FORCES AERIENNES

Christopher Chant ( December 5th, 1945 ) was born at Adlington Hall near Macclesfield ( Cheshire, England ). He spent most of his early childhood in East Africa, where his father was an officer in the Colonial Service. Aviation in particular and military matters in general have been a passion ever since he was given his first model aeroplane kit at about the age of 11. 

Christopher Chant returned to the United Kingdom for his secondary education at The King’s School ( Canterbury, Kent, England, 1959 - 1964 ) and then higher education at Oriel College ( Oxford, Oxfordshire, England, 1964 - 1968 ). At Oxford, he gained his degree in Literae Humaniores ( otherwise known as " Greats " and involving Greek and Latin language, ancient history and philosophy ), and was also heavily involved in various aspects of his college’s rowing club as an oarsman and coach. 

After taking his degree, Christopher Chant moved to London ( England ) as an Assistant Editor on the Purnell partworks History of the Second World War ( 1968 - 1969 ) and History of the First World War ( 1969 - 1972 ), and on the completion of the latter he moved to Orbis Publishing as Editor of the partwork World War II ( 1972 - 1974 ). As this partwork approached its conclusion, he decided on a half - shift of career direction to become a freelance writer and editor. 

Settled in Sutherland ( Scotland ) since the early 2000's, he continue to write extensively on military and aviation subjects, and have also contributed as editor and writer to the partworks The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Aircraft, War Machine, Warplane, Take - Off, World Aircraft Information Files and World Weapons, and to the magazine World Air Power Journal. 

In more recent years, he became involved in the creation of a five - disk CR - ROM series covering the majority of the world’s military aircraft from World War I to the present, and also in the writing of scripts for a number of video cassettes, TV programmes and DVD programmes. 

( sources : Wikipedia, http://www.cmchant.com )