Category: Military History

Early on the morning of December 8, 1941, Wake Island hummed with activity. For months, the wishbone-shaped Pacific atoll of three small islands–Wake, Wilkes and Peale–less than 10 miles long and barely above sea level, had been the site of construction work. Working feverishly to complete an airstrip and defensive fortifications were 449 U.S. Marines… Continue reading WWII Wake Island Prisoners

History’s Most Savage Siege — 10 Facts About the Battle of Verdun You May Not Have Known 1. The Germans wanted the Verdun to be a battle of Attrition. The morning of February 21, 1916, marked the beginning of one of the longest, bloodiest and costliest battles in World War I and history. For about 300… Continue reading WWI Battle of Verdun Facts

Within hours of their December 7, 1941, attack on the American naval base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, the Japanese military began its assault on the Philippines, bombing airfields and bases, harbors and shipyards. Manila, the capital of the Philippines, sits on Manila Bay, one of the best deep-water ports in the Pacific Ocean, and it… Continue reading WWII Bataan & Corregidor

They were two Marines from Texas in western Iraq, taking part in some of the worst fighting in the early stages of the insurgency. Both left the battlefield early — and ended up with Purple Hearts. But one didn’t earn it. Casey Owens was critically injured and lost his legs when his Humvee hit an anti-tank… Continue reading Stolen Valor: Unearned Purple Heart

I thought she was beautiful, although I never understood why she plucked her eyebrows off and penciled them on every morning an inch higher. She had been captain of her high school basketball team in Japan, and she ran circles around us kids on a dirt court in our small town in Upstate New York.… Continue reading WWII Japanese War Brides

U.S. Navy enlisted personnel—unlike those in the other services—wear their jobs on their sleeves. A Marine machine-gunner wears similar collar rank as the rest of his fire team; unless you ask him, or see his military occupation in his file, one could never know his job specifics just by looking at his uniform. Not so… Continue reading U.S. Navy Old, Obscure & Obsolete Jobs

The Ship That Wouldn’t Die The USS Laffey (DD-724) was laid down 28 June 1943 by Bath Iron Works Corp., Bath, Maine. She was launched 21 November; sponsored by Miss Beatrice F. Laffey, daughter of Medal of Honor recipient S1c Bartlett Laffey. Commissioned 8 February 1944, Cdr. F. Julian. Becton as her first “Captain”. After… Continue reading WWII USS Laffey (DD-724)

Shortly after Adolf Hitler declared war on the United States, just four days after the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, he was eager to prove to the United States that it was vulnerable despite its distance from Europe, Hitler ordered a sabotage operation to be mounted against targets inside America. The task fell to the Abwehr… Continue reading WWII Operation Pastorius

The debris of a crashed American plane in January 1966 in Palomares, Spain. Alarms sounded on United States Air Force bases in Spain and officers began packing all the low-ranking troops they could grab onto buses for a secret mission. There were cooks, grocery clerks and even musicians from the Air Force band. It was… Continue reading Cold War Hydrogen Bomb Accident 1966

In the NW corner of South Vietnam, in the Thua-Thien Province lies a narrow valley known as the A-Shau. Running North-South for 25 miles, it’s a mile wide bottom land covered in elephant grass and flanked by deeply forested mountains rising to as much as 5,500 ft. Bisected with a hard crusted dirt road with… Continue reading Vietnam The Battle of A-Shau