- Book Review: ‘Dam Busters: The Race To Smash The Dams 1943’ by James Holland
Article
CID:
- 180704
Authors:
- Shields, Ian
Publication Date:
- 01 November 2012
Journal Title:
- Air Power Review
Volume Number:
- 15
Issue number:
- 3
Page Numbers:
- Pages 111 - 112
Language:
- English
Abstract:
- Those fans of James Holland’s histories (including his very well-received Italy’s Sorrow and The Battle of Britain) will welcome this latest book that traces from early inception through execution and into the aftermath what is undoubtedly the most famous (and therefore mythologised) single air raid of the Second World War. Given its place in the popular imagination of both that War and of the history of military aviation, it is surprising that more books have not been written on the raid, but as James Holland highlights, there have been remarkably few. Although he does not make such a claim, this book appears to set out to be the definitive history of the raid; given that time has allowed both a more balanced view of the history of the Second World War and access to previously classified material (both denied to Paul Brickhill, author of the best-known, until now, 1951 account The Dambusters) to what extent does he succeed?
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