In addition to the nonproliferation related materials I have also been buying other items. As mentioned military history including naval, WW1 and WW2, early modern, medieval and ancient, a little terrorism related material, and some space and aviation books.
The aviation and space books are a bit of a mixed bag, split between the new, mostly collected on my travels, and the old, mostly gotten from local 2nd hand book stores and the library sale.
Aviation & Space books
“The Road to the 707″ was actually more interesting than I expected. I picked it up at the Boeing Museum of Flight bookstore in Seattle when we were over there this summer. I didn’t have much time to make a decision as the store was closing but it looked interesting on a quick flip through so I took a chance. In the event I was glad that I did. The book’s focus is not so much the 707 as the evolution of the various technologies that made it possible as experienced by the author. As such it is quite informative on the problems encountered during the development of early piston / propeller passenger aviation and even more useful on the process of introducing pressurization, jet engines and swept wings, all of which were extremely cutting edge technology at the time. The final chapters give a useful overview of the development and testing of the Dash-8, which was done entirely with the company’s own money in the absence of any contracts. When Boeing first flew the Dash-8 prototype there was little interest or acceptance on the part of airlines or pilots. Boeing actually had to take the plane on the road, so to speak, to give decision makers the opportunity to experience this breakthrough aircraft. Eventually Boeing was able to sell derivatives of the Dash-8 to the U.S.A.F. as the KC-135 and somewhat more refined evolutions of the original prototype to airlines around the world as the 707. The writing is great; complex technical topics are adequately explained and the author’s style is never turgid or dragging, which is never guaranteed with this sort of book.
Tommy Thomason’s “U.S. Naval Air Superiority” was bought on the same trip. I’d have to call it an absolute must for anyone who wants to understand carrier-based aviation. The book’s focus is the 25-odd year effort by the U.S. Navy to successfully adapt to the introduction of the jet-engine. Thi involved the development of a surprisingly large number of aircraft types over the period until they were able to finally put something in place that actually fulfilled their needs in the forms of the F-8 Crusader and the F-4 Phantom II. Although the focus is aircraft Thomason manages to squeeze in a lot of valuable information about the development of the carriers themselves and the significance of those developments, and the development of aircraft weapons systems in the period. this last aspect is particularly interesting as it highlights the difficulties the military was facing in the effort to respond to the introduction of the jet-engine. The issue of response and detection times was huge as the transformation in carrier tactics, and indeed carrier survivability, that had been enabled by the introduction of radar was being disrupted by the reduction in time available to intercept an attacker. Finding a workable solution was not helped by the inability to come up with effective weapons as missile technology was still very much in its infancy while cannons and unguided rockets were proving ineffective, to say the least. I am very much looking forward to receiving his companion volume “Strike from the sea” which deals with the evolution carrier-based bombers leading up to the F/A-18. It’s in the mail so hopefully I will have well before Birthmas.
Miscellaneous books
These books are exactly like they sound. A mixture of eclectic interests. “The Fate of Africa” was excellent and I’ll happily recommend it to anyone, though prepare to be depressed. It is an unending litany of failure and worse, the worse being so bad that failure begins to look like success. Contrary to what some reviewers have suggested I don’t see it as presenting colonization a the best thing that happened to Africa. Rather it does an excellent job of stripping away the special pleading and excuse making that surrounds so much discussion of Africa’s post-colonial experience. I was somewhat familiar with pieces of the history of some of the countries in Africa but seeming them all set out together, and more importantly beside each other served to highlight how egregiously the people of Africa have been betrayed by their “leaders.”
“Liberal Fascism” was something I had been meaning to take a look at for some time but I only got around to buying this summer. Looking for something small to take with me to Belize I stuffed it in my bag and read it on the plane. It was a good read but it really came into its own once I got stuck down in Belize for an extra week. It was the only book I had and I had the chance to make good progress through it. I know many, especially on the left don’t like this book but it is well worth a read, if only for the way it trace the intellectual history of many concepts and ideals that are in current use. As an example it is rather useful for the manner in which it highlights the connection of the left to such delights as eugenics. The need for this is difficult to overstate as general understanding of eugenics these days seems to take the view that eugenics was something uniquely practiced by the Nazis and by extension, the political right. Indeed, there was a program on History Channel just yesterday that adopted that very approach. Of course the truth is that eugenics was part of the mainstream of social thought prior to WW2 and it was widely applied throughout the developed world. I didn’t get the book finished before I came back from Belize and will have to return to it over the Birthmas break.
Well that’s enough book updates for the moment. Next post will be something else entirely.