atomic bomb attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the ensuing death and destruction that led to the end of World War II. The events that culminated in the fall of Japan - which forever changed the course of diplomacy, geopolitics, and warfare in the twentieth century - are vividly recreated through dramatic first-hand accounts of the major participants on both sides of the Pacific. They include: Harry Truman, the inexperienced American president who made the decision that would lead to unprecedented death and destruction; the war-mongering, but mysterious, Japanese Emperor Hirohito, who ultimately presided over his country's surrender; General Leslie Groves, the no-nonsense director of the Manhattan Project; and Paul Tibbets, the pilot of the plane, the Enola Gay, which dropped the very first nuclear bomb on Hiroshima in August 1945.

    This empire dominates western Europe from 800 until 1806, when it is defeated by Napoleon. The Second Reich: All of Germany is united behind Prussia under the leadership of Otto von Bismarck, victor of the Franco-Prussian War. Only Germany's defeat in World War I can break the power of the second German empire.What was the Third Reich?In 1933, Adolf Hitler was appointed Chancellor of Germany after convincing other members of the Reichstag that the Nazi party was better for the country than their feared rivals, the Communists. Within the year, the President of the German Republic will be dead, and Hitler will declare himself supreme leader of Germany.But how did it happen?The Third Reich: Adolf Hitler, Nazi Germany, World War II and The Last German Empire takes you on a guided tour of German history for the last thousand years. You'll study the constitution of the Weimar republic and the Treaty of Versailles, and come to understand why Hitler believed it was crucial to build a new Nazi empire that was second to no one other nation in Europe in terms of military development. You'll learn how Hitler used the rhetoric of racism and nationalism to transform himself from a democratically elected member of government into a dictator whose word was law.Most importantly, you'll learn how those changes paved the way to World War II and the atrocities of the Holocaust.

    

    

     They had raced four hundred miles across northern France, from the beaches of Normandy to the banks of the Moselle River, in less than one month. Facing them were the German forces that held the territory between the Moselle and the Sarre Rivers. Having had such success in the invasion of France the men of the Third Army were confident that they could smash their way into Nazi Germany. Yet, almost immediately, their progress was halted. A drastic shortage of fuel slowed the advance to a crawl, giving time for German reinforcements to arrive from across Germany and Italy. New Panzer divisions also arrived to support the Nazi forces and drive back the Allied forces. Over the next three and a half months Patton and his men fought against these battle-hardened troops and brutally powerful tanks in operations that have become subsequently known as the Lorraine Campaign. Hugh M. Cole’s The Lorraine Campaign is the definitive history of these bloody months of conflict. It records each phase of the campaign in brilliant detail, including the initial days when Patton’s army was brought to a halt at the banks of the Moselle, the Battle of Metz, and the offensive across the Saar River towards the Siegfried Line before the Germans launched their counteroffensive in the Ardennes. This book is essential reading for anyone interested in the European Theater of World War Two and how Patton and his Third Army were able to overcome huge obstacles in their drive to reach Berlin. Hugh M. Cole was an American historian and army officer, best known as the author of The Lorraine Campaign and The Ardennes: Battle of the Bulge, two volumes of the U.S. Army official history of World War II. During the Second World War he was assigned as a historical officer on the staff of General Patton's Third Army, with whom he participated in four campaigns in northern Europe. The Lorraine Campaign was first published in 1950. Cole passed away in 2005.

     Just over a month later they engaged five enemy destroyers and sunk three of them and received no damage themselves in what has been described by tacticians as “near perfect surface actions”. Over the course of the next four months Destroyer Squadron 23, which was nicknamed “The Little Beavers, would continue in the same vein and engage with enemy ships a further twenty-two times, destroying one Japanese cruiser, nine destroyers, one submarine, several smaller ships, and approximately 30 aircraft. “The Captains of Squadron 23 went out looking for trouble; they found it; they sank it; and then they looked for more. When a ship became lost, as some did, she simply headed for the enemy and continued to fight by herself. It is impossible for me to express the proud, paternal feeling I felt for you all during the heat of battle. There are many officers in the United States Navy who probably would have done as well had the opportunity been granted them. There are NO officers in the United States Navy who could have done better.” — Captain Arleigh Burke Ken Jones’ account of this brilliant squadron takes the reader to the heart of the action as he uncovers Arleigh’s tactics and the strategies that were deployed to defeat Japanese ships. He also uncovers what life was like for the men in the squadron as they powered across Pacific Ocean. “While the period covered by this book is relatively short, it was a crucial period in the Pacific War, and the vital part played by Destroyer Squadron 23 under the inspiring leadership of Arleigh Burke was, in a sense, only a beginning, but the vital beginning, of a steady drive forward which gained momentum and power until United States naval forces steamed victoriously into Tokyo Bay.” — Fleet Admiral William Halsey Ken Jones wrote a number of works on World War Two, including the biography Admiral Arleigh. His book Destroyer Squadron 23 was first published in 1959.

    The plan nearly succeeded, and almost certainly would have, were it not for one small Belgian town and its tenacious American defenders who held back a tenfold larger German force while awaiting the arrival of General George Patton’s mighty Third Army. In this dramatic account of the 1944–45 winter of war in Bastogne, historian Peter Schrijvers offers the first full story of the German assault on the strategically located town. From the December stampede of American and Panzer divisions racing to reach Bastogne first, through the bloody eight-day siege from land and air, and through three more weeks of unrelenting fighting even after the siege was broken, events at Bastogne hastened the long-awaited end of WWII. Schrijvers draws on diaries, memoirs, and other fresh sources to illuminate the experiences not only of Bastogne’s 3,000 citizens and their American defenders, but also of German soldiers and commanders desperate for victory. The costs of war are here made real, uncovered in the stories of those who perished and those who emerged from battle to find the world forever changed.

    So he 'volunteered' to fight for the Nazis. He describes his training and how he became an instructor before being sent into Russia. He nearly perished during the terrible winter of 1943-44 being wounded and finding himself with his friend lying dead on top of him. As the tide turned and the Russians advanced remorselessly through. He was wounded twice more and awarded the Iron Cross for bravery.With German resistance collapsing, the author had to flee for his life - capture by the Russians meant almost certain death. He surrendered to the Americans but describes the neglect he suffered at their hands. Unable to return to Latvia now occupied by the Russians, he became a Displaced Person eventually settling in the UK.

    The authoritative account of the B-17 Flying Fortress, the most formidable heavy bomber of World War II, with 32 pages of photographs.

    This book portrays the gradual awakening in the mind of a young Hitler Youth æeducatedÆ soldier of a Panzer Division, bogged down in the bitterest fighting on the Eastern Front, to the truth of the criminal character of what he is involved in.Having in mind that about 9 out of 10 German soldiers who died in WWII were killed in Russia, the book throws light on the largely unreported heroic sacrifices of Soviet soldiers and civilians often against seemingly hopeless odds, without which Europe might well have fallen to fascism. It deals less with grand strategies, tactics and military technicalities than with the human involvement of ordinary people, from both sides, who were caught up in that enormity of a tragedy, that epic struggle in Russia.It throws light on the chasm which existed between officers and men in the sharply class-divided Wehrmacht with most of the top rank officers having been drawn from the old imperial aristocracy.

    David Render was a nineteen-year-old second lieutenant fresh from Sandhurst when he was sent to France to join a veteran armoured unit that had already spent years fighting with the Desert Rats in North Africa. Joining the Sherwood Rangers Yeomanry five days after the D-Day landings, the combat-hardened men he was sent to command did not expect him to last long. However, in the following weeks of ferocious fighting in Normandy, in which more than 90 per cent of his fellow tank commanders became casualties, his ability to emerge unscathed from countless combat engagements defied expectations and earned him his squadron's nickname of the 'Inevitable Mr Render'.In Tank Action David Render tells his remarkable story, spanning every major episode of the last year of the Second World War in Western Europe, from the invasion of Normandy to the fall of Germany. Ultimately it is a story of survival, comradeship and the ability to stand up and be counted as a leader in combat.

     In 1940, as Nazi Germany spread its wings of war, France stood secure in the knowledge that they possessed the largest, most formidable, and best-equipped army in Europe. France also had a stalwart ally in Britain and the support of Holland and Belgium. But they were all about to face a new kind of enemy who fought a new kind of war. In this book, expert military strategist Bevin Alexander examines the groundbreaking martial concepts developed by three brilliant generals- Erwin Rommel, Erich von Manstein, and Heinz Guderian. Their plan was to unleash the power of the tank, grouping them into juggernauts that would slam into-and through-enemy lines, as aircraft supported them and ground forces swept in behind them. It was the Blitzkrieg. And it alerted the world that the deadly might of Germany could no longer be ignored...

    As the last chance to escape the dire implications of a winter campaign, Hitler directed seventy-five German divisions, almost two million men and three of Germany's four panzer groups into the offensive, resulting in huge victories at Viaz'ma and Briansk – among the biggest battles of the Second World War. David Stahel's groundbreaking new account of Operation Typhoon captures the perspectives of both the German high command and individual soldiers, revealing that despite success on the battlefield the wider German war effort was in far greater trouble than is often acknowledged. Germany's hopes of final victory depended on the success of the October offensive but the autumn conditions and the stubborn resistance of the Red Army ensured that the capture of Moscow was anything but certain.

     After covering the war from the British home front to North Africa, Italy, and France, he left the European Theater to go to the Pacific to cover what would be the last few months of conflict with the Japanese forces. Instead of recounting the discussions and activities of generals or the movements of armies, Pyle captured the daily lives of the common soldier and showed the public how their brothers, fathers and sons were experiencing the war. Rather than covering the war from safety, he threw himself into the heat of battle so that he could fully understand and record what the fighting men were going through. Last Chapter is a collection of his last articles that he wrote while witnessing the conflict in the Pacific. During his time in the Far East he spent time in the occupied Marianas, with pilots and aircrew of B-29’s as they flew in missions over the Japanese mainland, with sailors in the hundreds of boats that were swarming the Pacific Ocean, and with marines as they were preparing for the assault of Okinawa. "No man in this war has so well told the story of the American fighting man as American fighting men wanted it told", wrote Harry Truman. "He deserves the gratitude of all his countrymen." “These pages will of course have a commemorative value, mark an end to one of the best known, best loved figures of the war.” Kirkus Reviews Ernie Pyle was the most celebrated war correspondent of World War Two. His work ran in one-hundred and forty-four papers and reached an audience of forty million Americans. His brilliant portrayal of the everyday fighting man in World War Two won him a Pulitzer Prize in 1944. Last Chapter was first published in 1946 after Pyle had been killed at Ie Shima on 18th April, 1945.

    At my home, the mailman would walk up towards the front porch, and I saw it just as clear as if he's standing beside me—I see his blue jacket and the blue cap and the leather mailbag. Here he goes up to the house, but he doesn’t turn. He goes right up the front steps. This happened so fast, probably a matter of seconds, but the first thing that came to mind, that's the way my folks would find out what happened to me. The next thing I know, I kind of come to, and I'm in the push-up mode. I'm half up out of the underwater depression, and I'm trying to figure out what the hell happened to those prone figures on the beach, and all of a sudden, I realized I'm in amongst those bodies!” —Army demolition engineer, Omaha Beach, D-Day Dying for freedom isn’t the worst that could happen. Being forgotten is. — “My last mission was the Bastogne mission. We were being towed, we're approaching Bastogne, and I see a cloud of flak, anti-aircraft fire. I said to myself, ‘I'm not going to make it.’ There were a couple of groups ahead of us, so now the anti-aircraft batteries are zeroing in. Every time a new group came over, they kept zeroing in. My outfit had, I think, 95% casualties.” —Glider pilot, D-Day and beyond Maybe our veterans did not volunteer to tell us their stories; perhaps we were too busy with our own lives to ask. But they opened up to a younger generation, when a history teacher taught his students to engage. — “I was fighting in the hedgerows for five days; it was murder. But psychologically, we were the best troops in the world. There was nobody like us; I had all the training that they could give us, but nothing prepares you for some things. You know, in my platoon, the assistant platoon leader got shot right through the head, right through the helmet, dead, right there in front of me. That affects you, doesn’t it?” ” —Paratrooper, D-Day and beyond As we forge ahead as a nation, do we owe it to ourselves to become reacquainted with a generation that is fast leaving us, who asked for nothing but gave everything, to attune ourselves as Americans to a broader appreciation of what we stand for? This is the fifth book in the masterful WWII oral history series, but you can read them in any order. — “Somebody asked me once, what was the hardest part for you in the war? And I thought about a young boy who came in as a replacement; the first thing he said was, ‘How long will it be before I'm a veteran?’ I said, ‘If I'm talking to you the day after you're in combat, you're a veteran.’ He replaced one of the gunners who had been killed on the back of the half-track. Now, all of a sudden, the Germans were pouring this fire in on us. He was working on the track and when he jumped off, he went down, called my name. I ran over to him and he was bleeding in the mouth… From my experience before, all I could do was hold that kid’s hand and tell him it’s going to be all right. ‘You'll be all right.