BF

Although a little expensive for a short book, it is well worth the price. This book isn't meant to be a definitive summary of the air war in Russia, but it is a wonderful introduction to WWII air combat on the eastern front. The book is packed with great photos (and descriptive captions), comprehensive ace statistics and beautiful illustrations of their actual planes. It is very balanced between giving an overall summary of the eastern front war and providing actual accounts of real German pilots. Naturally it is centered around the Bf-109 but it doesn't read like a list of statistics; it is well-written enough to read all the way through, captions and all. This is a perfect supplement for anyone interested the Luftwaffe, the Soviet-German war, or especially the Messerschmitt Bf-109. Everyone will learn something from this book.

if youre a Bf-109 fan, buy it. Good color drawings and great info.

This book details the Units like JGs 51,52 and 54 which flew the Messerschmitt fighter from the "Emil" to the final "Gustav" variants in combat against the Soviets from the massive Russian slaughter in Barbarossa 1941 to the Defeat of the Third Reich in 1945. The book details the aces of Gunther Rall(275 kills), Gerhard Barkhorn(301 kills) and Erich Hartmann(352 Kills). Who all scored the bulk of their amazing tallyings against the Red Air Forces. The last of four volumes in the Aces series on the Messerschmitt BF 109 in Luftwaffe service, this title includes all the high-scoring aces, and explains how the pilots achieved such overwhelimng scores.

If you have plenty of books on the Luftwaffe, these little Osprey books usually provide lots of "unpublished before" photos and a wealth of color profiles, and this one is no exception. Great mini-history of the theater itself from the German perspective, and a must for any library on the subject of Western Front Luftwaffe aces.
Get the Russian Front 109 aces book as well, and check out the FW-190 series on both fronts too to round out your collection. As visual references these gems are unmatched for the price.

This book is just excellent!
Everything you want to know is in there.

Mr. Weal has done a great job in this book. A large review of the operations of the 109 units in the western front. Lots of information about units combats. Shows the hard work of the german fighter pilot in this theatre, lots of amazing pictures and excellent color plates. Tons of pages has been published on this subject, but this book is a good choice for modeleres and for anyone interested in german fighters, specially the 109. Strongly recommended.

When I ordered this book I was worried that I may have been straying too far into the realm of Luftwaffe esoterica. Perhaps so, but Vogt's book is an immensely useful supplement to any other book on the Bf109 on the market today.

Vogt deals with the after-market accessories (in modern parlance) for the Bf109 methodically and clearly, with judicious use of photographs, diagrams and reproductions from the contemporary Oberkommando der Luftwaffe parts listings. The latter are particularly interesting, especially for the model maker. Vogt manages to cover the plethora of G and K model Bf109s succinctly and provides a particularly useful listing of the Rustsatze kits known to have been used with each type.

Several remarkable points emerge, which I have not encountered in other sources. The use of red paint on the main-gear oleos and wheels to denote an aircraft equipped with the MW50 boost system is new to me and Vogt provides a contemporary colour photo to demonstrate this. I was fascinated to learn that that the full tropicalisation kit for the Bf109 not only included the well-known tropical dust filter for the supercharger intake, but also a comprehensive survival kit (with sandals!) and a rifle tucked away in the rear fuselage. The books is full of this sort detail, and I hope that future volumes emerge covering other types, especially the Fw190 series.

I strongly recommend this book for anyone seriously interested in the technical details of Luftwaffe aircraft, but especially the Bf109 enthusiast and model maker.

This is my favorite book on the '109, and I've seen many. It has great photographs of two restored 109's. One is the Mark Hanna restored G-10 on the cover, and the other is a G-2 tropical. My favorite are the closups of the 2,000 HP DB 605D engine showing the huge supercharger and cannon. Also of note are the stories and modern reunion photographs of two aces with this plane, one being #2 ace Gunther Rall. Fantastic. To sum up, a great picture book, but with good text (14 large page small print history at front of book)...not comprehensive as far as blow by blow combat accounts, but a great look at a great plane. Thanks.

This is a great book about the Zerstorer aces of world war 2. It covers the fighting of the Zerstorers in Poland, Denmark, Norway, France, the low countries, Russia, North Africa, Italy, and Finland. It also covers the Battle of the German Bight, and the Battle of Britian. It has lots of pictures, and the color plates are nice because they show how the planes were painted. Also the Ju 88c and Me 410 are also pictured and talked about a little in this book. Some of the pilots talked about are Werner Methfessel, Heinz Nacke, and Theodor Rossiwall.

this book overall is very good. the information is well laid out and easy to read. the author tries not to bog down with excessive information. it is pretty tight throughout. alot of aces that i had never heard of, which was good as i wasn't just reading stuff i had before. i would have prefered a little more information on the aces, rather than the campaigns. the book is packed with excellent photos and lots of them, it is still an excellent book and worth the read.

Weal and Price have teamed up to present a fascinating examination of the Me-109 aces of the Spanish Civil War and the early days of WW II. Dr. Price's experience, both as a Bomber Command member and decades of research and writing experience on WW II aviation come to light, just as Weal's evaluation of the aircraft and the men who flew them inform the reader, both expert and novice alike.

Though appearantly good for a novice (excuse me fellow reviewer), I have seen in the years between my sixteenth and my fortythird better books about the Bf109, offering more text, more photographs and more information to both historian and modeller. Most of these books share the distinction that they are out-of-prints (OOPs), but both the Squadron/Signal issues will soon follow. Amongst the books which in my eyes offer more are

"Bf109, Classic aircraft no. 2, their history and how to model them" (offers a wealth of information about the early Bf109's);
"Messerschmitt 0-nine gallery"(offers a wealth of information about the later Bf109's);
the three books in the Monogram close-up series (Gustav 1 and 2 and Bf109K) and
"The Ausburg Eagle, a documentary history",

but generally these books are bigger and therefore able to pack more information. This doesn't go up for the Monogram series, these are really much sought after!

To put it simply you can't do a better study on a single aircraft. I have been studing ww2 aircraft since i was 6 years old (Now Im 16) and i STILL find myself going back to read it! whoever is responsible for compiling all this info on one of the most sucessful fighters in the world my hat off to you!

Very uncommon for Osprey books are the number of wrong or misspelled German words.

Example: Eisenlaub it should be Eichenlaub denoting the Oak leaves to the knights cross

Thus 4 out of 5

I have always had an interest in the luftwaffe in north africa, but have found information to be sketchy. until now. this book is excellent. the information is clear and interesting. the book is filled with amazing pictures from the region as well as color plates of the many different camo, and some color paintings of pilots. this book is an excellent introduction into the bf-109 aces who flew in the campaign. there may be more informative books out there. but this one is an excellent one to start with. if you have an interest in the campaign in the desert or the luftwaffe in general then give it a read.

Like all ospery books, this is one is well worth the price. A must for all 109 fans.

I approached this book looking for a detailed acount of the Bf 109 as it performed against its adversaries and was developed to meet the demands of the war. I was hoping for something complementary to Prien and Rodeike's "Messerschmitt Bf 109 G, F, K" book, but giving us a more encompassing view of the 109-- after all, we have the space of an entire book to work with.

The book starts out well enough detailing the 109's development, but slowly loses focus on the plane itself and begins giving us just a generalized history of the air war from the German point of view. There were no specific details on the plane.

The book may be a decent introduction for someone starting out learning about the Luftwaffe, but by no means is for someone who already has a good working knowledge, and is looking for a detailed treatment of the 109 as an airplane. I see little reason for the book to have the title it does. I give it only 2 stars because i was expecting a book wholly on the 109, not a general history of the Luftwaffe's air war.

A different perspective on the history of one of the most notorious fighter planes of the Second World War.

This book shows every sign of being hastely put together for the fourtieth anniversary of the battle of Britain. Frightfully thin for a book by Osprey -38 pages- its main stength lies in giving a lot of sideviews, 27 black-and-white Hurricanes, 25 colour Hurricanes (including the cover); 21 Spitfire in black and white, 19 in colour; 35 Messerschmitts in black-and-white and an additional 37 in colour. With so much sideviews in just 38 pages you can imagine the depth of the text, but you can also say that the story of the battle of Britain is told in another book, and that this special is only for the modeller who wants his/her Hurricane, Spitfire or Messerschmitt to look different from the standard Airfix or Matchbox kit.
The artwork in the book is good for its time (1970), but since then a lot of water has passed the bridge. Nowadays there is better material to be bought, but one has to pay a far higher price than this book would cost, providing you can find it.