What I Am Reading - With Wings Like Eagles

With Wings Like Eagles - A History of the Battle of Britain

Michael Korda

Read it in paperback, a short read at 352 pages.

I really enjoy reading about the golden age of aerial combat, more specifically what is known as the Dog Fight.  As someone who owns a dog that likes to fight, this is the perfect terminology.  The fundamentals are simple, the biggest-baddest dog in the pack picks a target and then it becomes a swirling aerial melee of carnage as each dog attempts to use speed, altitude, and positioning to rend an opponent from the sky.  The limitations of aerial technology in the 1930's pushed the envelope in a realm that was still being hastily flushed out, especially aerial combat, in war time conditions.  It's interesting to read because flying these things took courage, real courage and nerves of steel.  When your own aircraft could simply stop working (engine malfunction, gun jam, landing gear failure, etc.) when you needed it the most or be turned into a molten ball of burning wreckage, streaking down from the heavens in an instant, all because you didn't see the enemy racing in above you using the sun as cover at 648 km/h, and all he had to do was flip the trigger for two seconds.

But where to begin?  WW2 was frantic with aerial combat.  Personally the European Theater is the most interesting to me.  At the time in which The Battle of Britain would commence, Germany had swept west with such efficiency and speed that they controlled most of the European continent with little loss, effectively rendering the general populace to their control while beginning to fortify their positions.   The only point of opposition still standing being the British.  Hitler, who was holding out for what he believed was imminent surrender from the British was apprehensive about committing to a land invasion over the channel and left it to his air force to pummel the British into this surrender.  As the months from the disaster at Dunkirk ticked on, one man, was tasked with formulating the defense of Britain.  This man's name was Hugh Dowding and this is widely the story of his efforts leading up to and during the Battle of Britain from a technical perspective. 

The book itself covers, generically, the efforts of Dowding to formulate an ingenious plan for defense of Britain in the face of opposition within his country and from the obvious impending external monster camped on the beaches of France and Norway followed by the execution of that defense during the highest frenzy of aerial combat.  It details out the plan, the execution, the players (both politically and militarily during the time), as well as the aircraft and pilots that would take part.

I thoroughly enjoyed it despite Mr. Kurdas' use of fact repetition, often covering content he had just captured in the chapter before.  It happens with some frequency but really isn't that much of a big deal.  Full of references and some pretty pictures this is a good read if you want some more detailed information about the Battle of Britain.  It most certainly not an account from the pilots point of view however.