Under the radar
Subtitle: a novel
By: James Hamilton-Paterson
Publisher: Faber and Faber
Published: 2013
Place of publication: London
Language: eng
Number of pages: 299
ISBN-13: 9780571273980; 9780571305025
Subjects: Englisch; Roman; Cold War; Fiction
Description: 1961. A squadron of Vulcan aircraft, Britain's most lethal nuclear bomber, flies towards the east coast of the United States. Highly manoeuvrable, the great delta-winged machines are also equipped with state of the art electronic warfare devices that jam American radar systems. Evading the fighters scrambled to intercept them, the British aircraft target Washington and New York, reducing them to smoking ruins. They would have done, at least, if this were not an exercise. This extraordinary raid (which actually took place) opens James Hamilton-Paterson's remarkable novel about the lives of British pilots at the height of the Cold War, when aircrew had to be on call 24 hours a day to fly their nuclear-armed V-bombers to the Western USSR and devastate the lives of millions.