Modern American Military Helicopters: Apache, Black Hawk, Chinook, Huey, Cobra, Seahawk, and the V-22 Osprey of the US Army, Navy, Marine Corps, and A (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9798180877789)

The United States builds and flies more military helicopters, in more roles, than any nation in history, and this is the book that explains how.

From the AH-64 Apache attack helicopter that kicked down the door on the first night of Desert Storm to the V-22 Osprey and the tiltrotor future now replacing the Black Hawk, this comprehensive guide and reference covers every major American military helicopter (attack helicopters and gunships, troop transports, naval sub-hunters and special-operations rotorcraft) flown by the US Army, Navy, Marine Corps, Air Force and Coast Guard, from Vietnam to Future Vertical Lift, with full specifications, combat analysis, and the engineering story behind the aircraft that own the vertical battlefield.

Each chapter combines technical depth with real combat history: the Apache's combat debut over Panama, Task Force Normandy on the opening night of the Gulf War, the Black Hawks shot down over Mogadishu, Somalia, in 1993, the stealth-helicopter raid that killed Osama bin Laden, the brownout landings of Iraq and Afghanistan, and the three great manufacturers (Sikorsky, Boeing and Bell) that turned aluminium, titanium and nerve into flying machines.

Whether you are a military aviation enthusiast, a defence analyst, a veteran, or simply fascinated by the machines that carry the fight into the third dimension, this book has everything you need.

Inside this book, you'll discover:

▸ AH-64 Apache: The most lethal attack helicopter ever built: the 30-millimetre gun slaved to the gunner's eye, the Hellfire and the mast-mounted Longbow radar, and the bloodied deep strike over Karbala that rewrote Army doctrine
▸ UH-60 Black Hawk: The workhorse that replaced the Huey and became the symbol of American air assault: Mogadishu's Super Six-One, the stealth Black Hawks of the bin Laden raid, and the airframe America cannot do without
▸ CH-47 Chinook: The tandem-rotor giant that first flew under Kennedy and is built to fly for a hundred years: the only helicopter that could keep the mountain outposts of Afghanistan alive
▸ UH-1 Huey to UH-1Y Venom: The thudding two-blade rotor that is the sound of Vietnam, reborn four-bladed and twin-engined for a second century of Marine Corps service
▸ AH-1 Cobra to AH-1Z Viper: The world's first purpose-built attack helicopter, born of desperation in Vietnam, still flying off the decks of warships sixty years later
▸ CH-53K King Stallion: The largest and heaviest helicopter America has ever built, fly-by-wire and able to sling 27,000 pounds and, at more than $100 million apiece, among the most expensive ever made
▸ SH-60 / MH-60 Seahawk: The Navy's Black Hawk, sent to sea to hunt submarines, sink ships and pluck downed aviators from the water off nearly every American warship
▸ V-22 Osprey: Neither helicopter nor aeroplane: the tiltrotor that nearly died being born, killed dozens of Marines in testing, and then reshaped how America fights
▸ The Night Stalkers: The secretive 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment, the Little Birds and the plus-or-minus-thirty-seconds standard, from the ashes of Desert One to the rooftop in Abbottabad
▸ Marine One and Future Vertical Lift: The white-topped presidential fleet, the costly collapse of the VH-71, and the V-280 Valor tiltrotor chosen to replace the Black Hawk at last

Every major aircraft chapter includes a Fast Facts panel with full specifications, production numbers, operators, and combat record. Each opens with a first-person vignette placing the reader in the cockpit at a decisive moment.

Thoroughly researched from open-source technical literature, declassified assessments, and combat reporting. All information is presented for educational and historical purposes.