A Sherman tank from the Canadian 27th Tank Regiment rolls through the shattered, deserted streets of Caen after the Germans pulled out. The British/Canadians lost thousands of men and 300-500 tanks. The delay in securing Caen badly damaged Montgomery’s reputation among the Allies.

European Theater

The European Theater of Operations (ETO) during World War II is generally regarded as the area of military confrontation between the Allied powers and Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy. The European Theater encompassed the Atlantic, Mediterranean, Eastern Front, Western Front, and Arctic areas of operation.

European Theater

Heinz Guderian: Author of the Blitzkrieg

By Phil Zimmer

Hitler was enraged as he stalked his way around the room during the waning months of World War II. Read more

European Theater

The Fight for Singling

By Arnold Blumberg

After four months and a 600-mile advance from the beaches of Normandy into Brittany and then through eastern France, the spearhead of Lt. Read more

European Theater

Means of Grace, Hope of Glory

By Robert Barr Smith

They carried no weapons, only holy books and rudimentary vestments, a crucifix or a Star of David and sometimes a little Communion kit. Read more

European Theater

Tactical Thunder: The Ninth Air Force

By Sam McGowan

As the landing craft carrying the invading Allied ground forces of Operation Overlord motored toward the Normandy beaches on June 6, 1944, they were protected and supported by the largest aerial armada the world has ever seen. Read more

German soldiers operate an Enigma machine, sending classified information encoded through a system of rotor settings that were believed to be virtually impossible to crack. However, Allied cryptanalysts at Bletchley Park were reading top secret German communications for some time during World War II.

European Theater

The Miracle of Bletchley Park

By Hervie Haufler

Great Britain’s military intelligence leaders learned from their experience in World War I that the kinds of minds capable of breaking codes are a rare commodity and are often not likely to blossom in a military atmosphere. Read more

In this March 11, 1945, image, troops and M4 Sherman tanks of the U.S. First Army cross the Ludendorff railroad bridge to the eastern bank of the great Rhine River. The last natural barrier along the western frontier of Germany, the Rhine was also crossed by Allied armies in other locations.

European Theater

Bridging the Rhine at Remagen: Infantryman Paul Priest Recalls the Historic Crossing

By George A. Larson

As Allied troops advanced along a broad front toward Nazi Germany in the winter of 1945, the United States Army was eager to capture an intact bridge over the Rhine River to allow its troops and heavy equipment to advance rapidly into Germany. Read more

We knew little about combat fatigue in WWII, yet more than 504,000 troops were lost due to what we now know as PTSD.

European Theater

Combat Fatigue: How Stress in Battle was Felt (and Treated) in WWII

By Duane Schultz

Eugene Sledge knew a thing or two about combat fatigue. It was September 15, 1944, on a tiny spit of land called Peleliu: the Japanese opened up with heavy mortar fire just as the Marines moved off the beach and started inland. Read more

European Theater

The Trains That Fueled the Normandy Breakout

By Kerry Skidmore

Historian Christian Wolmar concludes that the two world wars could not have been fought to such devastation without military railways, in his book Engines of War. Read more

European Theater

Pegasus Bridge: Operation Deadstick’s Glider Assault

By Christopher Miskimon

On a darkened airfield at 2230 hours on June 5, 1944, a reinforced company of British gliderborne infantry, D Company of the Second Battalion, Oxford & Buckinghamshire Light Infantry (Ox & Bucks), boarded gliders, prepared to start the invasion of France. Read more

European Theater

Bitter Fight at Gela

By Christopher Miskimon

The smoke had barely cleared from the battlefields of North Africa when the victorious Allies turned their attention northward to Europe. Read more

Manning his Bren Gun, an Canadian soldier prepares to advance during the Scheldt Estuary offensive in October 1944.

European Theater

Battle of the Scheldt Estuary

By Allyn Vannoy

As the Allied armies advanced across Western Europe in the summer of 1944, the First Canadian Army undertook the task of clearing the coastal areas and opening the Channel ports. Read more

European Theater

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

European Theater

Daredevil Tankers Turn the Tide at the Bulge

By Patrick J. Chaisson

“Peiper must be stopped!”

Lieutenant General Courtney M. Hodges, commanding the U.S. First Army, looked up from his maps and saw chaos everywhere. Read more

European Theater

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

European Theater

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

European Theater

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

European Theater

Behind Enemy Lines: Escape at the Bulge

By Jay Marquart

The sound of German artillery shells shrieking overhead from across the Siegfried Line was not the wakeup call Technical Sergeant Robert Walter of 3rd Platoon, L Company, 3rd Battalion, 393rd Infantry Regiment expected to receive on the morning of December 16, 1944. Read more