"RECCE": A COLLECTOR'S GUIDE TO
THE HISTORY OF THE SOUTH AFRICAN SPECIAL FORCES
by Paul Matthysen
15 years in the making, this book is the definitive publication
on the ‘Recces’. The South African Special Forces primary role is
intelligence-gathering, although they take ruthless offensive
action when necessary. Highly trained professionals in a class of
their own, these elite troops have garnered for themselves an
international reputation par excellence. This unique book includes
a comprehensive history of the Reconnaissance Regiments and
auxiliary units: Selection and training: Insignia, kit and
equipment: Honours and awards: Memorabilia, memorials and museums:
Plus 2,500 full colour images depicting actual-size insignia.
Co-authored by Matthew Kalwarf and Michael Huxtable.
New in d/w - Large format, 320pp,
2500 + colour & b/w illustrations
This persuasive study attacks the key myths surrounding the Battle
of Britain. Without denigrating the heroism of the fighter pilots,
Anthony Cumming challenges the effectiveness of the Royal Air Force
in 1940 and gives the Royal Navy much greater prominence. He
vigorously asserts the ability of British warships to frustrate
German plans for Operation Sea Lion and to repel Luftwaffe attacks
and argues that RAF took the lion's share of the glory only because
its colorful image could easily be used to manipulate American
opinion.
This is the story
of U-223,commanded by Karl-Jurgen Wachter from the time of her
commissioning in Kiel in January 1943, through a murderous career
to her eventual, but dramatic demise in the Mediterranean in March
1944. At the same time, the book covers the declining fortunes of
the U-boat arm as a whole from early 1943, when it seemed
invincible and seriously threatened the Allies with defeat, to
their final defiant show of force in the North Sea.
In spring, 1941, on an isolated, indefensible airfield 55 miles
from Baghdad, a group of poorly armed and outnumbered RAF airman,
together with a few soldiers, outfought the much larger and better
equipped Iraqi forces who were aided by the Germans and Italians.
The engagement would prove to be the first real defeat of the
Germans in World War Two. Meanwhile a relief column fought its way
across a 500 mile barren desert in temperatures approaching fifty
degrees centigrade, to reach the airfield. In a gigantic game of
bluff less than fifteen hundred soldiers supported by the RAF in
their obsolete aircraft went on to take Baghdad against odds of
twenty to one.
DEATH IN THE DOLDRUMS: U-CRUISER
ACTIONS OFF WEST AFRICA
by Bernard Edwards
With their very long range, the giant Type IX U-Cruisers gave
Admiral Dönitz's U-boat fleet global reach. Initially these boats
operated with considerable success off the East coast of America
and in the Caribbean but their main impact was in the Gulf of
Guinea, 1942-43 which, due to the closure of the Suez Canal, was a
vital Allied supply route. Two submarines in particular (U-68 and
U-505) had a profound effect causing major panic by their hugely
successful operations.
