Aircraft Carriers: A History of Carrier Aviation and Its Influence on World Events, Volume I: 1909-1945Aircraft Carriers is the definitive history of world aircraft carrier development and operations. Norman Polmar’s revised and updated, two-volume classic describes the political and technological factors that influenced aircraft carrier design and construction, meticulously records their operations, and explains their impact on modern warfare. Volume I provides a comprehensive analysis of carrier developments and warfare in the first half of the twentieth century, and examines the advances that allowed the carrier to replace the battleship as the dominant naval weapons system. Polmar gives particular emphasis to carrier operations from World War I, through the Japanese strikes against China in the 1930s, to World War II in the Atlantic, Mediterranean, Arctic, and Pacific theaters. It begins with French inventor Clément Ader’s remarkably prescient 1909 description of an aircraft carrier. The book then explains how Britain led the world in the development of aircraft-carrying ships, soon to be followed by the United States and Japan. While ship-based aircraft operations in World War I had limited impact, they foreshadowed the aircraft carriers built in the 1920s and 1930s. The volume also describes the aircraft operating from those ships as well as the commanders who pioneered carrier aviation. Aircraft Carriers has benefited from the technical collaboration of senior carrier experts Captain Eric M. Brown and General Minoru Genda as well as noted historians Robert M. Langdon and Peter B. Mersky. Aircraft Carriers is heavily illustrated with more than 400 photographs—some never before published—and maps. Volume II, which is forthcoming from Potomac Books in the winter 2006-2007 (ISBN 978-1-57488-665-8), will cover the period 1946 to the present. |
Contents
1 | |
23 | |
39 | |
4 Building Carrier Fleets | 53 |
5 Preparing for War | 71 |
6 War in the West | 95 |
7 War in the Mediterranean | 113 |
8 War in the Pacific | 141 |
19 The Invasion of Europe | 331 |
20 Across the Broad Pacific | 355 |
21 The Biggest Carrier Battle | 377 |
22 Marianas Aftermath | 401 |
Setting the Pieces | 409 |
The Battles | 423 |
25 The End of the Japanese Fleet | 445 |
26 The Final Battles | 463 |
9 Date of Infamy | 165 |
10 Japanese Triumph | 179 |
11 Offensive Defense | 195 |
12 The First Carrier Battle | 211 |
13 Midway | 223 |
14 Midway Aftermath | 247 |
15 Building Aircraft Carriers | 259 |
16 The First Assault | 281 |
17 The Solomons Won | 301 |
18 The European War | 311 |
Other editions - View all
Aircraft Carriers: A History of Carrier Aviation and Its Influence on World ... Norman Polmar No preview available - 2006 |
Common terms and phrases
aboard air group aircraft carriers airfields Allied anti-aircraft fire Ark Royal Avenger battleships bombs Carrier Division carrier force carrier planes combat command convoy craft damaged destroyers dive bombers enemy Enterprise escort carriers F4F Wildcat F6F Hellcat fast carriers feet fighters flattops fleet carriers flew flight deck flying four fuel German Guadalcanal guns hangar heavy cruisers Hornet island Japa Japan Japanese Japanese carriers Japanese planes Japanese ships June knots landing launched Lexington Leyte light carrier light cruiser Malta Marine Midway miles Mitscher Navy’s nese night oilers Okinawa operations Pacific patrol Pearl Harbor pilots radar raid Rear Adm Rear Admiral rier Royal Navy sank Saratoga SBD Dauntless seaplane ship’s Shokaku shot squadrons steamed strike sunk Swordfish Task Force Task Group TBF Avenger torpedo planes U-boat U.S. Army U.S. carrier U.S. Naval U.S. Navy Ulithi Vice Admiral warships Wildcats Yorktown Zero Zuikaku