German Aircraft in Russian and Soviet Service 1941-1951

by Andrei Alexandrov & Genadi Petrov

a Schiffer Military History Book

a review by Steve Jantscher

This is a standard variety Schiffer hardcover book covering a seldom covered subject. I've seen just a couple of books on the subject of captured and used German aircraft by the Soviets. This book follows the almost standard Schiffer practice of including several black and white photos, many that I've never seen before. I believe this must be due to the thaw since the fall of the iron curtain. Much excellent eastern research is now becoming available in translation to the western reader.

This is a large format, 281 page book with numerous well captioned black and white photographs, many pages of line drawings of the subject aircraft, as well as ten pages of side profile color drawings of some of the photographed aircraft.

The one aspect that I enjoyed the most was not the usual sight of Fw-190s or '109s with red stars, but rather the heavy emphasis in this book of experimental aircraft that the Soviets either captured whole, and continued flying, or those paper projects that gained life under Soviet tutelage.

If your interest runs to this subject, this is a required addition to your library. If you're just interested in Luftwaffe aircraft, this also offers an attraction in seeing how the Soviets used operational aircraft as well as expanded on German scientific efforts in aircraft design.