The book is festooned with one hundred black and white images and illustrations, in a mixture of both photographs, military images, propaganda posters, and even a painting from the period. All of them help to bring the text alive, providing visual engagement with the history. The authors also provide a collection of tables outlining the losses of the opposing sides to help the reader follow the course of the battle, while a number of personal reminisces bring the very human side of the conflict to our attention. All of this makes for a highly interesting book on a long-bypassed part of history. For the modeller it brings new information to the fore, which will help to inform your models of the Great Patriotic War with a collection of reference and images that have not been seen together before.

Scale Aircraft Modelling

There is a wealth of detail about the corps’ activities and aircraft and careful ‘panning’ will provide numerous specks or even nuggets of gold. This work, from Pen & Sword imprint Air World, is certainly worth purchasing by anyone who has a serious interest in Eastern Front air operations.

Royal Aeronautical Society

"...highly recommended for students of the Eastern Front."

Air Power History, Spring 2022

"A 1978 television series about WWII on the Eastern Front was entitled The Unknown War. Air Battle for Moscow might qualify for the same heading in its depiction of events within that conflict about which almost nothing heretofore has been known outside of Russia. That makes this new volume, derived from both Russian and German sources, particularly welcome."

Aviation History

As the title of the book indicates, this particular book concentrates on the air battle over Moscow but it also receives a lot of attention about the ground war. But what we actually have here is a very good book written about the Eastern front and it has been written by two Russian experts and I actually believe particularly history is much better when written by people native to the language of the country. For example, someone local to Moscow is able to get the right access and knowledge from archives, museums, libraries rather than someone coming outside of the country. I enjoyed the technical detail in the book and the book has tables and charts sporadic throughout the book. The book also contains a wide range of photographs particularly from Moscow and of Russian soldiers and people. This book was very informative and well written and I particularly would like to read a second book covering the second half of the war.

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UK Historian

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Royal Aeronautical Society

This is a very thoroughly researched study, using extensive use of the Central Archives of the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation. The basis of the book is therefore a mass of material that is not available to English language researchers. Where possible facts have been cross checked against published German records and accounts. The result is a blow by blow account told with considerable detail regarding the number of sorties flown, the losses on each day and the damage on the ground... So a very valuable addition to the literature of the Eastern front, providing much new material from the Russian perspective.

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WW2 Today

This detailed book puts the air war over Moscow into perspective and ties in the air battle with the ground war as the German onslaught was reaching its high-tide mark. Using Russian archive reports and more recent German secondary sources, the authors weave the two together, to reach a balanced view of the effectiveness of each warring power during this crucial part of Operation Barbarossa.

This book prevents a profusion of technical and operational detail, together with anecdotal reports in a coherent fashion. The reader is given a clearer view of an operation that has more usually only received coverage in passing as part of broader coverage of Barbarossa. The book is measured in tone, except where the personality of Richthofen is discussed. The book then slips into language familiar to any student of florid Soviet era prose. This should not deter the reader from an otherwise excellent study of the air campaign that reveals, for example Soviet misidentification and reporting of Luftwaffe aircraft types, the effectiveness of raids on Gorky, and the presence of lend-lease Hurricanes and Tomahawks.

The conclusions reached are not always the ones that might be expected, as the authors challenge the effectiveness of the Soviet air and anti-air defences. They also question the overall effectiveness of the German air offensive, and inflated kill-claims on both sides. The picture that emerges is of a scrappy offensive and defence, hampered by the weather in which, casualties were heavy on both sides. Students of operation Barbarossa, and the air war in particular, will find a good deal in this book to interest them.

Chris Kemp

The authors have produced an exceptionally well researched and fascinating book on a little-known aspect of the Second World War – The Air Battle For Moscow.

Dmitry Degtev and Dmitry Zubov are to be congratulated for their dedication and enthusiasm in researching archival material held by the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation. Between them they have produced a book of significance not only for those who have a specific interest in aerial warfare but also for those who enjoy reading about 20th century history.

Roger Coleman, The Wessex Branch of the Western Front Association

Pen & Sword Books are to be congratulated for bringing yet another Eastern Front view of WW2 to a Western readership.

There are two themes which predominate throughout the narrative. Firstly the land war on a scale not matched in the West - to which that in the air was largely a supporting role - and unremitting over four long years; secondly the ferocity of the conflict involving not only the military but also the civilian populations where, what would now be defined as ‘war crimes’, were almost the norm; but to these the authors add a third, a post-Stalinist view, which highlights how Soviet propaganda hid the nation’s limitations of organisation, training and equipment.

The ‘Air Battle for Moscow’ was not at all the equivalent of that for London; neither Hitler nor his Luftwaffe had planned any sort of aerial ‘blitz’, instead, even this ‘strategic’ assault, was an adjunct to aid the advancing armies. The individual raids were, by London standards, small but aimed at specific targets in which the Luftwaffe achieved some quite marked success. Against them the greatest constraints were those of the vast ranges of the Russian steppes and bomb-load capacity which were both at the limits of their available aircraft.

A first-class and detailed historical record by two superbly well-qualified joint authors.

Philip Styles – Archivist, The Shackleton Association

This almost analytical presentation of facts about the bombings of Moscow by the German Luftwaffe brings to light the problems encountered by the Germans in their attempts to subdue the city and the defence put up by the Russians. The claims are substantiated for both sides and in the 238 pages the story unfolds like a diary citing extracts from published and archive sources. The missions are described, the aircraft used and their payloads. It's a blow by blow account from July 1941 to April 1942 during the heaviest use of bombers by the Germans. There are 8 chapters containing 105 black and white photographs, 17 charts a map and 13 appendices, many of which are a biography of an important personality involved in the conflict. An interesting fact-filled read.

Gary Wenko, IPMS Magazine 1 2021