The Dramatic History of Japanese Aviation  Now Available: Wings for the Rising Sun: A Transnational History of Japanese Aviation by Jürgen P. Melzer

Wings for the Rising Sun: A Transnational History of Japanese Aviation by Jürgen P. Melzer (29 B&W and 10 color photos, 5 illustrations, 1 map). Available in both hardcover and paperback.
 

The history of Japanese aviation offers countless stories of heroic achievements and dismal failures, passionate enthusiasm and sheer terror, brilliant ideas and fatally-flawed strategies.

In Wings for the Rising Sun, scholar and former airline pilot Jürgen Melzer connects the intense drama of flight with a global history of international cooperation, competition, and conflict. He details how Japanese strategists, diplomats, and industrialists skillfully exploited a series of major geopolitical changes to expand Japanese airpower and develop a domestic aviation industry. At the same time, the military and media orchestrated air shows, transcontinental goodwill flights, and press campaigns to stir popular enthusiasm in the national aviation project. Melzer analyzes the French, British, German, and American influence on Japan’s aviation, revealing in unprecedented detail how Japanese aeronautical experts absorbed foreign technologies at breathtaking speed and went on to design and build boldly original flying machines that, in many aspects, surpassed those of their mentors.

Wings for the Rising Sun compellingly links Japan’s aeronautical advancement with public mobilization, international relations, and the transnational flow of people and ideas, offering a fresh perspective on modern Japanese history.
 
This and other books published by the Harvard University Asia Center are available for purchase from Harvard University Press. All recent Asia-related titles published by the Asia Center and by Harvard University Press are available for a limited time for online purchase at the 20 percent AAS conference discount here.