During the five years of the Second World War, the power of engines and speed of aircraft increased as much as it did during twenty years of peacetime. Conventional aircraft and engines reached the limits marked in the original design and surpassed them, very fast. The basis for this huge achievement was exotic fuels, short-lived artificially overpowered engines, propellers with four, five, and even six blades, and thinner wings with special sections of laminar flow. Then the faster Allied fighters began to be attacked by a demon that lived in the air: scientists called it compressibility buffeting and different type of aircraft suffered it at different speeds and manifested itself in different ways. The American and British designers never understood the true causes behind the aerodynamic phenomenon. They were forced to adopt brute force solutions by increasing engine power on the turbojet powered fighters, leaving in the background the research on the last projects of fighters, driven by monster piston engines. The purpose of this book is to present them to the public, for its notable interest.

The first B-29 flew over Tokyo on 1 November 1944. It was a photographic reconnaissance aircraft ironically named 'Tokyo Rose'. The Ki.44 fighters of the 47th Sentai took off to intercept it but as it turned out the Superfortress flew at such an altitude and speed that they could not reach it. The Ki-44-II-Otsu had been specifically designed for this type of interception and could reach the astonishing rate of climb of 5,000 m in four minutes; however it was not good enough. During the following ten months, a devastating bombing campaign of thousands of Superfortress destroyed 67 Japanese cities and half of Tokyo. The cultural shock and the political consequences were huge, when it was realised that the Japanese industry was not able to produce the specially heat and stress-resistant metallic alloys that were required to manufacture the turbo superchargers needed by the fighters in charge of defending the Japanese mainland. They lacked the essential chromium and molybdenum metals to harden the steel. This fact thwarted the manufacturing of numerous advanced projects of both conventional fighters and those derived from the transfer of German technology fitted with turbojets and rocket engines. They are thoroughly described in this book.

This new book covers the great variety of secret and largely unknown German missile programs: GUIDED MISSILES: Ruhrstahl/Kramer X1 "Fritz-X", Henschel Hs 293, Hs 294, Hs 295 and Henschel "Zitterrochen", Blohm und Voss Bv 226, Bv 246 "Hagelkorn" and Lippisch GB-3/L, Blohm und Voss Bv 143, Henschel G.T. 1200 and other gliding torpedos, Arado E-377 and E-377a, Mistel Me 262 A-1/A-2 and Me 262 A-1a/Ju 287b-1, Fieseler Fi 103 Series; PILOTED MISSILES: Blohm und Voss Bv 40, Daimler-Benz Projekt E and F, Messerschmitt Me 328, "Gleiter Bombenflugzeug" 1945, Projekt "Reichenberg" Series, Sombold So 344, Zeppelin "Rammer"; BALLISTIC MISSILES: EMW A-3/A-5, EMW A 4/A 4b, EMW A 5/A 8, EMW A 7/A 9/A 10, Blohm und Voss "Manuell Gesteuertes RAketen Projektil"; ANTI-AIRCRAFT MISSILES: Ruhrstahl/Kramer X-4, Ruhrstahl/Kramer X-7 "Rotkappchen", Henschel Hs 298 V1 and V2, Henschel Hs 117 "Schmetterling", Messerschmitt "Enzian", Rheinmetall-Borsig F-25 and F-55 "Feuerlilie", Rheinmetall-Borsig "Rheintochter" I and III, Rheinmetall-Borsig "Hecht" 2700, EMW C2 "Wasserfall."

When the Allies crossed the Rhine, Hitler decreed to go down fighting to the last man. A strange triangular bomber launched the 'Nicht loschbares Feuer' over London, destroying the city. Later, a black boomerang of sixty metres dropped two tons of anthrax over Washington and New York, making them inhabitable for fifty years. Thankfully, the inextinguishable firebomb was a figment of H. G. Wells' imagination. However, the construction of the secret flying wings had commenced at the start of 1945. Indeed, one fighter took to the skies on its only test flight. If these radical fighters of the Luftwaffe had been pressed into service earlier, they may well have changed the outcome of the Second World War. Profusely illustrated with technical drawings and fascinating data and information on the Luftwaffe's most radical fighter and bomber projects, The Ultimate Flying Wings of the Luftwaffe chronicles these revolutionary designs. A fascinating book for the military historian, modellers and those interested in aviation, this shows how close Hitler may have come in winning the war.

During the Second World War both Germany and Japan developed several types of anti-aircraft and anti-ship missiles. Unfortunately for them, the Allies were technologically superior in electronic warfare by mid-1944, just in time to interfere the guidance systems of first generation. The Japanese thought to have found the tactic to stop the invasion fleets, with the ritual of the terminal dive bombing. The Germans adapted their Sturmjager squadrons to the Taran tactics learnt from the Soviets. Once the radio frequency war was lost, the Axis scientists tried to develop other control techniques. But the acoustic, electrostatic and infrared sensors, together with the TV guidance system, were not ready on time and broken cables made the wire guided bombs frequently fail. Both countries began to design ramming fighters and suicide bombers when the futile devastation of their cities by the Allies bombers ensured that, when the time comes, there would not be lack of volunteer pilots. But this book is just about machines, depicting all known designs of all Axis suicide airplanes and panic fighters."

When the Nazis started to threaten the world with their efficient machine of propaganda, the main concern of European governments was the overwhelming reaction of panic that the expected bombing of the Luftwaffe might cause within the civil population. During the Munich Agreement in 1938, the democracies were defended by old biplanes and a bunch of modern fighters: 50 Hurricanes, 20 Morane-405 and 5 Fokker D.XXI. France and Great Britain took up the production of USA airplanes and cancelled exports to small countries, which were forced to design and build their own PANIC FIGHTERS with the intelligence and skill that desperation provides. When nothing seemed able to contain the German advance, France, Great Britain and the USSR developed several programs of emergency fighters, as did Australia, to face the Japanese expansion. At the time the course of events switched, it was the Axis powers that had to create their own PANIC FIGHTERS, some of them suicidal. The present book includes several last resource designs of fighters that are practically unknown and that were developed in times of tribulation by Australia, Belgium, Bulgaria, Canada, Czechoslovakia, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Great Britain, Hungary, Japan, Yugoslavia, Latvia, Netherland, Poland, Romania, Sweden and Switzerland.

The development of aviation engines in Germany was revolutionary during closing stages of the Second World War. In 1945, the Daimler Benz, Jumo and BMW engines in service, equipped with power boosting systems, generated 2,000 hp. There were prototypes that could generate 3,000 hp and BMW/Argus projects could reach 4,000 hp. To benefit from their extreme performances, Blohm und Voss, Daimler Benz, Dornier, Focke Wulf, Heinkel, Henschel, Messerschmitt and Skoda designed an impressive series of fighters that never left the drawing board. The reason was the decision taken by the Oberkommando der Luftwaffe to mass manufacture the iconic and revolutionary Messerschmitt Me 262 jet fighter. This lost generation of projects were quickly forgotten and after years of research have been recovered and presented in The Ultimate Piston Fighters of the Luftwaffe. Profusely illustrated with technical drawings and fascinating data and information on the Luftwaffe's most radical fighter projects, The Ultimate Piston Fighters of the Luftwaffe chronicles these revolutionary designs that might have changed the course of the war. A fascinating book for the military historian, modellers and those interested in aviation, this shows how advanced German scientists were towards the end of the Second World War and how the beloved Spitfire and Mustang would have been instantly superseded by radical Nazi fighters.

The biggest success of the Focke Wulf company during the Second World War was the choice of a radial engine for the Fw 190 fighter, in this way avoiding to compete against Messerschmitt for the in line engines. The decision of the Oberkommando der Luftwaffe to assign the few turbojets available to the Messerschmitt and Arado firms and the discovery of the terrible aerodynamic effect known as compressibility buffeting by mid-1942, made the life of fighter designers of the time very interesting. The Kurt Tank team proposed to install a centrifugal turbojet of his design in the nose of an Fw 190 A/3 with the intention of replacing it with a Jumo 004 B when available in 1943. Several designs followed that were able to use all turbojets, turboprops, ramjets and rocket engines, either projected or at their disposal. They constitute the documental foundation of this book. After failing in the TL Jagdfleugzeug contests in March 1943, Volksflugzeug in September 1944 and Hochleitungs Nachtjager in January 1945, Focke Wulf could finally overcome its competitors with the great Jagernotprogramm design Ta 183. Although it was too late to intervene in the Second World War, it served as inspiration for numerous designs of other countries during the first years of the Cold War.