Russian Aviation Colours 1909-1922 Camouflage and Markings Vol 3. Red Stars

by Marat Khairulin

Stratus Books
in conjunction with MMP Books

Reviewed by Graham Carter

HyperScale is proudly supported by Squadron

Other Volumes in the series have covered the Early Years, the Great War, and Against the Soviets.

This 168 page hard cover A4 book is the third of four volumes on the operations, camouflage schemes, personnel and special markings carried by aircraft used over Russia in the fourteen year period mentioned in the title. From what I gather it was published in the Russian language in 2015 and this translation has been made by Wojtek Matusiak. This, the fifth chapter, focusses on the “Worker-Peasant Red Air Force” which formed in early 1918 “after the Russian Air Force had been virtually destroyed. Anarchy, revolutionary chaos, a German offensive, Ukrainian separatism. . . ” contributed to  this destruction and so “Aviation units that managed to withdraw deeper into Russian found themselves under Bolshevik control and became the basis of the newly formed Worker-Peasant Red Air Force (W-PRAF)” - both quotations from page 5. 

Making extensive use of images drawn from museum collections, personal albums and reminiscences the book covers some extremely interesting schemes on a variety of aircraft that were used by this air force. The artistic endeavours of some of these pilots and their ground crew beggars belief and will provide the historian and modeller of these early aeroplanes with hours, days and months of pleasure and inspiration. It has certainly encouraged me to look through the stash! How fortunate are we that these photos have survived and that authors and editors such as Marat and Roger have the passion to record it all and that Mr. Kazakov has drawn up the schemes in such a detailed way.

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The sections covered are:

• An overview of RSFSR (Russian Socialist Federal Soviet Republic) insignia and emblems, followed by examples of aircraft, pilots and schemes from:

  1st Fighter Aviation Otryad
  4th Fighter Aviation Divizion
  10th Fighter Aviation Otryad
  11th Fighter Aviation Otryad
  12th Fighter Aviation Otryad
  13th Fighter Aviation Otryad
  1st Southern Aviation Otryad (15th Reconnaissance Aviation Otryad)
  13th Reconnaissance Aviation Otryad
  18th Reconnaissance Aviation Otryad
  27th Reconnaissance Aviation Otryad
  34th Reconnaissance Aviation Otryad
  35th Reconnaissance Aviation Otryad
  39th ‘Iron’ Reconnaissance Aviation Otryad
  43rd Reconnaissance Aviation Otryad
  3rd Artillery Aviation Otryad

• Special Duty Aviation Otryd of Instructors of the Moscow Aviation School

• Divizion Vozdushnykh Korabley “Il’ya Muromets”

• Individual pilot emblems of Red AF Aviation Otryads

Aircraft are usually illustrated with a number of clear and largish B&W images, captioned and accompanied by the colour artwork of Mr Kazakov. Especially well edited so that no images cross the centre-line, and only in a few cases do the details stretch over more than a double spread.  Sample aircraft include various Nieuports, SPADs, Moranes, DH9s, even Sopwith 1&1/2 Strutters, Farmans and a DFW CV, among others - plenty of modelling scope here.

This series is clearly a magnum opus and the serious fans of this period and the aeroplanes involved will not be disappointed, the historian with the depth of treatment and the modeller with endless variety of aircraft and schemes. Highly recommended, the four volume set would be indispensable to the aficionado of this period .

Thanks to MMP Books  for the sample.

All MMP Books are available direct from the publishers, who now accept credit cards (Visa, MC, Amex, Switch)  

North American distributors are MMD, Australian distributors are Platypus Publications. In Europe, the books are available from any good bookshop (via our UK distributors, Orca). Contact MMP direct in case of difficulties. 

Thanks to Roger at MMP Books  for the sample.

Review Copyright © 2018 by Graham Carter
This Page Created on 14 March, 2018
Last updated 19 March, 2018

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