Russia’s Time of Troubles

The Varangians founded a number of fortified towns in Slavic Russia in the 9th century that would become seats of Eastern Christian principalities. Read more

The Story of America’s Lost Battalion in World War I Is a Saga of Citizen Soldiers Who Endured a Hellish Maelstrom of Combat

Lines of drab-uniformed soldiers emerged from their night march and moved down a forested road into open country on September 26, 1918. Read more

Slogging into the Reich

Lieutenant William Paul Chapman’s fellow soldiers were tank hunting on the afternoon of August 11, 1944. The Battle of Mortain was raging around them, a counterattack by a German armored spearhead against the growing and inexorable advance of the Allied armies out of the Normandy beachhead. Read more

The Bold British Stroke at Taranto Preceded the Royal Navy Victory at Cape Matapan

The great British Royal Navy victory at Cape Matapan sealed the fate of the Italian Regia Marina, rendering Mussolini’s fleet virtually impotent after the spring of 1941. Read more

Assault Gun Tanker

The German push west came to a violent end.

On December 19, 1944, the Panther and King Tiger tanks of SS Lt. Read more

Defusing World War II’s dangerous legacy.

For the most part, World War II left the U.S. and Canadian homelands physically untouched. There were a few incidents of sabotage and a few small-scale attacks, such as a Japanese submarine’s shelling of an oil refinery in southern California and balloon bombs launched from Japan that floated over the Pacific and set fires in the western United States and Canada. Read more

Bloody Clash on the Tiber

On October 28, ad 312, a Roman emperor was drowning. The sight must have amazed his soldiers. All summer Rome had been filled with rumors of the western emperor, Constantine, and the ease with which he and his army had crossed the Alps and, once on Italian soil, strung together a handful of victories in the north. Read more

Cannon Thunder at the Battle of Valmy

Wind lifted away the fog sheltering the French lines. Atop a low ridge where the French army was deployed, a lone windmill provided a vivid range marker for 58 Prussian cannons on the neighboring hills. Read more

Prisoner of the Gestapo: Freed by Words

With war comes untold stories of unbroken spirits. These are universal stories without bounds and sides, some of which remain buried deep in psyches. Read more

WWII’s Tragic Aviation Accidents

It was Christmas Day, 1944. A U.S. Navy C-47 Skytrain with five men aboard was en route from Naval Air Station, Olathe, Kansas, to Columbus, Ohio. Read more

Rebel Blunder at the Battle of Bristoe Station

It took only moments for a golden opportunity to turn into a trap. Several days of pursuit in October 1863 through northern Virginia at last brought Lt. Read more

Warfare’s Unsung Pigeon

Battlefield communications are often a matter of life and death to individual soldiers and serve to determine not only the outcome of battles but entire wars. Read more

Ordeal at Monte Cassino

Lt. Gen. Mark Clark’s Fifth Army, comprising the U.S. VI and British X Corps, headed north from the Salerno battlefield in September 1943, German Field Marshal Albert Kesselring, commander of Army Group C in southern Italy, implemented new defensive tactics and fortifications. Read more

Corregidor: Gibraltar of the East

When Marine Private Donald Versaw arrived on the fortress island of Corregidor in the Philippines on December 28, 1941, three weeks after Pearl Harbor, he was impressed by how normal everything looked. Read more

The Wereth 11 Massacre During the Battle of the Bulge

In the winter of 1944-1945, within Belgium’s Ardennes Forest, better known as the launching pad of the Battle of the Bulge, two war crimes were committed. Read more

WWII’s Forgotten “Missing”

Recently, I saw an article about American MIAs—those service members who went “missing in action” during World War  II—and, frankly, was taken aback.  Read more

Frederick the Great at Torgau: “A Picture of Hell”

By Eric Niderost

King Frederick II of Prussia was busy writing dispatches, his face a study of grim determination as he scribbled out the words by the light of a guttering candle. Read more

The Forgotten Fleet

British naval operations in the Far East in World War II started badly and went downhill from there. Read more

April War Games

Quality aircraft combat games aren’t exactly a dime a dozen, and publisher Iggymob aims to fill in that hole with the upcoming Dogfighter: World War 2, which is currently in development collaboratively with iBong and Grumpy for PlayStation 4. Read more

Deadly Duel Above Berlin

“Our mission was Berlin. We flew in that dreaded position—last and lowest in the squadron.”

Archie Mathosian, B-17 Radio Operator, A/C #521 (Skyway Chariot), 100th Bomb Group (H), USAAF

“Last and lowest in the squadron.”These Read more