Allies Archives

Allies

The Norden Bombsight: Was it Truly Accurate Beyond Belief?

By Roaul Drapeau

In a 1921 bombing test, U.S. Army Air Corps General Billy Mitchell’s airmen sank the former German battleship Ostfriesland. Read more

Allies

Unnecessary Hell: The Battle of Peleliu

By Eric Niderost

In the predawn hours of September 15, 1944, the official start of the two-month Battle of Peleliu, a powerful fleet of U.S. Read more

In a photo taken from another B-29 in formation, this heavy bomber disgorges incendiary bombs from the skies above Formosa. The largest B-29 raid of the war to date took place on October 14, 1944. The target was the repair and supply facilities at Okayama on the island.

Allies

B-29 Superfortress: The Plane That Bombed Japan Into Submission

By Sam McGowan

As the Japanese delegation stood on the deck of the battleship USS Missouri on September 2, 1945, preparing to sign the documents that ended World War II, a large formation of Boeing B-29 Superfortress heavy bombers swooped low over Tokyo Bay as a reminder of the terrible destruction that had befallen their nation and turned Japan’s cities into ruins. Read more

In September 1944, Red Army soldiers wade through a marshy area during a patrol. Such terrain played an important role on the Taman Peninsula as both armies had to contend with mobility issues.

Allies

Breaching the Blue Line: The Soviet Army at the Taman Peninsula

By Victor Kamenir

The charred remains of men and machines scattered through the Kursk salient in July 1943 signified the death knell of the last attempt by the German Wehrmacht to regain the initiative on the Eastern Front. Read more

Allies

General Omar Bradley: Dwight D Eisenhower’s Indispensible Lieutenant

By Cole Kingseed

Great commanders need great subordinates. In the campaigns in the Mediterranean and European Theaters of World War II, General Dwight D. Read more

In his painting Suicide in Pairs, artist James Turnbull depicts a flaming Japanese kamikaze diving toward a stricken U.S. Navy transport vessel. Off Okinawa, the U.S. Navy endured the full fury of the desperate kamikaze attacks. (Naval Historical Foundation)

Allies

The USS Goodhue & A Torrent of Kamikazes at Okinawa

By Duane E. Shaffer

More than 60 years ago, in April 1945, the war in Europe was winding down to its inevitable conclusion. Read more

Allies

The Thunder of Operation Gallop

By Pat McTaggart

As Adolf Hitler’s vaunted Sixth Army lay in its death throes in the ruins of Stalingrad, German forces to the west of the city faced their own kind of hell. Read more

Allies

WWII Secrets: The Mysterious Inga Arvad

By Peter Kross

Shortly before Pearl Harbor, an attractive Danish journalist arrived in the United States to pursue a writing career. Read more

Crewmen of an American submarine go about their business as their craft heads out on another combat patrol. U.S. submarines decimated Japanese merchant shipping in the Pacific and also sank a number of enemy warships during the course of the war.

Allies

Darter & Dace at the Battle of Leyte Gulf

By David Alan Johnson

As soon as he arrived on the bridge of the submarine USS Dace, Lt. Cmdr. Rafael C. Read more

Allies

Iron Annie: The Junkers Ju-52

By William E. Welsh

Shortly before dawn on May 20, 1941, a flight of 500 transport planes took off from seven airstrips on mainland Greece. Read more

A Polish tank commander salutes as his unit passes in review during a ceremony in Scotland prior to deployment to Normandy. Polish units made a significant contribution to the Allied offensive in Western Europe. (National Archives)

Allies

Poles in the West: Fighting in the Falaise Pocket

By Major General Michael Reynolds

The dismemberment of Poland by the German and Soviet armies in September and early October 1939 saw the temporary destruction of the Polish armed forces. Read more

Allies

Was It Right to Drop the Atomic Bomb on Hiroshima & Nagasaki?

By Sam McGowan

The most controversial decision of the 20th century—probably in all of history—was the one reportedly made by President Harry S. Read more

Marching along on the Eastern Front at the head of his men, SS officer Leon Degrelle was a foreign-born politician who became a decorated military leader and saw extensive combat with German forces in World War II.

Allies

Was Leon Degrelle a Traitor of Belgium, or a German Army Hero?

By Richard Rule

Leon Degrelle was born in 1906 in Belgium to a prosperous family in the French-speaking region of Wallonia. Read more

Shown rolling along a dirt road in northwest Europe on November 29, 1944, a captured German Panther tank is in use by the British 4th Coldstream Guards, 6th Guards Tank Brigade. (Imperial War Museum)

Allies

How the Allies Used Captured German Tanks and Vehicles

By Christopher Miskimon

Geijsteren Castle sits north of the Dutch town of Venlo on the banks of the Meuse River. In late 1944, the castle was a strongpoint in the local German defenses and under attack by elements of the British Sixth Guards Tank Brigade. Read more

With infantry charging alongside, a motorcycle unit of the Red Army roars into action against German positions in July 1942. The submachine gun appears to be the weapon of choice for these soldiers.

Allies

Leningrad & Tikhvin: Nazi Winter Repulse During Operation Barbarossa

By Pat Mc Taggart

The men of Field Marshal Wilhelm Ritter von Leeb’s Heeresgruppe Nord (Army Group North) had little sleep during the night of June 21, 1941. Read more

On January 21, 1945, soldiers of the U.S. 8th Infantry Regiment, 4th Infantry Division move cautiously through the town of Moesdorf, Luxembourg. (All photos: National Archives)

Allies

Ernest Hemingway and the Ivy Leaguers in World War II

By Charles Whiting

During the second week of July 1944 a young, sharp Lieutenant Goldstein of the 4th Infantry Division’s 22nd Infantry Regiment was told by his boss, Colonel Buck Lanhan, “Expect a special civilian, a big war correspondent is coming to visit us. Read more

A mannequin wearing the uniform of a technical sergeant in the American 359th Infantry Regiment mans the equipment in the Hoffmann Museum’s “radio corner.”

Allies

Luxembourg’s Hoffman Museum

By Raymond E. Bell, Jr.

You won’t find the familiar little triangular signs, “Warnung Minen!” hanging on barbed wire today in Western Europe, with one exception. Read more

Allies

Night Battle: The Barroom Brawl Off Guadalcanal

By David Alan Johnson

November 13, 1942, was a Friday, which sailors aboard the cruiser USS San Francisco noted with anxiety. Read more

Red Army scouts report the findings of a recent foray to locate the Germans in the northern Caucasus. The Germans were not uniformed against the harsh Russian winter and suffered tremendous casualties as a result.

Allies

Russian Commanders: Marshal Semyon M. Budenny

By Blaine Taylor

At 8 am on the cold, blustery morning of November 7, 1941, the 24th anniversary of the Russian Communist Bolshevik Revolution of 1917, a dashing lone horseman galloped out of the Spassky Gate of the Kremlin onto snow-covered Red Square. Read more

Dressed in traditional garb, a lone Chinese man seeks the protection of a sandbag barricade in the International Settlement of Shanghai on August 12, 1937. Adjacent to the civilian are a British soldier and two American Marines who have donned their helmets. (© Bettmann/CORBIS)

Allies

A Memorable Marine Mascot

By Eric Niderost

Soochow was a mongrel dog with a remarkable gift for self-preservation. A homeless stray, he attached himself to some U.S. Read more

From Around the Network

The Battle of Tannenburg: Massacre in the Marshes

Matt Urban: Infantry Legend

The CIA Assassination of Rafael Trujillo

John S.D. Eisenhower’s ‘Yanks’