WWII

Warfare History Network, home of the foremost WWII History and WWII Quarterly magazines, is your best source for military history online. Here you’ll find our in-depth and vivid accounts of the greatest war in history, from Pearl Harbor to the Battle of the Bulge; from the desperate fighting on the Eastern Front to Iwo Jima and the Battle of Midway. Our vast collection of rare photographs, battle maps, illustrations and meticulously researched articles will give you new insight into the battles, leaders, weapons, and much more.

The bombardier of a Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress bomber mans the .50-caliber machine gun in the plane’s nose and scans the skies for German fighters as the formation enters hostile airspace. The Münster raid of October 10, 1943, proved costly for the Eighth Air Force in both men and aircraft.

WWII

Disaster In A Bright Blue Sky

By Allyn Vannoy

Lieutenant Robert Sabel struggled to get his Fortress, the Rusty Lode, home. Eight B-17s of his bomb group, the 390th, had already been shot from the sky. Read more

WWII

Chase’s Flying Columns

By Ed Miller

Santo Tòmas University, Manila, Philippines, about 9:00 p.m., February 3, 1945: Louis G. Hubele, a 45-year-old civilian internee of the Japanese, heard more than the usual amount of vehicle traffic on España Street. Read more

A British airborne soldier, identifiable by his sleeve patch showing Bellerophon riding the flying horse Pegasus, poses for a publicity photo with his Sten gun. To assault the Merville Battery, airborne troops landed both by glider and parachute, but the attack began unraveling from the beginning.

WWII

D-Day Disaster at the Merville Battery

By Flint Whitlock

The small French village of Merville (1940 population: 470), located just south of the coastal town of Franceville-Plage, had as its neighbor on its southern fringe an unwelcome German battery consisting of four concrete bunkers housing artillery pieces that pointed northwest toward Ouistreham and the mouth of the Orne River. Read more

On March 20, 1944, soldiers of the 30th Infantry Regiment, 3rd Division proceed cautiously through the rubble of Zweibrucken, Germany. Some fires still burn in the devastated city.

WWII

For Love and Country

By Walt Larimore and Mike Yorkey

During World War II, the U.S. Army determined that the typical frontline infantryman couldn’t take much more than 200 to 240 days of combat before mentally falling apart. Read more

In July 1943, Lieutenant Katye Swope, a nurse with the 802nd Medical Air Evacuation Transport Squadron, prepares patients for a flight from Agrigento, Sicily, to Britain for further medical treatment. Allied air evacuation operations began during the campaign in North Africa in February 1943 and continued for the duration of World War II in every theater.

WWII

2nd Lt. Reba Z. Whittle, flight nurse—and the only female P.O.W. in the ETO

By Stephen D. Lutz

On September 27, 1944, a C-47 Skytrain named “Mary,” tail number 43-48395, prepared to depart Royal Air Force Base Wharton in Lancashire, England, filled with assorted medical supplies destined for a U.S. Read more

WWII

Ukraine 2022: Echoes of 1939

Unlike the weekly current-events magazines, WWII Quarterly is edited, assembled, and sent off to the printer well in advance of the day you receive it in the mail or pick it up at the newsstand. Read more

Moments after hitting the beaches of southern France during Operation Anvil-Dragoon in August 1944, these American soldiers sprint toward the cover of a grove of pine trees. These men are loaded with full packs of equipment and provisions for the long fight ahead.

WWII

From the Alamo to the Riviera

By Bruce L. Brager

Operation Anvil, the invasion of southern France, was originally planned for June 1944, the same time as the Normandy invasion. Read more

A derelict, rusting Quonset hut is all that remains of the sprawling Camp Tarawa on the Big Island of Hawaii.

WWII

Stumbling Over History

Has this ever happened to you? You’re on vacation or taking a trip and unexpectedly you stumble across a piece of history you didn’t even know existed. Read more

One of the B-24 assembly lines at Ford’s Willow Run (Michigan) plant, where one bomber was produced every hour.

WWII

Willow Run Bomber Plant

They said it couldn’t be done. Doubters chided Henry Ford for declaring that his Willow Run Bomber Plant could turn out a B-24 Liberator heavy bomber every hour. Read more

WWII

Malayan Melange

By John W. Osborn, Jr.

One of World War II’s longest, least known guerrilla resistance campaigns was fought in the depths of the jungle covering 80 percent of Malaya’s 50,850 square miles; in it the most unlikely of friendships would develop, leading to a remarkable meeting, then parting, a decade later. Read more

WWII

Tigers in the Sky

By Christopher Miskimon

America had been at war for less than two weeks when Claire Chennault watched his American Volunteer Group (AVG) take off for its first combat mission. Read more

Explosions raise billowing clouds of smoke and flame as Malta endures one of many air raids conducted by German and Italian bombers.

WWII

Fighting with Sword and Prayer

By Jon Diamond

The British Army has had its share of religious zealots Serving in the upper echelons of command. These typically independent-minded soldiers, motivated largely by their spiritual belief, were in sharp contrast to those, as characterized by J.F.C. Read more

A Douglas C-47 Skytrain transport plane emblazoned with U.S. markings flies over the Pyramids at Giza, Egypt, in 1943.

WWII

The Workhorse Gooney Bird

Of all the workhorse weapons in the Allies’ World War II arsenal, from the American M-4 Sherman medium tank and jeep to the British Handley Page Halifax bomber and 25-pounder field gun, none was more widely and effectively deployed than the Douglas C-47 transport plane. Read more

The cruiser HMNZS Achilles, manned by its crew of New Zealanders, opens fire on the German pocket battleship Graf Spee during the early moments of the Battle of the River Plate. The British naval squadron, which also included the British cruisers Ajax and Exeter, drove the German raider to seek safety in the harbor of Montevideo, Uruguay.

WWII

Death of the Graf Spee

By Michael D. Hull

When German dictator Adolf Hitler loosed his troops into Poland on Friday, September 1, 1939, he hoped that a lightning conquest would result in a negotiated peace with Great Britain and France. Read more

During funeral services for Pfc. Felix Longoria on February 16, 1949, family members pause beside the flag-draped casket. Longoria was buried with full military honors at Arlington National Cemetery after a funeral home in his hometown of Three Rivers, Texas, refused to provide services to the Mexican American family.

WWII

The GI Forum

By Mike Shepherd

Hector Garcia was born in Llera, Tamaulipas, Mexico, on January 17, 1914, to schoolteacher parents, Jose Garcia Garcia and Faustina Perez Garcia. Read more

WWII

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