Norfolk Aeronautical Group

Book review :Typhoon

TYPHOON by Wing Commander Mike Sutton (Published 2022 by Penguin Books £8.99).  I bought my copy on Amazon for £4.50 but not sure if that offer is current.

There have been a large number of military aviation books from ex-service aircrew over the past few years, and most would probably appeal to NAG members, but I found this to be one of the more informative and enjoyable ones.  As well as telling a fascinating story and painting a sometimes-frightening picture of current combat operations in the Middle East it also takes us back to the author’s reasons for joining the RAF and his subsequent career progression, as well as the odd transgression.

The book contains an interesting and compelling description of how the Litening pod was used for real, including its extensive use as a search and surveillance tool in real time as well as for target engagement.  The resolution and zoom capabilities appear to be truly amazing.  The capability of Paveway is equally astonishing.  The author describes a sortie where two aircraft put two missiles down the same hole. Later he dials in an air burst to see off a sniper but leave the surrounding infrastructure untouched. They are probably worth every penny of the £30,000 alleged cost compared with how many thousand-pound bombs from a Vulcan bombing with the 1950’s navigation bombing system it had would have been needed to achieve the same results.

Overall rating 5*, but despite the successes and Typhoon reliability described in the book the fact remains that the RAF and politicians seem to have forgotten that quantity (of aircraft and weapons) has a quality all of its own – today the number of operational aircraft available to the RAF is probably less than 150 with perhaps 70% available at any one time.   John Blakeley