WWII

British soldiers put their backs into moving pieces of a Bailey Bridge built on pontoons over the Weser River in Germany, 1945.

WWII

The British Bailey Bridge

By Mike McLaughlin

I was always fascinated by the mastery of water,” Sir Donald Coleman Bailey reflected, long after the end of World War II. Read more

Smoke billows from the German freighter Drachenfels after sustaining damage during a raid by the British.

WWII

The Daring Calcutta Light Horse Raid

By Robert Barr Smith

Freighter Ehrenfels’ siren shrieked through the muggy night across the harbor. As the captain pulled down hard on the alarm cord, the alarm howled out over the steaming darkness, screaming that British raiders were in the harbor, alerting Ehrenfels’ crew and calling for help from ashore. Read more

A pall of black smoke hangs over the shore installations at Rabaul as a B-25 medium bomber streaks above a Japanese merchant ship riding at anchor.

WWII

The Bombing of Rabaul in November 1943

By Sam McGowan

In some historical circles, a mistaken impression has developed that the U.S. Navy’s Task Force 38 launched the aerial offensive on the Japanese stronghold at Rabaul, New Britain, that ultimately rendered the base useless. Read more

WWII

Lee Marvin

By Michael D. Hull

Near the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier and beside the grave of world heavyweight boxing champion Joe Louis in Arlington National Cemetery is the resting place of a film star who chose to be remembered first and foremost as a U.S. Read more

A squadron of B-25 “Mitchell” medium bombers fly in formation over the Italian countryside. Lieutenant Ben Ernst (inset) of Nashville, Tennessee, joined the Army Air Force for the “glamour,” but was shot down off the coast of Palermo, Sicily, in 1943 and spent 23 months as a prisoner of the Germans.

WWII

Bomber Pilot to Prisoner of War

By Amy Wannemacher

The second World War seems like a long time ago for most of the world, with the harsh realities of blitzkrieg warfare and the Holocaust primarily learned through books and films, possibly a museum. Read more

WWII

Kaiten

By Mark Carlson

For nearly three years World War II in the Pacific surged, raging in a hundred places from the Coral Sea to Guam, from Guadalcanal to Tarawa, and from Wake Island to the Philippines. Read more

WWII

Last Days of PT-34

By John Domagalski

The bleak opening days of World War II in the Pacific found the American territory of the Philippines under attack from the Japanese. Read more

Searchlights pierce the early morning of February 25, 1942, as a Coast Artillery Brigade fires more than 1,400 antiaircraft shells at a rumored Japanese attack on Los Angeles. Coming two days after a Japanese sub shelled an oilfield near Santa Barbara and less than three months after Pearl Harbor, the incident showed the nervous state of the nation.

WWII

Pearl Harbor Jitters

By Frank Johnson

Shortly after noon on Tuesday, December 9, 1941, in the wake of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, hostile warplanes were reported 200 miles off the Virginia coast and heading for New York City. Read more

From Around the Network

  • Latest Posts

    Audie Murphy: Most Highly Decorated
    Read More
  • The Prussian Army's Field Marshal Gebhard Leberecht von Blücher made some critical decisions on the field at the Battle of Waterloo.

    Military History

    The Prussian Army at the Battle of Waterloo
    Read More

  • Civil War

    Simply a Butchery: Grant at Cold Harbor
    Read More

  • Civil War

    Battle of Gettysburg: No Picnic at Culp’s Hill
    Read More