Introduction

Apollo 10 was launched on May 18, 1969, and was the dress rehearsal for putting man on the moon. The flight took the command/service module (CSM [CSM-106]) “Charlie Brown” and the Lunar Module (LM [LM-4]) “Snoopy” to the moon, where the LM separated, descended and maneuvered to within 9 miles of the lunar surface. The mission of Apollo 10 was to demonstrate the performance of the LM and CSM in the lunar gravitational field and evaluate docked and undocked lunar navigation. “Charlie Brown” and crew returned safely to Earth 8 days later, on May 26th. Like many of us, I was glued to my black & white television, in awe of the whole Apollo program.

Keep them coming, Bombshell Decals! The decals Bombshell produces is what the current industry needs, nose art of pinup girls and nicely done! They inspired our service men under wartime conditions and appear to carry on some sort of inspiration for modelers to recreate these aircraft in miniature. There is absolute minimum flash in these decals. No trimming is necessary but a reminder that they should be placed on a smooth finish, preferably glossy. All the numbers and letter designations big and small do not have flash background extended around the complete decal. The flash is a center band enough to maintain character spacing and alignment distance. There are no signs of color overlap, which makes the decals crisp and clear. This is very obvious just looking at the nose art ladies. You can actually see blended skin tones and hair highlights.

Unlike a lot of the white metal landing gear sets produced by Scale Aircraft Conversions, this is more than just a straight replacement for the landing gear provided in the Academy/Italeri Hawker Hunter kits. This set corrects a couple of errors in the kit; namely, the undersized main wheels and the length of the main gear legs. Among the 16 parts, you are also provided with a much more detailed nose wheel, and the detail on many of the other parts is superior to that of the plastic parts. The oleo scissors are also provided as one piece, rather than the two-piece affair provided in the kit. The one-piece unit should therefore be much easier to install, especially for someone like me who is all thumbs.

This is the first of Squadron’s “Combat Chronicles” series I have had a chance to read and review. The format is a little different than most other publications from this publisher, in that it is focused specifically on the combat operations of a particular unit operating the title aircraft.

This volume focuses on the training and combat operations of the 40^th Bomb Group/58^th Bomb Wing operating the B-29 during WW2. The author is a veteran of this unit, and narrates his experiences starting with early Stateside training. He then progresses through early combat operations flying from India, over “The Hump”, to stage out of forward bases in China. Next, he describes the Group’s relocation to the Marianas and the final phases of the bombing campaign against Japan. Ultimately, he discusses some of the efforts to air drop supplies to POWs immediately following the Japanese surrender.

The Imperial Japanese Navy Cruiser Submarine I-16 was constructed at Mitsubishi Shipbuilding in Kobe, and was then towed to Kure Navy Yard for completion, as well as commissioning in 1940. She was the lead boat for a class of five submarines that included the I-18, I-20, I-22, and I-24, which were Type C1 boats. The design of this class was based on the Junsen-type, and they were developed from the type KD6. These boats were designed to carry either the Ko-hoteki midget submarine or Kaiten suicide torpedo.