Operation Alacrity

Operation Alacrity
Author: Norman Herz
Publisher: Naval Institute Press
Total Pages: 402
Release: 2014-01-15
Genre: History
ISBN: 1612515088

To win the war against German U-boats, the Allies had to protect their convoys in the vast black hole of the mid-Atlantic known as the Azores Gap. In 1943 they devised a plan to set up air bases on the Azores Islands, owned by neutral Portugal. It was essential for the operation to remain secret because the Allies had to get there before the Germans, who had their own plan to build bases. Author Norman Herz took part in the Allied operation as a corporal with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' 928th Engineer Aviation Regiment. At the time he was given little information about the operation and told never to talk about what he did. After the war, Operation Alacrity remained mostly unknown, kept secret, Herz suggests, so the U.S. government would not be embarrassed--they had claimed they would not invade the Portuguese territory. In researching the book, Herz found not a word of the operation mentioned in any official U.S. history of World War II but a treasure trove of declassified memos and others documents from the files of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Combined U.S. U.K. Chiefs of Staff and in state department files. The story is filled with diplomatic intrigue and double-dealing, including secret meetings between Franklin Roosevelt and Winston Churchill and Churchill's use of a 1373 treaty with Portugal to justly landing in the Azores. The story also involves all of the Allied engineering branches, from U.S. Navy Seabees to RAF Sappers. The success of their operation is undeniable. U-boats stopped patrolling the Azores Gap and not a single Allied troopship was lost again in the area. Today the base is an important link to American and NATO defense worldwide.

Lists and Indexes

Lists and Indexes
Author: Great Britain. Public Record Office
Publisher:
Total Pages: 440
Release: 1974
Genre: Archives
ISBN:

Naval Warfare 1919-45

Naval Warfare 1919-45
Author: Malcolm H. Murfett
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 648
Release: 2008-11-04
Genre: History
ISBN: 1134048130

Naval Warfare 1919–45 is a comprehensive history of the war at sea from the end of the Great War to the end of World War Two. Showing the bewildering nature and complexity of the war facing those charged with fighting it around the world, this book ranges far and wide: sweeping across all naval theatres and those powers performing major, as well as minor, roles within them. Armed with the latest material from an extensive set of sources, Malcolm H. Murfett has written an absorbing as well as a comprehensive reference work. He demonstrates that superior equipment and the best intelligence, ominous power and systematic planning, vast finance and suitable training are often simply not enough in themselves to guarantee the successful outcome of a particular encounter at sea. Sometimes the narrow difference between victory and defeat hinges on those infinite variables: the individual’s performance under acute pressure and sheer luck. Naval Warfare 1919–45 is an analytical and interpretive study which is an accessible and fascinating read both for students and for interested members of the general public.

Tracing Your Air Force Ancestors

Tracing Your Air Force Ancestors
Author: Phil Tomaselli
Publisher: Pen and Sword
Total Pages: 216
Release: 2007-07-19
Genre: History
ISBN: 1844155730

Whether you are interested in the career of an individual air-man or woman, researching medals awarded to a pilot or crew member or just want to know more about a particular squadron or operation, this book will point you in the right direction. Assuming that the reader has no prior knowledge of the air force, its history or organization, Phil Tomaselli explains which records survive, where they can be found and how they can help you in your research. He also recommends resources available online as well as books and memoirs. Each era in air force history is described, from the pioneering days of early aviation and the formation of the Royal Flying Corps in the First World War to the creation of the Royal Air Force, its operations during the Second World War and its postwar development. The author explains the evolving organization of the air force in each period. He also provides pointers and examples which should help researchers find the records of units and bases that individuals served in.

The Quadrant Conference: August 1943

The Quadrant Conference: August 1943
Author: Joint History Office (U.S.)
Publisher: Government Printing Office
Total Pages: 450
Release: 2017-09-15
Genre: History
ISBN: 0160938813

The third historic meeting of Allied leaders in 1943 (Casablanca and Trident occurred earlier in the year), the Quadrant Conference (also called the Quebec Conference) was held from August 14 to 24 in Quebec City, Canada. President Franklin D. Roosevelt, British prime minister Winston S. Churchill, and the Combined Chiefs of Staff attended the conference, and Canadian prime minister Mackenzie King served as host. The opening of a second front in northern France, code-named Operation Overlord, was extensively discussed at the conference. Ultimately, the Allied leaders decided that Overlord was to be the main effort in Europe for the next year, with a target invasion date of May 1, 1944. In the Pacific, one important decision reached at Quadrant was the establishment of the Southeast Asia Command in the China-Burma-India Theater. Another major Allied focus in the Pacific was planning strategic bombing operations for the defeat of Japan using B-29 Superfortresses. Quadrant was one in a series of high-level conferences held by the US and British leaders in Washington, DC; Casablanca; Quebec; Cairo; Tehran; Malta; Yalta; and Potsdam to formulate the Allied grand strategy. At the Tehran, Yalta, and Potsdam conferences, the Soviet leader Joseph Stalin was also in attendance and played an important role. ISBN: 9780160938825 (Mobi) and ISBN: 9780160938832 (PDF) are also formats that are available for free download for this product title. The complete set of the World War II Inter-Allied Conferences series include the following available for free download: Arcadia Conference (Washington, DC), December 24, 1941–January 14, 1942: ISBN 978-0-16-093887-0 (Mobi); ISBN 978-0-16-093886-3 (ePub); ISBN 978-0-16-093888-7 (PDF) Post-Arcadia Conference (Washington, DC), January 23–May 19, 1942: ISBN 978-016-093890-0 (Mobi); ISBN 978-0-16-093889-4 (ePub); ISBN 978-0-16-093891-7 (PDF) Casablanca Conference (Morocco), January 14–24, 1943: ISBN 978-0-16-093893-1 (Mobi); ISBN 978-0-16-093892-4 (ePub); ISBN 978-0-16-093894-8 (PDF) Trident Conference (Washington, DC), May 12–25, 1943: ISBN 9780160938795 (Mobi); ISBN 9780160938788 (ePub); ISBN 9780160938801 (PDF) Sextant Conference (Cairo, Egypt), Eureka Conference (Tehran, Iran), and the Second Cairo Conference (Egypt), November 22–December 7, 1943: ISBN 9780160938856 (Mobi); ISBN 9780160938849 (ePub); ISBN 9780160939266 (PDF) Octagon Conference (Quebec City, Canada), September 12–16, 1944: ISBN 9780160939259 (Mobi); ISBN 9780160939273 (ePub); ISBN 9780160939280 (PDF) Argonaut Conference (Malta and Yalta, Soviet Union), January 30–February 11, 1945: ISBN 9780160939303 (Mobi); ISBN 9780160939297 (ePub); ISBN 9780160939242 (PDF) Terminal Conference (Potsdam, Germany), July 17–August 2, 1945: ISBN 9780160939235 (Mobi); ISBN 9780160939310 (ePub); ISBN 9780160939327 (PDF)

British Aircraft Carriers

British Aircraft Carriers
Author: David Hobbs
Publisher: Seaforth Publishing
Total Pages: 959
Release: 2014-09-30
Genre: History
ISBN: 1473853516

“This superb book . . . will undoubtedly become the definitive volume on British Aircraft carriers and naval aviation . . . magnificent.”—Marine News This book is a meticulously detailed history of British aircraft-carrying ships from the earliest experimental vessels to the Queen Elizabeth class, currently under construction and the largest ships ever built for the Royal Navy. Individual chapters cover the design and construction of each class, with full technical details, and there are extensive summaries of every ship’s career. Apart from the obvious large-deck carriers, the book also includes seaplane carriers, escort carriers and MAC ships, the maintenance ships built on carrier hulls, unbuilt projects, and the modern LPH. It concludes with a look at the future of naval aviation, while numerous appendices summarize related subjects like naval aircraft, recognition markings and the circumstances surrounding the loss of every British carrier. As befits such an important reference work, it is heavily illustrated with a magnificent gallery of photos and plans, including the first publication of original plans in full color, one on a magnificent gatefold. Written by the leading historian of British carrier aviation, himself a retired Fleet Air Arm pilot, it displays the authority of a lifetime’s research combined with a practical understanding of the issues surrounding the design and operation of aircraft carriers. As such British Aircraft Carriers is certain to become the standard work on the subject. “An outstanding highly informative reference work. It is a masterpiece which should be on every naval person’s bookshelf. It is a pleasure to read and a pleasure to own.”—Australian Naval Institute

The Deceivers

The Deceivers
Author: Thaddeus Holt
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Total Pages: 1176
Release: 2010-05-11
Genre: History
ISBN: 1439103887

In World War II, the Allies employed unprecedented methods and practiced the most successful military deception ever seen, meticulously feeding misinformation to Axis intelligence to lead Axis commanders into erroneous action. Thaddeus Holt's elegantly written and comprehensive book is the first to tell the full story behind these operations. Exactly how the Allies engaged in strategic deception has remained secret for decades. Now, with the help of newly declassified material, Holt reveals this secret to the world in a riveting work of historical scholarship. Once the Americans joined the war in 1941, they had much to learn from their British counterparts, who had been honing their deception skills for years. As the war progressed, the British took charge of misinformation efforts in the European theater, while the Americans focused on the Pacific. The Deceivers takes readers from the early British achievements in the Middle East and Europe at the beginning of the war to the massive Allied success of D-Day, American victory in the Pacific theater, and the war's culmination on the brink of an invasion of Japan. Colonel John Bevan, who managed British deception operations from London, described the three essentials to strategic deception as good plans, double agents, and codebreaking, and The Deceivers covers each of these aspects in minute detail. Holt brings to life the little-known men, British and American, who ran Allied deception, such as Bevan, Dudley Clarke, Peter Fleming, Douglas Fairbanks, Jr., and Newman Smith. He tracks the development of deception techniques and tells the hitherto unknown story of double agent management and other deception through the American FBI and Joint Security Control. Full of fascinating sources and astounding revelations, The Deceivers is an indispensable volume and an unparalleled contribution to World War II literature.

Organizing Victory

Organizing Victory
Author: Andrew Rawson
Publisher: The History Press
Total Pages: 690
Release: 2013-07-01
Genre: History
ISBN: 0752494031

Between December 1941 and July 1945 the Allied Heads of State met nine times to decide the ongoing strategy of World War II with their chiefs of staff. President Franklin Roosevelt and Prime Minister Winston Churchill decided the strategies for the Mediterranean and the Far East at the Arcadia conference in December 1941, reconvening in Casablanca for the symbol conference in 1943. They then considered the European campaign at the Trident Conference in May and the Quadrant conference in August. Generalissimo Chiang Kai-Shek joined them in Egypt for the Sextant Conference in November 1943, while Premier Joseph Stalin welcomed them to Tehran for the Eureka conference. The Octagon conference in September 1944 reaffirmed the Allied partnership's commitment to the European campaign. They then travelled to Yalta in the Crimea the following February to agree with Stalin how to end the war in Europe at the Argonaut conference. At the final conference in Potsdam, Berlin, in July 1945 President Harry S. Truman took the place of the recently deceased Roosevelt and the new PM Clement Atlee replaced Churchill part-way through the conference. They discussed the chaos of Europe and an end to the campaign against Japan; Truman also took Stalin aside to tell him about the atomic bomb. He affected indifference 0- but his spies had forwarned him of its existence. Discover what they discussed though the edited minutes of the meetings. Read the reasons and the compromises behind the decisions. follow the heated discussions as the war turned in favour of the Allies - and learn how the foundations for the post war world were laid. This is a history in the raw, unmediated: how would you, as President of the United States, reply to Stalin's formal suggestion that between 50,000 and 100,000 of the German High Command be liquidated at war's end? All the minutes are supported by footnotes containing extensive supplementary information?