After WWI, battlecruisers were readily converted into aircraft carriers, with questions on how to handle the aircraft on the flight deck beginning to be raised and techniques of how to attack enemy ships beginning to develop. How Carriers Fought focuses on the HOW, not the what, when, or the by whom. It begins by examining the tools and the building blocks of carrier operations, looking at what life was really like in the cockpit for the pilots alongside the technicalities of navigation and communication. A world of tactical dehydration, amphetamine pills, and illegal smoking is explored, as well as the measures they put in place to reduce their risk of death on being hit.This book goes on to examine the major carrier battles of WWII, from the Battle of the Coral Sea to the Battle of Leyte Gulf, with a focus on how the tools of carrier operations were employed during these battles. At the Battle of the Midway the debate of concentration vs. dispersion became relevant, as the Japanese decided to divide their forces while the Americans concentrated theirs. How Carriers Fought questions these tactics, exploring which worked best in theory and in practice. How were searches made, how many planes were used, what was the range and coverage of the search, and how many hits were scored and losses suffered?The final section of the book looks at how carrier operations changed in major ways during the course of the war, as better technology and a better understanding of this new type of warfare allowed for quick advances in how operations were carried out. For example, the balance between fighter and bomber planes changed dramatically, with the US beginning the war with 20% fighters and ending it with 80% fighters. This book gives a comprehensive insight into carrier operations in WWII, with a focus on the Pacific War between the US Navy and the Imperial Japanese Navy. A series of appendices expands on topics such as radar, landing on a carrier, radios and even carrier pigeons.

    Tasked with guarding vital Atlantic convoys and later commanding 'Hunter/Killer' groups, author Captain Donald MacIntyre (1904-1981) became a near-legend during the war, with 7 destroyed German submarines to his credit, as well as several U-boat captures. He also survived a torpedo hit, and, after ramming a U-boat, successfully piloted the damaged ship back to safety.

    By the time Foley finally managed to grab a few hours sleep three nights later, he'd already fought in a bloody attack that left sixty percent of his battalion dead or wounded. That was just the beginning of one of the toughest, bloodiest challenges the 94th would ever face: breaking through the Siegfried Line. Now, in Visions from a Foxhole, Foley recaptures that desperate, nerve-shattering struggle in all its horror and heroism. Features the author's artwork of his fellow soldiers and battle scenes, literally sketched from the foxhole Look for these remarkable stories of American courage at war BEHIND HITLER'S LINESThe True Story of the Only Soldier to Fight for BothAmerica and the Soviet Union in World War IIThomas H. TaylorTHE HILL FIGHTSThe First Battle of Khe Sanhby Edward F. Murphy NO BENDED KNEEThe Battle for Guadalcanalby Gen. Merrill B. Twining, USMC (Ret.) THE ROAD TO BAGHDADBehind Enemy Lines: The Adventures of an American Soldier in the Gulf Warby Martin Stanton

    Invaded by both Germany and the Soviet Union, it remained under occupation by foreign armies from the first day of the war to the last. The conflict was brutal, as Polish armies battled the enemy on four different fronts. It was on Polish soil that the architects of the Final Solution assembled their most elaborate network of extermination camps, culminating in the deliberate destruction of millions of lives, including three million Polish Jews. In The Eagle Unbowed, Halik Kochanski tells, for the first time, the story of Poland's war in its entirety, a story that captures both the diversity and the depth of the lives of those who endured its horrors.Most histories of the European war focus on the Allies' determination to liberate the continent from the fascist onslaught. Yet the "good war" looks quite different when viewed from Lodz or Krakow than from London or Washington, D.C. Poland emerged from the war trapped behind the Iron Curtain, and it would be nearly a half-century until Poland gained the freedom that its partners had secured with the defeat of Hitler. Rescuing the stories of those who died and those who vanished, those who fought and those who escaped, Kochanski deftly reconstructs the world of wartime Poland in all its complexity-from collaboration to resistance, from expulsion to exile, from Warsaw to Treblinka. The Eagle Unbowed provides in a single volume the first truly comprehensive account of one of the most harrowing periods in modern history.

    Ideal for readers of Evan Mawdsley, Max Hastings and Iain Ballantyne.On the 8th June 1940, the Nazi battleships Scharnhorst and Gneisenau opened their guns on the aircraft-carrier HMS Glorious.Within minutes the Glorious was taking on water and the order was given to abandon ship.Hundreds of men leapt into the icy waters of the Norwegian Sea. They hoped and prayed that nearby ships would have heard their distress signal and send help.Yet, they did not come. Men were left to tread water, hold onto small inflatables or clamber onto overcrowded lifeboats. The situation looked bleak for the few who survived the first twenty-four hours; there was nothing to eat and men resorted to drinking saltwater and their own urine to slake their thirst, but the effects of hypothermia and delirium began to take their toll.Over 1,200 men lost their lives as a result of this tragedy.Only forty men survived this ordeal, one of which was Royal Marine Ronald “Tubby” Healiss, who served as a member of a 4.7 gun crew on the Glorious. His award-winning account is a true and terrible record of suffering, which uncovers one of the greatest undocumented naval stories of the Second World War.

     Sixty-thousand marines had landed on the barren, volcanic island that was five miles long and two and half miles wide. For five weeks these men would become involved in some of the bloodiest and fiercest fighting of the Second World War. One third of them would end the battle either dead or wounded. The U.S. Marines on Iwo Jima written by five official marine combat writers, who personally saw action on the island, provides vivid insight into the battle that was described as “a nightmare in hell.” Henri and his fellow correspondents provide a step-by-step chronological overview of the battle as it was fought. They begin with an outline of the months of preparation that were undertaken before the first gun was fired before providing details on how the generals and admirals put their plans into action. Every aspect of the conflict is covered by the authors who interviewed many of the frontline troops to gain a sense of what the battle was like witnessed from the marines on the ground. “Among the Americans who served on Iwo, uncommon valor was a common virtue” — Fleet Admiral Chester W. Nimitz, Commander in Chief, U. S. Pacific Fleet. “The Japanese, despite heavy losses, offered maximum resistance, but the Marines were established on high ground and the conquest of Iwo Jima was assured.” — Fleet Admiral Ernest J. King. This book is essential reading for all who wish to understand what the U.S. Marines went through in their famous capture of Iwo Jima. The authors of this book are three Marine Corps combat correspondents and two Marine Public Relations Officers who were at Iwo Jima. Combat correspondents are trained like other Marines. They live and fight with the outfits to which they are attached and write articles for newspapers and magazines about the men in their units. In battle they can see only what happens in their own units’ limited sectors. In compiling this book, therefore, they drew upon their own experiences on Iwo plus stories written by other combat correspondents and Public Relations Officers who were there. The authors were Captain Raymond Henri, Public Relations Officer, 3d Marine Division, who passed away in 2015, First Lieutenant Jim G. Lucas, Assistant Public Relations Officer, 4th Marine Division, who passed away in 1971, Technical Sergeant W. Keyes Beech, Combat Correspondent, 5th Marine Division, who passed away in 1990, Technical Sergeant David K. Dempsey, Combat Correspondent, 4th Marine Division who passed away in 1999, and Technical Sergeant Alvin M. Josephy, Jr., Combat Correspondent, 3d Marine Division, who passed away in 2005. Their book was first published in 1945.

    It's the story of real people in war-friends and thieves, dreamers and killers, jokers and heroes-as well as the personal account of a young American plucked from a sheltered and comfortable life and sent to a foreign land to save the men fighting to save the world. Few books have portrayed the grit and wonder of war with such eloquence, and still fewer have shown how war looks through the eyes of a soldier whose mission was saving lives, not taking them.

    THE CORSAIR LOOKED TRULY VICIOUS …’ In 1942 Norman Hanson learnt to fly the Royal Navy’s newest fighter: the US-built Chance Vought Corsair. Fast, rugged and demanding to fly, it was an intimidating machine. But in the hands of its young Fleet Air Arm pilots it also proved to be a lethal weapon. Posted to the South Pacific aboard HMS Illustrious, Hanson and his squadron took the fight to the Japanese. Facing a desparate and determined enemy, Kamikaze attacks and the ever-present dangers of flying off a pitching carrier deck, death was never far away. Brought to life in vivid, visceral detail, Carrier Pilot is one of the finest aviator’s memoirs of the war; an awe-inspiring, thrilling, sometimes terrifying account of war in the air. PRAISE FOR CARRIER PILOT 'Just outstanding. Carrier Pilot is up there with First Light and The Big Show as one of the best pilot’s memoirs of WWII.’ ROWLAND WHITE, AUTHOR OF VULCAN 607 'Hanson's thrilling memoir takes you right into the cockpit in a way few writers have ever managed. The lethal world of the wartime Royal Navy carrier pilot, with its casual and shocking violence, horrific attrition, yet extraordinary camaraderie is so vividly brought to life that one can almost smell the smoke, oil and sweat. Real, adrenalin-charged, and ridiculously dangerous flying, Hanson's account is an aviation classic that has to be read.’ JAMES HOLLAND, AUTHOR OF DAM BUSTERS and THE WAR IN THE WEST

    The resulting account is a treasure trove of first-hand material, from personal memories, diary entries and letters to leave passes, wartime newspaper cuttings, Wehrmacht bulletins and more than 160 photographs.The account follows the unit from its formation in 1943 and the catastrophic events on the Eastern Front, through battles on the Western Front and engagements against the American 3rd Armoured Division to the confusion of retreat, panic-stricken flight and Soviet captivity in the closing stages of the war. Honest and unflinching, this remarkable collection of autobiographies offers a glimpse into life in Hitler's panzer division and is a stark testimony of a generation that sacrificed its best years to the war.This is the first English-language translation of the work.

    The place the Germans had chosen for this stand was Monte Cassino.Over the next few months it was to turn into one of the most famous, bitterly fought and controversial conflicts of World War II. It was here, under the shadows of the famous and ancient Benedictine Abbey, that four fierce and punishing battles were fought out between the Allies and the German Army. Few battles of the Second World War compare with Cassino for drama of the conflict nor for the prolonged agony of the combatants or the controversy over the tactics of the commanders that was to rage for years afterwards. 'Cassino: Portrait of a Battle' is the inside, first-hand account of that titanic struggle. Fred Majdalany, who fought in the battle as an infantry officer, provides the definitive history of Cassino, from the highest strategic level down to the bitter fighting on the ground, and the heroism and suffering of individual soldiers.It is a classic World War Two story that will appeal to students, military specialists and the general reader alike. Fred Majdalany's books have been widely praised. "Majdalany recounts the battle with the clarity of full comprehension."—New Yorker"A shrewd and valuable survey. . . . The course of the battle is lucidly and succinctly described in its successive stages."—Times Literary Supplement

    It is without question one of the most famous battles in history. Now, for the first time since Gordon W. Prange’s bestselling Miracle at Midway, Jonathan Parshall and Anthony Tully offer a new interpretation of this great naval engagement. Unlike previous accounts, Shattered Sword makes extensive use of Japanese primary sources. It also corrects the many errors of Mitsuo Fuchida’s Midway: The Battle That Doomed Japan, an uncritical reliance upon which has tainted every previous Western account. It thus forces a major, potentially controversial reevaluation of the great battle. Parshall and Tully examine the battle in detail and effortlessly place it within the context of the Imperial Navy’s doctrine and technology. With a foreword by leading World War II naval historian John Lundstrom, Shattered Sword is an indispensable part of any military buff’s library.Shattered Sword is the winner of the 2005 John Lyman Book Award for the "Best Book in U.S. Naval History" and was cited by Proceedings as one of its "Notable Naval Books" for 2005.

    B. Cates, General, U. S. Marine Corps. Saipan was the last barrier that the prevented the Allied forces from launching their entire military might against the Japanese homeland. Victory at Saipan was the key which opened the door to the soft underbelly of the Japanese Empire. Yet, because the Japanese were aware of this vulnerability, they were willing to throw everything they had against the ever-encroaching American forces and fight to the death to defend this island. Fifteen battleships began their bombardment of Japanese positions on 13 June 1944, they would fire over 165,000 shells onto the island. Then at 0700 on 15 June 8000 marines travelled in 300 LVTs to land on the west coast of Saipan to begin their assault. The Japanese high command realized that without resupply the island would be impossible to hold, but they and their soldiers were to fight until the last man. To make things as difficult as possible for the U. S. marines the Japanese used guerilla tactics to disrupt the offensive and dug themselves in in the mountainous terrain of central Saipan. Carl Hoffman’s brilliant account of this ferocious battle takes the reader through the course of its duration, from the initial discussion of plans and preparations right through to the eventual victory. This book is essential for anyone interested in the Pacific theater of war during World War Two and for the huge impact that the marine corps made in some of the bloodiest battles ever to have taken place. Carl W. Hoffman was a Major General in the United States Marines Corps. He served in World War Two, the Korean War and the Vietnam War. During World War Two he earned the Silver Star and two Purple Heart Medals while participating in operations on Guadalcanal, Tarawa, Saipan and Tinian. His book Saipan: The Beginning of the End was first published in 1950 and he passed away in 2016.

    You’re either alive or dead.”–Richard O’KaneHailed as the ace of aces, captain Richard O’Kane, winner of the Congressional Medal of Honor for his consummate skill and heroism as a submarine skipper, sank more enemy ships and saved more downed fliers than anyone else.Now Pulitzer Prize—winning author William Tuohy captures all the danger, the terror, and the pulse-pounding action of undersea combat as he chronicles O’Kane’s wartime career–from his valiant service as executive officer under Wahoo skipper Dudley “Mush” Morton to his electrifying patrols as commander of the USS Tang and his incredible escape, with eight other survivors, after Tang was sunk by its own defective torpedo.Above all, The Bravest Man is the dramatic story of mavericks who broke the rules and set the pace to become a new breed of hunter/killer submariners who waged a unique brand of warfare. These undersea warriors would blaze their own path to victory–and transform the “Silent Service” into the deadliest fighting force in the Pacific.

    A landmark text on the greatest land battle of the Pacific War.

    Week after week, Mauldin defied army censors, German artillery, and Patton’s pledge to “throw his ass in jail” to deliver his wildly popular cartoon, “Up Front,” to the pages of Stars and Stripes. “Up Front” featured the wise-cracking Willie and Joe, whose stooped shoulders, mud-soaked uniforms, and pidgin of army slang and slum dialect bore eloquent witness to the world of combat and the men who lived—and died—in it. This taut, lushly illustrated biography—the first of two-time Pulitzer Prize winner Bill Mauldin—is illustrated with more than ninety classic Mauldin cartoons and rare photographs. It traces the improbable career and tumultuous private life of a charismatic genius who rose to fame on his motto: “If it’s big, hit it.”