The German procurement process resulted in a wide range of gun-armed armored vehicles—assault guns, tank destroyers and self-propeled artillery—mounting both German and captured guns. Some were developed from existing German chassis; many employed captured enemy vehicles or were built in the factories of the countries they had conquered.Originally designed as infantry support vehicles, the Sturmgeschütz arm was controlled by the artillery but ended the war having knocked out more enemy tanks than the Panzers. Mainly built on the chassis of the PzKpfw III, particularly after it became obsolete, the StuGs proved durable and effective in infantry support and, when upgunned and even without a turret, as tank killers.The Germans produced a range of vehicles to fend off enemy armor. They mounted increasingly larger guns on any chassis they could lay their hands on, often captured vehicles—the Marder series on French or Czech chassis. There was also the Jagdpanzer range, better protected with an armored casemate providing overhead armor, based on tank chassis. Heavier Jagdpanzer were produced as the war continued the Hornisse/Nashorn (but without overhead protection), the Ferdinand/Elefant and the Jagdpanther armed with 8.8cm weapons. A few of the massive 12.8cm-armed Jagdtiger appeared before war’s end.Blitzkrieg showed that the Panzer divisions needed mobile artillery support, so the Germans mounted artillery weapons on tracked chassis: first PzKpfw Is and IIs and then PzKpfw IIIs and 38(t)s. The best known are the Wespe (on the PzKpfw II), the Grille (on the PzKpfw 38(t)), the Hummel (on the Geschützwagen III/IV), and the Sturmpanzer (on the PzKpfw IV).While some of the crew duties on these vehicles were similar to those of the Panzertruppen, they were completely different vehicles to fight in and fight with: strategically, operationally, tactically and logistically. This fully illustrated book tells the story of the soldiers who crewed these vehicles.

“In 2016, I was responsible for the deaths of over 600 people. But they deserved to die. All of them. History will not grant the Islamic State a redemption arc. They were the bad guys, the evil of our time. I don’t lose sleep over what we did. However, I still struggle with how easy it was. I still relive the darkest moments of that year. Technology turned warfare into a game, and we treated it as such.”Brennan Deveraux deployed to Iraq from January 2016 to August 2016, serving in the Strike Cell as the theater-level rocket artillery liaison for Operation Inherent Resolve, firing over 500 rockets and killing over 600 enemy fighters. His account relates a personal journey, addressing how US soldiers dealt with slaughtering a technologically inferior foe. This includes detailed and honest accounts of numerous artillery missions. He is open about having had a desire to rack up statistics and is candid about some choices he is not proud of. He shares the dark humor of war that he and his fellow soldiers sought refuge in when dealing with death, helping them escape their actions. Even so, at times they realized that they had lost their humanity, and the reality of warfare once again set in. When Brennan returned home, he was forced to face what he had done overseas in a life-changing moment with his family, experiencing an anxiety attack he could not explain.Brennan’s story is important because it paints a very different picture of what it means to be a soldier in a 21st-century military, exposing the impact of “remote” warfare on service members. It is a reflection on war and a soldier’s role in it, emphasizing the importance of empathy—even for the bad guys—and an appreciation for the families impacted by the inherent violence.

During the first decade of the 20th century, France led the way in aircraft design and achievements. After the outbreak of World War I, France produced trailblazing designs early – the Morane Saulnier monoplanes, Nieuport fighters, and then the Spads – clearly leading the way in terms of trends in aviation. Although the Fokker Eindeckers were the first 'point and shoot' aircraft, the Nieuport 11, while lacking interrupter gear, was the first maneuverable and cleanly designed fighter that featured ailerons and responsive controls on all axes. The Nieuports were so successful that Germany co-opted the sesquiplane with their Albatros line of fighters. The Spad VII was the first Allied fighter to employ an inline engine, and by extension influenced the design path of the S.E.5a and the Dolphin.French construction methodology was eclectic – the Nieuports were straightforward in their construction, as were the British, but the Spad was a labour-intensive yet rugged and finely built aircraft – requiring many different skill sets to produce. Moreover, Spads were built under license by many companies in France as well as in Britain. Finally, French engines were in demand for not only their own aircraft, but for much of the British aviation industry as well. This fully illustrated book complements the author’s titles on the German and French fighter aircraft.

During the Polish campaign, SS combat units were seconded to various formations of the Heer. Still considered more parade troops than frontline soldiers, they did not prove a decisive factor in the fighting, but the campaign was important for their transformation into real fighting units. They were criticized for their losses, and the officers were blamed, being considered poorly and inadequately trained. The SS officers in turn accused Heer commanders for sacrificing SS troops in suicidal missions. Himmler became convinced that if his units were used autonomously they could have better demonstrated their full potential, leading him to push for the SS to be considered a separate fighting force.Fully illustrated, this Casemate Illustrated describes the actions of the SS units that fought on the front line in Poland, primarily the Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler, the SS-Verfügungstruppen and the SS-Heimwehr-Danzig.

Some of the most daring naval raids undertaken during World War II involved the use of midget submarines — craft of under 150 tons and crewed by just a handful of men — including Japanese midget submarines deployed at Pearl Harbor, the British X-craft attack on the Tirpitz in a Norwegian fjord protected by layers of antisubmarine defenses, an Italian Maiale attaching limpet mines to the HMS Valiant, and German craft attacking Allied shipping off landing beaches.This Casemate Illustrated Special features all classes of midget subs and human torpedoes designed and used during World War II, and explores how they were used, featuring firsthand accounts from the men who operated these tiny craft. It will also feature the recovery of various wrecks of German, British, Japanese, and Italian midget submarines, including the search for the midget submarines sunk at Pearl Harbor in 1941. The final chapter will feature the restoration, testing and successful operation of a German Biber midget submarine.The expert text will be accompanied by both period photographs and exterior and interior images of the many midget submarines preserved in museums to this day.

Sons of the Arghandab tells the story of the 1-320th Field Artillery "Top Guns" Battalion, 101st Airborne, in the Arghandab Valley, 2010-2011.The Arghandab River Valley is known for its lush vegetation from its grape furrows and its pomegranate orchards. It’s also known as the birthplace of several Taliban leaders such as Mullah Omar and Akhtar Mohammad Mansour, and was a major crossing route for weapons coming from Pakistan into Kandahar. This hostile environment had already claimed the lives of many seasoned Infantrymen. But the Top Guns weren't infantrymen, they were artillerymen, deployed without their usual weapons and with minimal last-minute training, redesignated as "provisional infantrymen." Painstakingly researched by one of the Top Guns and told through the perspectives of the men who survived that terrible year, this is the harrowing story of Alpha, HHB, and Bravo Batteries as they undertook the challenges of an Artillery unit charged with an Infantry mission in the most hostile killing fields in Afghanistan.

Hero of Belleau Wood, Lemuel Shepherd was the living embodiment of a Marine Corps legend, for Belleau Wood was synonymous with Marine valor and sacrifice.At the age of just 22, after early graduation from Virginia Military Institute following the United States’ entry into World War I, Lemuel Shepherd was made a platoon commander in the 5th Regiment of Marines. His first challenge was to help screen and organize the many recruits needed to convert the company up to war strength. Within just a couple of weeks of reporting for duty, he was on a ship bound for Europe. He would participate in the Aisne-Marne offensive, facing machine guns at the famous battle of Belleau Wood, receiving the DSC and Navy Cross for his gallantry. There he was twice wounded. He returned to the front in August, seeing action in the St. Mihiel and Meuse-Argonne offensives, being wounded for the third time.His career in the Marine Corps continued after the war, encompassing time as aide-de-camp to the commandant of the Marine Corps, duty in China and Haiti, and a period on the staff of Marine Corps Schools, Quantico. After the US entered World War II, Shepherd took command of the 9th Marine Regiment, training it and leading it overseas. Promoted to brigade command in July 1943, he served on Guadalcanal, then as assistant division commander in the Cape Gloucester operation. In May 1944, he assumed command of the 1st Provisional Marine Brigade and led them in the invasion and recapture of Guam. Finally, he commanded the 6th Marine Division through the battle of Okinawa, for which he received a Gold Star. He would command all Marines in the Pacific during the Korean War, and then in 1952 he was appointed as the 20th Commandant of the Marine Corps, introducing a number of important policies that increased military proficiency for the corps.This new biography utilizes Shepherd’s oral history, a wide range of archival records from the Marine Corps History Division and the Virginia Military Institute, and a personal interview conducted by the author with General Shepherd in the 1980s, to give a fuller picture of the consummate “Leatherneck.”

Mercenaries, Gunslingers, and Outlaws is the story of 2½ years as a security contractor in Iraq. It’s not just a story about firefights and surviving IEDs while protecting American contractors, although those kinds of stories are there, it shares an account that covers the full spectrum of some of the most profound experiences of his life.Rather than a chronological account, the book is broken into sections covering an amazingly wide range of experiences and topics. The chapters within each section are relatively short and tell complete stories, much like vignettes, that keep the reader turning the pages. The reader experiences IEDs, high-speed crashes, firefights, run-ins with Iraqi security forces, the stress and uncertainty of being surrounded by locals, any one of whom could be an insurgent or suicide bomber, the tactics used to stay alive on the roads, and the inevitable human cost in lost and destroyed lives.Some sections tell the stories of the people he met and worked beside: former U.S. Army Green Berets, British Royal Marines, a former Lebanese Christian Militiamen captured by the Syrians when he was 16, British Gurkhas from Nepal, South African counter-terrorist commandos, a former member of the French Foreign Legion, and even a Buddhist monk. There are stories of heroic figures who were larger than life, of outlaws who came to Iraq because they didn’t fit in anywhere else and ended up not fitting in there either, and then there are the Iraqi people who invited the author into their homes.

The temperature was 40 degrees below zero when fighter planes screamed out of the clouds, puncturing the fuselage with a spray of machinegun fire and sending the bomber beside them into a death spin. This was followed by intense flak, as a hundred cannons on the ground tried to blow them out of the sky.When they finally made it back to the base, another enemy awaited them: homesickness, crushing boredom, relentless cold, and more mud than they could imagine. Bert Ibelle was a 19-year-old freshman at Dartmouth College when he enlisted in the Army Air Corps to fly dozens of bomber missions over Nazi-occupied Europe and win the Purple Heart. His buddy, Fran Brighenti, served as an infantry marksman on the opposite side of the globe, slogging through the steaming jungles of the Philippine and the fiery hell of Okinawa.Their wars couldn’t have been more different, nor could their approach to life. While the ever-exuberant Fran was a ladies man, Bert only had eyes for “Red,” the girl back home who was in love with another young man.This is their story—one that combines terror, humor, friendship, and a son’s search for his elusive father.

The week-long Allied bombing campaign against Hamburg in late July 1943 was not only hugely destructive but also had a significant impact on the German night fighter arm. From now on, the “boxes” of Kammhuber’s “Raumnachtjagd” would be the starting point from which fighters would be led into the bomber stream as early as possible, a tactic dubbed “Zahme Sau.” The night fighters had to quickly adopt new “freelance” procedures, and also found themselves increasingly engaged in daylight operations. These actions resulted in heavy losses—especially of experienced aces—which the Nachtjagd could ill afford and struggled to replace.The winter of 1943/44 saw a series of huge raids on Berlin. Although hard pressed, the Nachtjagd aces were still able to score some heavy tactical victories. Over a thousand RAF “Viermots” were shot down—more than double the expected losses—before the campaign was cut short. New night fighter aces emerged, often former transport and reconnaissance pilots, and the upward firing armament of the Bf 110s and Ju 88s could cut swathes through the “stream.” However, by mid-1944, as the Allies advanced, the night fighter aces were forced into new roles, including ground-strafing armor and troop concentrations, a role for which they were clearly unsuited. A small number of Me 262 jets were deployed in a new NJG 11, but exclusively committed against the rapid twin-engined Mosquitos of the RAF’s Light Night Striking Force. Heinkel He 219s were never available in significant numbers and prowling Mosquito intruders were an ever-present danger to Nachtjagd crews.While the surviving night fighter aces continued their defensive actions virtually every night, by March 1945 the Nachtjagd was in terminal decline. Of the 1,100 night fighter pilots and crew who claimed at least one victory, some 669 were lost, a casualty rate of around 74 percent.Fully illustrated and featuring newly translated personal accounts, this is a chronological account of the Luftwaffe night fighters in the second part of the war, covering major campaigns, the biographies of individual aces, and the details of their aircraft.

A full account of the Wilderness to the James River, including Grant's rise to high command, the condition of the armies going into the critical 1864 campaign, a deep look at the commanders on both sides, and the strategy of the campaign from both perspectives. The study is combat, strategy, and tactics from the first day of action until the last, when Grant—unable to capture Richmond, but now south and east of the capital—builds a long bridge and crosses the James River to attack Petersburg. Illustrated by photographs and excellent maps, it will conclude with a note about visiting the battlefields, the casualties, the treatment of wounded, and the burial of the dead.

Visual Friendlies, Tally Target: Surges continues the story of the role of forward air controllers (JTACs) and Close Air Support (CAS), picking up in 2006 and continuing through 2013. This volume covers the evolution of Joint Fires through the colloquial "second phase" of the War on Terror—the "surges" of Iraq in 2007 and Afghanistan in 2010–2011. The narrative is supported by the individual accounts of US Air Force, Army, Marine close air support specialists, as well as UK, Canadian, Danish and German coalition forward air controllers. Vol. II recounts the evolution of air power during the rising counterinsurgencies, as well as the psychology and mental makeup of these exclusive tribes. Notable accounts include the recovery mission of EXTORTION17, the first withdrawal from Iraq, previously unreported missions against insurgent strongholds, and multiple instances where the situational awareness and decision-making of forward air controllers prevented civilian casualties and fratricide.The story carries with it a continuation of the strategic lessons learned from America’s longest war: where tactical successes and innovation failed to achieve a strategic outcome amidst ambiguous grand strategy, flawed policy and a failure to understand the new battlefields of the 21st century, as recounted by the men whose air power tribes went into the breach again and again. Volume II concludes as the "War on Terror" nominally ended in 2013, as the final phase of the post-9/11 wars transitioned to the "Train, Advise, and Assist" missions in Iraq and Afghanistan.

By October 1943, the German 17th Army had been forced to retreat from the Kuban bridgehead across the Kerch Strait to Crimea. During the following months, the Red Army pushed back the German forces in the southern Ukraine. In November 1943, they eventually cut off the land-based connection of 17th Army through the Perekop Isthmus. Hitler prohibited a sea evacuation of 17th Army because he thought the Red Army could use the Crimean Peninsula to launch air attacks against Romanian oil refineries.In November 1943, the Russian launched a massive amphibious assault at two locations on the eastern coast of the Crimea, but its units were unable to prevent an Axis counterattack that collapsed the southern bridgehead. The Red Army held the bridgehead at Yenikale, from which they launched further offensive operations, culminating in a huge offensive in April 1944.Although the 17th Army bitterly contested every bit of ground, it was unable to stop the advance. Soviet forces reached Kerch on April 11, forcing the 17th Army to retreat towards Sevastopol. The remaining Axis forces in the Crimea were concentrating around the city by the end of the third week of April.The Germans intended to hold Sevastopol as a fortress, as the Russians had done between 1941 and 1942. However, the fortifications of the city had not been restored and the city fell on 9 May.From mid-April, Romanian and German ships undertook a huge and complex evacuation operation. The last phase of the evacuation, following the fall of Sevastopol, saw 37,000 troops transported under constant attacks from Soviet aircraft and shore artillery. Overall around 57,000 men were lost during the evacuation.Fully illustrated with rare and unpublished photos, this is a detailed account of the dogged attempt to retake the Crimea in 1943–44.

The “Battlin’ Bastards” of B Company, 1st Battalion, 506th Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division, fought daily against a numerically superior and well-trained enemy during their tours in Vietnam, 1968–71. Before the war, these men were brothers, sons, sweethearts, husbands, and fathers. Some were athletes, some musicians. Some were just out of high school, some in established careers. There is no monolithic “Battlin’ Bastard,” but when they joined the 101st Airborne Division—one of the most highly decorated divisions in the United States Army—in Vietnam, they united, fighting for each other, and fighting to return safely home.It was difficult to put their experiences behind them. As Bravo veteran, Terry Taylor, recalled, “I learned at the age of 18 that you don’t have to die to go to hell. Vietnam was hell on earth”. And yet despite the obstacles, many of these men built successful lives post-war. Decades after returning from the “Nam”, when the men were ready to cautiously revisit their experiences, the Bastards started stateside reunions.From these reunions came the wish to share their stories with the world, to honor, to educate, and to inspire. The result is this book, written from interviews and diligent archival research, in which the surviving “Battlin’ Bastards” tell their stories of combat in their own words, and honor those who “sacrificed for their country and their unit.”

Patrick Naughton’s father barely spoke of his time in Vietnam to his family, yet his service was the sole reason Patrick joined the U.S. Army as a teenager. Patrick Naughton Sr served in Vietnam with the 82nd Airborne and advising the South Vietnamese Army, while Patrick himself would serve in Iraq. Three decades of history and politics divided their service yet the similarities between their experiences are undeniably striking.Patrick’s attempts to understand his father led to a search for those who served with him in Vietnam, an examination of the personal relationship of a father and son whose few connections have been war, and a quest to understand war and its undeniable generational influence. The result is an engaging and eye-opening weaving together of the combat experiences of two generations of a military family.From the failure of grand stratagem, through personal combat stories, and the memories of those lost—America’s wars against communism and terror are laid raw through the experiences of one family.

In Vietnam, in 1967, William Chickering commanded a Mike Force battalion of Montagnards, highland tribesmen who were also members of a secret army, FULRO. Some senior American commanders worried that FULRO was communist, but those who fought with them understood that the goal of the United Front for the Liberation of Oppressed Races was to drive all Vietnamese—including communists—from the highlands. For a while, FULRO appeared capable of changing the course of the war in Vietnam. Then, inexplicably, it faded away.Chickering’s quest to understand FULRO took him to Phnom Penh in 1973, where he found five of the six leaders, the sixth having been mysteriously murdered. He was unable to discern the truth behind their political smoke, and just two years later, 150 of them—men, women, and children—disappeared into the maw of the Khmer Rouge. Among them was the family of Bhan, one of the leaders, who had been in the United States when Phnom Penh fell.In 1986, Bhan headed back to Southeast Asia to learn their fate. He resurfaced in Cambodia 22 years later, after an extraordinary odyssey. He had never found his family. Were they, and the rest of the FULRO Montagnards, executed by the Khmer Rouge, or could they still be alive, somewhere in Cambodia? Determined to finally unveil the truth, Chickering moved to Phnom Penh. His research led him to the widow of a Cambodian Cham widely assumed to have been FULRO’s sinister puppeteer, and eventually to FULRO’s secret papers. From these he was able to piece together why FULRO faded away, and how FULRO’s failure was connected to its one last heroic shot in 1965 to win a country for the Montagnards.This extraordinary account reveals a previously untold aspect to the Vietnam War: how a minority with dreams of reclaiming their homeland used the protagonists in a wider conflict to try and further their own ends, and almost succeeded.