WWII Archives

WWII

The Striking Cobra: Phase Two of the D-Day Invasion

By David Alan Johnson

“We’ve been slogging our way through hedgerow country, half an acre a day, and we’ve got to find a way to break out.” Read more

Field Marshal Erwin Rommel, commander of the German Atlantic Wall defenses, inspects the work of laborers during a tour to assess preparedness to repel an Allied invasion.

WWII

D-Day 1943: Could the Allied Invasion of Western Europe Have Happened One Year Earlier?

By Lt. Col. John Fenzel III

On June 6, 1944, the Allies unleashed on land, air, and sea the largest invasion force in world history in an enormous effort to liberate Europe from Nazi tyranny. Read more

Soldiers of the 154th Infantry Brigade (part of the 51st (Highland) Infantry Division) man a Vickers machine gun in support of the advance of Operation Veritable from Holland into Germany on February 8, 1945.

WWII

Reichswald: The Battle for a Sinister Forest

By Mike Phifer

The bloody fight for the Reichswald, according to Lieutenant General Horrocks, was a soldiers’ battle “fought by the regimental officers and men under the most ghastly conditions imaginable.” Read more

WWII

WWII Spies: Double Agent Dusko Popov, a.k.a. ‘Tricycle’

By Peter Kross

On March 18, 1941, an accident took place in the crowded streets of New York’s Times Square. Normally an accident like this would not make news. Read more

On March 4, 1945, soldiers of the 10th Mountain Division advance cautiously toward German positions at Sassomglare, Italy. The ranks of the 10th Mountain included some of the finest skiers in the world, but the troops also fought as regular infantry.

WWII

A Mountain Trooper’s Sketchbook

By Flint Whitlock

Since the days of ancient Babylon, artists have taken the time to record their visions of war. Long before the invention of photography, scenes of battle were being sketched, painted, and sculpted by talented individuals able to imbue their creations with sentiments of glory, dignity, and heroism. Read more

Australian Corporal G.E. Burns welcomes a trio of American sailors to Brisbane in a photo that has obviously been staged.

WWII

Culture Clash: Americans in World War II’s South Pacific

by Ken Wright

In 1942, Brisbane was the third largest city in Australia and the state capital of Queensland. To many, however, it was more like a big country town than a city, its 340,000 inhabitants living in a quiet, conservative, and isolated atmosphere. Read more

WWII

Charlie Mott: Flying Tiger Caged

By Bob Bergin

Charles D. Mott was a U.S. Navy dive-bomber pilot when he joined the American Volunteer Group (AVG), the small band of Americans who flew under the leadership of General Claire Lee Chennault and became known to history as the Flying Tigers. Read more

Advancing across the Italian countryside in the summer of 1944, a Churchill tank of B Squadron, 51st Royal Tank Regiment crashes through brush and undergrowth. The Churchill became the basis for a number of innovative armor designs with specialized functions.

WWII

Ordnance: The British Churchill Tank

By Christopher Miskimon

The German town of Goch lay east of the Reichswald forest, a scene of heavy fighting for the British Army as it ground its way steadily into the heart of Germany. Read more

Strutting through the streets of Prague, German paratroopers participate in a military parade after the occupation of Czechoslovakia in 1939.

WWII

Prague Uprising in the Spring of 1945

By Pat McTaggart

The first days of May 1945 found the German war machine in absolute chaos. Berlin had fallen, and entire German armies were surrendering en masse. Read more

U.S. soldiers walk past the bombed-out barracks that once housed members of Adolf Hitler’s SS guard. The building was hit during an Allied bombing raid.

WWII

The RAF Attempt to Assassinate Adolf Hitler

By Charles Whiting

Adolf Hitler believed in Vorsehung (providence). The German leader felt that if anything was going to happen to him, such as assassination, there was nothing he could do about it. Read more

A Panther tank of the 1st SS Panzer Division “Leibstandarte” moves forward warily during the Battle of the Bulge as its commander scans the horizon for signs of enemy forces.

WWII

The SS Elite In The Battle for Bastogne

By Major General Michael Reynolds

The story of Hitler’s Bodyguard, the 1st SS Panzer Division Leibstandarte (LAH), in the battle for Bastogne does not begin until after the siege of that city had been raised by the U.S. Read more

This photograph of the historic February 23, 1945, flag raising atop Mount Suribachi was taken as Marines took up positions and sought to anchor the pole in the debris and rock atop the extinct 550-foot volcano.

WWII

Franklin Sousley & The Battle of Iwo Jima

By Randall B. Ingram

Everyone has seen the now famous photograph of the three firefighters hoisting Old Glory over the ruins of the World Trade Center. Read more

The British battleships Warspite, Valiant, and Barham fire upon the Italian cruisers Fiume and Zara during the Battle of Cape Matapan on March 28, 1941. The Italian fleet suffered a humiliating defeat in the pivotal Mediterranean engagement.

WWII

Mussolini’s Navy Foiled: The Battle of Cape Matapan

By Glenn Barnett

In June 1940, Italian dictator Benito Mussolini wrestled with a dilemma. German Chancellor Adolf Hitler was the very essence of a victorious warlord. Read more

A Lockheed Hudson bomber of the Royal Australian Air Force scores a hit against a Japanese freighter near Port Moresby, New Guinea.Variants of the Lockheed Electra and Lodestar designs saw service around the globe during World War II.

WWII

Lockheed’s Electra and Lodestar

By Sam Mcgowan

During its history, the Lockheed Aircraft Corporation has earned a reputation for building versatile airplanes. Its 1950s era C-130 Hercules is no doubt the most famous, but it was not the first. Read more

A forlorn group of German soldiers carries the body of a dead comrade on a makeshift canvas stretcher. After a series of rapid successes on the Eastern Front, the Germans were subjected to the harsh Russian winter, followed by the sledgehammer blows of a rejuvenated Red Army.

WWII

From the Luftwaffe: Joachim Benz on the Eastern Front

By Joachim Benz, as told to Peter D. Fyfe and Ward Carr

Following service as a lieutenant in the U.S. Army Air Defense Artillery during the early 1970s, Ward Carr decided to remain in Germany, residing in Frankfurt. Read more

In full gear, paratroopers of the U.S. 82nd Airborne Division wait calmly in the skies above Sicily for the order to stand up and hook up aboard their Douglas C-47 Dakota transport aircraft.

WWII

WWII Letters: Corporal James. G. Delaney

By Maura B. Delaney

Letters were a valuable commodity to the World War II soldier. They were the link to home and to all things familiar in a most unfamiliar place and time. Read more

WWII

Still a Splendid Sight: Merrill’s Mauraders

By Al Hemingway

Private First Class Frank Rinaldi cautiously made his way through the dense foliage. He and other soldiers were on patrol when they heard the unmistakable sound of Japanese voices, and they inched their way forward to investigate. Read more

During a conversation with Attorney General Francis Biddle (left), J. Edgar Hoover, director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, gestures toward a display at a conference with President Franklin D. Roosevelt at the White House on April 7, 1942.

WWII

Walter Koehler & J. Edgar Hoover

By David Alan Johnson

Throughout his lifetime, FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover always boasted that no enemy agent, either spy or saboteur, ever operated at large in the United States during World War II. Read more

WWII

German U-Boats: Scapa Flow Shock

By Jon Latimer

World War II had been in progress for six weeks when on the evening of October 12, 1939, the German submarine U-47 surfaced off the Orkney Islands at the northern tip of Scotland. Read more