Famous Navy Ships: The HMS Electra
By Glenn BarnettWar clouds gathered rapidly once Germany invaded Poland on September 1, 1939. Allied demands that Hitler withdraw his armies went unheeded. Read more
Famous Navy Ships: The USS Tang
By Flint WhitlockDuring World War II, the United States employed 288 submarines, the vast majority of which raided Japanese shipping in the Pacific, thus preventing the enemy’s vital supplies and reinforcements from reaching the far-flung island battlefields. Read more
No Mercy! Remembering the Alamo
By Eric NiderostOn Friday, March 4, 1836, Generalissimo Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna Perez de Labron ordered a staff conference at his headquarters near San Antonio’s Military Plaza. Read more
WWII Nazi Spies: ‘Cicero’
by Kelly BellOn the evening of October 29, 1943, a middle-aged man, innocuous in appearance but for his deep-set, penetrating eyes, appeared at the German embassy in the Turkish capital of Ankara. Read more
Patton’s Persona
By Christopher MiskimonThe meeting room was freezing cold on December 19, 1944, despite the small stove in the corner. It was in northern France during one of Europe’s coldest winters in memory. Read more
The Human Face of D-Day
By Christopher MiskimonOn D-Day, Sergeant O.B. Hill of the 82nd Airborne Division landed by parachute along the flooded banks of the Merderet River. Read more
William R. Hogan’s ‘Task Force Hogan’
By Christopher MiskimonSam Hogan commanded 3rd Battalion, 33rd Armored Regiment, 3rd Armored Division in June 1944, during the Normandy campaign. Read more
Rory Laverty’s ‘Aluminum Alley’
By Christopher MiskimonThe United States carried out the world’s first long-range airlift for 42 months to keep Nationalist China in the war. Read more
Lt. Col. Major Clark ‘Derrick’s Bridgehead’
By Christopher MiskimonThe 597th Field Artillery Battalion, 92nd Infantry Division, was the first, last, and only direct support field artillery battalion entirely commanded by black officers to see combat in U.S. Read more
Brian Lane Herder’s ‘Early Pacific Raids 1942’
By Christopher MiskimonIn the chaotic period immediately after the Pearl Harbor attack, the Japanese military launched numerous offensives in support of its goals to expand Japan’s territorial holdings in Asia and the Pacific. Read more
“Mad” Mike Calvert: A British Legend in Burma
By Colonel Robert Barr SmithThe English officer studied the Burmese river and its surroundings. The area seemed quiet, for the moment peaceful. Read more
The Betrayal of Viriathus of Spain
By Ludwig Heinrich DyckIn 150 BC a young shepherd wandered down from the hills to surrender with others of his kind to the Romans. Read more
Hancock the Superb: Winfield Scott Hancock & the Battle of Gettysburg
By John DeppenOn East Cemetery Hill at Gettysburg National Military Park, an equestrian statue of Maj. Gen. Winfield Scott Hancock stands facing west toward the Evergreen Cemetery gatehouse. Read more
Walter Cronkite: The War As He Saw It
by Eric NiderostWalter Cronkite is the acknowledged dean of American journalists, an icon whose distinguished career spanned 60 years. Cronkite is best known as the anchorman and managing editor of The CBS Evening News, a position he occupied from 1962 to 1981. Read more
The Battle of Lepanto: “The Best Day’s Work in Centuries”
By William J. McPeakFor Europe, there was great news from Malta in August 1565. The Ottoman Turks had lifted their siege and made for home. Read more
OSS Spymaster Allen Dulles
By Peter KrossDuring World War II, Switzerland was one of the few neutral countries to survive unscathed amid the death and destruction that was being heaped upon the rest of Europe. Read more
Wake Island Survivor
By Eric NiderostThe siege of Wake Island lasted a relatively short time, from December 8 to December 23, 1941, yet it looms large in the annals of the Second World War. Read more
Gothas: The German Bombers of World War I
by Jim HavilandOn May 25, 1917, a fleet of 21 bombers lumbered in a line at 12,000 feet over the English coast. Read more
Singing Swords & Charging Warhorses
By Terry GoreItaly in the mid-11th century was in chaos. Ostensibly held together under the auspices of papal and Holy Roman Empire authority, the peninsula had become a collection of feuding city-states, each under its own local ruler or warlord. Read more
U.S. Navy Captain Forrest Biard
By Hervie Haufler“For several months after the outbreak of the war with Japan the very fate of our nation rested in the hands of a small group of very dedicated and highly devoted men working in the basement under the Administration Building in Pearl Harbor.” Read more
