Tempered Steel

`

Tempered Steel

The Three Wars of Triple Air Force Cross Winner Jim Kasler

Perry D. Luckett and Charles L. Byler
Foreword by James Salter

320 pages

Hardcover

March 2005

978-1-57488-834-8

$39.95 Add to Cart
Paperback

August 2006

978-1-57488-835-5

$19.95 Add to Cart

About the Book

Perry Luckett and Charles Byler have written the first biography of Col. James Kasler, who is the only three-time recipient of the Air Force Cross, the second highest medal for wartime valor. Kasler served as an eighteen-year-old B-29 tail gunner in World War II, became a legendary jet ace in Korea, and was so famous in Vietnam that he was known by name in the White House. Major General Hoyt Vandenberg put Kasler, along with Chuck Yeager and Robbie Risner, as "head and shoulders above the rest as stick-and-rudder pilots."

Kasler planned and led the most effective bombing mission of the Vietnam War. He was shot down and had to endure six and a half years of torture in a POW camp. His courage under those brutal conditions earned him the respect of such men as John McCain and James Stockdale. This book captures the essence of a genuine American hero who fought in three wars and traces the history of the U.S. Air Force during its formative period.