German Admiral Raeder’s Navy Raiders

On the nights of August 21 and 24, 1939, two dark ships slipped out of the German naval base at Wilhelmshaven and turned west toward the English Channel. Read more

Change WWII History With a Toy-Soldier Style Battle for the Ages, and Take the Fight to the Tabletop

For a World War II simulator with a surprisingly colorful twist, developer Noobz from Poland recently came through with the aptly titled Total Tank Simulator. Read more

Naval Showdown in the Solomons

The First Naval Battle of Guadalcanal began with a delay. Shortly before 1:30 am on November 13, 1942, the American cruiser USS Helena spotted a Japanese task force: “Radar contact. Read more

Prussian Blunder at Hochkirch

Cannons roared and muskets crackled in the darkness below the hill of Rodewitz, but King Frederick the Great of Prussia was in no hurry to move. Read more

Swift Invasion of Denmark

On the night of April 8, 1940, almost four million people went to bed at peace in the midst of a world war. Read more

The Great Viking Siege of Paris

Well before the great Viking siege of Paris, more than 300 islands dotted the length of the Seine River, reduced over the centuries by human impact and natural changes to slightly more than 100. Read more

Daring British Attack on Meiktila

While the soldiers and officers of the Japanese 15th Army fought fiercely to defend Mandalay in central Burma, they were alarmed to discover that British and Indian troops were dangerously close to attacking their supply depot at Meiktila, 90 miles to their rear. Read more

Nazi Stuka Ace Hans Rudel

In the village of Seiferdau, Southern Prussia, an eight-year-old boy with an umbrella jumped out of a second-story window. Read more

The Essential Role of Navy PBR Boats in the Vietnam War

The U.S. Navy deployed a variety of small boats to South Vietnam during the Vietnam War, but perhaps the best known of these is the river patrol boat. Read more

How Winston Churchill Prolonged the Defense of Antwerp in World War I

Joseph Mary Nagle Jefferies, a correspondent for Britain’s Daily Mail, was assigned to cover the opening phases of World War I in Belgium in October 1914. Read more

How The RAF’s Eagle Squadrons Joined the Eighth Air Force

“We went to London in ones and twos during our precious 24-hour passes to transfer and pick up our U.S. Read more

Peach Orchard Bloodbath: Day 2 of the Battle of Gettysburg

By Mike Phifer

On July 2, the day of the Battle of Gettysburg’s Peach Orchard conflict, Army of the Potomac commander Maj. Read more

Operation Market Garden: The American Airborne’s Audacious Role

With his troops in a bitter fight with German forces in northern France in the late summer of 1944, General Omar Bradley, commander of the Allied 12th Army Group, could not believe his ears. Read more

Hitler’s Bold Attack at Mortain

For once, the ULTRA message came late. Normally, the decoding machines and hard-working British cryptographers at Bletchley Park had an abundance of German Army messages to go through, but in the first days in August 1944, the German panzer divisions had gone to radio silence, which suggested they were going to attack, but not in which direction. Read more

The Film and Battle of San Pietro

By Michael E. Haskew

The monotonous rattle and snap of the film projector provided a steady accompaniment to the images flickering across the screen in the darkened room. Read more

General Jonathan M. Wainwright survived the privations of captivity at the hands of the Japanese.

Amid the great assembly of senior Allied officers who stood by while the representatives of the Japanese government and those of the victors of World War II in the Pacific signed the instrument of surrender aboard the battleship USS Missouri on September 2, 1945, in Tokyo Bay, two of the most unlikely attendees waited solemnly to step forward. Read more

Colonel William O. Darby and the U.S. Army Rangers

On the morning of Friday, February 18, 1944, fresh groups of German panzergrenadiers backed by tanks swept south from their defensive positions at Anzio and overran American forward positions at Aprilia, eight miles north of the landing beaches. Read more

First Battle of the Naktong Bulge

A battalion of the North Korean People’s Army (NKPA) crossed the Naktong River under cover of night on August 5, 1950. Read more

Marine Sergeant Mitchell Paige: Valor on Guadalcanal

As the 33 men of his machine-gun platoon set up their four s along the ridge facing south toward a jungle-shrouded ravine on Guadalcanal where the Japanese were massing for an attack on the evening of October 25, 1942, Marine Sergeant Mitchell Paige crawled in front of their position and rigged a makeshift trip wire designed to alert his troops should Japanese forces approach their line. Read more

Hitler’s Waffen-SS and the Last Battle in Berlin

In the predawn hours of April 24, 1945, SS-Brigadeführer Gustav Krukenberg received orders from Army Group Vistula defending Berlin to immediately lead the remnants of the 57th Battalion of the 33rd Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS Charlemagne from its staging area at the SS training camp at Neustrelitz to the German capital. Read more