Axis

Operation Tsuzigiri: Japan’s Ki-43s vs Allied ATC

by Jon Diamond

Why was Myitkyina such an important objective in the reconquest of Burma in 1943 through 1944 for the Allies and especially among them, Lt. Read more

Axis

Panzer Group 4: The March to Leningrad

By Pat McTaggart

Adolf Hitler was obsessed with Leningrad. When planning his invasion of the Soviet Union, the Führer demanded that the capture of the city, which he regarded as the cradle of Bolshevism, be one of the top priorities of the campaign, giving it precedence over the capture of Moscow. Read more

Axis

Citizen Spies: Simon and Marie Koedel

By Michael W. Williams

Buried in the October 24, 1944, edition of the New York times was the headline: “German Ex-Officer Held as Nazi Spy: Captain in Kaiser’s Army, 62 and Foster Daughter Accused of Sending Ship Data Before U.S. Read more

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Hedy Lamarr: Allied Inventor and Actress

By Eric Niderost

Hedy Lamarr was the most beautiful actress of her generation, a celluloid diva who was the epitome of Hollywood glamour, sensuality, and sophistication. Read more

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Battle at Crossroads X: Glidermen of Bastogne

By Leo G. Barron

For the cold and hungry GIs of Company B, 1/401st Glider Infantry Regiment, holding the western approach to Bastogne would push the men to the limits of their endurance. Read more

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Sir Claude Auchinleck: The Overshadowed Equal to Erwin Rommel

By Joseph M. Horodyski

British Field Marshal Sir Bernard Montgomery has gone down in history as the victor of El Alamein and the relentless nemesis of Field Marshal Erwin Rommel, Nazi Germany’s famed “Desert Fox.” Read more

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WWII Aircraft: The Arado Ar-234 Blitz Jet

By Robert F. Dorr

When the Arado Ar-234 Blitz jet bomber first appeared in the skies of Europe, most Allied airmen did not know what it was. Read more

Axis

Mers el Kebir: Why the Royal Navy Sunk the French Fleet in WWII

by Michael D. Hull

When the armistice between France and Germany was put into force on June 25, 1940, the fate of the powerful French Navy—the fourth largest in the world—was of critical importance to the British. Read more

Axis

Blunder or Deception? Stilwell at Myitkyina

by Jon Diamond

General Joseph W. “Vinegar Joe” Stilwell and his Sino-American Myitkyina Task Force (MTF), in a coup de main attack, seized the vital Japanese-controlled airfield just west of the town of Myitkyina on the great Irrawaddy River in northern Burma on May 17, 1944. Read more

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Nazi Time Capsule Found in Poland

A Nazi time capsule was discovered in Poland, buried in the foundations of the old Nazi training school of Ordensburg Krössinsee. Read more

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George C. Marshall: Architect of Victory

By Michael D. Hull

President Franklin D. Roosevelt was disturbed in the autumn of 1938 by the Munich agreement, at which the rights of Czechoslovakia were signed away, and by reports of mounting air strength in Adolf Hitler’s Nazi Germany. Read more

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WWII Vehicles: The Island-Hopping LVT

By R.J. Seese

While making business calls in Tampa, Florida, during the summer of 1980, I spotted a strange looking tracked contraption atop an overgrown pedestal in front of the U.S. Read more

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Hitler’s Lebensborn Children: Kidnappings in German-Occupied Poland

By Brent Douglas Dyck

In the summer of 1943, Malgorzata Twardecki, a single mother living in Nazi-occupied Poland, received an ominous order to bring her five-year-old son to the local town council office by 6 the following morning. Read more

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Operation Plunder: Crossing the Rhine

By David Lippman

“I am busy getting ready for the next battle,” Field Marshal Sir Bernard Law Montgomery wrote his son David in early March 1945. Read more

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Was the 1917 Enfield a Good Rifle Compared to the Springfield?

By Steve Lilley

In director Howard Hawks’s 1941 film classic, Sergeant York, then-Corporal Alvin York, portrayed by Gary Cooper, single-handedly knocks out more than 30 German machine-gun nests and, with little assistance, captures 132 enemy soldiers. Read more

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The Battle of the Coral Sea

By John Wukovits

World War II was less than six months old when the American public, already stunned by the debacles at Pearl Harbor and Guam, faced one of its darkest moments. Read more

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The Athens War Museum

By Peter Suciu

While not a major military power today, from the  time of the classical age through the Middle Ages, Greece was the center of several major military dynasties. Read more

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Soviet Navy Over Berlin

By Victor Kamenir

On July 22, 1941, exactly one month after invading the Soviet Union, German aviation conducted its first air strike on Moscow. Read more

Axis

Patton’s Last Command

By Alexander Lovelace

The October light was beginning to fade as the U.S. Army limousine sped along the autobahn in the American Zone of Occupied Germany. Read more

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Perilous Rescue of the SS Cape San Juan

By Eric Niderost

The giant Martin PBM-3R “Mariner” landed with a kind of swanlike grace, its stubby bow parting the waters, transforming them into a series of white and foamy ripples that radiated from the seaplane’s wake. Read more