The Royal Flying Corps (RFC) was created by Royal Warrant over 100 years ago on the 13th of April, 1912 and established the following month in May. The RFC can trace its origins back to the Royal Engineers and the early flying experiments undertaken by the Army from the 1870s, and by the Royal Navy from the 1900s.

During the First World War, around 22,800 Canadians joined the British flying services, as a national Canadian air force was nonexistent. Some of them, like William Bishop, William Barker and Raymond Collishaw, scored among the famous fighter aces of the First World War, however any attempts to establish a national air force failed due to a lack of support from the Canadian government.

The Royal Australian Air Force was officially created on the 31st of August, 1921.  It’s beginnings, however, date back to service undertaken during World War 1 and can trace its heritage back to the Central Flying School formed on the 7th of March 1913.

The Italian Air Force, called the Regia Aeronautica in Italian, was officially established in 1923 as an independent part of the Italian armed forces. It was the first air force to ever conduct  both a reconnaissance flight and a bombing run, in late October of 1911.

The war weary world was caught off guard two days after Japan's surrender when potent Japanese built warplanes once again roamed the skies in a show of force. The reality was this event was a long time in the making and the surprise birth of the new Indonesian Air Force was far from unplanned.

The Imperial Iranian Air Force (IIAF), as it was formerly called, was first established as a branch of the Imperial Iranian Armed forces by the Iranian ruler, Reza Shah, in 1920.

When the South African Air Force entered World War II it did so with a pedigree earned during the Great War, serving as the South African Aviation Corps (SAAC). After initially training in Europe, SAAC pilots joined the campaign for German South West Africa.

The Turkish interest in flight is based deep in it’s history, in 1632 Hezarfen Ahmet Çelebi flew 3300 meters across the Bosphorus Strait by launching himself from the top of the Galata Tower on his own handmade glider and ranks as one of the first successful flights in aviation history.

Officially, the People’s Liberation Army Air Force of the People’s Republic of China was established on 11th November 1949. After the victory of the communists in the Civil War and the retreat of the Kuomintang to Formosa (Taiwan), the new government in Beijing knew the importance of air power in a modern battlefield.

The history of Rhodesian Air Force started in 1935, when the air section of the 1st Battalion Rhodesia Regiment was formed in the British colony of Southern Rhodesia. Based at Belvedere airfield near Salisbury (present Harare), the newly born organisation accepted their first cadets which were then trained on de Havilland Tiger Moths

Korea was after Japan's defeat in World War II an ostensibly free nation. However this was short-lived, as tensions and the growing hostility between the US and the USSR quickly lead to a country divided by ideological differences.

By the late 1930s war was looking increasingly likely to engulf many regions across the globe; the Balkans was considered by many to be one of the most threatened areas. likely to engulf many regions across the globe; the Balkans was considered by many to be one of the most threatened areas.

Socially and financially exhausted by the disastrous First World War, the Austro-Hungarian Empire completely collapsed days before the end of “The War to End All Wars” on 11th November 1918. 

The Indian Air Force (Bharatiya Vāyu Senā) is the principal air arm of the Indian armed forces. Its primary responsibility is to secure Indian airspace and to conduct aerial warfare during a conflict.

The Royal Yugoslav Air Force (henceforth referred to as the JKRV - Jugoslovensko Kraljevsko Ratno Vazduhoplovstvo) was the successor to the Serbian Military Air Service, one of the youngest air forces in the world. However, it would not be until 1921 that the JKRV was a self-sufficient, independent air force, untied from French leadership, who supplied and outfitted them till that point.

The Eastern Baltic states of Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia are three independent nations in Northern Europe on the shores of the Baltic Sea.

The history of the Polish Air Force begins of the 11th of November 1918, when the country finally regained its independence after nearly 123 years of partitions.

Almost completely ignored in western history books and overshadowed by major events in other parts of the world, the Royal Thai Air Force never-the-less played an important part in regional actions from its foundation.