Description

With the end of the First World War in 1918 and the beginning of punitive reparations, the Inter-Allied Commission of Control began to roam its way far and wide across Europe; its mandate: to seek out and destroy all German aeronautical material and military aviation production facilities. Airfields and factories were surveyed, technical advances made by aeronautical designers and engineers assessed. The Commission’s inspectors targeted every aspect of aviation-related activity – from aircraft and airships to aero engines; instrumentation and wireless equipment through to armament – as part of the Allies’ systematic demilitarisation of Germany. Focussing specifically on the effect that the Armistice terms and the provisions of the Peace Treaty had on the German aviation industry, Retribution and Recovery details for the first time how many of the wartime military aircraft and post war civil designs found their way to other parts of the world, sometimes by surprising means. Illustrated with over 500 photographs.