Best selling historian Stephen Ambrose describes how the Army Air Forces recruited, trained, and chose those few who would undertake the most demanding and dangerous jobs in the war. These are the boys - turned pilots, bombardiers, navigators, and gunners of the B-24s - who suffered over 50 percent casualties.
Ambrose carries us along in the crowded, uncomfortable, and dangerous B-24s as their crews fought to the death - through thick, black, deadly flak - to reach their targets and destroy the German war machine. Twenty-two-year-old George McGovern, later a United States senator and a presidential candidate, flew 35 combat missions (all the Army would allow) and won the Distinguished Flying Cross. We meet him and his mates, his co-pilot killed in action, and crews of other planes - many of whom did not come back.
As Band of Brothers and Citizen Soldiers portrayed the bravery and ultimate victory of the American soldier from Normandy on to Germany, The Wild Blue makes clear the contribution the young men of the Army Air Forces stationed in Italy made to the Allied victory.
