Air Power and the Arab World 1909-1955 Volume 7

Volume 7 of the Air Power and the Arab World, 1909-1955 mini-series continues the story of the men and machines of the first half century of military aviation in the Arab world. These years saw the Arab countries and their military forces already caught up in the events of the Second World War. For those Arab nations which had some degree of independence, the resulting political, cultural and economic strains had a profound impact upon their military forces. In Egypt the Army generally remained quiet, continuing with its mostly unglamorous and little appreciated duties. Within the Royal Egyptian Air Force (REAF), however, there were a significant number of men who wanted to take action in expectation of what they, and many around the world, expected to be the defeat of the British Empire. The result was division, widespread mistrust, humiliation, and for a while the grounding of the entire REAF. In Iraq the strains of the early war years led to a political coup, military conflict with the British Empire, and the virtual destruction of the Royal Iraqi Air Force (RirqAF). Volume 7 of Air Power and the Arab World then looks at the first efforts to revive both the REAF and the RIrqAF, along with events in the air and on the ground elsewhere in the Arab world until the end of 1942.

"...this is another fine Helion publication that covers an area little discussed by other books." ModelingMadness.com

"....A story that I think gets overlooked, certainly by me, thanks to all the other events taking place in North Africa and the Middle East at the time. The archive images plus the section of super colour profiles offer some great ideas to modellers with a mix of aircraft that I think they may easily not have known about being in action in 1941-42. The account of the war in Iraq includes names of places that ring plenty of bells for more recent conflicts. Rather like Ukraine, something of a shame that such names have had to face warfare again so soon." Robin Buckland, Military Model Scene

"Helion’s relatively large format allows this series to pack in plenty of information along with a generous selection of photographs." The Journal of the Air Force Historical Foundation 

"If English-only readers didn’t have the team of David Nicolle and Gabr Ali Gabr, they’d completely lose these histories..." Cybermodeler