WWII

British soldiers hoist a lightweight, inflatable dummy Sherman tank. Soldiers in the U.S. Army’s top-secret “23rd Headquarters Special Troops” unit, also known as the “Ghost Army,” were detailed to deceive the Germans about Allied troop build-ups and positioning and draw the enemy away from the actual Allied intentions.

WWII

Deception in WWII

by Mason B. Webb

For Operation Neptune/Overlord, the Allies had 6,939 naval vessels, 11,590 aircraft, and 156,000 infantrymen and airborne soldiers (both parachute and glider) ready to participate in the D-Day invasion of northern France on June 6, 1944. Read more

Gudrun Himmler with her father Heinrich at a Nazi sports festival, 1938.

WWII

Death of a Nazi Princess

It seems that every month there is a news item that relates to World War II. Here’s one you may have missed:

Gudrun Margarete Elfriede Emma Anna Himmler Burwitz, the true-believing daughter of Heinrich Himmler, head of the dreaded SS and one of Adolf Hitler’s closest henchmen, died in or near Munich last year. Read more

WWII

Ten Interesting World War II Facts

1. The first American serviceman killed in World War II was Captain Robert M. Losey from Andrew, Iowa. He was serving as a military attaché and was killed in Norway on April 21, 1940, when German aircraft bombed the Dombås railway station where he and others were awaiting transportation. Read more

A group of Japanese Americans who have renounced their U.S. citizenship and expressed a desire to return to Japan are in custody of law enforcement officers at the Tule Lake relocation camp. These men were en route to the Santa Fe internment camp, where nationals of Axis countries were held during the war.

WWII

Detention In Wartime

By Gene Eric Salecker

After the surprise bombing of Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, many Americans in authority began to fear the large number of people of Japanese ancestry living along the West Coast of the United States, thinking that some of them might have sympathies for Japan and might assist in a possible invasion or sabotage American efforts to resist such an invasion. Read more

A German tanker stands on the Russian steppe near Voronezh after emerging from the turret of his PzKpfw. III tank. In the summer of 1942, Hitler mounted an armored thrust to the south along the Eastern Front, and it led to ruin.

WWII

Derailing Case Blue

By Pat McTaggart

After the brutal defensive fighting during the winter of 1941-1942, Adolf Hitler was ready for another round with the Russians. Read more

WWII

The Bold Bull of Scapa Flow

By Phil Zimmer

Late on the night of Friday, October 13, 1939, Kapitänleutnant Günther Prien surfaced his 218-foot-long submarine, U-47, and guided it through the protected, shallow, narrow channel at Kirk Sound. Read more

WWII

Mussolini’s Fall from Power

By Blaine Taylor

At 10:30 on the night of May 9, 1936, as 400,000 people stood crowded together on Rome’s Palazzo Venezia underneath the most famous balcony in the world, Italian Prime Minister Benito Mussolini, 52, the leader of the country’s ruling Fascist Party, strode forward and began to speak to the silent masses below him. Read more

WWII

Hitler’s Masters of Murder

By Mark Simner

“I must tell you something…. I took part in a mass killing the day before yesterday.

[When we shot the Jews brought by] the first truck, my hand trembled somewhat during the shooting, but one gets used to it. Read more

WWII

Holding Hosingen At All Costs

By Alice Flynn

Ordered to “hold at all costs,” 300 American soldiers defended the small Luxembourg town of Hosingen during the first three days of the Battle of the Bulge. Read more

Rommel vs Montgomery

WWII

Rommel vs Monty

By Zita Ballinger Fletcher

The famous retreat of the “Desert Fox” Erwin Rommel across North Africa following his defeat at the Second Battle of El Alamein in 1942 was less a retreat than a series of stubborn battles to hold ground. Read more

WWII

A Death in San Pietro

By Tim Brady

After sweeping through Sicily in the summer of 1943, Allied forces invaded Italy in September. The American Fifth Army landed at Salerno and moved up the peninsula through Naples that fall. Read more

WWII

The Last Days Of General Patton

By Michael D. Hull

Fearless, demanding, and inspirational, General George Smith Patton, JR., was generally recognized as the U.S. Army’s outstanding field commander by the end of World War II.  Read more

When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, the cruiser USS Pensacola was caught up in the confusion of the early days of American involvement in World War II while escorting troops and materiel to the Philippines. In this photo a convoy of ships assembles for a hazardous wartime voyage.

WWII

Alone at Sea

By Glenn Barnett

The American military presence in China, which stretched back to the 1850s, came to an abrupt end in November 1941. Read more

From Around the Network

  • Segearn Mort Shuffle took a sniper’s bullet in the chest outside the French fortress city of Brest during the Brittany Campaign.

    WWII

    An American Sergeant at Brest: Caught in the Crosshairs
    Read More
  • This haunting image of a snow-covered Bastogne was painted by a U.S. Army artist about the time of the siege in December 1944. U.S. forces refused to evacuate the Belgian crossroads town and stood against repeated German attacks.

    WWII

    Bravery in Embattled Bastogne
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  • In this March 11, 1945, image, troops and M4 Sherman tanks of the U.S. First Army cross the Ludendorff railroad bridge to the eastern bank of the great Rhine River. The last natural barrier along the western frontier of Germany, the Rhine was also crossed by Allied armies in other locations.

    WWII

    Assault on Ludendorff Bridge: The First Allied Crossing of the Rhine
    Read More

  • Military History

    Battle of Kings Mountain: an American Patriot Victory in the Carolinas
    Read More