History Channel's Dogfights

[Wuzak]

I have just bought and watched the dvd box set of season one of the History Channel's Dogfights.

This series looks at a number of famous air battles using cgi to visually show the battles, and also to explain the tactics of each situation.

The series has a number of battles from WW2, Korea and Vietnam, as well as an episode about the Israeli Air Force in the 6 days war, one about the sinking of the Bismarck, and another involving part of the Japanese fleet.


In general I found the series to be quite enjoyable and well executed. Some of their aircraft data I found to be inaccurate, or incomplete. For instance, when referring to Me 109s they failed to indicate which model was in use. The Dauntless was described as having one 0.30 cal gun for rear defence but the CGI clearly showed 2.

Has anybody else here seen this series (or season 2) and what are your impressions?

[Pete57]

Hi Wuzak,

I've watched both season 1 and season 2 on the History Channel and I pretty much agree with your assessment.

I've especially enjoied the episode where Ralph Parr goes head-to-head with a Soviet honcho in Korea, who gave Parr the wildest ride in his fighter pilot carreer.

I had read of this, specific dogfight in a couple of books, but its re-enactment with computer graphics is astonishing and left me with an even greater respect for some of the Soviet pilots who flew in Korea, devoid of any g-suit and gun-ranging radar, with less training than their US counterparts and yet managed to score some impressive tallies!

[Trexx]

Heck yeah. I eat it up, when it comes to that program.
That's the kind of show I'd make if I was in broadcasting.

One remarkable episode was about the Gulf War in 1991. Prior to that, the official statements from the U.S. Air Force was there wasn't any air to air combat other than an A-10 shooting down a helicopter. (and I think that was a U.S. Marine A-10)...
Nonetheless the show covered a slough of incidents where there was definitely air to air engagements.

The computer graphics are wonderful and fun to watch.