An Air Force KC-135 Stratotanker refuels a flight of F-105 Thunderchiefs on their way to strike targets in North Vietnam. Refueling operations in the Vietnam War peaked during Operation Rolling Thunder.

European Theater

Consolidated B-24 Liberator bombers of the U.S. Army Air Forces fly over the Market-Garden glider landing zones in Holland while on their way to bomb a distant target on September 18, 1944.

European Theater

What went wrong at Market Garden?

While the American 101st and 82nd Airborne Divisions were engaged in fighting near the Dutch towns of Eindhoven and Nijmegen, respectively, and the British XXX Corps struggled up the 100 miles of narrow road from the Belgian frontier toward Arnhem, Operation Market Garden very likely was already lost. Read more

European Theater

Colonel Hans Oster

By Brooke C. Stoddard

Adolf Hitler won victory after victory in the late 1930s: the remilitarization of the Rhineland in 1936, the incorporation of Austria into the Reich in 1938, the acquisition of the Sudetenland of Czechoslovakia in 1938 followed by the control over much of the remainder of Czechoslovakia six months later, and then the conquest of Poland in September 1939. Read more

As one aviator is strapped into the cockpit of his Hawker Hurricane fighter, other pilots of the Eagle Squadron dash to the aircraft as an alarm is sounded during the Battle of Britain.

European Theater

Yanks in the RAF

By David Alan Johnson

As they boarded the train for Montreal, the two Americans tried to look as inconspicuous as possible. Read more

European Theater

Pointe du Hoc: D Plus 60 Years

By Kevin M. Hymel

The gunfire has receded with the tide. One of the most valuable pieces of real estate in Normandy, France, on June 6, 1944, which once crawled with American GIs and German soldiers, now welcomes peaceful visitors from around the world. Read more

U.S. landing craft churn through the rough waters of the English Channel toward the coast of Normandy. The morning haze and the smoke ofå battle blow across the beaches, while some soldiers have already disembarked and wade the last few feet to shore.

European Theater

“We’ll Start the War from Here”

By Roy Morris Jr.

Peering through the predawn darkness at the slowly emerging shoreline 300 yards away, the little man with the famous name prepared once again to set foot in France as a soldier of the liberation. Read more

European Theater

Taps for Mauldin

By Kevin M. Hymel

Bill Mauldin understood war from the grunt’s-eye view. An enlisted man with the 45th Infantry Division, he turned his hobby into an art, penning Army life in World War II from Sicily and Italy to France and Germany. Read more

European Theater

Lili Marlene

By Sheldon Winkler

The true story of “Lili Marlene,” possibly the most famous war song ever written because of its universal themes of separation, loneliness, heartbreak, hope, fear of death, and dreaming for one’s love, is varying, contradictory, and controversial. Read more

European Theater

The U.S. Fifth Air Force: A Strategy to Win

By Sam McGowan

Although the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor was the event that served to galvanize America to fight World War II, President Franklin Roosevelt and his military advisers had pervasively decided that defeating the Japanese would be secondary to destroying the Nazi war machine in Europe. Read more

European Theater

1st Division on D-day

Dear Sirs:

I have enjoyed your new magazine for its subject matter, layout, and graphics. Your challenge is to present articles on subject matter that has been covered for many years by world-class writers such as Cornelius Ryan, Carlo d’Este, and lately Adrian Lewis about D-day. Read more

Soldiers of the 10th Mountain Division fire at German troops occupying barns in the rugged mountains of northern Italy.

European Theater

Storming Riva Ridge

By Flint Whitlock

From their hiding places in the valley below, the soldiers looked up at the wall of shale looming more than 3,000 feet above them. Read more

Patton spent his birthday, November 11, 1944, “getting where the dead were still warm.” He enjoyed his day by snapping a photograph of a recently captured German Stu. Gesch. 111 self-propelled gun. Patton’s shadow can be seen in the picture.

European Theater

War As He Saw It

By Kevin M. Hymel

Everywhere General George S. Patton, Jr., went, from North Africa to Sicily to continental Europe, his camera swayed from his neck, ready to capture images that interested him. Read more