background on the why's and where's of the airial combats.

How can one claim 352 victories? How can 106 pilots each claim a 100 or MORE victories? What were the Luftwaffe fighter aces doing? There's the book to tell you!
Mr. Spick first starts off with a chapter explaining basic combat tactics and then dives into the history, starting with the Spanish Civil War and ending with retreat from the East and the Jet Aces. Lots of first person accounts, detailed information on both German and Allied aircraft, and postwar examination of military records. Mr. Spick also deals with issues of training, climate and even morale!
A must for anybody interested in World War II, the Luftwaffe or just the development of 20th century air combat in general.

While there are many books on Luftwaffe fighter aces, this one is different because it compares and contrasts the specific combat tactics favored by many of the legendary (and not-so famous) German aces. Each chapter analyzes a different theater of operation and provides brief bios of the successful aces of that theatre. Like Mike Spick's "The Ace Factor" this book is a fresh view on a well-covered subject. An excellent and easy read with helpful diagrams and insightful statictical appendices (as opposed to the same old "top scorer" lists). I would love to see similar books from Spick on the RAF and USAAF aces

It seems like the author never took the time to do any research. Most of the information on tactics is either deducted from previously published pilot stories or based on common knowledge about the subject, and brings nothing new to the table. It's probably a good, cheap and readable book for the novice but borrows heavily from well known sources, making it a waste of money for the person who already has a few book on the subject.

Well written & informative book. Good first person accounts from veterans & of aircraft operation <e.g.: Bf-109>. Well laid out & organized. Great companion book to "The First and the Last"(Galland), "Horrido!" & "The Blond Knight of Germany"(Tolliver & Constable), as well as other Luftwaffe history & bios I own & have read.

I gave it 4 Stars instead of 5 ONLY because my copy was not bound very well (paperback) & I had to re-glue many of the pages. Photo pages were good, although some were not reproduced very clearly. Also found one table that had aircraft specs mis-labeled (Height & length <of one French fighter aircraft> reversed).

Overall, I throughly enjoyed reading this book.

I read this book a number of years ago. It gives a very general description of the jagdflieger in world war two. I re-read this book because I recently became interested in ww2 flight simulators. I was trying to gain some tactical insight. While the book does provide some insight, it falls short in this regard. Though a well reseached work with personal interviews from the legendary german aces: Hartmann, Rall ect. It does not break any new ground.

This book was very interesting. Not only did it talk about the Great Luftwaffe Aces but it described there Tactics & Techniques. Since I am into WWII air combat computer games, I picked up some very useful info on how to attack certain planes and the weakness of others. I would buy this book again!