WWII Archives

WWII

The Heroic Voyages of the USS Gwin

By Michael Fellows

Lieutenant Commander John Benjamin Fellows, the skipper of the American Gleaves-class destroyer USS Gwin (DD-433), stood on the bridge trying to see into the predawn blackness. Read more

WWII

The Heinkel He-177 Greif Heavy Bomber

By Allyn Vannoy

The Heinkel He-177 Greif (Griffin) was to become the only long-range heavy bomber operated by the Luftwaffe during World War II. Read more

WWII

Saint Sever Tank Duel: M4 Sherman vs. Mark V German Panther

By George J. Winter, Sr.

The Normandy landings, the fighting at St. Lô and Caen, Operations Goodwood and Cobra, and the subsequent Argentan-Falaise Pocket have always drawn major attention from historians, with respect to the early struggle for supremacy in France. Read more

WWII

Iwo Jima: This Shall Not Be in Vain

By Al Hemingway

Lieutenant General Holland M. Smith was 62 years of age. At a time in life when most men contemplate retirement, he was a very busy individual. 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

Weary of fighting, a Japanese soldier raises his hands in surrender at Roi-Namur as a companion begins climbing out of a hole near the center of this photograph. These are two of only a handful of Japanese troops that survived the fighting on Roi-Namur, choosing surrender rather than suicide. A wary Marine covers the prisoner with his rifle, taking no chances.

WWII

4th Marine Division in the Marshall Islands: First Time Under Fire

By Cleve C. Barkley

As 1943 drew to a close, Admiral Chester Nimitz’s Central Pacific campaign was gaining momentum. His forces had taken the Gilbert Islands that November and now targeted the Marshall Islands as the next step on the long road to Tokyo. 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

A Chinese soldier sheds some light on the German transmitter Farrell accidentally discovered in Canton. The discovery led him on a two-year investigation and the arrest of 21 German spies.

WWII

OSS Captain Frank Farrell Prosecuted Nazi Spy Ring In Postwar China

By Colonel Richard D. Camp, Jr. USMC (Ret) and Ms. Suzanne Pool

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

Their noses packed with blazing .50-caliber machine guns and their bomb bay doors open, North American B-25 Mitchell medium bombers streak toward a Japanese target in the South Pacific in this painting by Jack Fellows. Aircraft of the 38th Bomb Group participated in numerous raids such as this, including an attack on Kavieng, New Ireland, on February 15, 1944.

WWII

Flight Out of Hell: The Harrowing Bombing Mission to Kavieng

By Steven D. Smith

In the predawn darkness of Dobodura, New Guinea, 2nd Lt. William J. Smith of the U.S. Army Air Corps was roughly awakened by a noncom announcing that it was time to get dressed and get to the mess tent for breakfast. Read more

A column of German PzKpfw. III tanks rolls along a dirt road in North Africa. When American troops of the II Corps came up against the German veterans, the initial results were disastrous. The American commander, Maj. Gen. Lloyd Fredendall, was also found unequal to the task of leading troops in combat.

WWII

The Battle of Kasserine Pass and the Failure of General Lloyd Fredendall

By Jerome Baldwin

He came highly recommended, praised by General George C. Marshall as “one of the best.” But ultimately from these high hopes and expectations would come disastrous failure. Read more

By 1940, cruisers built under the post-World War I naval treaties were feeling their age. Anove, a captured Japanese photo- graph shows the HMS Cornwall succumbing to an air attack.

WWII

HMS Cornwall: a Symbol of British Naval Power

By William R. Hawkins

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

Thick clouds of smoke billow from the West Loch of Pearl Harbor after a series of massive explosions on May 21, 1944, sank or damaged several vessels.

WWII

The Second Pearl Harbor

By Gene E. Salecker

The first explosion came as a complete surprise to everyone around Pearl Harbor. The Sunday had started out clear and bright, but the sky quickly darkened as great clouds of thick black smoke rose high above the burning ships. 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

Meat Grinder at Yelnya

By Pat McTaggart

The smell of victory was in the air as the forces of Field Marshal Fedor von Bock’s Army Group Center continued to drive deep into the Ukraine during the final week of June 1941. Read more

B-29 Superfortress bombers rain destruction on Japan in 1945.

WWII

Game Changer: The B29

The Boeing B-29 Superfortress was a game changer. First rolling off the assembly line as a production aircraft in July 1943, the Superfortress was the answer to America’s need for a high-level long-range strategic bomber. Read more

WWII

The Los Banos Raid: WWII’s Finest Allied Mission?

By Donald J. Roberts II

As the nine C-47s flew closer to the drop zone, the lead plane descended to an altitude of four hundred feet. Read more

An American soldier cautiously approaches two burning vehicles that had been destroyed by a German ambush. As a scout, Private Sevel never wore equipment or heavy clothing in order to stay mobile on the battlefield.

WWII

A Scout in Patton’s Third Army

By Kevin M. Hymel

The Messerschmitt Bf-109 fighter plane dove out of the sky with machine guns firing. The pilot’s target—a pontoon bridge being stretched across Germany’s Werra River by American engineers. Read more

Soldiers of the 82nd Airborne Division talk during the flight from their staging area in North Africa to drop zones on the island of Sicily.

WWII

High-Spirited Stupidity

By Patrick J. Chaisson

Paratrooper Lt. Col. Bill Yarborough was flying into hell. As he prepared to jump from a Douglas C-47 transport plane then approaching the coast of Sicily, hundreds of American antiaircraft gunners below started shooting at him. Read more

American Marines armed with a Browning .30-caliber water-cooled machine gun and other light weapons pose during efforts to evacuate former Japanese Army personnel after their surrender in China following World War II.

WWII

Caught in the Chinese Conflict

By Eric Niderost

On September 2, 1945, Japanese representatives boarded the battleship USS Missouri, riding at anchor in Tokyo Bay, to sign an instrument of unconditional surrender. Read more

WWII

Profiles: ROTC Success

By Bruce Petty

More than 16 million Americans served in the U.S. military during World War II, but as fluid as the situation was in the Pacific, and considering the priority given to the European Theater, it is difficult to obtain an accurate count of how many served in the Pacific at any one time during World War II. Read more

WWII

From Around the Network

D-Day Capture of Les Moulins Draw

The Mystery of the Bulge’s Lost Soldiers

The Battle of Leyte Gulf: Oldendorf’s Textbook “Crossing the T”

The Mauser 98: The Best Bolt-Action Rifle Ever Made?