Belgium

Waffen SS General Felix Steiner’s WWII Legacy

“Where is Steiner?” Adolf Hitler demanded as his Thousand Year Reich crumbled around him in April 1945. “Is he attacking yet?” Read more

Belgium

The Hidden Freedom Trail

A few moments after his stricken Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress bomber tore apart, co-pilot Ralph Patton hurriedly put his bail-out plan into action. Read more

Belgium

The End of the Battle of the Bulge

Wednesday, December 27, 1944, found the military situation in the Ardennes Forest of Belgium stalemated. After 12 days of unrelenting struggle, the American and German forces on this part of the Western Front found themselves locked in brutal combat, unable to drive each other back. Read more

Belgium

The 1940 Battle of Gembloux

On May 10, 1940, a daring group of German parachutists descended on the mighty Belgian fortress of Eben Emael, compelled its surrender, and opened the way for the German Army’s drive into Belgium. Read more

Belgium

World War I’s Second Battle of Ypres: Salient of Death

Despite the incessant German shelling that had been hammering away at the French lines to their immediate left near the rubble-strewn city of Ypres in northwestern Belgium, the largely untested soldiers of the Canadian 1st Division found the early spring day of April 22, 1915, surprisingly warm and pleasant. Read more

Belgium

The Duke of Marlborough at Malplaquet

England’s survival hung in the balance. She had only recently clashed with an imposing Continental alliance, in a futile war characterized by unprecedented slaughter on obscure fields in Flanders. Read more

Belgium

The Duke of Wellington in Assaye in India

Years after he had saved the world from the ambitions of Napoleon, Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington, was asked by his friend, George William Chad, to recall the “best thing” he had ever done as a soldier. Read more

Belgium

WWII Ordnance: The Boys Anti-tank Rifle

When the first tanks appeared in World War I, they were relatively lightly armored and protected the crews only against small-arms fire. Read more

Belgium

Hitler’s Experience in the Trenches of the Great War

In the months before the outbreak of World War I, 25-year-old Adolf Hitler was living the starving artist’s life in the Bavarian city of Munich, selling his paintings door-to-door and in the city’s numerous beer halls. Read more

Belgium

How Winston Churchill Prolonged the Defense of Antwerp in World War I

Joseph Mary Nagle Jefferies, a correspondent for Britain’s Daily Mail, was assigned to cover the opening phases of World War I in Belgium in October 1914. Read more

Belgium

Siege of Bastogne: The Battle for Noville

By Kevin M. Hymel

It was December 19, 1944, one day before the Siege of Bastogne. Shortly after 10:30 am, 26-year-old Major William Desobry picked up his field telephone, called his combat commander, Colonel William Roberts, and asked if he could withdraw from the Belgian village of Noville. Read more

Belgium

World War II’s Famous Battle of the Bulge

On December 16, 1944, Hitler launched Operation Wacht am Rhein, or Watch on the Rhine. Popularly known as the Battle of the Bulge, the ensuing offensive was a desperate effort to win a major victory in the West. Read more

Belgium

Battle of the Bulge POWs: One Man’s Story of Capture

Nobody knew it in the 6th Armored Divisions 9th Armored Infantry Battalion, but the tide of the Battle of the Bulge had turned by the time the outfit moved into snow-covered fields and forests near Bastogne. Read more

Belgium

Ford’s Willow Run Factory

They said it couldn’t be done. Doubters chided Henry Ford for declaring that his Willow Run Bomber Plant could turn out a B-24 Liberator heavy bomber every hour. Read more

Belgium

Captured! Belgium’s Mighty Fort Eben-Emael

At 4:25am in the predawn darkness of May 10, 1940, nine German gliders silently skidded to a stop on the hilltop of the most heavily defended fortress in Europe, disgorging 71 highly trained German Fallschirmjäger. Read more

Belgium

The Imperial War Museum

Although Britain has a number of war museums, the Imperial War Museum (IWM) is acknowledged as the Holy Grail of them all—the one you must visit when in London. Read more

Belgium

Smashing Hitler’s Atlantic Wall

After overrunning France and other Western European countries in 1940, Adolf Hitler was certain that the Allies would one day attempt to invade the European continent and attack through the occupied countries to destroy his regime. Read more

Belgium

Combat and Fear: A Replacement’s Story

After going on active service in May 1943, Robert W. Creamer was sent to take basic training at Fort Eustis, Virginia. Read more

Belgium

Brutal Battle for a Dutch Island

Look at a map of Holland. At the extreme southwest corner, connected to the mainland by a narrow causeway, is a peninsula known as Walcheren Island jutting into the North Sea. Read more

Belgium

Heroic Stand at Hosingen

First Lieutenant Tom Flynn and his fellow POWs remained locked inside their boxcar prison on a Frankfurt railroad siding on Christmas Eve, 1944, as air raid sirens wailed and bombs exploded throughout the city. Read more