This group was formed on 25 January 1943, it arrived on English soil in March-April 1944 and retook the soil of Normandy after having operated under the skies of Normandy from England. It was based at A-5, at Cartigny-l'Epinay (Calvados.) This book retraces the military actions of this cavalry group, thanks to its war journal and to the testimonies of its veterans. Through the pages, we discover another Battle of Normandy, one viewed from the sky, and the birth of tactical aviation dedicated to the application of ground troups. Numerous photos by the USAAF but also those of veterans, many profiles of planes and vehicles.

This is a rare day-to-day account by a young German squadron leader in Jagdstaffel 35 during the grim last year of the war. Originally published in 1933, it provides minute descriptions of kills, losses, and the Germans’ step-by-step retreat in the face of increasingly overwhelming Allied forces in the air. Brutally honest and vividly written, Stark’s account of the end-game of the Imperial German Army Air Service provides an intimate, front-row glimpse of the death-throes of a once feared corps. This book also contains reproductions of some of the author’s paintings depicting life on the Western Front.

Included in the latest Mini top colors is a decal sheet was printed by Cartograf. The authors selected the following vehicles:- Pz.Kpfw. II Ausf. F of the 1st Ranger Battalion, Tunisia, spring 1943,- Sd.Kfz. 222 of No. 2 ACC, North Africa, 1943,- Jagdpanzer 38(t) „Chwat”, Warsaw, Poland, August 1944,- Pz.

In May 1861, the Kentucky state legislature passed an ordinance declaring its neutrality, which Governor Beriah Magoffin confirmed four days later. Kentucky’s declaration and ultimate support for the Union stood at odds with the state’s social and cultural heritage; after all, Kentucky was a slave state and enjoyed deep and meaningful connections to the new Confederacy. Much of what has been written to explain this curious choice concludes Kentucky harboured strong Unionist feelings, but here in Divided Loyalties: Kentucky’s Struggle for Armed Neutrality in the Civil War, James Finck persuasively argues that the Commonwealth did not support neutrality out of its deep Unionist’s sentiment. In fact, it was Kentucky’s equally divided loyalties that brought about its decision to remain neutral. Both Unionists and Secessionists would come to support neutrality at different times when they felt their side would lose.Along the way, Dr. Finck examines the roles of the state legislature, the governor, other leading Kentuckians, and average citizens to understand how Kentuckians felt about the prospects of war and secession, and how bloodshed could be avoided. The finely styled prose is built upon a foundation of primary sources including letters, journals, newspapers, government documents and published reports. By focusing exclusively on one state, one issue, and one year, Divided Loyalties provides a level of detail that will deeply interest both Kentuckians and Civil War enthusiasts alike.About the AuthorJames Finck was raised in Virginia where he developed a love of the Civil War. He received his undergraduate degree in history at the College of William and Mary, a master’s degree at Virginia Tech, and his Ph.D. at the University of Arkansas. Dr. Finck taught history at the University of Texas—Pan American. He currently teaches American history at the University of Science and Arts of Oklahoma. He lives in Oklahoma with his wife and three young children.

The author, a Berliner himself, offers us a chronicle where we follow Wilhelm Mohnke in 1933 Berlin, followed by his first fight, his injury, the Battle of the Bulge at the head of the HJ, and especially the recent fighting in Berlin where he became the military commander of the Chancellery.

“Clear out the Shenandoah Valley “clean and clear,” Union General-in-Chief Ulysses S. Grant ordered, in the late summer of 1864.His man for the job: Major General “Little Phil” Sheridan, the bandy-legged Irishman who’d proven himself just the kind of scrapper Grant loved. Grant turned Sheridan loose across Virginia’s most vital landscape, the breadbasket of the Confederacy.In the spring of 1862, a string of Confederate victories in the Valley had foiled Union plans in the state and kept Confederate armies fed and supplied. In 1863, the Army of Northern Virginia used the Valley as its avenue of invasion, culminating in the battle of Gettysburg. The Valley continued to offer Confederates an alluring backdoor to Washington D.C.But when Sheridan returned to the Valley in 1864, the stakes jumped dramatically. To lose the Valley would mean to lose the state, Stonewall Jackson had once said—and now that prediction would be put to the test as Sheridan fought with Confederate Lieutenant General Jubal Early for possession.For the North, the fragile momentum its war effort had gained by capturing Atlanta would quickly evaporate; for Abraham Lincoln, defeat in the Valley could very well mean defeat in the upcoming election. For the South, more than its breadbasket was at stake—its nascent nationhood lay on the line.Historians Daniel Davis and Philip Greenwalt, longtime students of the Civil War, have spent countless hours researching the Valley battles of ‘64 and walking the ground where those battles unfolded. Bloody Autumn: The Shenandoah Valley Campaign of 1864 shifts attention away from Army of the Potomac and the Army of Northern Virginia to the campaign that ultimately determined the balance of power across the Eastern Theatre.

When the Pacific war began it was a case of “when not if” Darwin would be attacked. But nobody could have predicted the extraordinary scale and ferocity of the 19 February 1942 raid. A massive strike force, blooded at Pearl Harbor just weeks before, hit Darwin in the biggest Japanese air attack ever in the South Pacific. Since then, generations of Australians have been drawn to the stories and folklore of the Darwin action. But facts have blurred and mythology has thrived. What of the warning that never happened? What of the ghost ship actually sunk in the Atlantic a year earlier? Did a fighter pilot contrive a false combat record? Did the authorities cover up the raid? Why do Australians know so little about it? This is the book that tests these many Darwin myths and reveals new information: another ship sunk; the actual intent and nature of the attack; the precise extent of the Japanese losses. The Darwin raid is usually portrayed as a wholesale disaster for the Allies, and a day full of military ineptitude. Carrier Attack shows the defenders were alert and fought with purpose. Arguably it was the Japanese that wasted much of their attacking strength, and in this way the Darwin defenders avoided a much larger catastrophe. Carrier Attack provides a timely and fresh analysis of the raid. Most importantly, it draws on specially translated Japanese sources.

This book presents the remarkable personal journals of a German soldier who participated in Operation Barbarossa and subsequent battles on the Eastern Front, revealing the combat experience of the German-Russian War as seldom seen before.Hans Roth was a member of the anti-tank (Panzerjäger) battalion, 299th Infantry Division, attached to Sixth Army, as the invasion of Russia began. Writing as events transpired, he recorded the mystery and tension as the Germans deployed on the Soviet frontier in 1941. Then a firestorm broke loose as the Wehrmacht broke across the front. During the Kiev encirclement, Roth’s unit was under constant attack as the Soviets desperately tried to break through the German ring. At one point, a friend serving with the SS led him to a site where he witnessed civilians being massacred (which may well have been Babi Yar). After suffering through a horrible winter against apparently endless Russian reserves, his division went on the offensive again, this time on the northern wing of “Case Gelb,” the German drive toward Stalingrad In these journals, attacks and counterattacks are described in “you are there” detail, as if to keep himself sane, knowing that his honest accounts of the horrors in the East could never pass through Wehrmacht censors. These journals, including original maps, some of which Roth himself helped compose, were recently discovered by his descendants. Roth was able to bring three of them back to his wife during the war, and after she emigrated to America she kept them but never spoke of them. Roth never brought back a fourth journal, as his fate after the summer of 1943 in Russia is still unknown. What he did leave behind, now finally revealed, is an incredible firsthand account of the horrific war the Germans waged in Russia.

This book explores the unlikely coalition between Germany and Finland in World War II, and their joint military operations from 1941 to 1945. An oft overlooked participant of the war, Finland fought against the Soviets in the infamous and illegal Winter War, alongside Germany in the Continuation War of 1941, and finally against former ally Germany in the conclusive and bloody Lapland War. In his prologue Lunde covers the turbulent history of Finland, from its separation from the Soviet Union in 1917 to its isolation after being bludgeoned in 1939–40. Lunde examines both Finnish and German motives for forming a coalition against the USSR, and how—as logical as a common enemy would seem—the lack of true planning and preparation would doom the alliance.Lunde posits that it was inconceivable that the highly professional German General Staff allowed itself to accept the militarily unsound and shaky coalition that was waged between Finland and Germany. The war aims were not discussed nor harmonised, there were no campaign plans with tasks and missions spelled out past the initial assault, no effective main effort established, inadequate force levels, and an unsound command structure within various headquarters. Practically every rule in the book was broken.In this book, Henrik Lunde, the renowned author of Hitler’s Pre-emptive War: The Battle for Norway, 1940 (Casemate) once again fills a profound gap in our understanding of World War II.

This time the authors focused on the planes used in Europe, choosing the following schemes:- Mustang III FZ111, coded WC-V, usually flown by F/L Mieczysław Gorzula; No. 309 (Polish) Squadron, No. 133 (Polish) Wing, based at RAF Andrews Field, UK, May 1945,- Mustang IV KH663, coded PD-L, usually flown by W/O Leszek Bisanz; No. 303 (Polish) Squadron, 3rd Polish Fighter Wing, based at RAF Hethel, UK, 1946,- Mustang IVA KM112, coded PD-D, assigned to S/L Witold Łokuciewski; No. 303 (Polish) Squadron, 3rd Polish Fighter Wing, based at RAF Hethel, UK, 1946.All planes are presented and described in a 12 page, full-colour guidebook, which also includes five archive photos. One of the aircraft carries attractive nose art applied by the crew. The decals were printed by Cartograf. They include individual and national markings for all three schemes.

The Red Series is back with another issue devoted to the P-51 Mustang. This time the authors focused on the planes used in Europe, choosing the following schemes:- Mustang III FZ111, coded WC-V, usually flown by F/L Mieczysław Gorzula; No. 309 (Polish) Squadron, No. 133 (Polish) Wing, based at RAF Andrews Field, UK, May 1945,- Mustang IV KH663, coded PD-L, usually flown by W/O Leszek Bisanz; No. 303 (Polish) Squadron, 3rd Polish Fighter Wing, based at RAF Hethel, UK, 1946,- Mustang IVA KM112, coded PD-D, assigned to S/L Witold Łokuciewski; No. 303 (Polish) Squadron, 3rd Polish Fighter Wing, based at RAF Hethel, UK, 1946.All planes are presented and described in a 12 page, full-colour guidebook, which also includes five archive photos. One of the aircraft carries attractive nose art applied by the crew. The decals were printed by Cartograf. They include individual and national markings for all three schemes.

This work describes U.S. Marine Corps helicopter operations, including their actions and evolution, throughout the Vietnam War. The book is divided into parts spanning the three stages of the Corps’ combat deployment: “Buildup (1962–1966),” “Heavy Combat (1967–1969),” and “The Bitter End (1975).” Each part includes chapters devoted to “telling the story” of Marine helicopters from the individual to the strategic level.Vietnam has often been called our “first helicopter war,” and indeed the U.

The array of new technologies that came on the scene in the early 20th century resulted in widely varied new forms of military special operations once civilisation embarked on its greatest war. Suddenly, fighting men could be delivered by parachute, submarine, glider, jeeps, and fast amphibious craft deep into enemy territory to perform special tasks; yet others would continue to perform missions the same as their ancestors in previous wars—on foot using stealth, endurance and patience.This work contains discussions of the employment of various special purpose, special mission organisations during World War II. These units operated in Allied and Axis countries and in various theatres of war including Europe, North Africa, the Pacific, Asia, and the continental United States. Representing every major combatant, the operations include various kinds of raids, intelligence gathering missions, support to partisan/guerrilla groups, prisoner rescues, direct-action missions, and at least two where the object was simply to steal something. Some missions would have been officially denied if the operations had been caught in the act.The book is divided into two sections: Behind Enemy Lines and Behind Friendly Lines, to demonstrate that special-purpose organisations can be employed wherever needed, even in areas controlled by military units of their own or allied countries. Many of the units described run the gamut of special mission types, from commando to parachute units, reconnaissance to sabotage units, and partisan training units as well as those with combined missions. Many of the operations described in this book continue to serve as templates for modern Special Operations missions, while still others—the first attempts of their kind—continue to serve as examples of what not to try under the circumstances.Michael F. Dilley served for 20 years in the U.S. Army’s Military Intelligence branch, and for 25 years with the Department of Defense as a contractor in various fields of research, instruction, and investigation.

Takeo Nakano immigrated to Canada from Japan in 1920, later marrying and starting a family in his adopted homeland. Takeo's passion was poetry, and he cultivated the exquisite form known as tanka.Then came the Second World War. Takeo Nakano was one of thousands of Japanese men forcibly separated from his family in 1942 and interned in labour camps in the British Columbia interior. Takeo was one of those who protested the forced labour in the camps and the separation from his family. His punishment was to be sent even further away, to an isolated internment camp in northern Ontario.This book, first published in 1982, is a rare first-person account of the experience of internment. This new edition includes a foreword by his daughter, Leatrice M. Willson Chan, with whom he collaborated in preparing his memoir.

The attack on Pearl Harbor on 7 December, 1941, has been portrayed by historians as a dazzling success, “brilliantly conceived and meticulously planned”. With most historians concentrating on command errors and the story of participants’ experiences, this book presents a detailed evaluation of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on an operational and tactical level.It examines such questions as: Was the strategy underlying the attack sound? Were there flaws in planning or execution? How did Japanese military culture influence the planning? How risky was the attack? What did the Japanese expect to achieve, balanced against what they did achieve? What might have been the results if the attack had not benefited from the mistakes of the American commanders? The book also addresses the body of folklore about the attack, supporting or challenging many contentious issues such as the skill level of the Japanese aircrew, whether midget submarines torpedoed Oklahoma and Arizona, as has been recently claimed, whether the Japanese ever really considered launching a third wave attack, and what the consequences might have been. In addition, the analysis has detected for the first time a body of deceptions that a prominent Japanese participant in the attack placed into the historical record, most likely to conceal his blunders and enhance his reputation. The centrepiece of the book is an analysis using modern Operations Research methods and computer simulations, as well as combat models developed between 1922 and 1946 at the U.S. Naval War College. The analysis puts a new light on the strategy and tactics employed by Yamamoto to open the Pacific War, and a dramatically different appraisal of the effectiveness of the attack on Pearl Harbor.

On the third day of Gettysburg, Robert E. Lee launched a magnificent attack. For pure pageantry it was unsurpassed, and it also marked the centerpiece of the war, both time-wise and in terms of how the conflict had turned a corner—from persistent Confederate hopes to impending Rebel despair. But Pickett’s Charge was crushed by the Union defenders that day, having never had a chance in the first place.The Confederacy’s real “high tide” at Gettysburg had come the afternoon before, during the swirling conflagration when Longstreet’s corps first entered the battle, when the Federals just barely held on. The foremost Rebel spearhead on that second day of the battle was Barksdale’s Mississippi brigade, which launched what one (Union) observer called the "grandest charge that was ever seen by mortal man.”Barksdale’s brigade was already renowned in the Army of Northern Virginia for its stand-alone fights at Fredericksburg. On the second day of Gettysburg it was just champing at the bit to go in. The Federal left was not as vulnerable as Lee had envisioned, but had cooperated with Rebel wishes by extending its Third Corps into a salient. Hood’s crack division was launched first, seizing Devil’s Den, climbing Little Round Top, and hammering in the wheatfield.Then Longstreet began to launch McLaws’ division, and finally gave Barksdale the go-ahead. The Mississippians, with their white-haired commander on horseback at their head, utterly crushed the peach orchard salient and continued marauding up to Cemetery Ridge. Hancock, Meade, and other Union generals desperately struggled to find units to stem the Rebel tide. One of Barksdale’s regiments, the 21st Mississippi, veered off from the brigade in the chaos, rampaging across the field, overrunning Union battery after battery. Barksdale himself was killed at the apex of his advance. Darkness, as well as Confederate exhaustion, finally ended the day’s fight as the shaken, depleted Federal units on their heights took stock. They had barely held on against the full ferocity of the Rebels, on a day that decided the fate of the nation. Barksdale’s Charge describes the exact moment when the Confederacy reached its zenith, and the soldiers of the Northern states just barely succeeded in retaining their perfect Union.