Biographical note

Tom Cooper is an Austrian aerial warfare analyst and historian. Following a career in worldwide transportation business - during which he established a network of contacts in the Middle East and Africa - he moved into narrow-focus analysis and writing on small, little-known air forces and conflicts, about which he has collected extensive archives. This has resulted in specialisation in such Middle Eastern air forces as of those of Egypt, Iran, Iraq, and Syria, plus various African and Asian air forces. Except for authoring and co-authoring more than 30 books - including about a dozen of titles for Helion's @War series - and over 1000 articles, Cooper is a regular correspondent for multiple defence-related publications. David Nicolle was born in London in 1944. He worked for the BBC Television News and the BBC Arabic Service while also writing for educational magazines on various historical subjects - including aviation - before receiving a PhD from Edinburgh University. While continuing to write and illustrate articles for educational magazines, Dr Nicolle also started writing books on various aspects of aviation and military history - largely focusing upon the Arab and Islamic world. In 1983, he became a lecturer in History at Yarmouk University in Jordan, where he continued to teach until 1987. After returning to England, Dr Nicolle continued to write and now has more than 100 books and dozens of TV documentaries to his name.