While the Allies largely relied on mass production to help them win World War II, Hitler's Nazi Germany put a great deal of their limited resources into new technologies. Nowhere was this more evident than in some of the revolutionary aircraft developed for the Luftwaffe. By the end of 1944, a number of jet and rocket aircraft were entering front-line service in the roles of high-speed interceptor, fighter, reconnaissance and bomber.

In addition to these tangible assets, which were used with varying degrees of success, the drawing boards of Germany were littered with dozens of advanced designs that never reached the prototype or production stages. Many of these operational and paper projects advanced the pace and influenced the direction of aircraft development in the decades following World War II, with many of the German engineers responsible for these innovations seamlessly continuing their roles in the United States and the USSR.

Modellers have had a long fascination for the Luftwaffe's jet arsenal and secret weapons of fact and fiction and this new Osprey Masterclass will explore the Luftwaffe jets and rocket planes that saw service at the end of World War II. This title will discuss the background behind these wonder weapons before covering aspects of the aircraft in detail - powerplants, cockpits and ordnance - with photographic walkarounds and modelling guides. Special attention will then be given to the techniques for painting and finishing late-war jets and rocket aircraft, with step-by-step techniques offered for bare metal, puttied panel lines, unfinished plywood and the ever-controversial RLM camouflage colours. Finally, the rocket and missile technologies and the "Luftwaffe '46" phenomenon will also be covered, with modelers having a particular fascination for these "what if" aircraft that never saw service but now appear as scale models.


From the Hardcover edition.