Tales from the Frontline

A fully illustrated account of Middle East Command’s strike force as told by its pilots and airmen, from the author of Hunters Over Arabia.

After two years servicing Vampire trainers at the RAF’s Central Flying School, Ray Deacon left Little Rissington and joined thirty fellow airmen for a voyage out to Aden aboard HMT Nevassa on her last sailing as a troopship. Posted to 8 Squadron at RAF Khormaksar, he spent the next two years living and working in the torrid heat of this desert outpost. It had its compensations, however—the opportunity not only to experience life on a busy front-line operational squadron while working on ground attack and fighter reconnaissance versions of the Hawker Hunter, but to savor the delights of a trip in aeronautical engineer Sydney Camm’s most versatile aircraft topping his list.

In addition to defending the skies above Aden and its Protectorates, Middle East Command expended a large proportion of its energy supporting army activities in the mountains of the Aden hinterland: dropping supplies, transporting personnel between posts, and in the case of the Hunter squadrons, attacking dissident targets and patrolling the border with Yemen. It was against this background that Deacon wrote his first book on RAF Middle East Command operations, Hunters over Arabia. Tales from the Frontline: Middle East Hunters is a fully illustrated companion volume that comprises anecdotes, stories, and experiences of life on the Hunter squadrons as told by the pilots and airmen who flew and maintained the Hunter during its twelve-year tenure in Arabia.