BRAD ELWARD

"Unequivocally the most thorough and authoritative account of the United States Navy Fighter Weapon School (TOPGUN) from its inception in 1968 until today. Equally impressive is how author Brad Elward superbly delves into the infancy of fighter aircraft dogfighting more than half a century before TOPGUN was established. He skillfully leads the reader though decades of developments, innovations, mistakes, and reckonings that defined the fascinating path of naval aviation through the 20th and 21st century. While some readers may be drawn to this epic book because of the storied airplanes and events that define this history, Mr. Elward does an even better job of sharing insights into the people who are unquestionably the crucial ingredient to making TOPGUN what it is today.”

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CAPT James Christie, USN (ret), 38th Commander of TOPGUN, 2013-2014.

“TOPGUN – The Legacy is an amazing read and the definitive history on the Navy Fighter Weapons School.  Brad has spent countless hours interviewing members of the TOPGUN Staff to get a real feel for the organization and standards of excellence which have been maintained for over 50-years.  Enjoy the read!”

CAPT Dan “Dix” Dixon, USN (ret) – Former NSAWC/N7 (TOPGUN CO), 2001-2003.

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"The mission of a TOPGUN instructor is to be an expert in aerial combat, an instructor of instructors, and to perfect the art of teaching and learning.

Brad Elward has written the definitive history of TOPGUN and how its instructors have created one of the world’s most revered institutions.

TOPGUN – The Legacy accurately captures the storied 50-year history of TOPGUN.  Through thousands of hours of interviews with hundreds of TOPGUN instructors, Elward takes the reader through the origins and formation of the school and deep inside the evolution of air combat instruction for naval aviators— TOPGUN – The Legacy is the only book in existence which tells this monumental story.

Elward’s determination to precisely tell TOPGUN’s story matches the same work ethic TOPGUN instructors have used for decades.  It’s a tribute to past TOPGUN instructors who never settled on being good enough, and who’s efforts chronicled in this book will serve as a roadmap for future TOPGUN instructors to forge their own legacy."

LtCol Pat “Kato” Cooke, USMC (Ret.), TOPGUN Instructor & Training Officer (1989-93).  

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“While the rest of the country has been mesmerized during these early summer weeks by the Hollywood version of Top Gun, Brad Elward's book capture the real TOPGUN training, aircraft and people that no movie really could. The tome provides all the real history and details about the real school and the pilots in a clear prose that resonates more soundly - and with a more enduring tone - than any fleeting cinematic high jinks.”

Michael Fabey, author of Heavy Metal: The Hard Days and Nights of the Shipyard Workers Who Build America's Supercarriers and Crashback: The Power Clash Between the U.S. and China in the Pacific.

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 “The U.S. Navy’s famous TOPGUN — the Naval Fighter Weapons School — hardly needs introduction, given Hollywood’s treatment of the institution. After beginning with a history of fighter tactics, the author focuses on the disappointing kill ratio of Navy pilots over North Vietnam in the mid-1960s and the effort of some visionary aviators to create a school that would train pilots and radar intercept officers in tactics — forgotten earlier as missile-armed jets evolved — and reverse their fortunes in combat. The outstanding results spoke for themselves as Navy fighters ran up the score in 1972. TOPGUN has survived and thrived as the Navy vowed never to forget the basics of aerial combat. In this massive book, the author — who conducted 450 interviews — exhausts his subject with as complete a history of TOPGUN as could be imagined.”

SeaPower Magazine, December 2021.

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“This is a thoroughly researched and careful analysis of TOPGUN, the school. The inclusion of former instructor commentary threaded throughout the text lends enormous credence to Elward’s deconstruction of the important moments in the school’s history. This book is the story of TOPGUN like you’ve never seen before with critical and open analysis of key events, machines and the people brought together to achieve great things. Read it cover-to-cover or dip across and in and out, any student or aficionado of aerial warfare will gain enormous insights into the pre-eminent fighter weapons school of the past 50 years, what made it tick and how it evolved through challenge and change. This is a real beauty, a trophy on any bookshelf that will no doubt claim the mantle of go-to text for this incredible story.”

Takis Diakoumis, Flight Line Book Review, April 2022.