WWII
British airborne troops were landing near Arnhem, Holland, on the morning of September 17, 1944. Despite the fact that elements of two veteran SS panzer divisions were reconstituting in the area, the Germans were taken much by surprise. Read more
WWII
When World War II in Europe came to an end, General Dwight D. Eisenhower, Supreme Commander Allied Expeditionary Force, published a victory message to the troops. Read more
WWII
Following the Washington Naval Treaty of 1922 (and roughly four years prior to the construction of the HMS Cornwall), cruisers became a focus of the interwar naval arms race, no less keenly felt by the British, whose survival depended on the sea-lane. Read more
WWII
The wide-scale murder of Jews by Nazi Germany’s Einsatzgruppen began in Poland in September 1939, protested only by German Army Generals Johannes Blaskowitz and Georg Kuchler. Read more
WWII
On the eve of the turning point of World War II in the South Pacific, the U.S. Navy’s most experienced aircraft carrier commander, Admiral William F. Read more
WWII
By the summer of 1940, Hitler’s Nazi war machine had advanced from victory to victory, crushing Poland, overrunning France and the Low Countries, and ejecting Allied forces from the continent of Europe at Dunkirk. Read more
WWII
In 1944, air traffic over southern Britain was almost at the New York City rush- hour level. On any given early morning, heavily laden B-17s and B-24s would be circling, laboriously assembling into formation for runs to targets in France and Germany. Read more
WWII
The Allied invasion of Nazi-occupied Europe was inevitable as the tide of World War II turned against Germany. Read more
WWII
I wrote previously about my guided three D-Day tours in the summer of 2014. I repeated the tour-guiding experience in May and June this year for the Minnesota World War II History Roundtable during a tour of Fifth Army battlefields in Italy. Read more
WWII
Two of America’s most famous senior commanders to emerge from World War II were Eisenhower and MacArthur. These officers were largely responsible for command decisions that resulted in Allied victories in the South Pacific and in Europe. Read more
WWII
On orders from Soviet Premier Josef Stalin, the offensive that resulted in the capture of the Nazi capital of Berlin in April 1945, developed into a race between the army groups of two Soviet commanders, Marshal Georgy Zhukov and Marshal Ivan Konev. Read more
WWII
Marine Captain Frank Farrell stood in the open door of the Army Air Corps C-47 waiting for the “green light,” the signal to leap into space, on a mission that could mean life or death for hundreds, perhaps thousands, of people. Read more
WWII
The most contentious of command rivalries during World War II involved General George S. Patton, Jr., of the U.S. Read more
WWII
In the misty early morning of February 4, 1944. thousands of Japanese troops marched silently through the jungle in the first move of their counter-offensive against the British-Indian XV Corps attempting to advance south in the Arakan region of Burma. Read more
WWII
On a dark night in September 1941, moving at periscope depth, an Italian submarine edged into Gibraltar Bay near the British harbor. Read more
WWII
One of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s longtime interests was the hidden world of espionage. In the months before the United States entered World War II, the commander-in-chief was dabbling in the covert world of intelligence-gathering, using a number of trusted personal friends as his own private eyes and ears around the globe. Read more
WWII
The mighty invasion armada for the main thrust at Luzon in the Philippine Islands was being assembled on December 28, 1944. Read more
WWII
A series of swift victories took Japanese troops to the gates of India in 1941-1942 when British and Indian units fell back to the Assam hills northwest of Burma. Read more
WWII
In November 1941, about 150 miles off the west coast of Australia, a singular naval battle was fought that had great implications for all struggles at sea, past and future. Read more
WWII
Germany operated surface auxiliary cruisers, sometimes termed commerce raiders, in both world wars. The defeat of France in June 1940 opened Atlantic Ocean ports to the Germans for the first time, greatly facilitating access to the high seas by such raiders. Read more
