Long before he entered politics, when he was just in his early 20s, South
Dakotan George McGovern flew 35 bomber missions over Nazi-occupied Europe,
earning a Distinguished Flying Cross for bravery under fire. Stephen Ambrose,
the industrious historian, focuses on McGovern and the young crew of his
B-24 bomber, volunteers all, in this vivid study of the air war in Europe.
Manufactured by a consortium of companies that included Ford Motor and
Douglas Aircraft, the B-24 bomber, dubbed the Liberator, was designed to
drop high explosives on enemy positions well behind the front lines--and
especially on the German capital, Berlin. Unheated, drafty, and only lightly
armored, the planes were dangerous places to be, and indeed, only 50 percent
of their crews survived to the war's end. Dangerous or not, they did their
job, delivering thousand- pound bombs to targets deep within Germany and
Austria.
In his fast-paced narrative, Ambrose follows many other flyers (including
the Tuskegee Airmen, the African American pilots who gave the B-24s essential
fighter support on some of their most dangerous missions) as they brave
the long odds against them, facing moments of glory and terror alike. "It
would be an exaggeration to say that the B-24 won the war for the Allies,"
Ambrose writes. "But don't ask how they could have won the war without
it." --Gregory McNamee for Amazon.com
» Browse
Military Aviation
|
|
|
|
Related
Sections
