یک سرباز در کابین: از تفنگ‌ها تا طوفان‌ها در جنگ جهانی دوم (مجموعه تاریخ نظامی استک‌پول)

"I could see a carpet of twinkling lights from the ack ack all along the rail sidings which bordered the canal. I dove onto these with my cannons going. Then suddenly, when the attention of all the guns turned on me, I realized how foolhardy I was being. I ran the guns along the row of rail trucks—opened the throttle wide and pulled straight up for the clouds—with tracers crossing in front and on all sides of the plane." Ron Pottinger started the war as a rifleman in the Royal Fusiliers, then transferred to the Royal Air Force, where he began flying the 7.5-ton Hawker Typhoon. He flew dozens of dangerous ground attack missions over occupied Europe through bad weather, heavy flak, and enemy fighters before being shot down and taken prisoner. In October 1939, barely a month after World War II erupted in Europe, Ron Pottinger was conscripted into the British Army as a rifleman in the Royal Fusiliers. A year later, amidst pilot shortages due to losses during the Battle of Britain, he transferred to the Royal Air Force, where he began flying the 7.5 ton Hawker Typhoon fighter. He flew dozens of dangerous ground-attack missions over occupied Europe through bad weather, heavy flak, and enemy fighters before being shot down in early 1945 and ending the war in a German prisoner of war camp. Ron Pottinger served for six years during World War II, most of it flying combat missions in the Royal Air Force. He lives in England In this WWII memoir, a British rifleman turned fighter pilot recounts his frontline experiences, both on ground and in the skies. Ron Pottinger served his country through the entirety of the Second World War. Assigned to the infantry in 1939, he soon became a rifleman in the Royal Fusiliers. Later, he was able to transfer to the Royal Air Force, where he began flying the 7.5-ton Hawker Typhoon. In A Soldier in the Cockpit , Pottinger recounts dozens of dangerous ground attack missions, flying over occupied Europe through bad weather, heavy flak, and enemy fighters. Though he was eventually shot down and taken prisoner, he survived to tell his tale.