Articles Archive

British Paratrooper at Arnhem: An Interview With James Sims

By Eric Niderost

Q: Could you give us a little personal background before we talk about your war experiences?

SIMS: I was born on April 29, 1925, at Sheffield in Yorkshire. Read more

A Japanese POW commander (Sessue Hayakawa) and a British colonel (Alec Guinness) conduct a battle of wills in The Bridge On the River Kwai.

Military Films

By Blaine Taylor

From earliest recorded history to yesterday, it is now possible to trace virtually all major human conflicts on videotapes and DVDs through both rental and purchase. Read more

A soldier of Company G, 335th Infantry Regiment, fires on German positions near the town of Beeck, Germany, November 29, 1944. The 335th Regiment was part of the 84th Infantry Division—a training unit deployed to Europe as the U.S. Army experienced a shortage of combat troops.

84th Infantry: From Training to Trial

By James G. Bilder

As casualties mounted in the fall of 1944, the U.S. Army began experiencing a problematic manpower shortage in the ranks of its infantry. Read more

Finnish Sniper Simo Häyhä

By Ronald Anderson

The 1939 war between Finland and Soviet Russia has been a minor inclusion in most histories of World War II. Read more

The Battle of Gaugamela: Alexander the Great vs. Darius III

By Marc G. De Santis

The Battle of Gaugamela began on the morning of October 1, 331 bc, when two great armies drew up for battle to determine the destiny of empires. Read more

A Horrible Harbinger: The Sino-Japanese War of 1894

History is like a limitless forest. More out there than you can ever take in. Turn over a stone and who knows what discoveries abound. Read more

Canadian tanks and troops advance across the Liri Valley toward the so-called Hitler Line in May 1944. The tanks seen in the distance likely belong to the 8th “Princess Louise” Hussars, which accompanied the Cape Breton Highlanders during this movement forward in the Italian campaign.

Bouncing the Hitler Line

By Patrick J. Chaisson

A Polish flag, followed minutes later by a Union Jack, appeared above the ruins of the abbey on the summit of Italy’s 17,000-foot Monte Cassino. Read more

Charles de Gaulle seized the opportunity to oppose the Nazis and assert political control in France.

When Charles de Gaulle flew to London in 1940, his country was on its knees and days later Nazi jackboots were tromping down the Champs Élysées in Paris. Read more

Indians make their way through the woods. Familiar with the forest, they stealthily tracked U.S. Army movements and staged devastating ambushes.

Northwest Indian War: Marching Against Little Turtle

By Robert A. Lynn

In the 1780s the Founding Fathers of the United States didn’t so much revise the old Articles of Confederation as devise an entirely new government as set forth in the Constitution. Read more

Nineteenth-century artist Eugene Delacroix depicted Trajan as a young soldier on his war horse. Trajan had good training as a warrior and fought in many areas of the empire. While in his 30s he skillfully crushed a rebellion on the German frontier. He also held important administrative posts.

The ancient city of Selinus, a major trading center in Cilicia, sat atop a steep outcropping of rock that rises abruptly from the edge of the Mediterranean on the southern coast of Asia Minor, now modern Turkey. Read more

Soldiers of the 320th Barrage Balloon Battalion work on the moorings of a barrage balloon on the coast of Normandy after D-Day. The balloons were made of two-ply cotton fabric impregnated with vulcanized or synthetic rubber, then coated with aluminum. Typically, the balloons were raised in the evening after Allied aircraft had returned to bases in England.

African American D-Day Heroes

By Dr. Forest Issac Jones

The heroics of African American soldiers during the D-Day invasion of Normandy on June 6, 1944, have not been taught regularly in high school or college history classes. Read more

The Death of Vice Admiral Chuichi Nagumo

By Jack Adamson

When interviewed in the late 1960s by John Toland for his book, The Rising Sun: The Decline and Fall of the Japanese Empire, Takeshi Hirakushi told a fantastic tale. Read more

Sudanese warriors charge a British relief contingent formed into an infantry square in this painting of the Battle of Abu Klea by William Barnes-Wollen.

Breaking the Square: Britain Takes on Mahdi at the Battle of Abu Klea

By Simon Craig

Until weapons technology made it redundant, the infantry square was a most effective and versatile formation. It needed no ditches or palisades; it could stand its ground, advance, or retreat; and it could offer a wall of fire on all four sides. Read more

Military Weapons: The M2 Browning .50-cal

By John D. Gresham

When one thinks back to the weapons of mass destruction that emerged in the 20th century, usually the atomic bomb or poison gas come to mind. Read more

The Nazi concentration camp at Dachau was liberated by American soldiers of the 45th Infantry Division, Seventh Army, on April 30, 1945. Prisoners who were able to stand and to comprehend that the hour of deliverance had come cheered the liberators just days before the final collapse of the Third Reich.

Evil on Trial

By Flint Whitlock

In the spring of 1945, after more than five-and-a-half years of total, merciless war in Europe––and the deaths of millions of human beings on the battlefields, the bombed-out cities and in the concentration and extermination camps––the carnage and destruction in Europe had finally come to an end. Read more