Dunkirk
Fighter Ace Douglas Bader: The RAF’s Legless Legend
By Michael D. HullBombed almost daily for several months and in fear of an imminent German invasion, the British were hanging on by their fingernails when September 1940 came. Read more
Dunkirk
Dudley Clarke’s Commandos
By Jon DiamondAfter the British Expeditionary Force’s (BEF) debacle at Dunkirk in northern France in May 1940, the new prime minister, Winston Churchill, needed a novel type of fighting force to strike back at Nazi Europe. Read more
Dunkirk
Queen of the Desert: The Infantry ‘Matilda’ Tank
By Jon DiamondThe origins of the Matilda Tank or “I” Tank date back to 1934, when Maj. Gen. Percy C.S. Read more
Dunkirk
Miracle at Dunkirk
By Jon DiamondFollowing the 76th anniversary of the evacuation of the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) from the beaches and harbor of Dunkirk, one is amazed at the number of articles and volumes written about the subject. Read more
Dunkirk
Operation Sea Lion: Hitler’s Cancelled Invasion of Britain
By Mark SimmonsMajor Graf Von Kielmansegg, an officer in Germany’s 1st Armored Division based near Orleans, France, was dragged from a cinema on the night of August 28, 1940, and told to report to his chief of staff. Read more
Dunkirk
The Wehrmacht in France: Decisions in a Time of Debacle
By Brooke C. StoddardMay 10, 1940, marked the beginning of the war in western Europe. Nazi-controlled Germany invaded Holland, Belgium, Luxembourg, and France. Read more
Dunkirk
Brian G. Horrocks: Bernard Montgomery’s Frontline General
By Michael D. HullA big challenge faced Maj. Gen. Brian G. Horrocks, an infantryman, when he was cross-posted to take command of the British Army’s 9th Armored Division in March 1942. Read more
Dunkirk
Sergeant Major Stan Hollis: The Victoria Cross on D-Day
By Michael D. HullA chill breeze cut through the early morning haze, and the storm-swollen sea was rough off the coast of northern France on Tuesday, June 6, 1944. Read more
Dunkirk
Mers el Kebir: Why the Royal Navy Sunk the French Fleet in WWII
by Michael D. HullWhen 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
Dunkirk
Was the 1917 Enfield a Good Rifle Compared to the Springfield?
By Steve LilleyIn 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
Dunkirk
What Happened in Dunkirk: a Royal Engineer Tells His Story
By Norman Wickman, as told to Pauline HaytonPauline Hayton was 52 years old before her father, Norman Wickman, talked about his life in the British Army, and what happened in Dunkirk as he saw it. Read more
Dunkirk
The Generals’ Battle: British War Minister Leslie Hore-Belisha
By Jon DiamondLord John Vereker, 6th Viscount Gort, Commander in Chief of the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) in France in 1940, and his chief of staff, General Henry Pownall, have both been forever associated with the British Army’s greatest continental defeat; namely, the retreat through Flanders and eventual evacuation from the harbor and beaches of Dunkirk in May and June, after being engaged with the invading German Wehrmacht for only three weeks. Read more
Dunkirk
Free France Resurgent: Charles de Gaulle in World War II
By Glenn BarnettOn the evening of June 16, 1940, Marshal Henri Philippe Pétain was appointed Prime Minister of France. It was a critical time. Read more
Dunkirk
WWII Warplanes: The Superb Supermarine Spitfire
By Sam McGowanIn the annals of World War II, one of the most famous airplanes is the British-developed Supermarine Spitfire, an agile, elliptical-wing fighter that has become synonymous with the Royal Air Force victory in the Battle of Britain. Read more
Dunkirk
Scandinavian Airborne Assault
By Henrik O. LundeThe Polish Campaign in 1939 demonstrated the awesome effectiveness of aircraft as weapons platforms for close ground support. Read more
Dunkirk
Operation Pedestal: The Rescue of Malta
By Michael D. HullLocated 58 miles south of Sicily in the Mediterranean Sea, the rocky, 122-square-mile island of Malta was the hinge upon which all Allied operations in the Middle East turned during the first half of World War II. Read more
Dunkirk
General Arthur Percival: a Convenient Scapegoat?
By Jon DiamondOn February 15, 1942, the island fortress of Singapore surrendered with 130,000 men, thus ending the defense of Malaya as one of the largest military disasters in the history of British arms since Cornwallis’s capitulation to Franco-American forces at Yorktown in 1781 during America’s Revolutionary War. Read more
Dunkirk
Germany in World War II: The Long Surrender
By Charles WhitingIt was said on May 8, 1945, that some of the victors wandered around in a daze. They were puzzled by a strange silence. Read more
Dunkirk
The Four Days’ Battle: A Dutch Triumph
by Eric NiderostAdmiral General George Monck, first Duke of Albemarle, walked into the great cabin of his flagship Royal Charles with a calm and determined air, tersely greeting his assembled captains before they all sat down at a large table. Read more
Dunkirk
Air Chief Marshal Hugh Dowding & Hermann Goering
by Michael HaskewBy the summer of 1940, Hitler’s Nazi war machine had advanced from victory to victory, crushing Poland, overrunning France and the Low Countries, and ejecting Allied forces from the continent of Europe at Dunkirk. Read more
