Vickers Valiant

The Vickers Valiant was the first of the three V-bombers that became Britain's first line of defence in the Cold War. It was responsible for testing at both Maralinga and Christmas Island of nuclear weapons and the intiial stages of the testing of the Blue Steel stand-off bomb. Although not at fast or able to go greater distances than the Victor and Vulcan it lead the way in testing many experimental equipments before fatigue failure of the main spar caused all Valiants except one to be grounded. The cause was a change in role from high level to low level penetration of Soviet defences which caused one near fatal accident and subsequent immediate inspection of most of the remaining Valiants found similar fatigue cracks in the main spars. The Suez crisis saw Valiants being deployed to Malta and the first of the V-bombers to drop bombs in anger when they attacked airfields in the Canal Zone. This much needed addition to the Warpaint series fills the gap in histories of the three V-bombers. Written by Tony Buttler it is a very comprehensive history of the type and the many important contributions it made to British defences. The book contains many three view colour drawings of Valiant camouflage schemes by Richard J.Caruana and has a large four page supplement of 1:72nd scale plans.