WWII
It was called “rodding,” and it was a complex manual procedure used by British cryptographers at Hut Eight in the Government Code and Cipher School at Bletchley Park to decipher Italian Naval Enigma coded messages. Read more
WWII
A host of famous fighters and bombers in the Allied arsenal spearheaded the aerial offensives that helped secure victory against the Axis powers in World War II. Read more
WWII
When word reached 21-year-old Private Bradford “Brad” Freeman in Mourmelon-le-Grand, France, that the entire 101st Airborne Division was being put on 24-hour alert for movement to the front, he was neither surprised nor shocked. Read more
WWII
One of the best known and most effective champions of the Allied cause in World War II was a dour, slightly built Iowa native wearing rimless glasses who never fired a shot in anger and collected no ribbons for gallantry. Read more
WWII
“We went to London in ones and twos during our precious 24-hour passes to transfer and pick up our U.S. Read more
WWII
Little more than four months after the disastrous attack on Pearl Harbor, America went on the offensive against Japan with one of the boldest and best remembered bomber raids of World War II. Read more
WWII
While the soldiers and officers of the Japanese 15th Army fought fiercely to defend Mandalay in central Burma, they were alarmed to discover that British and Indian troops were dangerously close to attacking their supply depot at Meiktila, 90 miles to their rear. Read more
WWII
On paper, the Reising submachine gun appeared to be an ideal close-combat weapon. Accurate, lightweight, and inexpensive to manufacture, it was selected by the U.S. Read more
WWII
Private First Class Bob Wolf rode in a jeep along an exposed hill in Germany’s Ruhr Valley when he heard an enemy artillery round screeching toward him. Read more
WWII
At first, Major Robert Staver seemed to have plenty of time. An Army Ordnance officer with a mechanical engineering degree from Stanford, he had been sent to Germany as part of the Combined Intelligence Objectives Subcommittee. Read more
WWII
Q: Could you give us a little personal background before we talk about your war experiences?
SIMS: I was born on April 29, 1925, at Sheffield in Yorkshire. Read more
WWII
As casualties mounted in the fall of 1944, the U.S. Army began experiencing a problematic manpower shortage in the ranks of its infantry. Read more
WWII
The 1939 war between Finland and Soviet Russia has been a minor inclusion in most histories of World War II. Read more
WWII
A Polish flag, followed minutes later by a Union Jack, appeared above the ruins of the abbey on the summit of Italy’s 17,000-foot Monte Cassino. Read more
WWII
When Charles de Gaulle flew to London in 1940, his country was on its knees and days later Nazi jackboots were tromping down the Champs Élysées in Paris. Read more
WWII
The heroics of African American soldiers during the D-Day invasion of Normandy on June 6, 1944, have not been taught regularly in high school or college history classes. Read more
WWII
When interviewed in the late 1960s by John Toland for his book, The Rising Sun: The Decline and Fall of the Japanese Empire, Takeshi Hirakushi told a fantastic tale. Read more
WWII
In the spring of 1945, after more than five-and-a-half years of total, merciless war in Europe––and the deaths of millions of human beings on the battlefields, the bombed-out cities and in the concentration and extermination camps––the carnage and destruction in Europe had finally come to an end. Read more
WWII
Midway: The Pacific War’s Most Famous Battle (Mark Stille, Osprey Publishers, Oxford, UK, 2024, 328 pp., Read more
WWII
HMS Warspite fought in two world wars and several major battles against a combination of enemies to become the most decorated ship ever to serve the Royal Navy. Read more
