HMS Prince Of Wales
Famous Navy Ships: The HMS Electra
By Glenn BarnettWar clouds gathered rapidly once Germany invaded Poland on September 1, 1939. Allied demands that Hitler withdraw his armies went unheeded. Read more
HMS Prince Of Wales
The Fairey Swordfish Torpedo Bomber
By Phil ZimmerRadar, atomic bombs, jet engines and early cruise missiles were among the numerous technological advances of World War II. Read more
HMS Prince Of Wales
The Fall of Malaya: Japanese Blitzkrieg on Singapore
By David H. LippmanThe moon like a tray was sinking in the western sea and the deep red sun showed its face to the east. Read more
HMS Prince Of Wales
Tragic Surrender
By Mark SimmonsOn Saturday, December 6, 1941, a Royal Australian Air Force Lockheed Hudson bomber on a reconnaissance mission from Khota Bahru on the west coast of Malaya was flying northwest over the China Sea toward the Gulf of Thailand. Read more
HMS Prince Of Wales
Kiwis Over the Pacific: The RNZAF in World War II
By Allyn VannoyDuring early World War II operations in the Pacific, Geoff Fisken would become one of the most outstanding pilots of the RNZAF—the Royal New Zealand Air Force. Read more
HMS Prince Of Wales
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
HMS Prince Of Wales
The Doomed Expansion of Imperial Japan
by Michael E. HaskewSince 1931, Japan’s army had asserted control over territory on the continent of Asia, brushing aside Chinese resistance, condemnation and political pressure from other nations, and most recently, the Allied military. Read more
HMS Prince Of Wales
The Indian Ocean Raid: Disaster for the Royal Navy
By David H. Lippman“So this is the Eastern Fleet,” ran Vice Admiral Sir James Fownes Somerville’s signal. “Never mind. Many a good tune is played on an old fiddle.” Read more
HMS Prince Of Wales
Undeclared War in the Atlantic
By James I. MarinoBetween September 1939 and December 1941, the United States moved from neutral to active belligerent in an undeclared naval war against Nazi Germany. Read more
HMS Prince Of Wales
Royal Navy Ravaged
By Michael D. HullHistory was made in the Mediterranean Sea on the night of Monday, November 11, 1940, when the Italian Navy’s battle fleet was devastated at Taranto, off the Ionian coast of southern Italy. Read more
HMS Prince Of Wales
The St. Nazaire Raid
By Flint WhitlockBritain badly needed a victory. As if to underline Britain’s difficult fortunes, on May 21, 1941, the German battleship Bismarck and heavy cruiser Prinz Eugen dealt the island kingdom a serious blow by sinking the battlecruiser HMS Hood and severely damaging the new battleship HMS Prince of Wales during a furious engagement in the Denmark Strait. Read more
HMS Prince Of Wales
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
HMS Prince Of Wales
The Repulse and Prince of Wales Battleships: How They Sunk
by Joseph M. HorodyskiDuring the 1920s and 1930s Great Britain built up its Far East defenses steadily if slowly, centering around Singapore as its primary naval base in the Pacific area. Read more
