With a preface by Hero of the Soviet Union M.V. Vodopyanov Shpanov's work "First blow. The Tale of the Future War," published just before the war, in the summer of 1939, was advertised as "Soviet military fiction." But it was not intended for children. The book was published by the Military Publishing House of the People's Commissariat of Defense and, moreover, not somehow, but in the training series "Commander's Library." The book was intended to popularize our military aviation doctrine.