Book Reviews

Book Reviews

NYT’s Living History of World War II

By Michael D. Hull

Tensions were high among expectant crowds gathering on the evening of August 14, 1945, in New York City’s Times Square, where news bulletins had streaked across the electronic “zipper” sign high on the Times Tower since 1928. Read more

Book Reviews

A. Jay Cristol’s ‘The Liberty Incident’

By Lt. Col. Harold E. Raugh, Jr., Ph.D., U.S. Army (Ret.)

On June 8, 1967, during the height of the Six-Day War between Israel and its Arab adversaries, the USS Liberty was attacked apparently without warning while in international waters in the eastern Mediterranean. Read more

Book Reviews

The Battles of Twin Tunnels and Chipyong-ni

By Lt. Col. Harold E. Raugh, Jr., Ph.D., U.S. Army (Ret.)

Success in combat and life and death on the battlefield may often owe to the manpower, materiel, or logistics superiority of one opponent over the other. Read more

Book Reviews

The Archaeologist Was a Spy

By Lt. Col. Harold E. Raugh, Jr., Ph.D., U.S. Army (Ret.)

Sylvanus G. Morley (1883-1948) was considered the most influential and successful archaeologist of the pre-Columbian Maya civilization. Read more

Book Reviews

Ivan R. Dee’s ‘Forged in War’

By Michael D. Hull

They were two unlikely looking warriors, yet their fateful friendship and shared leadership ensured the Allied victory in World War II and laid the groundwork for peace. Read more

Book Reviews

The Wehrmacht

By Michael D. Hull

Between September 1939 and November 1941, the German Army inflicted crushing defeats on Polish, Dutch, Belgian, Norwegian, French, British, and Soviet Armies, achieving in a matter of months what had been impossible during four bloody years of attrition on the Western Front in 1914-18. Read more

Book Reviews

W.W. Norton’s ‘Beyond Glory’

By Lt. Col. Harold E. Raugh, Jr., Ph.D., U.S. Army (Ret.)

He makes Rambo look like Captain Kangaroo,” were words used to describe the battlefield exploits of Medal of Honor recipient Captain (later Colonel) Lewis H. Read more

Book Reviews

Laurence Rees’ ‘Horror in the East’

By Michael D. Hull

Corporal Bill Hedges of the Australian Army was part of the force that fought Japanese troops back across the rugged Owen Stanley mountain range in New Guinea after their failed advance toward Port Moresby in 1942. Read more

Book Reviews

The Comanche Code Talkers of World War II

By Lt. Col. Harold E. Raugh, Jr., Ph.D., U.S. Army (Ret.)

Among the stalwart 4th Infantry Division soldiers who assaulted Utah Beach at Normandy on D-day were 13 specially recruited and trained Comanche Indians of the 4th Signal Company. Read more

Book Reviews

Marine Rifleman

By Lt. Col. Harold E. Raugh, Jr., Ph.D., U.S. Army (Ret.)

For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life and beyond the call of duty,” began the citation for the Medal of Honor awarded to then-U.S. Read more

Book Reviews

H. Paul Jeffers’ ‘In the Roughrider’s Shadow’

By Michael D. Hull

When the men of E Company, 2nd Battalion, 8th Infantry Regiment, U.S. 4th Infantry Division stepped out of a Higgins boat into waist-deep water at Utah Beach, Normandy, early on Tuesday, June 6, 1944, they were accompanied by a short, slender man with a dented nose. Read more

Book Reviews

Marching with the Big Red One

By Lt. Col. Harold E. Raugh, Jr., Ph.D., U.S. Army (Ret.)

Kill them, Lieutenant. Don’t take any prisoners,” exhorted the bedraggled engineer officer to the new replacements, “Don’t take any prisoners!” Read more

Book Reviews

McCarthy and Syron’s ‘Panzerkrieg’

By Michael D. Hull

When German forces rumbled across the Polish frontier in the early hours of Friday, September 1, 1939, igniting World War II, it was the speed and mobility of the armored divisions—the Panzerwaffe—that stunned the world. Read more

Book Reviews

Rommel and Caporetto

By Lt. Col. Harold E. Raugh, Jr., Ph.D., U.S. Army (Ret.)

Trench warfare on the Western Front during World War I was generally static, stultifying, and unimaginative. Read more

Book Reviews

Edwin P. Hoyt’s ‘The U-Boat Wars’

By Michael D. Hull

When Chancellor Adolf Hitler started rearming Germany in 1934, his submarine force commander, Admiral Karl Doenitz, asked for men and materiel to create a fleet of 300 U-boats. Read more

Book Reviews

Colin White’s “1797, Nelson’s Year of Destiny”

By Lt. Col. Harold E. Raugh, Jr., Ph.D., U.S. Army (Ret.)

That would be absurd,” responded the legendary Royal Navy Admiral Sir (later Lord) Horatio Nelson to the patriotic lady asking to rename her pub the Nelson Arms, “seeing I have but one.” Read more

Book Reviews

Roscoe C. Blunt, Jr.’s “Foot Soldier”

By Michael D. Hull

A few days after German panzers rumbled through the chill, foggy Ardennes Forest early on December 16, 1944, breaching thinly held American lines and causing widespread confusion and near panic, a number of Allied units were rushed in to plug the gaps. Read more

Book Reviews

Martin Blumenson’s ‘Anzio’

By Lt. Col. Harold E. Raugh, Jr., Ph.D., U.S. Army (Ret.)

The World War II campaign in Italy, fought in rugged terrain that favored the German defender, inhibited maneuver, and restricted resupply efforts, had ground to a standstill by the end of 1943. Read more