WWII

WWII

Last Man In Hell: A Navy Beachmaster on Omaha Beach

By Kevin M. Hymel

The Landing Craft Mechanized (LCM) carrying Army engineers and Navy beachmasters hit a mine on its way into Omaha Beach. Read more

WWII

The Panzer VIII Maus: The Heaviest Tank Ever Built

By Brandt Heatherington

As early as 1941, the German high command had visions of military technology that was far ahead of its time, and many innovative technological concepts were becoming reality. Read more

WWII

“John Ford’s Navy”: A Filmmaker in the OSS

By Michael D. Hull

With such award-winning films as Stagecoach, Young Mr. Lincoln, Drums Along the Mohawk, The Grapes of Wrath, The Long Voyage Home, and How Green Was My Valley behind him, John Ford was one of Hollywood’s most respected directors by the time World War II broke out in 1939. Read more

WWII

An American Invasion in New Zealand

By Bruce M. Petty

Early in the 20th century, the population of New Zealand was just under a million. According to official sources, 20 percent of New Zealand’s eligible manpower served in uniform during World War I. Read more

WWII

Silver Salvage in Caballo Bay: Japan’s Sabotaged Treasure Hunt

By Jamie Malinowski

Early in the morning of July 8, 1942, in the calm waters of Caballo Bay south of Corregidor Island in the Philippines, a casco, a 12-foot by 60-foot flat-bottomed wooden diving barge, bobbed placidly in the open water 120 feet above the ocean floor. Read more

WWII

Fighter Ace Douglas Bader: The RAF’s Legless Legend

By Michael D. Hull

Bombed almost daily for several months and in fear of an imminent German invasion, the British were hanging on by their fingernails when September 1940 came. Read more

WWII

The Last Flight of Nelson King

By Keith Buchanan

The Nelson King, a Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress bomber, was en route to Berlin on March 6, 1944, when it flew into a whirlwind of Luftwaffe fighters. Read more

WWII

Nicholas Horthy: Hitler’s Vassal?

By Blaine Taylor

The career of Admiral Nicholas Horthy spanned not only two world wars, but also stretched across the decades from the age of sail to atomic-powered submarines. Read more

WWII

The Big Three in Tehran: The Meeting That Shaped WWII

By Michael D. Hull

World War II made a disparate trio of allies —British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, Soviet Marshal Joseph Stalin, and American President Franklin D. Read more

WWII

Silver Screen Surprise: Norvald Flaaten Recalls His Wartime Careers

By Jason Antonio

Norvald Flaaten never expected he would appear in a movie when he signed up with the Canadian Army during World War II, but the subject of the movie and what he had to do was too good to pass up. Read more

WWII

The FCC’s RID and Japan’s Surrender

By Susan L. Brinson

George Sterling received a teletype message from the War Department just after 5:15 am on August 15, 1945. Read more

WWII

Mission to Madagascar: British Assault on Diego Suarez Port

By Cleve C. Barkley

In early 1942 things could have hardly looked bleaker for the Allies. In Europe, Hitler’s war machine had steamrolled across the entire continent and was now battling before the gates of Moscow. Read more

WWII

Armored Strike at Arras: Counterattack Against the Blitz

By Christopher Miskimon

The midday sun sat almost directly overhead as Subaltern T. Hepple led his tank out of the French village of Petit Vimy. Read more

WWII

Colonel Bernt Balchen’s Secret Air Force

By Patrick J. Chaisson

The Bug was in deep trouble. On a top-secret flight over occupied Norway, this ancient, war-weary C-47 Skytrain transport aircraft became the helpless target of German antiaircraft guns, all firing desperately to bring down the transport and its precious cargo. Read more

WWII

The Second Great War (and the Weather that Defined it)

By Eric Niderost

Weather has long played a vital role in human history. Kublai Khan’s attempted conquest of Japan was foiled when his invasion fleet was destroyed by a typhoon. Read more

WWII

Guns for Victory: The Watervliet Arsenal in World War II

By Patrick J. Chaisson

President Franklin D. Roosevelt electrified the world when on December 29, 1940, he called on America to become “the great arsenal of democracy.” Read more

WWII

Sinking the Wilhelm Gustloff

By Chuck Lyons

Snow flurries swirled out of the darkness over the Baltic Sea. Chunks of ice floated on the water, and lookouts shivered at their posts. Read more

WWII

Japan’s Underwater Aircraft Carriers

By Phil Zimmer

Lieutenant Commander Stephen L. Johnson had a problem on his hands; a very large problem. His Balao-class submarine, the Segundo, had just picked up a large radar contact on the surface about 100 miles off Honshu, one of Japan’s home islands, heading south toward Tokyo.  Read more

WWII

How Politics, Blunders, and Betrayal in the European Theater Shaped the Postwar Order

By William Weidner

British historian Alan Clark wrote in his book Barbarossa, “Roosevelt’s betrayal of Eastern Europe, whether out of calculation or gullibility, is so notorious as to need no further recapitulation.” Read more

WWII

“Flak Was Our Worst Enemy”: Wilbur Bowers’ Air War Over Europe

By Richard A. Beranty

For 33 months beginning in 1942, the U.S. Eighth Air Force and its precision daylight bombing strikes against German targets in Europe tried to pound the Third Reich into submission. Read more