Normandy air battle - recommended books?

[Picchio]

Hi all, 

Similarly to Bergstrom's books on the Eastern front, what are the references for exploring and understanding the history of the air operations above Normandy that IL-2 is recreating? What are your recommendations?

[MarcoPegase44]

6 hours ago, Picchio said:

Hi all, 

Similarly to Bergstrom's books on the Eastern front, what are the references for exploring and understanding the history of the air operations above Normandy that IL-2 is recreating? What are your recommendations?

 

The 2 best books on the subject..

The only hyper-detailed book on the Allied airfields in Normandy, their construction, the equipment, the squadrons that occupied them.

And the other on the German fighter...

It's full of photos, color profiles, plans.

It's in French but I believe that these 2 books have no equivalent.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[357th_KW]

“D-Day 1944 - Air Power Over the Normandy Beaches and Beyond” by Richard Hallion gives a nice overview of the campaign.

 

”Over the Beaches” by John Forman is another good one - it’s focused on the build up to D-Day and then gives a war diary with daily activity for the first month of the campaign.

 

The 2nd Tactical Air Force series by Chris Shores has a ton of info about the RAF’s role in the campaign, though the books are hard to find and very expensive.  If you dig around you can probably find PDF copies in some of the online libraries.

 

Robert Caldwell’s “JG26 Luftwaffe Fighter Wing War Diary vol 2” gives a ton of detail about JG26’s role in the campaign with lots of personal accounts.