# Recommend some books on post-WW2 military aviation **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [August 20, 2013, 4:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recommend-some-books-on-post-ww2-military-aviation/666721 "2013-08-20T16:57:52Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2013, 3:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recommend-some-books-on-post-ww2-military-aviation/666721/21 "2013-08-22T15:55:57Z")
> [@Boyo\_Jim](#): > > Can’t remember the title, but Brown also has one with a souped up heavily armed B-52 as the main “character”. Several of those, I think _Flight of the Old Dog_ was the first. I’m one of those who thinks real stories are far more interesting than fiction, though. Especially formulaic fiction. ---
**Author:** ![Boyo\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2013, 5:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recommend-some-books-on-post-ww2-military-aviation/666721/22 "2013-08-22T17:38:54Z")
> [@ElvisL1ves](#): > > Several of those, I think _Flight of the Old Dog_ was the first … That’s the one I was thinking of. ---
**Author:** ![Atomic\_Alex](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/atomic_alex/32/175_2.png) [@Atomic\_Alex](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atomic_Alex)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2013, 8:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recommend-some-books-on-post-ww2-military-aviation/666721/23 "2013-08-22T20:06:09Z")
> [@ElvisL1ves](#): > > I’m one of those who thinks real stories are far more interesting than fiction, though. Especially formulaic fiction. Well after you’ve finished something like ‘The Holocaust’ by Martin Gilbert _(cross-thread alert)_ a straight-forward fun bubble-gum action novel is just what you need. And reading something like the novel I mentioned earlier, ‘Firebreak’, which depicts a future war in the Middle East from the perspective of someone writing in 1991 just after the First Gulf war gives an interesting new twist on things. I have to say that its a fun book, the author is very fair with competent and likable and unpleasant and dislikable characters from all sides. ---
**Author:** ![Icerigger](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/icerigger/32/432_2.png) [@Icerigger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Icerigger)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2013, 9:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recommend-some-books-on-post-ww2-military-aviation/666721/24 "2013-08-22T21:54:57Z")
How about the memoir of one of the first female combat pilots and her experience aboard a carrier. **She’s Just Another Navy Pilot: An Aviator’s Sea Journal** by Loree Draude Hirschman > **[She's Just Another Navy Pilot: An Aviator's Sea Journal: Draude, Loree Y,...](https://www.amazon.com/Shes-Just-Another-Navy-Pilot/dp/1557503354)** > > She's Just Another Navy Pilot: An Aviator's Sea Journal \[Draude, Loree Y, Hirschman, Dave\] on Amazon.com. \*FREE\* shipping on qualifying offers. She's Just Another Navy Pilot: An Aviator's Sea Journal ---
**Author:** ![Damfino](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Damfino](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damfino)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2013, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recommend-some-books-on-post-ww2-military-aviation/666721/25 "2013-08-22T22:29:46Z")
Hmm. You might also try \* Rogue Hercules \* by Dennis Pitt which is about mercenary gun runners flying a C 130 Hercules in Africa in conflict with Soviet fighter advisors ---
**Author:** ![Atomic\_Alex](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/atomic_alex/32/175_2.png) [@Atomic\_Alex](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atomic_Alex)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2013, 9:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recommend-some-books-on-post-ww2-military-aviation/666721/26 "2013-08-23T21:16:32Z")
Thanks, I’ll check those two out! ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2013, 9:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recommend-some-books-on-post-ww2-military-aviation/666721/27 "2013-08-23T21:46:33Z")
> [@Gray\_Ghost](#): > > Do helicopters count? [_Chickenhawk_](http://www.amazon.com/Chickenhawk-Robert-Mason/dp/0143035711) is one of the best military memoirs period, not just an aviation memoir. The author flew UH-1 Huey helicopters in Vietnam… Loved that book. My three favorite bits from it: - The flight instructor who loved to frighten trainees. Once he flew along railroad tracks just a few feet above the ground, the wires on nearby telephone poles _above_ the rotors. The trainees begged him to pull up. Instead, he stayed low and went _even faster_. - The flight instructors had a button they could hit to cut power to the helicopter’s engine at any time, and often did so, so that trainees got used to having to be constantly aware of their surroundings, with some flat area nearby in mind, ready for an emergency autorotation (unpowered landing on the momentum of the rotors alone) at any time. - The author joked that, given the sketchiness of their navigational training, IFR stood for “I follow railroads,” and VFR stood for “Visually follow railroads.” ---
**Author:** ![fiddlesticks](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fiddlesticks/32/18129_2.png) [@fiddlesticks](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fiddlesticks)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2013, 10:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recommend-some-books-on-post-ww2-military-aviation/666721/28 "2013-08-23T22:02:54Z")
Ben Rich’s _Skunk Works_ is a very interesting account of the design of the U-2 and SR-71 among other things up through the F-117. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recommend-some-books-on-post-ww2-military-aviation/666721.md?page=1)