Flyboys, a story of war and horror but also of friendship and honor, tells the story of those men. Over the remote Pacific island of Chichi Jima, nine American flyers-Navy and Marine pilots sent to bomb Japanese communications towers there-were shot down. One of those nine was miraculously rescued by a U.S. Navy submarine. The others were captured by Japanese soldiers on Chichi Jima and held prisoner. Then they disappeared. When the war was over, the American government, along with the Japanese, covered up everything that had happened on Chichi Jima. The records of a top-secret military tribunal were sealed, the lives of the eight Flyboys were erased, and the parents, brothers, sisters, and sweethearts they left behind were left to wonder. Flyboys reveals for the first time ever the extraordinary story of those men. Bradley's quest for the truth took him from dusty attics in American small towns, to untapped government archives containing classified documents, to the heart of Japan, and finally to Chichi Jima itself. What he discovered was a mystery that dated back far before World War II-back 150 years, to America's westward expansion and Japan's first confrontation with the western world. Bradley brings into vivid focus these brave young men who went to war for their country, and through their lives he also tells the larger story of two nations in a hellish war. With no easy moralizing, Bradley presents history in all its savage complexity, including the Japanese warrior mentality that fostered inhuman brutality and the U.S. military strategy that justified attacks on millions of civilians. And, after almost sixty years of mystery, Bradley finally reveals the fate of the eight American Flyboys, all of whom would ultimately face a moment and a decision that few of us can even imagine. Flyboys is a story of war and horror but also of friendship and honor. It is about how we die, and how we live-including the tale of the Flyboy who escaped capture, a young Navy pilot named George H. W. Bush who would one day become president of the United States. A masterpiece of historical narrative, Flyboys will change forever our understanding of the Pacific war and the very things we fight for.

    47 DAYS tells the true story of Günter and Helmut, best friends, who dared to defy and disobey. Without knowing how long the war might continue, they spent 47 harrowing days as fugitives on the run. Being caught meant certain execution. 47 DAYS is a novelette, an excerpt from the novel, SURVIVING THE FATHERLAND—A True Coming-of-age Love Story Set in WWII Germany. Set against the epic panorama of WWII, it is a sweeping saga of family, love, and betrayal and illuminates an intimate part of history seldom seen: the children's war.

    Learn about her remarkable experience during the Holocaust and its long-term aftereffects. Some of Rachel's struggles within the Nazi SS final solution were similar to the tragic experience of Anne Frank. Both found poignant but fleeting young love. Each had an attic experience and both were chronicler-victims of World War 2. While Anne Frank survives in her diary, Rachel survived and is telling her story. Rachel endured 6 long years in Hitler's death camps. Rachel's remarkable saga didn't end with her liberation at the end of World War 2. Rachel had lost her idyllic community, her strong Jewish spiritual roots, her adolescence and most of her immediate family. So thorough and diabolical was the Nazi Holocaust that Rachel even lost her birthday! Rachel tells us about those terrible personal moments in the camps when Life and Love struggled against Death personified. On one of these struggles with Death, Rachel's Love experienced that scream. That powerful Holocaust Scream is her biggest hurt. You can find out about that scream for yourself. Prepare to cry. Rachel was clever and resourceful. She was able to hide in the camps. How could she do that? You will find out. When the camp gates were finally thrust open, Rachel had to reconnect to all those things that we take for granted. It wasn't easy. Rachel had to take charge in order to get through the post-war turmoil. Rachel became a beacon of help to many in need. Rachel and her husband Carl were interviewed by movie director Steven Spielberg. Some of her concentration camp and ghetto experiences served as background for the movie, "Schindler's List." Learn about Rachel's encounters with Nazis in the United States. Rachel is witty and charming. Her attitude toward her Holocaust experience is truly remarkable. Find out how Rachel feels about the German people. Rachel is an example of the "leading lady" persona. What does it mean to be a "leading lady?" Rachel's story unfolds like a kaleidoscope of images. There is a rhythm to her story, one that defies organization. The rhythm creates a remarkable connection with the reader. You will sense the rhythm as you resonate with it. Get ready. The story includes several dialogues with Rachel. In the dialogues, Rachel tells her story in her own words as much as possible. These dialogues reveal Rachel's keen memory, insight, honesty and vulnerability. Rachel has some advice for those who may be in terrible circumstances. You can meet this remarkable women and follow the gripping tale of her life's struggles. It's time for you to meet Rachel. Come on in.

    Over the next thirty-five days, approximately 28,000 soldiers died, including nearly 22,000 Japanese and 6,821 Americans, making Iwo Jima one of the costliest battles of World War II.Best-selling oral historian Larry Smith dug deep for exclusive stories from Iwo Jima veterans, including the last surviving flag raiser on Mount Suribachi, a Navajo "Code Talker," a retired general, two Medal of Honor recipients, B-29 flyers, and other die-hard Marines who secured the island. Along the way, Smith investigates the controversy surrounding the famous photograph by Joe Rosenthal and presents the groundbreaking story of Japanese General Tadamichi Kuribayashi, rumored to have committed suicide rather than submit to capture.With dozens of photographs and maps, Iwo Jima is an unprecedented look at this pivotal battle and an inspiring study in courage, perseverance, and humanity.

    He wrote the classic on which George C. Scott based his film portrayal.

    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

    Kernan served in many battles and was aboard the Hornet when it was sunk by torpedoes in the Battle of the Santa Cruz Islands.“One of the most arresting naval autobiographies yet published.”—Sir John Keegan“An honest story of collective courage, evocative, well-written, and fixed before the colors fade.”—Kirkus Reviews“[Kernan] recounts a wonderful and exciting American story about a poor farm boy from Wyoming who enlisted in the Navy. . . .[He] has written eight other books. I will go back and read them all.”—John Lehman, Air & Space“Details . . . make the moment vivid; that is what it was like, on the Hornet in its last hours.”—Samuel Hynes, New York Times Book Review

    This biography of the charismatic leader relies almost entirely on the original of the period. David Irving's exhaustive research has led him to a dusty personnel file on the young Rommel applying - and being turned down - for army commissions, the long-lost "Rommel Diaries", dictated day-by-day to an army corporal and covering two momentous years of his triumphs and defeats in North Africa and numerous other private papers. From them emerges the picture of both an outstanding soldier and military commander, whose tactical genius, brilliance on the battlefields and extraordinary exploits captures the imagination of the world, and Rommel as a husband and father.

    Don Malarkey takes us not only into the battles fought from Normandy to Germany, but into the heart and mind of a soldier who beat the odds to become an elite paratrooper, and lost his best friend during the nightmarish engagement at Bastogne. Drafted in 1942, Malarkey arrived at Camp Toccoa in Georgia and was one of the one in six soldiers who earned their Eagle wings. He went to England in 1943 to provide cover on the ground for the largest amphibious military attack in history: Operation Overlord.In the darkness of D-day morning, Malarkey parachuted into France and within days was awarded a Bronze Star for his heroism in battle. He fought for twenty-three days in Normandy, nearly eighty in Holland, thirty-nine in Bastogne, and nearly thirty more in and near Haugenau, France, and the Ruhr pocket in Germany.This is his dramatic tale of those bloody days fighting his way from the shores of France to the heartland of Germany, and the epic story of how an adventurous kid from Oregon became a leader of men.

    Like old soldiers everywhere, they are fading away. But these soldiers have an incredible and sometimes shocking story to tell. It certainly does not make for comfortable reading. Secrets which have been bottled up for a lifetime are revealed, stories are told at last and memories which have been hidden away for 60 years finally resurface. These are facets of history's most dreadful war being revealed for the very first time. "The Wehrmacht" is a remarkable personal record of the Third Reich's rise and fall from the inside: of how those responsible for the maelstrom sent their armies to conquer only to see them crushed as the world united against them; of men who were seduced by the siren call of Hitler, only to pay a terribly heavy price. It allows the human stories to unfold within the bigger picture behind the major campaigns of the Second World War - from the early Blitzkrieg successes through the submarine warfare of the Battle of the Atlantic, and the brutal hardships of the Russian Front, to the last days of the Reich and the fall of Berlin. "The Wehrmacht" is a brilliantly researched and thought-provoking book that reveals unique human dimensions of the world's greatest military conflict.

    He focuses on the home front: how our culture and politics affected the course of the war and how the war in turn affected us. Index.

    With a wry tone rarely seen in a combat memoir, Virski describes the hardships, the near-starvation rations, the inadequate clothing for the frozen wastelands, and his tense interactions with officers of the NKVD (secret police). He is wounded twice; earns a Medal of Valor; witnesses atrocities committed by both the Germans and the Soviets; is branded a deserter; and somehow finds time to fall in love more than once on his journey.A testament to the will of the human spirit, My Life in the Red Army is a must read for fans of World War 2 adventure.*Includes annotations and illustrations.

    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.

    soil.” – Admiral Nimitz All Americans are familiar with the “day that will live in infamy.” At 9:30 a.m. on Sunday, December 7, 1941, Pearl Harbor, the advanced base of the United States Navy’s Pacific Fleet, was ablaze. It had been smashed by aircraft launched by the carriers of the Imperial Japanese Navy. All eight battleships had been sunk or badly damaged, 350 aircraft had been knocked out, and over 2,000 Americans lay dead. Indelible images of the USS Arizona exploding and the USS Oklahoma capsizing and floating upside down have been ingrained in the American conscience ever since. In less than an hour and a half the Japanese had almost wiped out America’s entire naval presence in the Pacific. Despite fighting in North Africa and the Atlantic, the United States still had the resources and manpower to fight the Japanese in the Pacific. Though the Japanese had crippled the American fleet at Pearl Harbor, its distance from Japan made an invasion of Pearl Harbor impossible, and Japan had not severely damaged important infrastructure. Thus, the United States was able to quickly rebuild a fleet, still stationed at Pearl Harbor right in the heart of the Pacific. This forward location allowed the United States to immediately push deeply into the Pacific Theater. The Americans would eventually push the Japanese back across the Pacific, and one of the most instrumental leaders in the effort was Admiral Chester W. Nimitz, who commanded the U.S. Pacific Fleet and helped coordinate joint operations with the legendary General Douglas MacArthur, the Supreme Commander, Southwest Pacific Area. The ensuing strategies would lead to decisive operations at places like Midway, Iwo Jima, Okinawa, and others before the use of the atomic bombs compelled Japan’s surrender in August 1945. Admiral Chester W. Nimitz: The Life and Legacy of the U.S. Pacific Fleet’s Commander in Chief during World War II chronicles Nimitz’s life and examines the decisions he made during history’s deadliest war. Along with pictures of important people, places, and events, you will learn about Admiral Nimitz like never before.