Continuing with the study of the lesser known Air Forces that fought in the skies of Europe during World War II, in this book we want to remember the Spanish Air Force and how it defended the Spanish skies from several Air Forces that took part in the war. Besides we can read about the Blue Squadrons that fought against the Soviet Air Force in the Eastern Front in spite of the Spanish neutrality. We have written a text that will show us the bravery and courage of these men, in a difficult balance between the Allies and the Axis that allowed to General Franco continue in his position as chief of the Spanish state after the World War 2. We want to compile in a didactic way but without academic intention, the information about this topic from various main sources such as Juan Arráez Cerdá, José Luis González Serrano, Carlos Caballero, Francisco Martínez Canales or Jorge Fernández-Coppel, trying to focus on the Spanish Air Force actions during the world conflict defending the Spanish neutrality and in the Blue Squadrons actions against the USSR. Finally as is required we use this work to pay tribute to all the members of the Spanish Air Force that fought for their country during the difficult years of World War II.

HMS Badsworth (L03) was one of eighty-six British Hunt-class escort destroyers. The class would eventually comprise four separate types built between 1939 and 1943. Design work on the class began in 1938. The Admiralty wanted to create warships optimized for convoy escort duties and patrolling. Since there was a huge demand for such vessels in the fleet, their cost was to be the deciding factor. A decision was made to design ships which would be smaller and slower than an average destroyer. In conjunction with their overall simple design this was to allow for rapid mass-scale production. The design was based on the Black Swan-class sloop, but the new destroyers were to be faster and better armed.

Petlakov Pe-2 (Peshka) is the best-known twin-engine light bomber of Soviet aviation in World War II. The plane was susceptible to structural changes, which allowed it to be used as a heavy fighter (also night), a dive bomber or a long reconnaissance plane.Vladimir Petlakov constructed the Pe-2 in prison, where he got in 1937 for allegedly delaying the works on the ANT-42 Tupolev bomber. Petlakow, while serving the sentence, was appointed the head of the constructors' group, which was to create a fast and durable machine that could freely escort the ANT-42. That is how the VI-100 was made. It was a quite advanced plane for its time (the first flight took place on December 22, 1939). It was a fully metal construction. The machine was equipped with a pressurised cockpit, turbochargers and many advanced electronic systems.

A captivating story of German submarines that fled to Argentina on the eve of the Third Reich’s capitulation, unwilling to surrender to the Allies. The authors of the book discovered numerous unpublished documents in England, Argentina, Germany and the USA. They debunk myths and expose lies concerning the escapes of the German Nazis and the transportation of large amounts of treasure, mainly gold, as well as documentation of the most valuable military projects of the German Reich, which were supposed to turn the tide of the war. The book uses documents from interrogations of the U-Boot commanders who were sent to a special POW camp near Washington for prisoners of exceptional importance.

The rocket missile ORP Gen. T. Kosciuszko is currently one of the more valuable Polish Navy ships. Belonging to the American type Oliver Hazard Perry, together with the twin ship ORP Gen. K. Pulaski, he went under the white-and-red flag under an agreement between the governments of the United States and the Republic of Poland. The ship was built as USS Wadsworth with a tactical number FFG 9 at the Todd Pacific Shipyards in San Pedro, California.

Suzutsuki was the third ship from the series of the most powerful Akizuka destroyers, designed specifically as anti-aircraft defenseships, whose main armament consisted of 8 universal 100 mm caliber guns with excellent ballistic characteristics. The Akizuki destroyers were designed before the beginning of World War II as anti-aircraft ships for fast Japanese groups of aircraft carriers. They were completely different from the previous Japanese destroyers, in which the emphasis was put on strong artillery (127 mm guns) and torpedo armament. They were inspired by the British Dido class light anti-aircraft cruisers, however, in contrast with them, the Akizuki destroyers were medium size ships intended for anti-aircraft defense of groups of fleet.

The late 1930s saw a rapid development and modernization of the Royal Navy. His Majesty's government decided to build new classes ofbattleships, aircraft carriers, light cruisers which were distinctly better suited for fighting surface combatants than escorting merchants or hunting down and sinking submarines. The destroyers were no exception and by the outbreak of the war in 1939, the British navy had commissioned subsequent medium and large-size destroyers of: A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J and K classes, as well as those of the Tribal class. Sloops of the Grimsby, Bittern, Egret and Black Swan classes had also been built.The British needed a large number of universal destroyers of a smaller displacement, but versatile enough to perform various wartime duties. A new type of destroyer, according to its design’s creators would perform the “fleet work” duties, which included escorting task forces of larger ships and offensive gunnery and torpedo missions. However, that concept soon became obsolete.

The Focke-Wulf Fw 190 was an advanced fighter developed by Germany to be the successor to the Mersserschmitt. Adapted to a wide variety of combat situations, Focke-Wulf soon began to dominate the skies, allowing Germany to take back their air superiority from Britain and her fearsome Spitfire Mk V. Some of the Luftwaffe’s most successful fighter aces few the Fw 190 and was soon preferred over its older counterpart. Filled with rich drawings that provide an unparalleled display of the fighter, this book is an ideal choice for any modeller which a penchant for recreating Germany’s most acclaimed aircraft.

In 1939 the Japanese Navy General Staff demanded to develop a project of a destroyer with a speed of 40 knots. The project was called "Project F52" and was included in the plan called Maru Yon. In connection with this, a project was prepared and the construction of the Japanese destroyer with number 125 (later named Shimakaze) began.

The destroyer Spravedlivyy was constructed in the Severniy Sudostroitelniy Zavod imeni A.A. Zhdanova (Shipyard No. 190) in 1954–1956 as one of 27 Project 56 destroyers, also known as the Spokoinyy class (designated Kotlin by NATO). They were destroyers in the old fashion, created in the early 1950s by designers of the 53rd Central Design Bureau (CKB-53) led by head designer

Progression in development of Osa-class missile boats revolutionized naval warfare. Even though those ships were considered very small marine vessels, they constituted one of the most numerous boat types in the history of shipbuilding. There were more than 400 units built in total.

The SMS Blücher was the last armored cruiser built by the German Empire. She was constructed to counter the new armored cruisers rumored as being built by the British. Blücher was larger than preceding armored cruisers and carried heavier guns but was unable to match the size and armament of the battlecruisers which replaced armored cruisers in the British Royal Navy and – later - the Imperial German Navy (Kaiserliche Marine). When the Germans learned of the true details of these new British ships, called Invincible class, and that they were to be armoured with 12" battleship guns, they realized that the Invincible class was a completely new type of warship, soon to be known as battlecruisers. By the time the Germans learned of this it was too late to turn back and construction of the Blücher took place as scheduled. The ship was named after the Prussian Field Marshal Gebhard von Blücher, the commander of the Prussian forces at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815.

The Messerschmitt Bf 110 was a typical working horse of the German Luftwaffe. It was used for a variety of tasks, although it was designed strictly as a heavy fighter (in this role, however, did not meet all the hopes placed in it). Dozens of developed versions of this aircraft prove that it was a successful and flexible construction when it comes to the used armament, propulsion and equipment.

The idea of creating such an album dedicated to the battleships of World War Two had been born in the last dozen or so years. During this period, various concepts appeared in print, which were meant to present those beautiful ships in the form of a "condensed pill.” Most of the contributions have been made by foreign authors who had had greater access to photographic references. It was not easy, because it was difficult to choose several photos illustrating the entire history of the battleship, starting from the moment of the keel laying and ending with its sinking. Then, in some cases it has a further history as a wreck resting on the seabed until today.Initially, we selected over 1,000 photos, which we had to give up because of the size of such an album. In the end, it was divided into two volumes, thanks to which the number of photos remained only slightly reduced. In the case of vessels with a large or interesting combat history, we tried to put more photos illustrating their operational activities.Some ships have a very limited number of photos included. The best example of this is the Japanese battleship "Musashi", of which only few photographs exist. Most of them come from private collections and it was very difficult to get permission to publish them. Despite these difficulties, it was possible to gather unique photographic material enriched with the brief combat records of individual battleships, which will hopefully allow the reader to trace their story. In the first volume, the author describes all the most important battleships from Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Greece, Spain, Japan, France, and Germany.