With the war clouds gathering over Europe, the British were looking to America to fill its squadrons with aircraft. The brand new Spitfire was working through its teething problems and production lines getting up to speed.

In 1939 the P-36 was quite a hot plane but with an unreliable engine. Curtis mated an inline Allison engine to the P-36 airframe and the P-40 was born. The P-36 performed very well during the Battle of France in 1940. French pilots shot down more German aircraft flying P-36s (Curtis model H-75) than any indigenous aircraft. The Brits wanted the updated Curtis model H-81 (P-40B). They found the first batch unsatisfactory for European skies but good enough for North Africa. The shortcomings of the B model became obvious quickly and the next batch was rejected, to the benefit of the AVG in China. They got the updated P-40D (externally identical to the E model and used only by the Brits). By this time Lend Lease and the USA war machines were getting into high gear. The US government was buying lots of everything and shipping it to whomever would take it. The Curtis Company was not allowed to make major modifications to the airplane to keep production lines rolling and the P-40 was less expensive by at least 1/3 of any other US fighter. The P-47 was close to and the P-38 was more than double the price. This led to lots of P-40s in British livery sitting on docks.

Stalin was desperate for aircraft also and the P-40, while not satisfactory fighting Bf109s over England, was good enough to fight them over Russia. Part of this was where they were used. The Russian fighters were designed for point defense and tactical use, therefore had short operational ranges. The longer range of the P-40 made them useful in the northern most reaches of the front, providing air cover for the Mirmansk convoys. The mechanical reliability was also better, appreciated on long flights over water and enemy territory. In addition, where was that enemy territory, Finland? KH-51 started out in upstate New York as all P-40s did. It went initially to the Brits and then to Russia. The Russians painted it olive drab, marked it #23 and painted the rudder and upper vertical stabilizer white (see P-40 in action for a drawing). Russian stars were painted in the usual 6 positions (under wing, fuselage side and vertical stabilizer) and possibly the tops of the wings also (as was typical of non-indigenous aircraft). The Finns forced it down in 1943, and put it back into flying condition. The repainting job was not thorough and the browner Russian olive showed through in some areas. This aircraft was prized by the Finns as it was the only one captured and P-40s were a frequent adversary. Familiarization flights were highly sought after. With no spare parts, the number of flying hours was kept to a minimum.
My model represents the first paint job and markings. Later the spinner was painted green, the yellow theater markings painted over and finally the swastikas changed to the white/blue/white roundels of the post surrender Finnish air force. I built this model straight from the Mauve box. I have not decided if I will put an after market seat in or use the slab provided in the kit. The kit is the best P-40 1/48th scale manufactured. This is not saying much. No P-40 kit is in the ballpark of the recent Tamiya releases. On the other hand, I like P-40s and there is not much guilt that I did not trick it out. I feel obliged to put in maximum effort on a $35 Tamiya kit. These $10-15 P-40s? So what if perfection is not obtained.                                              
Happy Modeling!