Description

pp. 336, b/w photographs, “The book opens with the experience of 354th Fighter Group, the first fighter pilots to receive the legendary Mustang fighter, enabling them to finally take up the fight against the German Reich. Continuing the focus on the European Theater of Operations is the story of the 332nd Fighter Group – the Tuskegee Airmen – the only all-black unit of the airforce, revealing how they rose above discrimination to be feared by their enemies and revered by their colleagues. The action then switches to the Pacific, where the crack 475th Fighter Group included amongst its ranks the highest scoring American pilots, the legendary Dick Bong and Tom McGuire. The book concludes with the story of the pilots based on Iwo Jima who risked their lives to fly hundreds of miles across the Pacific, with no hope of rescue, in order to attack the heavily defended Japanese mainland.”