This exceptionally good volume is a paperback book with 48 pages. It included the text with black and white photographs, full colour artwork, informational charts, and detailed captions. The book discusses the design, development, operation and history of the Valentine Infantry Tank during the years of 1938 through 1945. The text is well written and very detailed and covers all aspects of the Valentine Infantry Tank and its variants including the abortive Valiant tank with great depth up to end of the WWII. Newsome provides great detail for the Valentine tanks and its SP versions starting with the design and development, production numbers and the manufacturers, specifications such as engine types, armament and armour details, delivery periods, WD numbers, flaws in design such as poor fields of vision through the vision ports etc. I found the chapters Driving and Fighting especially interesting. Of the many conversations and experimental types built on Valentines Newsome described amphibious Valentines, flamethrowers, bridgelayers and anti-mine flail.

The extensive technical information is given in tabular form in four big tables. There are also tables showing production by marks and version by manufacturer; orders and deliveries of Valentines and derivatives, by contractor and vehicle number and Supplies of Valentines and deliveries to the USSR, by period and type.

Newsome notes that the sometimes repeated claim that the driver in Archer had to leave his seat during firing in order to keep his head is false. According to him, the recoil of the 17 -pdr gun was arrested at 14.5 inches by a hydraulic buffer and two steel springs. That shouldn’t be a problem with an AFV of 16.76 metric tons but one must keep in his mind that the cartridge case of 17 -pdr was about 23 inches long and the length of a complete 17-pdr APCBC round (the longest and the most important ammunition for the 17-pdr gun) was appr. 34 inches long. But of course there was enough room, even though without much space to spare, between the recoil guard and driver’s head to allow him to stay on his seat. Probably not a most comfortable place to be when the very powerful gun was fired.

There are plenty of b/w photographs, the only colour photo is the cover one. What I miss are a photograph of an Mk III/V from above that would show the roof arrangement of the three men turret and a photograph showing how cramped the turret was. Almost all photographs are interesting even if some are rather small. I am not a fan of Osprey’s “action” colour illustration plates, there are two in this book, one of the probably most famous Valentine action, the 23rd Armoured Brigade attack Ruweisat Ridge, Egypt, on 22 July 1942 and the other of the only British tank action in the Far East in 1943, that of the 146th RAC attack at Donbaik in Burma. IMHO both are nice but I would have substituted the first one (IMHO the jungle plate is more beautiful) for a 5-view drawing of one of the main production Valentine marks.  To be honest I must admit that I would prefer a 5-view drawing of Archer because I’m fan of that small but deadly oddity and because I already have 5-view drawings of several Valentine marks.

There is also the normal colour cut-a-way view, the object of it being a Valentine IV and six colour profiles of Valentines (Mks I, III, two of VI, IX and XI) plus one of Bishop and one of Archer, some with smaller colour drawing(s) showing the front or the front and rear of the vehicle, the latter cases are Valentine VI at the Canadian Armour School at Borden Camp, Canada, in 1942 and the Archer ʽL1’ of 102nd  Anti-Tank Regiment Royal Artillery, 15th (Scottish) Division, in Germany, February 1945.

I have two complains besides the lack of a 5-view drawing and the couple photographs mentioned above. Contrary to what Newsome writes according to Zaloga and Grandsen, Valentine was the most popular British tank in Soviet service, preferred to the Matilda because of its better mobility. I have also read the same from some older sources. Also the http://tankarchives.blogspot.fi/2013/10/lend-lease-shopping-trip.html indicates that. And the Red Army clearly used its Valentines also in main offensive operations at least up to the late summer of 1944. See e.g. http://tankarchives.blogspot.fi/2016/06/world-of-tanks-history-section-taming.html for an example of use in late January 1944. 18th Tank Corps was also part of the 5th Guards Tank Army, one of the spearheads of the Red Army so definitely not a second-rate unit.  I doubt that not even the 6th Guards Cavalry Grodno Division, which operated NNW Berlin during the last days of April 1945, can be called a second-rate unit. Its tank regiment had eleven combat-ready Valentines at that time, making 39% of the regiment’s combat ready AFVs, see http://tankarchives.blogspot.fi/2015/02/valentines-for-victory.html.
Secondly according to the Red Army’s Valentine VII Manual, clearly a translated copy of the British one with Russian text and captions, the fifth gear was in the left bottom corner of the gate not in top left corner as Newsome writes. I don’t know which is right. Also there is one difference in given armour thicknesses between the manual and the book, namely the thickness of louvres and covers on the hull roof. In this case I think the manual has the correct information.

All in all an exceptionally good little book and warmly recommended.

Sources:
Red Army’s Valentine VII Manual

Dyer, D.P., Infantry Tank Mark III ‘Valentine’ – (Part 2) Bellona Military Vehicles Prints 38 (Hemel Hempstead:
      Model & Allied Publications 1974).
Fletcher, David, The Great Tank Scandal - British Armour in the Second World War Part 1 (London: HMSO,
      1993).
---- , The Universal Tank - British Armour in the Second World War Part 2 (London: HMSO, 1993).
Zaloga Steve J. and Grandsen, James, Soviet Tanks and Combat Vehicles of World War Two (London: Arms
      and Armour Press, 1984).

http://www.wwiiequipment.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=65:valentine-infantry-tank&catid=38:infantry-tanks&Itemid=56
http://tankarchives.blogspot.fi/2016/06/world-of-tanks-history-section-taming.html
http://tankarchives.blogspot.fi/2013/09/lend-lease-impressions-valentine.html
http://tankarchives.blogspot.fi/2015/02/valentine-mkix-trials.html
http://tankarchives.blogspot.fi/2015/02/valentines-for-victory.html
http://tankarchives.blogspot.fi/2013/10/lend-lease-shopping-trip.html

I was a bit disappointed with the article on the technical evolution of the Beaufighter, because it claimed that the max. speeds and especially the service ceilings of the Beaufighter Mk. If, IIf and TF.X were exactly the same. There wasn’t much difference in max. speeds but service ceilings were different. That made me put the publication aside for a couple years. But when I continued the reading I found out that it is fairly good after all. It covers admirably the many roles in which Beaufighter was utilized and there are many interesting black and white photos. The articles are:

Close Shave on an encounter between a Beaufighter from 235 
   Squadron and a Focke-Wulf Fw 190 from1./JG 5 off the coast of 
   Norway on March 3 1943 by Andrew Thomas. Nicely checked also
   against German records.
Aces a table of the Beaufighter aces by Andrew Thomas.
Adapt, Improve, Excel, the evolution of the Beaufighter by M L 
   Wynch. The article also deals very briefly with Buckingham,
   Buckmaster and Brigand. There are 3-view drawings of
   Beaufighter If, II and TF.X plus several interesting b/w photos. 
    IMHO the most glaring shortcoming in this article is that it doesn’t reveal that the leading idea of using the
    most of the structures/components of Beaufort in Beaufighter didn’t work out. During the development of
    the prototypes the different demands of a fighter to a torpedo bomber necessitated alternations and so
    the idea of community between Beaufort and Beaufighter became only an unfilled dream.
Power, on the power plants used on the Beaufighters. Some good detail photos here.
Beaufighter Squadron Directory by Andrew Thomas. The photos here includes a rare colour photo of a 235
    Squadron Beaufighter Ic.
Malta’s Auxiliaries on the 600 Squadron brief deployment on the island by Robin J Brooks.
A London ‘Beau’, a colour 3-view of Beaufighter VIf X7887 of 600 Squadron in black night fighter camo by
    Pete West with a brief service history.
Rare Birds, the Beaufighter survivors.
Whispering Death on operational history of Australian Beaufighters by Jim Grant.
Under Other Flags on Overseas Use and Post-War Exports by Doug Hall.
Punch on the armament options of Beaufighter with a table of the armament options of Beaufighter Mk.
    VIf, Mk. X and Mk. 21 and good detail photos of different armaments.
A Bob’s Worth on 1944 booklet Beaufighter – The Account of the Part Played by the Aircraft in Defence and
    Offence by Jonathan Garraway.
Strike Wing on the North Coates Strike Wing 1942 – 1943 by Graham Pitchfork. Operations and tactics used,
    also something on the leading personalities. Some stunning photos taking during attacks but these are
    well known.
Deserts and Seas on the Beaufighter operations of 252 Squadron by Jonathan Garraway. There are some
    interesting tables in the article; one gives the aircraft types and versions used by 252 Squadron with the
    timeframes of the use, the second the bases used and the third is ‘Losses of First Squadron Mk.Ics 1941’.
Stars and Stripes on USAAF 417th NFS Beaufighter night fighters by Warren E Thompson. An interesting
    article with lot of references from combat reports. But the last statement that there was very little, if any,
    dissatisfaction with the aircraft seems to be an understatement, because according to Pape & Harrison, at
    least some Americans complained loudly about Beaufighter, not least because it was a tail dragger. 
    There were also complains that it was a bit slow making catching of Ju 88 difficult. Some Americans even
    claimed that the Beau was rather useless as a night fighter.
Night Owls on Beaufighters in their main duty, alongside that of a strike fighter, namely as British and
    Commonwealth night fighter by Andrew Thomas. And of course the combat accounts given cover besides
    the air defence of Great Britain and Northern Ireland also the Mediterranean Theatre of Operations and the
    CBI area. I would have liked if the place of Roy Butler’s Do 24 claim on 26 September 1944 had been given
    more unambiguously. Now I had to check the place of the claim from Aces High for confirmation that the
    victim was probably 1M+RR mentioned in de Jong’s book. The few actions which I compared against
    Thomas’ Beaufighter Aces of World War 2 are the same in both publications.
Tugging at sleeves not only on the TT.10 but also the post-war operations of the TF.X by Doug Hall. This is
    an interesting article. Target tugs were important but often forgotten planes. Also the few post-war
    Beaufighter TF.X operations, not only during the initial part of the Malaya Emergency but also earlier ones
    on Java and in Burma, are given brief notices.


http://www.wwiiaircraftperformance.org/beaufighter/x7542.html
http://www.wwiiaircraftperformance.org/beaufighter/el290.html
http://www.wwiivehicles.com/great-britain/aircraft/fighter/bristol-beaufighter-fighter.asp

Bingham, Victor, Bristol Beaufighter (Shrewsbury: Airlife Publishing, 1994).
Bowyer, Michael J. F., Interceptor Fighters for the Royal Air Force (Wellingborough: Patrick Stephens, 1984).
Green, William, Famous Fighters of the Second World War (Garden City: Doubleday & Co., 1969).
Gunston, Bill, Classic aircraft. Fighters (Optimum Books, 1978).
Jong, Peter de, Dornier Do 24 Units Combat Aircraft •110 (Oxford: Osprey Publishing, 2015).
Pape, Garry R. & Harrison Ronald C., Queen of the Midnight Skies: The History of America’s Air Force Night
    Fighters (West Chester, PA: Schiffer Publishing, 1992).
Shores, Christopher and Williams, Clive, Aces High (London: Grub Street, 1994).
Thomas, Andrew, Beaufighter Aces of World War 2. Osprey Aircraft of the Aces • 65 (Oxford: Osprey
       Publishing, 2005)

Marco Mattioli’s SAVOIA-MARCHETTI S.79 SPARVIERO TORPEDO-BOMBER UNITS Osprey Combat Aircraft • 106 (2014) 96 pages.

One of the better Osprey books, based on what the Italian torpedo planes really achieved, not on what they claimed.

The first poor results with level bomber attacks against Allied ships forced Italians to form its first experimental torpedo-bomber unit on 25 July 1940, about 1½ month after Italy’s entry to the WWII. The first torpedo attack was made on 15 August 1940. So to my surprise the Italians were definitely a late comer to the torpedo-bomber field. The fact that the Luftwaffe sent its first landplane torpedo-bomber crews to Italy to get torpedo training and the fact that Italians had several successes with torpedo bombers during the WWII had made me to believe that Italians had longer experience with torpedo-bombers.

I was surprised how few planes made most of the early Italian attacks, usually only two or three planes participating. E.g. in December 1941 three Sparvieri attacked a Royal Navy formation of three Anti-Aircraft cruisers and eight destroyers. Not surprisingly they achieved nothing in good visibility. But sometimes those attacks by a couple S-79s were successful. The small formation size was a big contrast to e.g. IJNAF twin-engine torpedo planes attacks, e.g. against the Force Z (consisted of the battleship HMS Prince of Wales, the battlecruiser HMS Repulse and four destroyers) on 10 December 1941. In the spring of 1942 there were the first bigger formation attacks, 9 – 12 planes attacking same time early in 1942 and up to 41 against the Pedestal convoy in August 1942. In early November 1942, a couple days before the opening of the Operation Torch, Italians concentrating 75 S.79 and 25 S.84 torpedo bombers on Sicily and Sardinia. That didn’t mean massive torpedo attacks against the invasion fleets, the biggest S.79 attack consisted 14 torpedo-bombers and usually formations consisted of under 10 planes. They didn’t achieve much, the Allies only lost the sloop HMS Ibis. The effective defense of Allies forced Italians to initiate night attacks, and after they lost from 27 March to 10 April 1943 ten aircrews out of 25 engaged in daytime actions and had sunk only the 9,545-ton freighter Empire Rowan in return, Italians abandoned daytime torpedo attacks altogether.

When the Allies invaded Sicily in July 1943, the S.79 torpedo-bomber force numbered 99 aircraft, of which 41 were airworthy. Their only success was a hit on the fleet carrier HMS Indomitable.

On the page 23 there is an odd claim that a head-on torpedo attack would force the target ship to slow down. In fact the standard evasion maneuver was to turn towards attacking torpedo planes and so to give the smallest target to them. And anyway it takes time to slow down a ship. The attack described seems to have been a variation of the standard “anvil” attack in which one torpedo plane/group of torpedo planes approaches 45deg right off the bow and another 45deg left off the bow. If the target ship turns towards one attacker/group of attackers it gives to the other one clean broadside drop.

I was surprised how effective Blenheim fighters were against Savoia-Marchetti S.79s (meaning that they accomplished something) and how ineffective Beaufighters were (many times they managed only to damage S.79s, I had expected that a fighter armed with four 20mm cannons and six machine guns would have been more effective against rather archaic looking mixed construction three motor) during the early part of the war.

S.79 torpedo-bombers got their last success before Italy’s armistice was achieved on the night of 7 September 1943 when the 1625-ton British LST-417 was torpedoed and forced to run aground on the shore near Termini Imerese on Sicily.

While I have been aware on the German actions against Italian fleet after the Italy’s armistice on 8 September 1943 their actions against Italian planes trying to fly to Allied-controlled areas were new to me. Out of 34 Sparvieri which had set off for Allied-control territory, two were shot down by Bf 109G pilots of JG 77 who also forced three other S.79s to turn back. One crew flew north voluntarily.

 After armistice on 8 September 1943

Those Sparvieri which ended under Allied control were principally used as transport and liaison duties. Italians who chose to continue fight alongside Germany joined the Repubblica Sociale Italiana (RSI), in northern Italy, which was created towards the end of September 1943.  Between the autumn and winter of that year RSI organized its own air force, the Aeronautica Repubblicana, later redesignated the Aeronautica Nazionale Repubblicana (ANR). The first mission against Allies’ Anzio beachhead was flown on the night of 10 March 1943 by six S.79s but it was unsuccessful and one Sparviero was lost. The only success of the ANR Sparvieri occurred on 4 August 1944 when during the attack of three Greece based Sparvieri the 7100- British freighter Samsylarna was torpedoed north of Benghazi and forced to run aground. The last mission of the ANR Sparvieri torpedo bombers was flown on late 5 January 1945 by two Sparvieri crews. Through 1944-45 ANR Sparvieri succeeded in damaging just one freighter for the loss of about 100 airmen. 11 actions were fought, during which 50 torpedoes were dropped.

During the war Sparviero was the most effective antishipping weapon Italy had, the Sparviero units sunk 21 ships (nine warships and 12 freighters) and damaged 17 others (11 warships and six merchantmen).

There are some quotes from Italian combat reports and memoirs on some actions. The big plus is that while Italians’ claims are mentioned they are checked against Allied records and it is clearly mentioned what claims can be verified from Allied reports, same thoroughness is seen in several other Osprey books of this series, e.g. Osamu Tagaya’s Mitsubishi Type 1 Rikko ʽBetty’ Units of World War 2. There are many interesting photos, even some dramatic action photos, but most of the photographs are small. And of course the colour profiles, many of them very interesting as one can predict when Italian planes are in question. There are also 12 unit badges in colour. There are four appendices: S.79 torpedo-bomber units (giving basic facts of the units’ histories), S.79 warships kills 1940-43, S.79 merchant ship kills 1941-44 and S.79 Gold Medal for Military Valour recipients.

Altogether an excellent addition to one’s library.

Dunkirk to the Rhineland. Diaries and sketches of Sergeant C S Murrell, Welsh Guards Edited by Nick Murrell (Pen & Sword Books Limited, Barnsley, South Yorkshire, England,  2011)
ISBN 978 1 84884 389 9

An excellent account of Sergeant Murrell's experiences whilst on active service during WWII. The quality of his sketches publish in the book is excellent and the accuracy of his verbose recording of events seems to be good and he wrote them down just after they had occurred and often while they occurred. Murrell, who had already served with the 1st Battalion Welsh Guards before the war from 1933 to 1937, served the whole war with the same Infantry Battalion but during the spring of 1940 he was attached to General Headquarters, Royal Corps of Signals as a temporary relief and in 1944 – 1945 he served with the Intelligence Section of the Battalion. These two sections of his diaries are covered in the book. Because of his pre-war service he seems to have had the attitude more like that of a regular than that of a conscript to the war and to the British Army.  Most clearly this is shown when in 1940 he had got to sand dunes near Dunkirk and was told by a staff officer that it was not just an evacuation of non-combatant troops, but the whole BEF, Murrell found it impossible to believe that a British Army can be beaten by a German one.

He didn’t participate the actual fighting but in 1940 he experienced the chaos of the retreat to Dunkirk and the air attacks, once he was waiting German armour armed with a Boys Anti-Tank rifle, on which he noted that “We have little confidence in the weapon, and our belief is that it is ineffective except against something like a Bren gun-carrier. Against a tank I think it would be quite useless – even against a light one.” So he had fairly accurate prediction on Boys capabilities, even if a bit too pessimistic, in fact .55in Boys A/T rifle was capable to pierce even the frontal armour of the German light PzKfw I tank and that of un-up armoured light PzKfw II, which was the status of some 30 % of the German PzKfw IIs in May 1940, from a short distance. Only the sides and the rear of the up armoured PzKfw IIs, 70% of the stock, were vulnerable to Boys.

In 1944 – 1945 he served with the Intelligence Section of the battalion which formed a part of the infantry component of the Guards Armoured Division. So his story isn’t that of a front line rifleman even if he took part some combat patrols onto no-man’s land without contact with the enemy but he experienced lot of artillery fire, mortaring and the ʽMoaming Minnies’ German Nebelwerfer multiple rocket-launching projectors fire, the latter he hated most of the German artillery weapons. He tells what it was to sit in one’s trench during a heavy artillery barrage. While not participating to the sharp edge of combats his position with the intelligence section allowed wider picture on situations than that of a man in the foremost foxholes.

At the beginning of the each chapter there is a short general view of the situation, in 1940 from the viewpoint of the 1st Battalion Welsh Guards and in 1944 - 1945 from the viewpoint of the Guards Armoured Division, so the reader gets some background information on the events  Murrell describes.

So a book well worth of its price and highly recommended.

A very good purchase, this collection of articles proceeds chronologically through the first part of the year 1945. 130 A-4 size pages. At first it gives the development of the situation in the autumn of 1944 followed by an article on the Operation Bodenplatte, the surprise attack against Allied airfields on January 1, 1945 by the Luftwaffe.

This  12 pages article is good but of course if one wants a definite account of the operation the real thing, Manhro’s and Pütz’ excellent Bodenplatte book is a must, but that is of course not surprising. The text is informative and the photos are well-chosen. The figures of the LW losses are clearly taken from Manhro’s and Pütz’ book but they are only partially given, the infomation that 47% of the LW losses were by Allied AA and 23% were by Allied fighters is only a partial truth because according to the Manhro’s and Pütz’ book in addition 5% of the losses were by either Allied AA or Allied fighters and 11% were to unknown causes. The German flak, contrary to the old myth, contributed only 5% of the German losses.

The story of the shooting down of three Mistels by four P-51 Mustangs from the 55th Fighter Group on Feb 3, 1945 is a good one. It gives besides the good information on the combat a brief history of the Mistel and the planned attack on Scapa Flow by Mistels and flare-dropping Ju 88s and 188s and the fates of the four Mustang pilots during the last few months of the war. Out of the four one was shot down by the deadly German Flak and went missing, possibly murdered by furious civilians, another became a prisoner of war when his attempt to rescue a friend downed by Flak failed and one was killed either because he stalled at low level or because of he was shot down by ground fire.

Squadron Leader Clive Rowley has written an interesting article on the Australian ace Tony Gaze’s life. While serving in the RAF Gaze got 1½ jet kills while flying Spitfire XIVs before being posted on May 1, 1945 to command ‘A’ Flight of 616 Squadron on Meteor III jets. Naturally the eight pages article concentrates on his combat career and its ups and downs. The only complain I have is that Me 262s of KG 51 is sometimes given as a Me 262 of JG 51, which is totally wrong, JG 51 was a conventional fighter unit equipped in 1944 – 45 with Bf 109Gs and fighting in the Eastern Front, the only exception was the IV./JG 51 which during the last month of the war was equipped with Fw 190s, before that it also had Bf 109Gs. Also the KG(J) 51,  which Rowley sometimes uses, is wrong, the unit was a bomber/fighter-bomber unit not a fighter unit formed out of a bomber unit. Rowley gives a different WNr. and code to Gaze’s Me 262 victim, 500064 and 9K+CL than John Foreman and S. E. Harvey in their a bit dated Me 262 Combat Diary, 110615 and 9K+NL but the unit and the pilot are same even if both give the unit designation wrongly. Smith and Creek agree with Foreman and Harvey in the WNr., they don’t give the code, and give the unit designation rightly. But Andreas Brekken’s/Aviation History Society Norway’s webpage agree with Rowley see http://www.ahs.no/ref_db/lw_loss_public.asp?lossid=103175, so while both Andreas and Smith & Creek are very good researchers in this case I tend to believe Andress in that at least in loss documents the WNr. and code is given as 500064 and 9K+CL.

The eight pages Natter article is very good.

Yaks over Köningsberg, the story of the French Normandie-Niemen fighter regiment operations over Kaliningrad area/East Prussia in the early part of 1945, pure chronology based only information from one side other than the OoB of the Luftwaffe’s Luftflotte 6 on the 11 January 1945. One notice on it, while it is true that ground-attack versions of Fw 190s could be used as pure fighters as the author writes they were handicapped by the weight of their extra armour. In the introduction part of the article unit’s pilot losses during its early part of existence are compared to the claimed victories which is doubly misleading, firstly over-claiming was common in all air forces and secondly pilot losses were fewer than aircraft losses. Luckily in the main part of the article which tells the story of its participation to the fighting over East-Prussia also those losses where pilots survived are mentioned.

Ram Them! is a good blow-to-blow article on the Sonderkommando Elbe’s ramming attacks on April 7, 1945 with well-chosen B/W photos. It concentrates to the action between SKdo Elbe and USAAF heavy bombers and doesn’t spend much space on the fighter vs fighter combats between Luftwaffe fighters and USAAF escorts, mentioning only a couple air victories achieved by P-51 pilots or delve much the moral/ethical discussion amongst German commanders on the advisably of ramming attacks. But that is quite understandably, in a short article like this it is good to have a clear focus. The author is in opinion that only ten bombers were lost to the Elbe pilots while Weir in his book on the subject writes that USAAF seems to have lost 13 bombers to the Sonderkommando Elbe pilots. Also according to Caldwell’s Day fighters book Sonderkommando Elbe pilots got 13 or 14 bombers. According to Freeman’s The Mighty Eight War Diary at least eight and according to Boehme’s JG 7 history twelve heavy bombers at most. In the end of the article there is a short note on the Oberst Hajo Herrmann’s final wartime scheme – Sonderkommando Bienenstock, demolition teams flown on Fieseler Fi 156 Storck light STOL planes behind enemy lines.

King of Fighters The Best Single-seater of 1945.
The author rightly pointed out the importance of pilot quality in fighter combat and so paper figures were not all important The article claims that Bell P-63 Kingcobras were used against Germany in small numbers by the Soviets but because of the lack of corroborating evidence Yefim Gordon in his Soviet Air Power in World War 2 (2008) and in his and Sergey Komissarov’s US Aircraft in the Soviet Union and Russia (2008) writes that he/they stick(s) to the generally accepted version of events that the Kingcobras did not see combat on the Soviet-German front. So in its place there should be Bell P-39Q or N, if one Lend-Lease Eastern Front plane is wanted to be included. And why not, P-39 was widely used by Soviets until the end of the war and three (2nd, 3rd and 5th) of their five top aces got most of their kills while flying Airacobra.
While generally acceptable article but on the Soviet fighters there are a number of points on which I have a different view. The maximum climb rate given for the Spitfire LF Mk. IX (4,470 ft/min) seems to be that of the much rarer HF Mk. IX, which was lower than that of the real one for LF Mk IX, namely 5,080 ft/min at sea level and 4,725 ft/min at 2,000 ft with the boost of +25 lb/sq.inch. while using 100/150 grade fuel, and with +18 lb/sq.inch boost (100/130 grade fuel) 4,620 ft/min at sea level. As for Spitfire Mk. XIV the given 4,700 ft/min is correct for +18 lb/sq.inch boost, but during the last 1½ months of the war in Europe +21 lb/sq.inch boost was allowed with 100/150 grade fuel making possible the climb rate of almost 5,100 ft/min at sea level. On the contrary the rate of climb given to Tempest Mk. V (4,700 ft/min) seems to be optimistic, the maximum figure I have seen is 4,380 ft/min at sea level.
On Republic P-47 Thunderbolt the Spitfire version to which it and North American P-51 Mustang are compared is missing, the claims made are true only when the US planes are compared to Spitfire Mk. XIV, Spitfire LF Mk. IX was slower than P-51D at all altitudes and slower than P-47D at medium and high altitudes. And both mentioned US fighters zoomed better than any WWII era Spitfire. And not only Mustang but all WWII fighters powered by liquid-cooled engines were vulnerable to even light battle damage to their cooling system.
Contrary to claim of the author, P-38L didn’t lack stopping power, its armament, while not exceptionally heavy, was a good average for a late war fighter.
Lockheed P-80A had the same six .5 M2 as P-51D Mustang but its machine guns were all concentrated to the nose giving more concentrated and effective fire pattern.
While the first Lavochkin La-7s that reached combat zone had max speed of 406 mph and rate of climb 3,396 fpm, the late La-7s from late 1944 onwards had max speed of 418 mph and rate of climb 4,762 fpm , so in early 1945 and under 2,000m only Hawker Tempest was faster than it and Bf 109K-4 had equal speed. Spitfire Mk. XIV with +21lb boost became faster at little under 3,000 m and with +18lb boost at little under 4,000 m. Spitfire Mk XIV with +21lb boost out climbed it at all altitudes as did Bf 109K-4, but Spitfire Mk. XIV with +18lb only above appr. 1,500 m. La-7 was an excellent low- and medium altitude fighter and these were the altitudes where most of the Eastern Front air combats were fought. It suffered from engine unreliability which arose from the engine installation not from the engine itself. And while roll-over bar was recommended for production La-7s, according to Ves̆ts̆ík’s Lavoc̆kin La-7 book it wasn’t installed and that seems to be the case. But it isn’t all bad, according to the article La-7 had bigger spinner than La-5FN, I don’t remember seeing that information before but when I measured the spinners from the line drawings in Gordon’s Lavochkin’s Piston-Engined Fighters the results confirmed that. So at least according to the line drawings the information is correct. A pair more complains; the second photo seems to shows a Lavochkin La-5F not a La-7 and La-7 was powered by Shvetsov ASh-82FN not by ASh-82FNV, maybe the author means Shvetsov M-82FNV which was the prototype/pre-production version of the engine of which was installed in La-5FNs and La-7s. Its production version was at first designated as Shvetsov M-82FN but soon re-designated as Shvetsov ASh-82FN to honour its chief designer Arkadiy Shvetsov.
On Yak-3 there is a bit different problem, according to Gordon’s Soviet Air Power book the max. speed of it was 398 mph not 407 mph given in the article, but performance, especially the maximum level speed, of the partly wooden Soviet fighters varied even more than the metal Western ones. And I have seen Soviet/Russian graphs showing both 401 and 405 mph as the maximum speed for Yak-3. But again it is the maximum rate of climb that is my main problem, the table in the article shows 3,650 fpm while Soviet graphs showed 4,330 fpm, which is the rate of climb that would explain why Soviet pilots had so high regard on that little fighter and why German pilots thought it being so dangerous opponent. It seems that the author has got his Soviet aircraft specifications from Wikipedia, where somebody has calculated the Soviet rates of climb by simply using the time to altitude information from Gordon’s Soviet Air Power book and converting it to a rate of climb by dividing the altitude (16,400 ft) by the time needed to reach it. The results definitely aren’t the maximum rates of climb of those planes.
While as I wrote above, it seems that Bell P-63 Kingcobra didn’t see combat in Europe during the WWII, the climb data given in article seems to be too low, the internet site says 3,600 ft/min, according to Dean it was even better. This is in line with the time to height information in Gordon’s and Wagner’s books.  According to Dean P-63 had the best rate of climb of the all USAAF fighters seeing series production during WWII.  Otherwise the description of P-63 is ok and rightly pointed out reasons why USAAF didn’t use it as a combat plane, the lack of range and high altitude performance, it was low and middle altitude fighter.
Focke-Wulf Fw 190A-9, the speed given is that without compressibility correction which is the way how German data was rather often given, so almost 10 mph too optimistic when compared other planes whose maximum speeds are usually given with compressibility correction. Also its rate of climb seems to have given as 2,350 ft/min, which is same as given in Kens’ and Nowarra’s old Die deutschen Flugzeuge 1933-1945 and Wood’s/Gunston’s Hitler’s Luftwaffe for Fw 190A-8  when a German document I have seen gives 11.7 m/s which converts to 2,303 ft/min for Fw 190A-9. The same document gives only 9.7 m/s, that is 1,909 ft/min, for Fw 190A-8 but also 14.0 m/s (2,756 ft/min) with emergency power with increased boost.  On the other hand 3,445 ft/min for Fw 190A-8 with 1.42 ata boost is given in my very poor copy of the Focke-Wulf Flugzeugbau-Flugmechanic-L graph dated 12 Jan 1944. The maximum RoC isn’t better with 1,68 ata but this higher boost gives significantly better RoC between 1.500m and 5.500m. The figure 2,677 ft/min A-8 1.32 ata is given in Focke-Wulf Flugzeugbau-Flugmechanic-L graph dated 13 Nov 1943. A Soviet test gives maximum 3,563 ft/min with special power and 3,150 ft/min with the combat power (probably means Steig- und Kampfleistung) but the Fw 190A-8 used in it was without outer wing cannon and also had smaller fuel load and was 314 kgs lighter than the standard Fw 190A-8 in German flight tests graphs. I admit that Fw 190A-9 was a hard nut to open and in the end I didn’t find a reliable source for its rate of climb but IMHO the maximum RoC of a normal Fw 190A-9 fighter should be at least 3,445 ft/min.
The speed of Fw 190D-9 given seems to be some 8 mph optimistic relative to the delivered production aircraft because it assumes the installation of the engine gap seal. On the other hand, the speculation that the speed without MW50 might has been as low as 360 mph is rather odd, Soviet data gives that speed as appr. 390 mph, and Soviet data for Fw 190s tended to be clearly lower than values in German or Western Allied documents. Also the rate of climb value given, 3,300 ft/min, is rather conservative, in early 1945 Fw 190D-9 was capable to 3,405 ft/min with take-off power and 4,232 ft/min with special emergency power (Sonder-Notleistung).
I would not call Messerschmitt Bf 109 as long-suffering. On the Bf 109K-4, only the Bf 109K prototype had a slightly bulged canopy, the production machines had the standard Erla/Galland canopy.
The DB605DM was cleared up to 1.75ata, the DB605DB pushed the limit up to 1.8ata, and both could be sustained with use of either B4 fuel + MW-50 (as mentioned in various documents, even if it was an afterthought in the DM case) or with C3 fuel. With 1.8 ata boost and 2,800 rpm 605DB produced 1,850 ps/1,825 hp. Without MW-50 with B4 fuel it produced 1,430 ps/1,410 hp. However the DB605DC max power, with 1.98 ata boost and 2,800 rpm could be achieved only with use of C3+MW-50. It then produced 2,000 ps/1,973 hp. Problems were the scarcity of methanol for the MW-50 and the limited supply of high octane C3 for Bf 109 units because Fw 190As and Fs could use only it, so usually Bf 109 units had to be content with lower octane B4.
The given range seems to be too short when compared to the Spitfires but the same figure is given in Poruba’s and Janda’s Messerschmitt Bf 109K book. On the other hand Martinek’s article gives the range of Bf 109G-10 as 650 km, which converts into 404 miles and G-10, while otherwise very similar to K-4, had fixed tailwheel and lacked the outer wheel well covers (but often the tailwheel was locked down and outer wheel well covers removed in operational K-4s) so it’s range should have been shorter than that of K-4 or when compared to a K-4 with modifications just given in parentheses, the same. A plane had many different ranges depending on engine settings used and the flight altitude but IMHO the 404 miles range is truer when compared the ranges of Spitfires given in the article.
Messerschmitt Me 262 part is OK but again there was no KG(J) 51, it was simply KG 51.
Messerschmitt Me 163, MK 108 wasn’t slow firing with its 650 rounds/min rate of fire but it had fairly low muzzle velocity, 540 m/s (1,770 ft/s).
On the conclusion part of the article, IMFO Meteor III wasn’t non-operational but because of snaking and its poor rate of roll it wasn’t a top-class fighter in 1945. In the end the author concludes that the choice for the title of the best fighter in the ETO has to be made between Spitfire XIV and Me 262 and he chooses Spitfire XIV. I agree, that if the choice is made without thinking of the range and the combat altitude, the choice is between the two but even with the haste and desperate situation in which Me 262 was rushed into service and all the problems which followed from that, Me 262 would have dominated the duel between these two planes if the combat had begun from equal positions. Spitfire might survive because of its better horizontal manoeuvrability and acceleration but to win it should have to surprise the Me 262 or the Me 262 pilot should have to make a bad error.
So while otherwise passable article on the late war fighters in ETO it fails badly on the Soviet planes.

Then Wee Willie Ran out of Luck, an excellent article on the “career” of the Boeing B-17G-15-BO 42-31333 Wee Willie” and some of the numerous crews who flow combat mission on it during its 128 missions. Also showing the dramatic pictures of its fiery end on April 8, 1945 over Stendal on its 128th mission. My only complaint is that I’d have liked information on what was done to it at the completion and modification centre at Cheyenne, Wyoming.

Next article is on Hans-Guido Mutke’s dive on April 9, 1945. IMHO a bit unnecessary article because we had only Mutke’s word on the incident and he came into public with his story only 44 years after the incident. But this article takes only two pages and also tells how Mutke flying the Me 262A-1a/R1 “White 3” WNr. 500071 ended in Switzerland on 25 April 1945. The plane is nowadays at the Deutsches Museum in München.

Canadians against the Komet. An interesting article, but it still does not give a definite answer what was the target of the only combat use of the Sondergerät SG 500 Jagdfaust. Not that I criticize the author, it is often impossible to dig out the truth because of the overclaiming and conflicting eyewitness report. The lack of the Luftwaffe records doesn’t help, more so when we talked about the last months of the war with all the chaos on the German side. The author things that the Me 163 pilot Fritz Kelb attacked one of the Lancasters of 433 Squadron RCAF or 405 Squadron RCAF. According to Ethell’s & Price’s book, Kelb shot down a B-17. Different Wiki articles give different victim. Wiki article on Me 163 says “resulting in the destruction of a Halifax bomber, although other sources say it was a Boeing B-17”, Wikiarticle on Sondergerät SG 500 Jagdfaust says that “Fritz Kelb downed an RAF Lancaster using it.”

Then a two pages article on the well-known combat between a Piper L-4 Grasshopper and Fieseler Fi 156 Storch.

Piston Engine Zenit, a good and impartial article on Focke-Wulf Ta 152. At first a very short overview of the development and production of the Ta 152 followed by a description of its combat use at JG 301.  But the author forgot the very brief JG 11 part, it got 4 to 6 Ta 152s near the end of April 1945, but during its last movement during the war, from Neustadt-Glewe to Leck, two out of a formation of four Ta152s from the Stab JG11 were shot down by Spitfires during the transfer flight and the third had to make a belly-landing at Lech airfield.

Then an article on a murder of a shot down USAAF P-51 pilot.

And then the article which gave the tittle of this publication, Spitfires Over Berlin, the story of a Spitfire XIV formation from 350 (Belgian) Squadron combating with Focke-Wulf Fw 190s over the western fringes of Berlin. The Belgian side is well told but there is next to nothing on the German side, so very one-sided story. Besides the quotes from the Allied pilots’ combat reports the other interesting point is a couple photos showing rather battered Spitfire XIVs of the 350 (Belgian) Squadron, fitness of some parts of the engine cowling seemed to have been rather poor.

On the other hand the next article on the activities of the Luftwaffe on April 24, 1945 is interesting, even if the situation was hopeless to Germans and fuel reserves were very low, the Luftwaffe flew over 800 combat sortie on that day, of which nearly 500 were fighter sorties, almost 250 fighter-bomber, ground-attack and anti-tank sorties and some 90 recce, most flown by Fw 190s and Bf 109s. With only six pages it is only a short overview as the author himself admit but very interesting one.

The Ringmaster’s Grand Finale. April 26, 1945: JV44 and Adolf Galland.  The article is a good one, so I have nothing to complain on it but the subject. JG 7 was much more important Me 262 fighter unit than Galland’s JV 44 but much less well known, at least in English speaking world, so I would have been much more eager to see an article on the former unit.

Then a nice article on the Heinkel He 162A and the only possible air kill achieved by a He 162A pilot. It also gives information on the all nine fatal accidents suffered by He 162A pilots during its use in WW2, a couple more French and British pilots died in He 162A accidents after the war but that is outside the scope of this publication. These is even a photo of the wreck of Flying Officer Tom Austin‘s Tempest V JN877 but it is also clearly stated that we will probably never know for sure if Leutnant Rudolf Schmitt shot down the Tempest because of the time difference and not even the place where the Tempest crashed was exactly a match with the combat area reported by Schmitt. Austin reported that he had suffered a catastrophic engine failure and some sources say that the loss was allocated to a German AA unit. There are several fairly small photos of He 162As but what I miss is a photo showing the ventilation disc on the port side of the canopy of He 162.

The last but one article, Final Dogfight May 8, 1945 gives one probably answer but in fact there were later air combats in Europe, mostly friendly fire cases. USAAF Lockheed F-5 photo-reconnaissance planes (unarmed version of the famous Lockheed P-38 Lightning fighter plane) of the 39th Photographic Reconnaissance Squadron/10th Photographic Group, belonging to the 9th U.S. Air Force were then operating from Y-10 airfield in Wiesbaden, Germany.
On 8 May 1945, the unit was on a Prisoner-of-War Camp Pin-Pointing Mission in Dresden airspace, i.e. in the area recently seized by Soviet troops. Several Soviet Yak fighters of the 106th Guards Fighter Air Regiment from Cottbus airfield attacked Captain Malcolm L. Nash. Second Lieutenant Lazuta wrongly took Nash´s F-5E for a German Focke Wulf Fw 189 (twin-fuselage plane like F-5), and shot it down in Reichenbach area, approx. 40 kilometres West of Dresden. Captain Nash made a belly landing in the field. Though he escaping serious injury his F-5E was totally demolished.
On 9 May 1945 afternoon, the 39th Photo-Reconnaissance Squadron sent six Lockheed F-5s to search for the missing Capt. Nash. Two of the F-5s piloted by 1/Lt Thomas P. Petrus and 2/Lt. Thomas Jackson, flew as far as Prague. By coincidence, this happened when six Soviet US built Bell P-39 Airacobras patrolled the area. They were part of the 100th Guards Fighter Air Regiment. Soviet fighters covered Soviet tanks advancing to Prague, and one of them, Major Vasilyi A. Pschenitchnikov, took the American twin-fuselage F-5 for a German Fw 189 and shot down the plane over Prague. While 1/Lt Petrus, suffering heavy burns, saved his life on parachute, Maj. Pschenitchnikov on his return added to his score the kill of „Fw 189“, his thirteenth and the last WW2 kill.
There was also at least one another dogfight on 9 May: Ju88, from possibly II/KG200 (144032), was attacked and damaged by FAA fighters over Skagerrak.
And on 11May 1945 Anson XII PH539 of the Desert Air Force Communication Flight was attacked by three Yak fighters while off course. It force-landed in a field near Graz, Austria and struck trees.

The last article is Aftermath May 9, 1945 and beyond. It is on the Allied war booty planes and scientific intelligence during the last days of the war and immediate afterwards. There is a list of the Watson’s Whizzers’ Me 262s and a list of the German aircraft captured by the British and US. Surprisingly it seems that  British gave all four Focke-Wulf 190Ds they had captured to US while they kept few 190As and F-8s plus a two of the three Ta 152Hs themselves.  Not surprisingly there are many night-fighters, mostly Junkers Ju 88G-6s but I was a little surprised of the number of Messerschmitt Me 163Bs captured by British, at least 23.

All in all I am very positively surprised at this purchase, almost all articles are good and interesting with well-chosen pictures, almost all them clear even if some are rather small in size. It gives interesting and many-sided picture of the last five months of the air war on the Western Front. Only major complains is the lack of articles on the Soviet Air Forces and the underestimations of the performance of Soviet fighters.

Main sources:
Motorenmustern for DB 605D series engines

Boehme, Manfred, JG 7 The World’s First Jet Fighter Unit 1944/1945 (Atglen, PA: Schiffer Publishing, 1992).
Caldwell, Donald, Day Fighters in Defence of the Reich A War Diary, 1942 – 45 (Barnsley: Frontline Books,
               2011).
Dean, Francis H., America’s Hundred-Thousand The U.S. Production Fighters of World War II (Atglen, PA:
               Schiffer Publishing, 1997).
Ethell, Jeffrey & Price, Alfred, World War II Fighting Jets (Shrewsbury: Airlife Publishing, 1994).
Foreman, John and Harvey, S. E., Me 262 Combat Diary (New Malden: Air Research Publications, 1990).
Freeman, Roger A., The Mighty Eight War Diary (London: Arms and Armour Press, 1990).
Gordon, Yefim, Lavochkin’s Piston-Engined Fighters (Hinckley: Midland Publishing, 2003).
Gordon, Yefim, Soviet Air Power in World War 2 (Hinckley: Midland Publishing, 2008).
Hermann, Dietmar & Wunderlich, Markus, Die kurze Karriere der Focke-Wulf Ta 152, Flugzeug Classic, Apr.
                2010.
Kens, Karlheinz and Nowarra, Heinz J., Die deutschen Flugzeuge 1933-1945 (München: J.F. Lehmann Verlag,
                2. Ausgabe, 1964)
Manhro, John and Pütz, Ron, Bodenplatte The Luftwaffe’s Last Hope (Crowborough: Hikoki Publications,
                2004).
Martinek, Josef, ‘Bf 109G-10 – the most agile “Gustav”’, Zlínek, No. 4 / Vol. III.
Murawski, Marek J., JG 1 “Oesau” 1944-1945 (Lublin: KAGERO, 2002).
Poruba,T and Janda, A, Messerschmitt Bf 109K (Hradec Králové: JaPo, 1997).
Price, Alfred, The Spitfire Story (London: Cassell & Co, Revised Second Edition, 2002).
Shores, Christopher and Williams, Clive, Aces High (London: Grub Street 1994).
Smith, J. Richard and Creek, Eddie j., Me 262 Volume Three (Crowborough: Classic Publications, 2000).
Ves̆ts̆ík, Milos̆, Lavoc̆kin La-7 (Praha: MBI, 2000).
Wagner, Ray (Ed.), American Combat Planes (Garden City, New York: Doubleday & Company, Inc., New
               Revised Edition, 1968)
Weir, Adrian, The Last Flight of the Luftwaffe (London: Cassell & Co, 2000).
Wood, Tony/Gunston, Bill, Hitler’s Luftwaffe. A pictorial and technical encyclopedia of Hitler’s air power in
               World War II (:Leisure Books, Reprinted, 1984).

http://www.spitfireperformance.com/spitfire-IX.html
http://www.spitfireperformance.com/spit14v109.html
http://www.wwiiaircraftperformance.org/P-63/P-63.html
http://www.wwiiaircraftperformance.org/fw190/leistungsdaten-1-10-44.jpg
http://www.wwiiaircraftperformance.org/fw190/fw190d9test.html
http://www.wwiiaircraftperformance.org/Methanol.pdf
http://users.atw.hu/kurfurst/articles/MW_KvsXIV.htm  
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daimler-Benz_DB_605#Variants
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Messerschmitt_Me_163_Komet
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jagdfaust
http://forum.12oclockhigh.net/showthread.php?t=40780
http://forum.12oclockhigh.net/showthread.php?t=7258

Over the Battlefield - Operation Goodwood by Ian Daglish. Edition: Hardcover (2005)
Pages: 272    Publisher: Pen & Sword Military     ISBN: 1 84415 153 0

This is an interesting book on the Operation Goodwood, especially on the actions of the armoured elements of the 11th Armoured Division, the 29th Armoured Brigade and the 2nd Northamptonshire Yeomanry (the armoured reconnaissance regiment of the 11th which was in fact its fourth tank battalion), during it. The most unique feature of the book is the generous use of aerial photographs taken during the first day of the battle by a RAF PR Spitfire.
 
Daglish had carried out a great deal of original research, and has attempted to find the best authentic British sources for each part of the battle. From notes one sees that he had used at least some British war diaries and from text that he has utilized especially signal logs, and has been aware the problems with their use. But he seems not to have used German war diaries. The text is supported by a large number of aerial photographs taken during the battle, and a good selection of related pictures, which often help to explain some of the more obscure elements of the battle. The aerial pictures and pictures on the ground show well the awesome destruction produced by the pre-attack aerial bombardment and by the artillery barrage. And the actions of Becker’s 200. StuG Abteilung is well described with help of few Becker’s drawings on its tactical deployment. It is awful to see the tracks lines made by the Tiger IIs/King Tigers of the 1./sPzAbt. 503 attacking towards Lirose, one pair of track marks ending into a massive bomb crater, the destiny of the company commander’s tank. Or track marks of the failed assault on Bras by the 3rd RTR on 18 July, mostly straight approaching followed wavering retreat by those still capable to move.

There are also a fair amount of extracts from personal accounts, but overwhelmingly those of British, more balance in this would have been helpful. The lack of a bibliography is a minus. At least a bit more should have been given the goals of the offensive, at least the minimum geographical objectives laid down by Montgomery and the more restricted geographical objectives given by Dempsey, the GOC of the British 2nd Army, on the eve of the battle. IMHO a note that more detailed information can be found in author’s earlier book on the subject isn’t enough. Also no clear figures of the total losses suffered by the British and German forces during the battle are not given, only on the page 194 is given the tank losses of the “sabre” squadrons of the 29th Armoured Brigade suffered on 18th July 1944 but that is all. After all the given main objectives of the operation were, alongside the pinning down the main part of the German armour against British sector, ‘write down the German armour to such an extent that it is of no further value to the Germans as a basis of the battle. To gain a good bridgehead over the Orne through Caen…’ so the information of the losses is significant in order to understand the success or failure of the operation. I understand that the object of this book is to describe how the battle was fought but a half page on objects and a page on the losses and on the significance of the ground gained should have been possible plus a map showing the line reached at the end of the operation. And no information of the strength and armament of the remains of the 16. LW-Feld- Division, which was the first unit to took the impact of the British attack. The book heavily concentrated on the events on 18 July, they took 144 pages of the book. The day was clearly the most important day of the operation and the aerial photos used were taken on that day but 19 July got only 10 and half pages and the last combat day, 20 July, got less than a half page. IMHO a little more balanced handling would have been better. 19th got reasonable description and it was an important day, because on that day British at last took some tactically important places, Bras, Hubert-Folie and Bourguebus on Bourguebus ridge. But at least a page more would be nice for the 20th.

In fact this is more a detailed, meticulously researched and lavishly illustrated account of the 3½ days battle than a history of the operation. This observation also made the amount of the space given to the different days more understandable. It was the armoured part of the 11th Armoured Division which did the majority of the fighting on the British side on the first day of the operation.

Chapters
1 - July 1944: The Opponents
2 - Mid-July: The Approach to Battle
3 - 18 July, Dawn: The Bombing
4 - 18 July, Morning: The British Tank Run
5 - 18 July, Morning: The German Response
6 - 18 July, Mid-Morning: Things Fall Apart
7 - 18 July, Midday: The Ridge & The Cauldron
8 - 18 July, Afternoon and Evening: Twilight of Ambition
9 - 19 & 20 July: The End and the Reckoning

The appendices are very good and informative:
I - The Goodwood Battleground. This contains a very good verbal description on the terrain.
II - Army Maps and Map References. A short but good description on the military maps in use in 1944 in the
      ETO and on British gird system
III - Telling the Time. Explains the times used by the warring parties
IV - Armour in Combat during Goodwood. A very good on Sherman survivability and reasons why it brew-up
      fairly easily. Also very good on the survivability of Panther and Tiger but IMHO it would have been better
      to say that the clearly most numerous German tank type in Normandy, PzKpfw IV seems to have
      brewed-up as easily as Sherman.
V - Lessons Learned from Goodwood. Some interesting observations but IMHO anyway a bit light on conclus-
     ions. IMHO the most interesting piece of information in this appendix is the way Goodwood was used to
     bolster NATO’s morale.   
VI - 11th Armoured Division, Goodwood Order of Battle. This appendix has good information, firstly the TOE
      of British armoured division is not as well-known as of those of comparable German and US divisions and
      British subunits were not so neatly named as in most of armies, not like as II./PzR 2 etc.
VII - 21.Panzerdivision, Goodwood Order of Battle This is also interesting and important, because the TOE of
      the 21. Panzerdivision was unique. The part of the 22. Panzer Regiment gives the right number of Panzer
      IVs, which formed its striking power, it had on 1 June 1944 but missed 6 Panzer IIIs and the 40 French
      tanks (38 SOMUA S35s and 2 Hotchkisses) it also had, not that the French ones were very important on
      D-Day and they had no effect during the Goodwood. Daglish also gives the number of Pz IV L/48s
      available on 1 July, 17 July (50) and 1 August but not that of on 22 July (22), which would have been
      useful because it clearly shows that also the Germans suffered heavy AFV losses during the Goodwood.
      Also exceptionally both of the division’s two PzGrRgts had an armoured infantry battalion riding on
      armoured half-tracks and extra self-powered firepower. But he failed to mention the Panzer Artillery
      Regiment 155, with two (instead of usual one) of its three artillery battalions equipped with self-propelled
      guns. It also had one extra self-propelled rocket projector battery. The main weakness of its equipment
      was that its medium SP artillery was equipped with 15 cm sFH 13 field howitzers instead of the newer
      15 cm sFH 18, the main difference being the clearly shorter maximum range of the older field howitzer.
      Short mention is made on 200. Panzer-Jäger Abt. which was equipped with very heavy but exceptionally
      powerful 8.8cm Pak 43/41 anti-tank guns. The essential info on the gun is given but not the quantity (24)
      of the guns the battalion had. And of course the 200. StuG-Abtailungen commanded by Major Alfred
      Becker, the innovator of its all SP guns based on captured French chasses used extensively by the
      21. Panzer Division.
VIII - Bombing the Goodwood Battlefield. A good overview, goes through each target area telling approx.
      number of bombers participating, amount of bombs dropped on that target area, how accurate the
      bombing was at that area and  its effects on Germans.
IX - The Question of the Cagny '88s'. Good, but from German side based mostly on the memoirs of
      von Luck, the unpublished late 40s memoirs (based on his diary) of Becker, the CO of the 200. StuG-Abt
      and Pickert’s (the GOC of the III. Flak Korps) ‘Die III. Flak Korps in der Normandie Schlacht’. A consultation
      of German war diaries would have made this appendix more convincing.
     
      LATER ADDITION (on 31 Dec 2015): And even General Pickett in US Army Historical Division foreign
      military studies MS B-597 said that some LW 88s engaged British tanks during Operation Goodwood but
      without giving places, so it is impossible to say if some of these were present at Cagny.
      While reading Dunkirk to the Rhineland. Diaries and sketches of Sergeant C S Murrell, Welsh Guards
      Edited by Nick Murrell I came across a piece of information on Cagny 88s. Murrell served with the
      Intelligence Section of the 1st Battalion Welsh Guards. In the book on the page 91 "...Here we are dug in
      on the outskirts of Cagny. 50 yards away, along a row of tall trees, lies a battery of four abandoned
      88mm guns, and strewn about each gun, a pile of yard-long shells that are so deadly to our tanks."

     WNW of Cagny a dirt/gravelled road lined by tall trees on its NW side turned from the main road to NE.
     This treeline seems to have been an excellent position to ambush the C Squadron/2nd Fife & Forfar
     Yeomanry. And the road would explain the lack of track marks, which the artillery tractors/half-tracks
     should have left on the ground. And in fact there is a suspious trackmark on the field SE of the road soon
     after the crosroads NW of Cagny. But of course this sort of line-abreast placement amongst tall trees
     wasn't suitable to AA work but clearly a deployment for A/T action. The  other possibility is the orchard NE
     of Cagny but guns deployed there would have had to fire through the  broken hedge line west of them in
     order to hit the Shermans of the C Squadron/2nd Fife & Forfar Yeomanry. But the key is the exact location
     of the HQ of the 1st Battalion Welsh Guards in the evening of 19 July 1944 which I don't know, the war
     diary text doesn't give other information than "Rear Battalion H.Q. moved forward to just outside Cagny"
     but anyway the 88s clearly were there. And according to Ludovic Fortin's British Tanks in Normandy p. 35
     when the infantry of the Guards Armoured Division seized Cagny it captured three 88 guns abandoned by
     the Germans.
     305. Heeres-Flak-Artillerie-Abteilung attached to the 21. Panzer Division had two four gun 88 mm
     batteries. Maybe von Luck had some problems with one of the battery commanders and because he didn't
     want to accuse him publicly on a cowardly behavior after the war he invented an unnamed Luftwaffe unit
     whose commander was unwilling to obey his orders. That is of course purely my speculation.

     http://ww2talk.com/forums/topic/33912-war-diary-1st-battalion-welsh-guards-jan-dec-1944/
     Dunkirk to the Rhineland. Diaries and sketches of Sergeant C S Murrell, Welsh Guards Edited by Nick
     Murrell (Barnsley: Pen & Sword Books Limited, 2011).
     Fortin, Ludovic, British Tanks in Normandy (Paris: Histoire & Collections, 2012)

X - Mike Wetz. The story of the reconnaissance flight which produced the aerial photos used in the book with
     good info on RAF’s photo recon procedures.
Index

Four main complains:
The lack of biography.
The lack of a good colour topographic map, there is a fairly good b/w topographic map but during printing process its height contours has become rather badly faded, so while it gives well out the positions of villages and bigger farms, roads, railway embankments and orchards the elevations are hard to gauge and topography is essential in understanding tactical moves in military history.
Much too limited information on the goals of the operation and on the losses suffered.
Too little information on the 20th July actions.

Smith, J. Richard and Creek Eddie J., Me 262 Volume One. Classic Publications Burgess Hill, West Sussex 1997. ISBN 0 9526867 2 4. 224 pages, Dimensions: 30.6 x 22.8 x 2 cm

Simply an excellent book, full of relevant information, technical drawings and specifications. It is also a book for modelers, plenty of good quality b/w and some colour photographs, many colour profiles and an appendix on Luftwaffe’s camouflage and markings. Unfortunately difficult and very expensive to get nowadays.

This volume, the first of four, covers development of the Me 262 from its initiation to the eve of the beginning of its operational testing, in other words to the end of 1943 but the development history is taken to mid- 1944, with information on the use and careers of the ten prototypes and the first seven pre-production aircraft (Me 262 S1 – S7) and the initial production methods.

The book begins with good survey of Willy Messerschmitt’s career and the history of his firm, altogether 26 pages.
Then followed a 16 pages thorough chapter on the German jet engine development, which covers well the three jet engines that influenced the design of the Me 262 (BMW P3304, BMW P3302 (BMW 003) and Jumo 004). The BMW 003A, a different engine from the P3302, which flew in later Me 262 development aircraft, is also discussed, even if it did not influence the airframe design.  The story of the development of Me 262 itself began on the page 56. The book has many photographs of wind-tunnel models that were prepared to evaluate the several stages of airframe design that began with what looks like a straight-wing Me 309 derivative or cousin and ended with the swept-wing fighter that went to production. Also other descriptions of technical matters is very good e.g. the descriptions of Zeiss TSA 2D and Lofte 7H bomb sights

There are four appendices:
Appendix. 1. Camouflage and Markings
Appendix. 2. Me 262 Prototype Flights
Appendix. 3. German Reaction Engine Designation System
Appendix. 4. Messerschmitt Personalities and Company Organization. This is an extensive list of Messerschmitt personalities, often accompanied with a micro biography.

For modellers the Appendix 1 is interesting, for those interested in Me 262:n development the Appendices 2 and 4 are very useful.

Difficult to find something to criticize but there is always something.  
The index could be more detailed and there are some annoying typos. Also when the writers wonder why Hitler didn’t cancel his order to concentrate initially purely on the Me 262 Jabo/bomber versions soon after the D-Day when the main reason behind his reasoning, the ability of Jabo/bomber version to bomb invading Allied troops on the beaches, had disappeared they forget the effect of the Operation Fortitude, which kept Germans waiting for the “main landing” because it deluded them to believe that the D-Day was only a diversion. And there are some errors when the authors write on some side topics, e.g. the claim that LW was able to fly only about 100 sorties on D-Day, when the right figure is 300+. Also their claim on the effectiveness of the ‘Big Week’ seems to be based on what Allied thought they had achieved, at least German aircraft production figures don’t show the level of production drop in March1944 mentioned in the book.

And thanks to Arno for lending his copy.