In his spare time, he has become one of the few individuals from outside Vietnam to be given open access to the files of the Vietnamese People's Air Force (VPAF). He has made numerous visits to Hanoi, and other Vietnamese cities in the past 20 years, and has interviewed many of the leading aces from the war years. He has written two titles in Osprey's Combat Aircraft series: MiG-17 and MiG-19 Units of the Vietnam War and MiG-21 Units of the Vietnam War. Jim Laurier is a native of New England, growing up in New Hampshire and Massachusetts. He has been drawing since he could hold a pencil and throughout his life he has worked in many mediums creating artwork on a variety of subjects. He has worked on the Osprey Aviation list since 2000, and in that time he has produced some of the finest artwork seen in these volumes.