In a follow-up to the Bay of Pigs' attempt to oust Fidel Castro from power in Cuba came the events leading to the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962. This 37th book in the Helion & Company Latin America at War series provides daily insights into the identification, escalation, and resolution that took place from January 1961 through December 1962. The author, Linda Rios Bromley, takes the reader into meeting rooms, briefings, and events that took place during one of the most critical events of the post-WW2 world during the 20th century.
What's New
Illustrators: Pablo Patricio Albornoz, David Bocquelet, Luca Canossa, Tom Cooper, Micky Hewitt, and Anderson Subtil
Helion is a UK-based company that produces books on many aspects of Military History from the Late Medieval period through to the present day. Helion was established in 1996, and since then they have published over 1,200 books, with 100 or more new titles coming out every year, for readers around the world.
F-Toys/Platz have been producing small-scale (1/144th) aircraft kits for a few days now and originally released their F-16 kit in 2015. This latest iteration has new parts and decals that will allow you to build an F-16C with conformal fuel tanks. The new parts, in a soft resin, are those tanks and decals for a test bed aircraft stationed at Eglin AFB circa 2001 and another assigned to the 14th Fighter Squadron at Misawa AFB, Japan.
The kit comes in an open-ended box with some extra bits that will allow you to build several different configurations should you so choose. At the very least you will have some excellent parts (various under-wing stores) for the spares box. There is even a pilot figure. Another nice addition is an alternative vertical stabilizer with the braking parachute housing.
Ian Baxter has done it again. Not only is he an amazing, captivating author, he once more approached a very difficult topic, and did it well, presenting the horrifying facts in a manner that honors the dead, but doesn’t sugar coat it. This book follows the familiar Images of War format with brief introductions for each chapter followed by a lot of photographs to complement his topics.
Between the covers of this (9.6”x7.4”) paperback book are 144 pages, with over 250 black and white photographs, and two very detailed appendices, is the story of the Liberation of Nazi Concentration Camps during 1944 and 1945. It is composed of the following:
Ammo isa company founded by Mig Jimenez and based out of Spain. It provides products for the modeling community by way of paints, weathering effects, tools, and various modeling merchandise. Ammo has provided IPMS-USA a twelve (12) bottle acrylic paint set for review.
In the Box
The paint set contains twelve (12) 20 ml bottles with nontoxic and odorless water based acrylic paints.Inside each bottle is an agitator ball to help mix when shaking. These paints are presented in a new clear container featuring a new cap that can be opened and closed with one hand. The following colors are provided:
Human beings sure like to squabble, and the more history they share, the more enmity they seem to feel. America is little over 200 years old, and has had only one internal conflict during that time, and yet it still impacts the country to this day.Imagine, then, a region occupied for millenia2, and the potential only increases.
India and Pakistan have been at each other’s throats since the day of partition, and the author Ravi Rikhye, does a good job of explaining the incredible complexities of the hostility for the average reader.Suffice it to say that my head was buzzing after reading the introduction. It’s very hard for someone not born in that part of the world to really understand what the grievances are. The author himself states flatly that writing history is a subjective experience, and that there are no “bad guys” or “good guys” in this struggle. After reading the entire book I have to agree.
I’ve read a number of books about 20th century so-called brush wars, and it becomes fairly obvious over time that these small, relatively isolated conflicts often serve as relief valves for larger nations who dare not directly confront each other. In the nuclear age, such aggressiveness would almost certainly be fatal.
It has been an honor to review Special Hobby’s new AH-1G kit, and hereby express extreme thanks to them for providing IPMS USA with this new release. We continue to be fortunate with their ongoing support of the reviewer corps!
Special Hobby continues to provide subjects avoided by others… as a business model, this ensures they continue to exist and thrive on the concept of “do what others can’t or won’t”.
(Note: the Air Force Reserve unit here in Oklahoma has always had “SH” as their Fighter unit tail marking, meaning what everyone should know it does. In the case of this review as a transplant Okie I shall use SH as an abbreviation for Special Hobby, intending it to mean “S-Hot” in their case for untouchable ability and a quality product)
ICM is a hobby company based out of Ukraine. They have provided IPMS-USA a six (6) bottle acrylic paint set for review.
In the Box
The paint set contains six (6) 12ml bottles with nontoxic water based acrylic paints. The following colors are provided:
- Camouflage Green (1071)
- White (1001)
- Olive Green (1068)
- Aluminum (1023)
- Black (1002)
- Varnish Satin (2002)
Straight out of the bottle, the paint’s viscosity is thick and purposely prepared for brush painting. The instructions do recommend thinning 40-60% with water or thinner for airbrushing. All surfaces are recommended to have primer applied prior to painting. Volume wise, the paint takes up about 70% of the bottle and has “room” to add thinner if so desired.
Note, the bottles are not the usual dropper style (think Vallejo) but a twist off cap and a large opening to allow brushes to enter the bottle.
Hobby Boss first released their new-tooled F4U-1A Corsair back in 2012. Thirteen years later in 2023, after numerous reiterations and re-releases, they have produced a 2 in 1 release with extra parts to provide a kit of the -1A and -2, respectively.
Construction, as is the norm, begins in the softly detailed cockpit. There is no provision for any type of seat harness, so I used a set from a Warbirds Decals sheet. Overall detail in the cockpit is soft, and the instrument panel decal is lacking in detail.
Step 2 has the modeler construct the engine, replete with a full exhaust collection ring and exhaust. The instructions are confusing in this step (as with many other steps), so the fitting of the exhaust system was done by trial and error. Parts of this subassembly are nicely detailed, such as the exhaust system & transmission housing, while the cylinder heads are soft.