Customer Reviews

P-40 Warhawk Aces of the Pacific (Aircraft of the Aces)

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

 

 

After reading Osprey's P-39 Airacobra Aces of World War 2 (Osprey Aircraft of the Aces No 36), I decided to follow up and read about the P-39's stable mate in the South West Pacific and its aces. As with the previous book, this one follows the now tried and true Osprey method of Introduction and then a round robin summary of the different areas of the Pacific that flew the P-40. As with the P-39, the P-40 was the aircraft enabled the US to climb back into the war. In the Appendices I learned that P-40's were responsible for 655 kills and was the aircraft that many aces learned from (actually it was amazing how many future aces started with the P-40 in the Pacific). For the chapters, the best was Chapter 2, Backs Against the Wall. I enjoyed reading about the early exploits of P-40 pilots against the Japanese in the Philippines and Indonesia. If there's a disappointment in this book, it's got to be Chapter 3, The New Guinea Campaign. Mr. Molesworth seems to have lost some steam at this point and focused on only a few encounters.



The bottom line is this is a solid 4 star book. The color plates are great for modelers or wargamers. While some of the descriptions could have additional information, this is a nice Reader's Digest about what the P-40 pilots did. Something that's seriously missing though is the lack of a bibliography. A bibliography does help me identify future books to read about things I'm interested in and I'm disappointed Osprey didn't include one.

A quiet morning for the Americans at Hawaii on 7 December 1941. Passing the time away with games and other activity, the Americans at Hawaii are totally unprepared of what's about to happen. Then, out of nowhere, Japanese planes apear overhead. Within seconds, bombs are going off, torpedoes are being dropped and planes are strafing. Within minutes ships, cars, parked planes and buildings are on fire. The start of WWII for the Americans had just begun.

'P-40 aces of the Pacific' is a worthy read.
The book starts with the P-40 pilots at Pearl Harbor, and ends at the Aleutian islands off Alaska.
I found the information on aces nicely done. The color plates are well drawn (as all Ospreys are) and plentiful on pictures.
The book boasts 85 pages of information on lots of pilots/aces who flew the P-40 Warhawk. The book explains about aces such as Robert Westbrook, Richard West, Robert Byrnes and more. The book even has John Chennault, son of AVG 'Fying Tigers' commander Claire L. Chennault. (But John never reached 'ace' status).
But this book does explain about both aces and just P-40 pilots which can be confusing as to which is an ace and which isn't.
But overall this book is well worth it's price. I recommend this book for anyone that wants to learn more or begin learning about P-40 aces of the Pacific.

Carl Molesworth is a great historian and writer.
The 7th, 10th and 13th AF coverage was excellect.
I enjoyed the colot plates are descriptions.
Bring on the next one!!

The author wasted 12 pages on operations in the Aleutian Islands, since there were no P-40 pilots who achieved ace status in that theater of operations. Authors should not write about aces in any theater of operations unless there were aces who score five kills or achieve ace status because in those areas, they manage to score the victories needed to become aces.

There should have been more combat stories about scoring victories against the Japanese in the Netherland East Indies particulary those of William Hennon, since he was only person in his squadron to score 5 victories in that area of operations.

Finally, the author has the audacity to include in his list of aces, pilots who 4 or less aerial victories. The book should be about aces not people who did not achieve ace status.