European Theater Archives

Polish soldiers, attached to the British Eighth Army in Italy, slog along a flooded road.

European Theater

Blood In The Soil

By Glenn Barnett

In 1939 the one thing that Adolf Hitler and Josef Stalin could agree on was the partition of Poland. Read more

European Theater

The surrender did not begin well. As First Lieutenant Virgil Lary stood in the road next to a snow-covered field just south of Malmédy, Belgium with his hands raised, one of the German tankers poked his head out of the hatch and fired twice at him with his pistol. Read more

European Theater

Operation Husky: Allied Power Struggle

By William Dennis

By the summer of 1943, American forces felt that they had proven that they were as good as anything the enemy could throw at them. Read more

This post-World War II cinematic recreation of the Italian manned torpedoes in action was said to be referencing the attack on British shipping in the port of Gibraltar in 1943.

European Theater

Italy’s Daredevil Torpedo Riders

By Chuck Lyons

On a dark night in September 1941, moving at periscope depth, an Italian submarine edged into Gibraltar Bay near the British harbor. Read more

Seize the Day by Jim Dietz shows men from the 505th Regiment, 82nd Airborne in Sainte-Mère-Église, the parachute of trooper John Steele still hanging from the church tower in the background.

European Theater

Target: Sainte-Mere-Eglise

By Flint Whitlock

The night of June 5/6, 1944, was pretty much like every other night since the Germans had occupied Normandy and the Cotentin Peninsula in the summer of 1940: dark, quiet, chilly, and mostly boring. Read more

European Theater

The Power of Cloth

By G. Paul Garson

The evolution of the Nazi-era military wardrobe followed from a long history of European uniforms in general and Imperial German uniforms in particular. Read more

The Cromwell tank of Captain Roy Dunlop and another just to the rear with smoke billowing from it are shown near Point 213 after being immobilized by Tiger tanks east of Villers-Bocage. Both British tanks belonged to A Squadron, County of London Yeomanry.

European Theater

Tigers Triumphant at Villers-Bocage

By Michael E. Haskew

On D-day, June 6, 1944, the British 3rd Infantry Division was the first to land on Sword Beach. Read more

Brigadier General Ted Roosevelt reads mail while serving in Italy in January 1944. The son of President Theodore Roosevelt, he named his Jeep “Rough Rider” in honor of his late father and his exploits during the Spanish-American War.

European Theater

Teddy Roosevelt, Jr. Led At Utah Beach

By Michael D. Hull

Famed war correspondent Ernie Pyle reported in August 1944, that one of his favorite U.S. Army officers was a regimental colonel who shared Lt. Read more

European Theater

Montgomery’s Bridge Too Far

By Michael D. Hull

Operation Market-Garden, British Field Marshal Bernard L. Montgomery’s imaginative and daring plan—reluctantly endorsed by his superior, General Dwight D. Read more

European Theater

Looking for the Luftwaffe

By Joseph Frantiska, Jr.

Chain Home, or ‘CH’ was the codename given to the system of early warning radar stations located along the Europe facing coasts of the United Kingdom (UK) before and during World War II to locate and follow aircraft. Read more

The Third Reich kept up a steady barrage of music of one style or another, from the constant thump of marching boots and military bands, to street recitals, to radio broadcasts of German classical music, to light romantic fare—all part of the “emotion over intellect” campaign that Nazi Party ideology promoted. A constant soundtrack engulfed citizens and soldiers with a litany of songs that also served to promote morale and military aggressiveness and whose lyrics sought to drum in Nazi political and racist propaganda.

European Theater

Off Duty, German Style

By G. Paul Garson

War has been described as long periods of extreme boredom punctuated by brief moments of extreme terror. Read more

Weary GIs move inland after landing in Sicily in July 1943 in this contemporary painting, Red Beach at Gela, 1700, by Mitchell Jamieson.

European Theater

The Big Red One in World War II

By Steven Weingartner

The outbreak of World War II on September 1, 1939, found the United States in an isolationist mood that precluded, for the time being, any direct involvement in the conflict. Read more

Searchlights stab into the darkness as Royal Navy warships illuminate Italian cruisers during the Battle of Cape Matapan. Prince Philip served aboard the battleship HMS Valiant during the decisive naval victory over Mussolini’s fleet.

European Theater

Prince Philip’s War

By Michael E. Haskew

The son of Prince Andrew of Greece and Denmark and Princess Alice of Battenberg, Prince Philip was the last of five children and a great-great grandchild of Queen Victoria. Read more

European Theater

Axis Collapse in Normandy

By Robert L. Durham

German panzergrenadiers surrounded Hill 314 just east of Mortain in Normandy on August 7, 1944, trapping several companies of the 2nd Battalion of the U.S. Read more

A single German soldier stands guard over several American prisoners, captured in the confusion on D-Day. At least some of these prisoners were airborne, and Charlie Lefchik shared a similar journey to a prisoner of war camp.

European Theater

Riding the German Rail

By Richard A. Beranty

The large number of Allied prisoners being funneled south to Rennes, France, following the D-Day invasion swelled the German transit camp to capacity so the decision was made to transport the men to permanent locations inside Germany. Read more

An abandoned German weapons carrier lies smashed along a roadside as soldiers of the British Eighth Army search for German snipers in Acquino on May 27, 1944.

European Theater

Eternal City Liberated

By Michael E. Haskew

Italy was unforgiving. German resistance to Allied operations had been brutal since the Salerno landings in the autumn of 1943, and by the following spring frustration had mounted upon frustration. Read more

American soldiers splash ashore at Anzio, Italy, during an end run expected to compromise the German defenses of the Gustav Line. The landings failed to achieve the desired results and remain controversial to this day.

European Theater

Prudence or Paralysis?

By Steve Ossad

Hitler called it an “abscess.” British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, the chief sponsor and loudest cheerleader for the endeavor, grudgingly proclaimed it “a disaster.” Read more

European Theater

The MG-42 Light Machine Gun

By Arnold Blumberg

Whether fighting in the mountains of the Italian peninsula, assaulting Nazi defensive positions along the vast Russo-German Eastern Front, or clashing with German Army opponents from Normandy to the Elbe River, from 1942 to 1945, Allied soldiers in World War II faced a determined enemy armed with the most effective machine gun produced during that struggle: the Maschinengewehr 42, or the MG 42 for short. Read more

The German flagship SMS Cöln takes fire from Commodore William Goodenough’s cruisers. Having suffered severe damage, her crew decided to scuttle her in the hope that they would be picked up by ships in close proximity. Sadly, all but one man perished at sea.

European Theater

Race to Victory

By John Protasio

Commodore Reginald Tyrwhitt of the Royal Navy was in a grave predicament on August 28, 1914. His force was near the German base at Heligoland Bight. Read more

European Theater

Achtung! Panzers in Normandy

By Michael E. Haskew

The ongoing debate between German Field Marshals Erwin Rommel and Gerd von Rundstedt over how best to use the German Army’s elite panzer divisions against the coming Allied invasion ultimately reached no clear conclusion. Read more

European Theater

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Soldiers of God