Austro-Hungarian Aces of World War 1

Description

Starting the war with only 35 aircraft, Austro-Hungarian industry went on to produce only moderate numbers of poor quality aircraft. The fliers of the Austro-Hungarian Empire operating on the Serbian and Russian fronts were fortunate at first, finding themselves faced by small numbers of aircraft yet more obsolescent than their own. Serbia fell in 1915, but when Italy declared war the Austro-Hungarians were still faced with a two-front war - a static front against Italy, and a far more fluid one against Russia. Austro-Hungarian fighter pilots performed bravely and often very effectively under extremely difficult geographic, climatic and operational conditions.

Christopher Chant is a successful writer on modern military matters and has a substantial number of authoritative titles to his credit. Military history and especially aviation have long been his passion. Having been part of the editorial team on Purnell's best selling 'History of the First World War', he became a full time writer and editor in 1974 and has spent over 25 years working extensively on military and aviation subjects. Mark Rolfe is an extremely talented profile artist. He has worked on a number of titles in Osprey's Aircraft of the Aces and Combat Aircraft series.

"Those with an interest in the tragedy of the 'Great War', its air operations and its southern theater, may be fascinated with Mr. Chant's history of Austro-Hungary's airmen who gained the coveted title of 'Ace.'" --Fred Boucher, AeroScale (April 2007) "The book is introduced by an excellent overview of Austro-Hungarian air units, listing unit designators, airfields, commanders and aircraft types; three pages of highly useful information that puts the fi ghter forces within a broad perspective. The text also notes in detail the struggle by the Hapsburg Empire's Luftfahrtruppen [Air Service] to attain good solid performing fi ghters in the license-built variants of Germany's famed Albatros D-series. Key points are illustrated by photos that are very fine ... Master aviation artist Harry Dempsey's 32 fullcolor profiles nicely reinforce the photos, depicting a variety of aces' aircraft and markings ... This volume has been a long time in coming, but is well worth the wait. It is recommended highly." --Over the Front (Summer 2013)