Luftwaffe at War, Volume 2: Blitzkrieg in the West 1939-1940. Cet article n’est pas disponible.Luftwaffe at War, Volume 2: Blitzkrieg in the West 1939-1940

The story of the rise of one of the world's most powerful air forces - the Luftwaffe - is one immersed in adversity and audacity. In 1939, after years of increasing tension, the German assault on Poland unleashed warfare in Europe for the second time in a generation. For Poland's allies the speed of the German invasion, advance and victory was a salutary warning as to the potency of the massive growth in German military prowess since the Nazi's came to power in 1933.

With victory assured in the east and with Poland carved up between Germany and the Soviet Union, Hitler was able to turn his attention to the west. Both Britain and France had responded to the growing crisis of the late 1930s with a significant enhancement to their military capability but, in strategic planning, many of their commanders anticipated a war similar to that fought between 1914 and 1918, a strategic overview emphasised by the French construction of the Maginot line. As in 1914, Britain sent an Expeditionary Force to France, with limited air support and equipped with armour that would prove to be no match to that possessed by the Germans. The failure of Allied planning was highlighted by the rapid German victories in the Low Countries, France and then Scandinavia. As in th east, German success was largely the result of the integrated use of air and land power, a combination that the Allied forces were unable to match.

In the second of a new series, noted aviation historian, Edward Hooton, examines the period between the victory over Poland in 1939 and the crushing defeats of Belgium, the Netherlands, France, Norway and Denmark during the dark days of 1940, when ultimately only Britain was left undefeated. As in the campaign against Poland, it was probably the Luftwaffe that had perhaps the most important role. It won air supremacy over the theatre of operations and was able to destroy much of the enemy's material before the army swept forward. This book examines in detail the Luftwaffe's role in the Blitzkrieg during the Spring and Summer of 1940.

This volume contains many rare and unpublished photographs along with colour diagrams of the aircraft involved and also some high quality 3-D mapping to show key military operations. It will be required reading for all aviation enthusiasts, historians as well as for those who model the aircraft of the period.

Dipl. Eng. Dénes Bernád was born in 1964 in Transylvania (Rumania), in a family of indigenous ethnic Hungarians. He studied at the Transylvanian University in Brasov, where he graduated in 1988 as a Mechanical Engineer. From 1992 he lived in Canada, and in 2006 he returned with his family to Hungary. Currently, he works in the automotive industry as Program Launch Manager. He is fluent in three languages. His main interest is the military history of Central and Eastern Europe, especially Rumania, Hungary and Bulgaria. His books deal especially with air forces and aircraft of these countries. He has written or co-authored seventeen historical books. Aside from the above books, Dénes Bernád has published many studies concerning the history of aviation in Air Enthusiast, Air International and FlyPast (UK), WW1 Aero (USA), Avions (France), Repülés, Aero História and Új Szárnyak (Hungary), Militaria and Skrzydlata Polska (Poland) and Aeronatica, Aeromagazin and Model-Ist (Rumania). He is also the founding member of the Asociatia pentru Propagarea Istoriei Aviatiei (ARPIA) - Association for Propagation of History of Aviation (Bucharest, Rumania) and Magyar Repüléstörténeti Társaság (MRT) - Hungarian Society of Aviation History (Budapest, Hungary). He is also a foreign correspondent of the French aviation magazine Avions.