WWII
They weren’t originally supposed to be there. In the early planning for the invasion of the island of Okinawa, the 27th Infantry Division was to be held in reserve as the eventual garrison force after the defeat of the Japanese 32nd Army. Read more
WWII
On the evening of September 26, 1940, American radio announcer and journalist William L. Shirer noted in his later famous Berlin Diary that the next day Italian Foreign Minister Count Galeazzo Ciano would arrive there from Rome, adding that most people thought it was for the announcement that Francisco Franco’s Spain was entering the war on the side of the Axis. Read more
WWII
Lieutenant Jimmie Monteith, Company L, 16th Infantry Regiment, arrived off Omaha Beach with the first assault wave, on D-Day, June 6, 1944. Read more
WWII
It crossed silently on a chilly winter evening over the southern Oregon coast, descending slowly, its ballast spent. Read more
WWII
Vice Admiral Norman Denning said of Ian Fleming, the “ideas man” who worked at British Naval Intelligence, that a lot of his proposals “were just plain crazy.” Read more
WWII
Major General Charles “Chuck” Yeager, United States Air force (Ret.), was one of a handful of people who could rightly claim the title “living legend.” Read more
WWII
Lieutenant Commander Mochitsura Hashimoto, Imperial Japanese Navy, stared intently through I-58’s periscope. Visibility was poor until the moon peeked through the clouds and he spotted a dark silhouette on the horizon. 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 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
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
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
WWII
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
WWII
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
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
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
WWII
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
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
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
WWII
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
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
![The 185th Infantry Regiment (40th ID) hits the beach in an LCVP [Landing Craft Vehicle, Personnel] during amphibious training on Guadalcanal in the Solomon Islands in early March 1944.](https://warfarehistorynetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/W-Spr26-Bud-Elliott-3.jpg)
