Mikulins inclusion in the form of a brief bio may seem odd given the title, however, given how much the Germans
studied the Mikulin swirl throttle, I judged he had a genuine role in the activites of the western front.
Three years ago I wanted to make the book about all engines from all fronts, but it became clear that to cover Russian
and Japanese engines to the same degree of depth as the German activities (which would be very justified considering
how little is written about them), would have required at least 2 more years and about £20,000 in research costs. I
did actually do a lot of studying on where Russian documents were, and was in quite advanced discusssion with
some Russian researchers about a trip. However, it became apparent that the cost would be prohibative, as
I would have needed to hire a local "fixer", and probably a technical translator, the Russian stuff is also
strewn across many unconnected archives, each of which have arcane access requirements. The main
archive of interest required they recieve a personal letter of recommendation from a senior Russian
civil servant... it all just got incredibly complicated. In Japan, none of the manufacturers answered my letters
requesting archive access, so I had to re-designate the book "western front", and get on with it.
