Early aircraft armament; the airplane and the gun up to 1918
Harry Woodman

When war broke out in 1914, pilots took to the skies only armed with personal sidearms, rifles of carbines. Soon, however, armament manufacturers and the respective air corps engineers were working flat out to develop effective machine-gun systems that could be installed upon the aircraft and made to work efficiently. In the meantime dozens of improvisations saw active service, their succeses or disasters affecting the progress of each country’s advances as they strove for aerial superiority above the battlefields of Europe. The author has examined the developments of all the leading European nations of the period: Britain, France, Italy, Germany, Austro-Hungary and the United States. He covers an enormous range of armaments. Detailed are also the technological developments that were undertaken in those few brief years.

With 200 photographs and 70 line drawings.