Lee's Army of Northern Virginia at Cemetery Hill and Culp's Hill--two of the most critical engagements fought at Gettysburg on 2 and 3 July 1863. Pfanz provides detailed tactical accounts of each stage of the contest and explores the interactions between--and decisions made by--generals on both sides. In particular, he illuminates Confederate lieutenant general Richard S. Ewell's controversial decision not to attack Cemetery Hill after the initial southern victory on 1 July. Pfanz also explores other salient features of the fighting, including the Confederate occupation of the town of Gettysburg, the skirmishing in the south end of town and in front of the hills, the use of breastworks on Culp's Hill, and the small but decisive fight between Union cavalry and the Stonewall Brigade.Rich with astute judgments about officers on each side, clearly written, and graced with excellent maps, Pfanz's book is tactical history at its finest.--Civil War A meticulous examination of the desperate engagements that over the course of the three days swept up and down the rough slopes of these two hills, the strategic anchors of the Union right flank.--New York Times Book ReviewThe first and most comprehensive narrative yet written on this part of the battlefield. . . . Civil War enthusiasts should clear a space on their bookshelf for Gettysburg--Culp's Hill and Cemetery Hill.--Blue and Gray Harry Pfanz provides the definitive account of the fighting between the Army of the Potomac and Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia at Cemetery Hill and Culp's Hill--two of the most critical engagements fought at Gettysburg on 2 and 3 July 1863. He provides detailed tactical accounts of each stage of the contest and explores the interactions between--and decisions made by--generals on both sides. In particular, he illuminates Confederate lieutenant general Richard S. Ewell's controversial decision not to attack Cemetery Hill after the initial Southern victory on 1 July.

    Describes the struggle against entrenched ineffiency and corruption in the military, and recounts the author's own experiences trying to get equipment tested under conditions that resemble combat.

    Picking up the story after Midway, the author presents a scrupulously accurate account of what happened, describing in rich detail the actual planes and pilots pitted in the ferocious battles that helped turn the tide of war. Based on correspondence with 150 American and Japanese veterans, or their families, he reveals the thoughts, pressures, and fears of the airmen and their crews as he reconstructs the battles. These are the story of the Wildcat and Zero fighters, and the Dauntless, Avenger, Betty, Kate, and Val bombers. Lavishly illustrated with drawings, maps, and photographs, this fresh look at the campaign set a standard for aviation histories when first published in 1994.

    One of the first to come out of the famed Underwater Demolition Team 21, he was an initial member -- a "plank owner" -- of America's deadliest and most elite fighting force, the U.S. Navy SEALs.Through three tours in the jungle hell of Vietnam, he walked the point -- staying alert to trip wires, booby traps and punji pits, guiding his squad of amphibious fighters on missions of rescue, reconnaissance and demolition -- confronting a war's unique terrors head-on, unprotected . . . and unafraid.This is the story of a hero told from the heart and from the gut -- an authentic tour of duty with one of the most legendary commandoes of the Vietnam War.

    The insights are brilliant and intriguing as Deighton warns that the lessons of the War remain unheeded.

    It is a chronicle of World War I, told from the viewpoint of the soldiers themselves through diaries, letters and interviews with survivors. The story of 1915 is stark, brutal, frank, sometimes painfully funny, and always human. Lyn Macdonald's other works include 1914-1918 Voices and Images of the Great War, 1914: The Days of Hope and They Called it Passchendaele.

    They flew their "Flying Fortresses" almost daily against strategic targets in Europe in the name of freedom. Their astonishing courage and appalling losses earned them the name that resounds in the annals of aerial warfare and made the "Bloody Hundredth" a legend.Harry Crosby arrived with the very first crews. After dealing with his fear and acquiring skill and confidence, he was promoted to Group Navigator, surviving hairbreadth escapes and eluding death while leading thirty-seven missions, some of them involving two thousand aircrafts, he left with the very last. Now in a breathtaking and often humorous account, he takes his readers into the hearts and minds of the intrepid airmen to experience the heart-stopping emotions, the triumph and the white-knuckle terror of the war in the skies in a riveting, unforgettable book destined to become a classic.

    It is must reading for every aficionado of modern military history.” –San Francisco ChronicleErwin Rommel’s instinct for battle and leadership places him among the great commanders of history. In this definitive biography, David Fraser, an acclaimed biographer and distinguished soldier, looks at Rommel’s career and shows how wild and superficially undisciplined Rommel’s bold style of leadership could be, and how it inspired the men under his command to attack with ferocity and pursue with tenacity—qualities that served him well in his great battles in the North African desert and throughout his entire military career. Fraser also thoroughly explores the question of Rommel’s possible involvement in the plot against Hitler and the reason for his forced suicide, even though there was no criminal evidence against him.Revealing his failings as well as his genius, Knight’s Cross is a fascinating biography of a soldier whose distinguished career has become a part of history.

    More than 60 Army and Marine Corps infantrymen speak of their experiences during their year-long tours of duty.

    And with good reason. Offering an unprecedented range of descriptive and illustrative detail, the author describes the evolution of the battleship classes through all their modifications and refits. As well as dealing with design features, armour, machinery and power plants and weaponry, he also examines the performance of the ships in battle and analyses their successes and failures; and as well as covering all the RN s battleships and battlecruisers, he also looks in detail at the aircraft carrier conversions of the WWI battlecruisers Furious, Glorious and Courageous. British Battleships 1919-1939 is a masterpiece of research and the comprehensive text is accompanied by tabular detail and certainly the finest collection of photographs and line drawings ever offered in such a book. For this new edition the author has added some 75 new photographs, many of them having never appeared in print before, and the book has been completely redesigned to fully exploit the superb photo collection. A delight for the historian, enthusiast and ship modeller, it is a volume that is already regarded as an essential reference work for this most significant era in naval history and ship design.

    Rebel radio: the story of El Salvador's Radio Venceremos describes the courage and sacrifices of the young men and women responsible for running the guerrillas' radio station during the ten-year-long civil war in El Salvador

    Brings together interviews with more than eighty survivors to recount one of the bloodiest battles of the Vietnam War, the 1967 campaign in the mountains of Dak To, during which members of the 173rd Airborne Brigade found themselves caught up in a deadly struggle against overwhelming odds, often cut off from supplies, communications, and reinforcements.

    Experts still argue over who won. This account of the desparate battle that took place in sight of Niagara Falls has become a military history classic. The author narrates the events in detail while providing an examination of the weapons, tactics and personalities of the opposing armies. "Fair tretment of both sides in the Lundy's Lane encounter ... should earn this book a 'definitive' treatment for years to come." David Skaggs, Journal of the Early American Republic.

    What was it like to face these odds day after day? We learn that men sustained by faith in each other and joined by the unique bonds of combat can overcome anxiety, fear, and even terror to achieve common goals.

    Yet little has been written about the actual experiences of combat - what the modern battlefield is really like and how professional soldiers, sailors and airmen, prepare to "cope with carnage". This book compares the ways in which the British Army, the US Army and the Israeli Defence Force motivate their peacetime soldiery and train their special forces, as well as showing the power and range of modern weapons and the ability of technology to eliminate darkness so that fighting can take place around the clock.

    When Lenin became too infirm to remove Stalin from a position of power, when the shah of Iran's terminal cancer was kept secret from fellow Iranians and foreign supporters until Ayatollah Khomeini's Islamic revolution had succeeded, the political consequences were monumental. In this absorbing book, two experts in political psychology reveal how the infirmities of leaders have affected their own societies and the broader course of world events. Drawing on a wide range of examples, including Mad King Ludwig of Bavaria, Woodrow Wilson, Adolf Hitler, Idi Amin, Deng Xiao-peng, Ferdinand Marcos, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and Menachem Begin, Dr. Jerrold M. Post and Robert S. Robins explore the impact of physical and mental illness on political leadership.Post and Robins investigate the effects of illness on the leader, his inner circle, his followers, and the political system itself. They discuss such thought-provoking topics as:—how the nature of the illness affects decisionmaking;—how mortal illness can make a leader more determined to make his mark on history;—how a leader's disability can be hidden from the public in every political system;—the effects of prescribed drugs and substance abuse on leadership behavior;—the conflicted role and ethical dilemmas of physicians who care for the powerful;—and how the demands and privileges of high office compromise the quality of medical care.In closed societies where there is no clear mechanism of succession, say the authors, the ailing or aging leader and his close advisers can become locked in a fatal embrace, each dependent upon the other for survival: a captive king and his captive court. In the absence of clear rules for determining when a leader is disabled and should be replaced and how a successor will be chosen, illness in high office can be highly destabilizing. Post and Robins's book will be engrossing—and timely—reading for all those interested in leadership, history, and the political process.

    Original.

    With this book, he offers a brutally honest account of his experiences of the campaign.

    Army, helps liberate Buchenwald, trains youngsters for Israel's War of Independence, and drives the Mirrer Rosh Yeshivah and countless others daily to the sunrise minyan at the Kosel.

    This book tells the story of the Division in the words of the soldiers who fought with it: of its part in the three ferocious battles in Normandy - Epsom, Goodwood and Bluecoat, the great 'Swan' to Amiens, the taking of Antwerp, right flanking for Market Garden, back-up in the Ardennes and the final slog into Germany across well-defended river barriers, to the liberation of Belsen, Lubeck and the Danish frontier. The Division suffered 10,000 casualties, with almost 2,000 lost in action, and so this is also a story of courage and the hardships of a winter campaign, of being wounded, comradeship and fighting fear. Contributions are included from twelve of the regiments who proudly wore the sign of the Black Bull. Memories from troop commanders and riflemen, bombardiers and signalmen, tank crews, troop leaders and from the dashing GOC are brought together to reveal what life was like at the sharp end. Published in commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the Normandy landings, The Black Bull is illustrated with over fifty black and white contemporary photographs showing the Division in action. It will appeal not only to those who still have memories of the battles and to those who fought in the Second World War, but also to readers interested in the day-to-day actions and thoughts of soldiers on the front line for almost a year.

    The trials and tribulations of the invading force are captured in eye-witness accounts from over 100 of the participants and make this an unforgettable saga of men moving towards disaster.

    The book examines Byzantine attitudes to warfare, the effects of war on society and culture, and the relations between the soldiers, their leaders and society. The communications, logistics, resources and manpower capabilities of the Byzantine Empire are explored to set warfare in its geographical as well as historical context. In addition to the strategic and tactical evolution of the army, this book analyses the army in campaign and in battle, and its attitudes to violence in the context of the Byzantine Orthodox Church. The Byzantine Empire has an enduring fascination for all those who study it, and Warfare, State and Society is a colourful study of the central importance of warfare within it.

    the highest British award were awarded for one night of blood and fire in 1879 than ever before or since. That night has become immortalized in the mythology of the British Empire as 'Rorke's Drift'

    Authentic uniforms and weapons are captured in full color in realistic backgrounds. This "bible" for militaria collectors and modelers features original uniforms and gear, and kits from leading private collectors, posed on live models. An accurate, very thorough and well photographed record.

    

    Book by Nye, Roger H.

    Specifically, the heroes are a handful of National Guardsmen of the Carolinas' 30th Infantry Division who, for five days in August, 1944, withstood the full fury of a massive Nazi counterattack that threatened to cut-off and defeat the Allies' breakout from the Normandy beaches.

    Not only are we taken into the very heart of the fighting, we are also given a panoramic view of naval warfare through the centuries. 'A masterly study' DAILY MAIL 'Rich in unexpected facts and insights. . . Keegan's historical command is dazzling. ' JAN MORRIS INDEPENDENT

    Alonzo Hereford Cushing offers valuable insights into the nature of the Civil War and the men who fought it. Brown's vivid descriptions of the heat and exhaustion of forced marches, of the fury of battle, have seldom been matched in Civil War literature.

    Browning explores the often-changing war aims of the major belligerents-Austria, France, Great Britain, Prussia, Piedmont-Sardinia, and Spain-and links diplomatic and military events to the political and social context from which they arose.

    A hired man on a farm in Juneau County, Wisconsin, he was among the first to anwer Lincoln's call for volunteers in 1861. Sullivan fought in a score of major battles, was wounded five times, and was the only soldier of his regiment to enlist on three separate occasions.An Irishman in the Iron Brigade is a collection of Sullivan's writings about his hard days in President Lincoln's Army. Using war diaries and letters, the Irish immigrant composed nearly a dozen revealing accounts about the battles of his brigage-Brawner Farm, Second Bull Run, South Mountain, Chancellorsville and Gettysburg as well as the fighting of 1864. Using his old camp name, Mickey of Company K, Sullivan wrote not so much for family or for history, but to entertain his comrades of the old Iron Brigade. His stories-overlooked and forgotten for more than a century- are delightful accounts of rough-hewn Western soldiers in the Eastern Army of the Potomac. His Gettysburg account, for example, is one of the best recollections of that epic battle by a soldier in the ranks. He also left a from-the-ranks view of some of the Union's major soldiers such as George McClellan, Irvin McDowell, John Pope, and Ambrose Burnside.An Irishman in the Iron Brigade is in part the story of the great veterans' movement which shaped the nation's politics before the turn-of-the-century. Troubled by economic hardship, advancing age, and old war injuries, Sullivan turned to old comrades, his memories, and writing, to put the great experiences of his life in perspective.

    Elting.Volume I is composed entirely of the various French uniforms worn from the Revolution to Egypt to Russia and finally to Waterloo. Other volumes contains other nations' uniforms.

    As Jack Shulimson shows, only a century ago the Corps' identity and existence were much in question. Although the Marines were formally established by Congress in 1798 and subsequently distinguished themselves fighting on the Barbary Coast, their essential mission and identity remained unclear throughout most of the nineteenth century. But amid the crosscurrents of industrialization, technological change, professionalization, and reform that emerged I Gilded Age America, the Corps underwent a gradual transformation that ultimately secured its significant and enduring military role. In this enlightening study, Shulimson argues that the Marine Corps officers' inextricable ties to the Navy both hampered and aided their attempt to define their own special jurisdiction and professional identity. Often treated like a poor relation, the Marine officers frequently found themselves in direct competition with their counterparts in the Navy and at times the object of the latter's scorn. Shulimson reveals the processes, politics, and personalities that converged to create these tense and sometimes embattled relations, but he goes on to show how Marine officers (with the Navy's blessing) eventually transcended their second-class role.

    The First Missouri Confederate Brigade earned the most distinguished record of any comparable unit. Yet, earlier historians have ignored its accomplishments during some of the most strategically important engagements of the war. Significantly, they had major roles from their first battle at Pea Ridge in early 1862 to their last at Fort Blakely in April 1865.

    Army during World War II hoped that they might make permanent gains as a result of their military service and their willingness to defend their country. They were soon disabused of such illusions. Taps for a Jim Crow Army is a powerful collection of letters written by black soldiers in the 1940s to various government and nongovernment officials. The soldiers expressed their disillusionment, rage, and anguish over the discrimination and segregation they experienced in the Army. Most black troops were denied entry into army specialist schools; black officers were not allowed to command white officers; black soldiers were served poorer food and were forced to ride Jim Crow military buses into town and to sit in Jim Crow base movie theaters. In the South, German POWs could use the same latrines as white American soldiers, but blacks could not. The original foreword by Benjamin Quarles, professor emeritus of history at Morgan State University, and a new foreword by Bernard C. Nalty, the chief historian in the Office of Air Force History, offer rich insights into the world of these soldiers.

    

    From the early rise of Assyrians, Persians, Carthaginians, and Romans, view the ascendency of Parthians, Goths, Byzantines, Mongols, and the Ottoman Empire, and follow it to the 20th-century triumphs of Texas Rangers, Russian Cossacks, Bengal Lancers, and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.

    For the first time a broad survey has been made of the size of the navies and the production of warships from the Renaissance to the mid-19th century. The aim of the study is to explain the role of the navies in the process of monopolization of violence to the states, their position as growing organizations within the states and the interplay between dynamics and inertia within established institutions with a long life-span. The method is mainly comparative and as far as possible all European and American navies have been taken into consideration, including oared flotillas. There are extensive appendices and tables on the size and structure of the navies.

    There may be an interactive relationship between policy, strategy and weaponry but, he contends, policy and strategy always take the front seat.

    The siege was an integral part of medieval military experience, and was particularly significant in the Mediterranean region. Rogers explores siege warfare and the role it played in the First Crusadeand the establishment of the Crusader States, in Italy, Spain, and Portugal, and in the seaborne expeditions of the Italian maritime states. Rogers sets out to discover how it was that crusading forces handicapped by rudimentary organization and logistical support were able to conduct some of themost dramatic siege operations of the pre-gunpowder period. He traces the development and diffusion of techniques and analyzes the experience of siege warfare in every aspect, from the question of supplies of component parts for siege engines to the often complex political situations of besieger andbesieged. This is a book which contributes not only to the military history of the twelfth century but also to its political and cultural history.

    In contrast, no fewer than a million Swiss troops served as mercenaries in the armies of Europe during the preceding 500 years. Swiss mercenaries form a significant strand in the rope of European military history, and this book draws on many French and German-language sources to describe how the Swiss emerged from the isolated valleys of the Alps with a new method of warfare. Their massed columns of pike-carrying infantry were the first foot-soldiers since Roman times who could hold their own against the cavalry. For a brief period at the end of the 15th century the Swiss army appeared unbeatable, and after Swiss independence had been ensured they were hired out as mercenaries throughout Europe. Kings and generals competed to hire these elite combat troops. Nearly half of the million served with the French, their centuries of loyal service culminating with the massacre of the Swiss Guards during the French Revolution. Marlborough, Frederick the Great and Napoleon all hired large numbers of Swiss troops, and three Swiss regiments served in the British Army.

    This behind-the-scenes account of the development of the Navy's frontline strike fighter exposes the politics of high-stakes Pentagon weapon procurement.

    Army created parachute regimental combat teams. Drawing on daring volunteers willing to hurl themselves from airplanes and hit the ground fighting, the 517th PRCT became one of the most highly trained airborne units in the world. Blooded in northern Italy in 1944, the Battling Buzzards dropped at night in southern France for the second D-day to spearhead a savage advance through the Champagne region and then into the Alps.Gerald Astor, acclaimed author of A Blood-Dimmed Tide, draws on the words of the men of the 517th to create this gripping, action-packed account of a unit that existed for only two years but fought heroically to defeat the vaunted German forces. From its campaign in Italy to its assault in the French Alps, the Battling Buzzards helped push the Germans out of southern Europe one fierce, close-quarter battle at a time. Then, after six months of nonstop action, the exhausted, battle-hardened 517th was called into the ultimate battle — at a place called The Bulge....

    M. Moriarty's Marine Observation Squadron II, VMO-Z, was an indispensable part of the Marine Corps's air war in Vietnam. For the pilots and observers of VMO-2 were the crucial link in the Marine air/ground team, providing fire support and intelligence for the reconnaissance and infantry units on the ground in their never-ending battle of survival, evasion, and escape in the deadly jungles of Vietnam.During his tours in Vietnam, Moriarty saw many incidents that never made the history books. And on their missions flying in Southeast Asia, Moriarty and his crews often made the difference between life and death for recon teams and grunts in contact with the NVA below. The sacrifice and heroism Moriarty saw deserve a place in our nation's history that should never be forgotten.

    Most of these detentions took place in the summer of 1940, soon after Winston Churchill became Prime Minister, when belief in the existence of a dangerous Fifth Column was widespread. Churchill, at first an enthusiast for vigorous use of the powers of executive detention, later came to lament the use of a power which was, in his words, `in the highest degree odious'.This book provides the first comprehensive study of Regulation 18B and its precursor in the First World War, Regulation 14B. Based on extensive use of primary sources, it describes the complex history of wartime executive detention: the purposes which it served, the administrative procedures and safeguards employed, the conflicts between the Home Office and the Security Service which surrounded its use, the part played by individuals, by Parliament, and by the courts in restraining abuse of executive power, and the effect of detention upon the lives of individuals concerned, very few of whom constituted any threat to national security. Much of what was done was kept secret at the time, and even today the authorities continue to refuse access to many of the papers which have escaped deliberate destruction. This study is the first to attempt to penetrate the veil of secrecy and tell the story of the gravest invasion of civil liberty which has occurred in Britain this century.

    The Celts adopted this weapon from European Bronze Age cultures and completed its development after it had been superseded by short, stabbing weapons in thewarfare of advanced civilizations. Nonetheless, the role played by the Celtic long sword remained considerable. In this first major study of the subject, Pleiner assesses the importance of the sword, and provides the first systematic treatment of the relevant historical and technological problemsassociated with its manufacture.

    

    - Provocative and entertaining study of sieges in history - Commentary on the nature and evolution of combat across the centuries Bruce Allen Watson examines seven sieges: Jerusalem at the end of the First Crusade in 1099, Malta in 1565, Sebastopol during the Crimean War, Kut-al-Amara in World War I, Singapore in World War II, Dien Bien Phu, and the 1991 Gulf War.

    This memoir of his service is a remarkable narrative, filled with the minutiae of the soldier's life and paced by a continual succession of battlefield anecdotes.Three main stories emerge from Benson's account: his reconnaissance exploits, his experiences in battle, and his escape from prison. Though not yet eighteen years old when he left his home in Augusta, Georgia, to join the army, Benson was soon singled out for the abilities that would serve him well as a scout. Not only was he a crack shot, a natural leader, and a fierce Southern partisan, but he had a kind of restless energy and curiosity, loved to take risks, and was an instant and infallible judge of human nature. His recollections of scouting take readers within arm's reach of Union trenches and encampments. Benson recalls that while eavesdropping he never failed to be shocked by the Yankees' foul language; he had never heard that kind of talk in a Confederate camp!Benson's descriptions of the many battles in which he fought--including Cold Harbor, The Seven Days, Manassas, Sharpsburg, Fredericksburg, Spotsylvania, and Petersburg--convey the desperation of a full frontal charge and the blind panic of a disorganized retreat. Yet in these accounts, Benson's own demeanor under fire is manifest in the coolly measured tone he employs.A natural writer, Benson captures the dark absurdities of war in such descriptions as those of hardened veterans delighting in the new shoes and other equipment they found on corpse-littered battlefields. His clothing often torn by bullets, Benson was also badly bruised a number of times by spent rounds. At one point, in May 1863, he was wounded seriously enough in the leg to be hospitalized, but he returned to the field before full recuperation.Benson was captured behind enemy lines in May 1864 while on a scouting mission for General Lee. Confined to Point Lookout Prison in Maryland, he escaped after only two days and swam the Potomac to get back into Virginia. Recaptured near Washington, D.C., he was briefly held in Old Capitol Prison, then sent to Elmira Prison in New York. There he joined a group of ten men who made the only successful tunnel escape in Elmira's history. After nearly six months in captivity or on the run, he rejoined his unit in Virginia. Even at Appomattox, Benson refused to surrender but stole off with his brother to North Carolina, where they planned to join General Johnston. Finding the roads choked with Union forces and surrendered Confederates, the brothers ultimately bore their unsurrendered rifles home to Augusta.Berry Benson first wrote his memoirs for his family and friends. Completed in 1878, they drew on his--and partially on his brother's--wartime diaries, as well as on letters that both brothers had written to family members during the war. The memoirs were first published in book form in 1962 but have long been unavailable. This edition, with a new foreword by the noted Civil War historian Herman Hattaway, will introduce this compelling story to a new generation of readers.

    We're giving the American people what they want and badly need--heroes, said a Vietnam jungle POW. I feel it's our responsibility, our duty to help them where possible shed the idea this war was a waste, useless, as unpopular as it may have been. In the first book to explore the entire range of memoirs, biographies, and group histories published since America's Vietnam POWs returned home, Craig Howes explores the development of a collective history. He describes how these captives drew upon their national heritage to compose a unified, common story while still in prison, and how individual POWs have responded to this Official Story. Examining what racial, cultural, and political assumptions support this shared Official Story, Howes places the POWs' experiences squarely in the center of American history, and within those larger clashes of opinion and belief which characterized the nation's response to the Vietnam War. The result is an engrossing study of what these captivity narratives can tell us about the POWs, their captors, and America's Vietnam legacy.

    The Rexist movement was founded in the early 1930s by Leon Degrelle as a movement of renovation and conquest, and it was gradually transformed into a political party which won 11% of the vote in the general election of 1936. After the German blitzkreig which overwhelmed Belgium in May 1940, Degrelle and the Rexists declared open support for the Nazis, founding a volunteer army which fought on the Eastern front, and eventually receiving the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves for his efforts in supporting the Nazis. After the fall of the Reich, Degrelle fled to Spain where he continues to live today. Conway has based this account of a little-known part of the history of World War II on a comprehensive examination of the Belgian and German records, as well as personal interviews with Degrelle himself and other surviving Rexists.

    Army Signal Intelligence Service broke the Japanese diplomatic code. In 1975 Ōshima Hiroshi, Japan's ambassador to Berlin during World War II, died, never knowing that the hundreds of messages he transmitted to Tokyo had been fully decoded by the Americans and whisked off to Washington, providing a major source of information for the Allies on Nazi activities.Resurrecting Ōshima's decoded communications, which had remained classified for several decades, Carl Boyd provides a unique look at the Nazis from the perspective of a close foreign observer and ally. He uses Ōshima's own words to reveal the thought and strategies of Adolf Hitler and other high-ranking Nazis, with whom Ōshima associated.In addition to providing illuminating insight into Nazi activities and attitudes--military buildup in North Africa, the unwillingness to accept a separate peace with the Soviets--Boyd illustrates the functions of MAGIC. He demonstrates how that intelligence, gathered by teams of American cryptographers, influenced Allied strategy and helped bring about the downfall of Hitler and his Japanese confidant.

    Spaatz embodies the spirit and accomplishments of the American airman. His professional life, encompassing the first half of the twentieth century, is the story of the rise of U.S. air power as a positive force for world peace. At the pinnacle of his wartime success, General Spaatz controlled an air armada that wielded the world's most destructive weapons before the dawn of the nuclear age. As the senior U.S. Army Air Forces officer in Europe during World War II, he presided over a monumental expansion of American air power in the theater and directed the systematic bombing of Nazi Germany. This volume traces Spaatz's career from his formative years and World War I experiences as a fledgling fighter pilot through the end of World War II—when he attended the German surrender surrender as commander of the U.S. Strategic Air Forces in Europe.