THE FIGHTIN' TENTH — Cold War to Desert Storm
A Memoir by Captain Michael Makatura, USAF (Ret.)

Publisher: Köehler Books · Virginia Beach, VA (koehlerbooks.com)
Publication date: May 5, 2026
ISBN (Softcover): 979-8-89747-116-4
ISBN (Hardcover): 979-8-89747-118-8
Pages: 282
Formats: Hardcover · Softcover · Kindle · Audiobook (TBD)
Category: Military Memoir / Aviation History
Price: Softcover $18.95 · Hardcover $28.95
Buy: Amazon — https://www.amazon.com/Fightin-Tenth-Cold-Desert-Storm-ebook/dp/B0GWW6P518
     Köehler Books — https://www.koehlerbooks.com/book/the-fightin-tenth-cold-war-to-desert-storm/

Press contact: makaturaorlando@gmail.com
Web: thefightintenth.com

==================================================
SYNOPSIS — SHORT
==================================================
An Executive Officer's account of the 10th Tactical Fighter Squadron, from Cold War alert duty at Hahn Air Base, West Germany, to the opening night of Operation Desert Storm.

==================================================
SYNOPSIS — MEDIUM
==================================================
In 1989, Captain Michael Makatura arrived at Hahn Air Base, West Germany, to serve as Executive Officer of the 10th Tactical Fighter Squadron — a front-line unit flying the F-16C on alert against the Soviet threat. Then the wall came down, the mission inverted, and within a year the squadron was bound for the Persian Gulf. The Fightin' Tenth is the insider's account of that whiplash: the alert pads and daily grind of Cold War Europe, the culture of a fighter squadron, and Operation Desert Storm seen from the operations side. It is less about the hardware than about the people who lived around it — the pilots, the maintainers, the support crews, and the families who held the line at home.

==================================================
SYNOPSIS — LONG
==================================================
When Captain Michael Makatura reported to Hahn Air Base in 1989 as its incoming Executive Officer, the 10th Tactical Fighter Squadron sat on the most contested ground in the world. Its F-16Cs stood alert against a Soviet armored force that everyone trained to fight but no one expected to actually face. The work was relentless and largely invisible — the personnel, logistics, and daily discipline of a unit kept permanently ready for a war that never came.

Then the ground shifted. The Berlin Wall fell, the threat that had defined the squadron evaporated, and within months the 10th was no longer guarding a European frontier — it was packing for the desert.

The Fightin' Tenth follows that turn. Makatura saw the war from the operations side, where he managed administration, logistics, and the daily reality of running a squadron at war. It is a memoir of a fighter squadron caught between two very different wars — the callsigns and hierarchies and hard-won trust, the families and maintainers and logistics, the rapid deployment to the Gulf, and the opening nights of the air campaign. Makatura writes without myth-making, more interested in the people than the machinery, and in what the work asked of everyone who kept the jets flying. The result is a precise, unsentimental record of a moment most histories skip — the seam between the Cold War and the wars that followed — told by the insider who lived it from the ground up.

==================================================
AUTHOR BIO — 50 WORDS
==================================================
Michael Makatura served as Executive Officer of the 10th Tactical Fighter Squadron at Hahn Air Base, Germany, through the final years of the Cold War and Operation Desert Storm. A 1987 graduate of Pitt Johnstown, he and his wife, Rhonda, have five children and live in Winter Garden, Florida.

==================================================
AUTHOR BIO — 150 WORDS
==================================================
Michael Makatura served as Executive Officer of the 10th Tactical Fighter Squadron at Hahn Air Base, Germany, during the final years of the Cold War and into Operation Desert Storm. Born into a working-class family in Port Vue, Pennsylvania, a blue-collar suburb of Pittsburgh, he never imagined he would one day be part of a fighter squadron that helped shape the end of the Cold War. He graduated from the University of Pittsburgh at Johnstown in 1987 and joined the Air Force soon after, earning his commission as a second lieutenant through Officer Training School. Selected for operations management — a non-flying support role for flying squadrons — he was assigned to Hahn in 1989, where he succeeded Captain Bill Turner as the squadron's executive officer. He remained at Hahn through Desert Shield and Desert Storm. He and his wife, Rhonda, have five children and reside in Winter Garden, Florida.

==================================================
ENDORSEMENTS
==================================================
"In The Fightin' Tenth, Mak captures the remarkable transition of the 10th Tactical Fighter Squadron from Cold War missions in Europe to combat operations in Desert Storm. From aviation enthusiasts to readers discovering air combat for the first time, this is a compelling story of American airpower and the men and women who made it happen."
  — Lt Gen Steve "Woody" Wood, USAF (Ret.), 10th TFS pilot and Sabre 1 (1991)

"Mak scored a 'shack' — a direct hit on the bullseye — with this book."
  — Col Edward "Julio" Houle, USAF (Ret.), former F-16 pilot and 10th TFS Sabre 1

"The Tenth played hard, trained harder, and fought to win! This book is a must-read for the military enthusiast."
  — BGen Joey "BooBoo" Booher, USAF (Ret.), F-16 pilot with the 10th TFS

"The Fightin' Tenth is an outstanding read that I couldn't put down. Mak puts you in the middle of the action of a story that's exciting and true."
  — BGen Paul "Doodle" Dordal, USAF (Ret.), 10th TFS pilot and Sabre 1 (1987–1989)
