Jon Lake

Once upon a time, back before the World Wide Web took over the information world, there was a publisher of aviation books and journals. And what a wonder these books and journals were! They had the best quality printing paper, binding, photography, artwork, illustrations, and writing. The publisher was AIRtime Publishing, an entity that existed in different forms between 1989 and 2011. A much younger me waited with anticipation their quarterly journal products, World Air Power Journal, Wings of Fame, and International Air Power Review, in their large cardboard mailers. Unfortunately, as the new millennium progressed, issues of the later Review became less and less frequent--only 27 issues over the course of 10 years. Then it was gone....

However, during its brief existence, AIRtime managed to put together sufficient material to publish books as well. These volumes resembled their periodical siblings in quality and content, but tended to be encyclopedic in their coverage or very subject specific, as is the case with the object of this review: "Gumman F-14 Tomcat" This volume, appearing in 1998, is rather thin at 224 pages, has ten chapters. Chapters One and Two talk about the development and initial deployment of the F-14, while Chapters Three and Four speak to the technologies and systems employed in the aircraft. Chapters Five and Six discuss the F-14's operational history, while Chapters Seven and Eight highlight the aircraft's two aircrew positions--pilot and radar intercept operator (RIO). Chapter Nine takes the Tomcat's story to the press time of this book, 1997, describing several schemes to extend the aircraft's service life. Chapter Ten looks like a last minute addition to the book, providing details of the Tomcat's first bombing missions over the Balkans. Editor Jon Lake also provides a lengthy segment on the squadrons flying the aircraft, along with detailed descriptions of the variants of the aircraft either built or planned. There is also a nice section of drawings of the different F-14 versions.

A hallmark of AIRtime Publications is its relationship with aircraft operators to tell the story of subject aircraft, and "Tomcat" is no exception. All chapters feature interviews with either individuals connected with the F-14 program itself or F-14 aircrew. The editing of the text sometimes leaves something to be desired, as it appears that some chapters are segments thrown together without any attempt to transition the change in between. However, I suspect most readers will not buy it to read the text alone--the photography, artwork, and cutaway illustrations are well worth the price of admission.

Compared with Mike Guardia's work "Tomcat Fury", the AIRtime offering is clearly the superior work. Jon Lake's team of contributors, primarily British aviation writers (also including American aviation author Robert Dorr) clearly know their subject, something Guardia could not be accused of. The only drawback to the AIRtime work is its timeliness. When "Tomcat" was published in 1998, the F-14 had another eight years of operational life--years that are covered in the Guardia book. These missing years include the intensive combat flying of Operations Enduring Freedom over Afghanistan and Iraqi Freedom using the F-14's newly developed precision strike capability. Lake's volume touches on aspects of what became known as the "Bombcat", but the F-14's Balkan strike operations were too limited to be evaluated fairly.

Despite the timeliness drawback, "Tomcat" is a volume to be sought. If you find one online or in a used bookstore, get it!… (mais)

What I liked about the author's Osprey contribution regarding the Shorts Sutherland was how he went out of his way to debunk lingering myths about that aircraft's service and performance, and that is also a theme with this book. This is as Lake basically views the Blenheim as overrated out of the gate, not really a major improvement over the biplane support aircraft that it replaced, and was mostly valuable as an intermediate aircraft to wean RAF pilots off old-school machines. However, the RAF did go to war in the Blenheim, and one senses a certain degree of anger from the author over the good men thrown away in ill-considered daylight missions; largely because nothing better was available. As for the greatest service of the crews of the Blenheim, Lake figures that would be the anti-shipping campaign against the German invasion fleet in 1940; that was a worthy sacrifice.

It should also be noted that this work concentrates on RAF and allied "free" units. Significant foreign operators such as Finland, Turkey, Romania, and Yugoslavia are not covered.… (mais)

Considering that this booklet is over twenty years old it's held up quite well and is still worth reading. That such is the case is mostly due to the author going out of their way to debunk some of the war-time propaganda that touted the Sunderland, and is honest about its limitations. About the only point that I stubbed a metaphorical toe on was when Lake was a bit too jocular about how bad canned food would get you a woman for the night in Madagascar in 1943, not thinking that there was war-induced famine in British-controlled Africa too.… (mais)