Volume Eight of the Pacific Profiles series presents the most accurate profiles and histories to date of Imperial Japanese Navy floatplanes which served in the South Pacific theatre, throughout New Guinea and the Solomons. The markings of the six floatplane types deployed in the theatre are covered: the A6M2-N Rufe, E8N2 Dave, E13A1 Jake, F1M2 Pete, E9W Slim and E7K Alf. Floatplane operations commenced in January 1942 with the invasion of Rabaul. Later Rufes were often misidentified as Zeros with their presence in the Solomons seemingly ubiquitous. Petes often fought Allied fighters, with other types focused on reconnaissance and occasional bombing missions, sometimes at night. Most floatplane activity had ceased by late 1943, leaving a handful of stay-behinds operating from Rabaul and Kavieng. Illustrated, unit by unit, are examples of the varied types of markings, camouflage and tail code systems which appeared on floatplanes assigned to sea tenders, shore, ship and submarine-based units. Each of the 76 profiles cites draws on evidence from colour photos, Combined Fleet orders, POW interrogations, technical reports and post-war wreck surveys. Brief histories of every unit includes their role in the theatre and defines the ever-changing markings systems as ordained by Tokyo. Numerous maps and diagrams help the reader understand command structures such as the R-Area Air Force and the 11th Seaplane Tender Division. Never before have such accurate profiles been presented, most for the first time. The author is world-renown for his expertise in Japanese aerial warfare in the Pacific.

Ernest ‘Andy’ Andrews began his training as a machine gunner at Fort McClellan in Alabama in July 1943. In early 1944, he arrived in the UK for further training before D-Day, ahead of the 1st Infantry Division deploying on the evening of June 5th on the USS Henrico. Due to a problem with his landing craft, Andrews only reached Omaha Beach on the early evening of June 6th, but his experience was still a harrowing one. Fighting in Normandy, he was nicked by a bullet and evacuated to England in late July when the wound became infected, before returning to participate in the Normandy breakout. Following the race across France in late August, he participated in the rout of several retreating German units near Mons, Belgium, and his outfit approached Aachen in mid-September. For a month, Andrews’ squad defended a bunker position in the Siegfried Line against repeated German attacks, then after Aachen surrendered, the unit fought its way through the Hurtgen Forest to take Hill 232. Early on the morning of November 19th, he engaged in his toughest battle of the war as the Germans attempted to retake Hill 232, where he was again wounded. After surgery and a month’s convalescence he rejoined H Company in time to fight in the Battle of the Bulge. His unit then participated in the fast-moving Roer to the Rhine campaign, then the battle to expand the Remagen bridgehead. Breaking out from the Remagen bridgehead, Andrews’ squad stumbled on a German tank unit and this time he narrowly escaped death. Following a rapid advance up to the Paderborn area, the unit raced to Germany’s Harz Mountains, where the Wehrmacht was trying to organize a last stand. They ended the war fighting in Czechoslovakia, where Andrews witnesses the German surrender in early May. Following occupation duty, he returned to the States in October 1945. This vivid first-hand account takes the reader along from Normandy to victory with Andy Andrews and his machine-gun crew. The war shaped the author’s postwar life in countless ways, and in 1994, he made the first of three return visits to the European battlefields where he had fought.

By the spring of 1864, the Army of the Potomac and the Army of Northern Virginia had become battle-hardened, battle-weary foes locked in an ongoing stalemate. With the presidential election looming in the fall, President Abraham Lincoln needed to break the deadlock and so brought to the east the unassuming "dust-covered man" who had strung together victory after victory in the west: Ulysses S. Grant. "Well," said soldiers in the Army of the Potomac with a grudging respect for their Southern adversary, "Grant has never met Bobby Lee yet." Robert E. Lee and Ulysses S. Grant would come to symbolize the armies they led as the spring campaign got underway, and the clash that began in the Virginia Wilderness on May 5, 1864, turned into a long, desperate death-match that inexorably led to Appomattox Court House eleven months later. The war would come to an end, but at what cost along the way? Grant vs. Lee: Favorite Stories and Fresh Perspectives from the Historians at Emerging Civil War recounts some of the most famous episodes and most compelling human dramas from the marquee match-up of the Civil War - not just the two most successful commanders produced by either side but the two largest and most fabled armies of the war.

In the popular memory, the end of the Civil War arrived at Appomattox with handshakes and amicable banter between Robert E. Lee and Ulysses S. Grant - an honorable ceremony amongst noble warriors. And so it has been remembered to this day. But the war was not over. A larger and arguably more important surrender had yet to take place in North Carolina. This story occupies but little space in the vast annals of Civil War literature. As author Ernest A. Dollar Jr. ably explains in Hearts Torn Asunder: Trauma in the Civil War’s Final Campaign in North Carolina, the lens of modern science may reveal why. This war’s final campaign in North Carolina began on April 10, 1865, a day after Appomattox. More than 120,000 Union and Confederate soldiers were still in the field bringing war with them as they moved across North Carolina’s heartland. Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman was still out to destroy the South’s ability and moral stamina to make war. His unstoppable Union troops faced Maj. Gen. Joseph E. Johnston’s demoralized but still dangerous Confederate Army of Tennessee. Thousands of paroled Rebels, desperate, distraught, and destitute, added to the chaos by streaming into the state from Virginia. Grief-stricken civilians struggling to survive in a collapsing world were caught in the middle. The collision of these groups formed a perfect storm long ignored by those wielding pens. Hearts Torn Asunder explores the psychological experience of these soldiers and civilians during the chaotic closing weeks of the war. Their letters, diaries, and accounts reveal just how deeply the killing, suffering, and loss had hurt and impacted these people by the spring of 1865. The author deftly recounts the experience of men, women, and children who endured intense emotional, physical, and moral stress during the war’s dramatic climax. Their emotional, irrational, and often uncontrollable reactions mirror symptoms associated with trauma victims today, all of which combined to shape memory of the war’s end. Once the armies left North Carolina after the surrender, their stories faded with each passing decade, neither side looked back and believed there was much that was honorable to celebrate. Hearts Torn Asunder recounts at a very personal level what happened during those closing days that made a memory so painful that few wanted to celebrate, but none could forget.

In 1940, the U.S. Army began to standardize the production of vehicles it required to fight a modern war – including support and medical vehicles. The first deliveries of the ¾-ton Dodge WC54 ambulance arrived in 1942. Built by Chrysler, and utilising the same chassis and engine as the entire Dodge WC series, the WC54 ambulance has specific features specific to use for the rescue and transport of injured soldiers. In all, more than 26,000 Dodge WC54 vehicles would be built during the war. Used by the U.

In April 2011, the newly created Royal Navy Response Force Task Group deployed to the Mediterranean to provide a range of military options in response to the Arab Spring. For the next six months the group planned and prepared for a range of potential operations including noncombatant evacuations from Libya, Yemen and Syria, maritime interdiction operations off the Libyan coast, and amphibious landings. On 3 June the group began launching attack helicopter strikes into Libya and in the nights that followed planned 47 and executed 22 strikes destroying a range of targets including: 54 vehicles, 2 rigid hull boats, 2 BM 21 rocket launchers, 4 main battle tanks, 1 zsu antiaircraft vehicle and 3 command and control nodes. The operation saw the first operational use of Apaches from the sea and the first embarkation of US Army combat search and rescue teams and Blackhawk helicopters in an RN warship. This is a personal account by the Group’s Commander, which brings to life the challenges of command – including authorizing strikes and mitigating risk to UK aircrew – in a complex and challenging environment. It reveals how closely the RN Group worked with its French counterpart, the support provided by the United States, together with the complexity of working alongside NATO and of simultaneously dealing with a range of UK authorities. This is a story of leadership under pressure and the remarkable professionalism of all involved and the bravery of Army aircrew. It was modern defence and joinery at its best – British Army and USAF helicopters operating from RN ships, supported by Fleet Air Arm aircraft and fixed wing jets as part of a largely air campaign.

Dunkirk resonates through British history. The "miracle of deliverance", as Prime Minister Winston Churchill described the evacuation of nearly 340,000 troops from the small French port, in most people's minds marks the end of British involvement in France in 1940. Dunkirk finally fell to the advancing German forces but it was far from the end of the story. Tens of thousands of troops and British civilians were still in France. By the end of June, a further 250,000 people had been brought back to the United Kingdom. This is the story of that second miracle of deliverance that has never been fully told. Operation Aerial was an audacious plan to bring home the disparate units of the BEF that were cut off south of the River Somme or isolated near the Maginot Line as the Germans - and Rommel's tanks in particular - advanced in May and early June 1940. This evacuation was also to include thousands of British citizens who were trapped in France and given little guidance beyond instructions to head to ports on the west coast. Dunkirk had been a military evacuation and civilians had not been catered for. The Royal Navy, supported by a fleet of merchant navy ships, worked its way down the western coast of France trying to keep one step ahead of the Germans. As one port was captured they moved down the coast to the next from Cherbourg, to St Malo, to Brest, to Saint-Nazaire, to Lorient, to La Rochelle, to Bordeaux, to Bayonne and finally Saint-Jean-de-Luz. Operation Aerial is almost unknown alongside Operation Dynamo partly because it doesn't have the romance of the little ships but also due to controversies, disasters and accusations of a cover-up. Amid these controversies are stories of incredible resourcefulness, simple courage and remarkable heroism, underpinned by largely excellent organisation and command. There were the nurses on board the hospital ships who returned time and time again despite being attacked, the demolition teams that stayed until the Germans were breathing down their necks and took their chance when it came to being evacuated, and the many ordinary soldiers and civilians who struggled through the chaos, confusion and disintegration of France to get back home so they could continue the battle against Hitler. Now it is time that story was told.

Between 1940 and 1945, the Diamond T Motor Car Company supplied just over 50,000 vehicles to the US military, and also to the Allies. Of these, just over 30,000 were heavy 4-ton 6x6 trucks of varying types: cargo, tow truck, pontoon carrier, engineer, and cartographic. The 'Diamond' would serve in all theatres of operations, wherever its robustness and reliability were necessary to complete the mission. Due to its expertise, Diamond T also produced the famous half-track, with more than 10,000 manufactured. All of these models are described in this book by Didier Andres, an expert in the subject. It is illustrated throughout using archival and period photographs and diagrams.

R. D. Hooker, Jr. was a combat soldier and leader in five wars. He then served as a senior Pentagon advisor and as a White House staff member in four different administrations. At the time of his retirement from the military in 2010 he was the most decorated colonel in the US Army. Beginning with his enlistment at 18 in 1975, this memoir chronicles his experiences in the post-Vietnam Army as a young paratrooper, as a West Point cadet, and as a combatant in the many military conflicts which followed. Hooker served in the invasion of Grenada, in the earliest days of the Somalia intervention, as one of the first American responders to the Rwandan genocide, with the first American units to enter both Bosnia and Kosovo, in peace-keeping operations in the Sinai desert, in the Pentagon on 9/11, and again in combat in Iraq and Afghanistan. Rising from private to colonel, he commanded a paratroop company, battalion and brigade and served in the continental US, Latin America, Europe, the Middle East, Africa and Southwest Asia. When not serving with troops, he taught at West Point and served in several high-level Pentagon assignments and in the White House in the administrations of George H. W. Bush, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush and Donald Trump. As a gritty and accomplished combat soldier and leader of vast experience, the author's writing conveys a first-person, hands-on appreciation of the American soldier and of close combat, around the globe and through five different conflicts, in all its demanding, heroic, and often tragic dimensions. Few if any memoirs of this genre can match the narrative arc shown here. In addition, the author describes each of these campaigns from a strategic and policy perspective informed by his White House and Pentagon experiences as well as years of academic training. The juxtaposition of these contrasting perspectives is both compelling and unique.

For three millennia the Mediterranean Sea served as the center of western civilization and the scene of many colossal wars and naval battles. In the early summer of 1940, this ancient body of water again played host to a new and extensive conflict as the Kingdom of Italy challenged Britain for dominance within the region. With France on the verge of collapse and Britain facing the prospect of imminent invasion, the Italians hoped to re-establish control over the Mediterranean. The only thing standing in their way was the heavily outnumbered British Mediterranean Fleet and the equally outnumbered British ground and air forces present in the region. Together, these forces would determine whether the Mediterranean reverted back to Italian control or whether the Allies would prevail and retain supremacy over this great body of water for themselves. This book tells the story of this epic struggle. This was a prolonged and colossal conflict waged at differing times against the combined forces of Italy, Germany and Vichy France over a wide area stretching from the coastal waters of Southern Europe in the north to Madagascar in the south and Africa's Atlantic coast in the west to the Persian Gulf in the east. Utilizing a variety of weapons including surface warships, submarines, and aircraft along with sizable merchant fleets, the British and their subsequent American partners maintained vital seaborne lines of communication, conducted numerous amphibious landings, interdicted Axis supply activities and eventually eliminated all semblances of Axis maritime power within the theatre. In turn, these actions facilitated multiple Allied victories that helped secure the defeat of the European Axis.

The diminutive Union XII Corps found significant success on the field at Antietam. Its soldiers swept through the East Woods and the Miller Cornfield, permanently clearing both of Confederates, repelled multiple Southern assaults against the Dunker Church plateau, and eventually secured a foothold beyond the Dunker Church in the West Woods. This important piece of high ground had been the Union objective all morning, and its occupation threatened the center and rear of Gen. Robert E. Lee's embattled Army of Northern Virginia. Federal leadership largely ignored this signal achievement and the opportunity it presented. The XII Corps' achievement is especially notable given its string of disappointments and hardships in the months leading up to Antietam. Cedar Mountain to Antietam: A Civil War Campaign History of the Union XII Corps, July – September 1862 by M. Chris Bryan is the story of the formation of this often luckless command as the II Corps in Maj. Gen. John Pope's Army of Virginia on June 26, 1862. Bryan explains in meticulous detail how the corps came within a whisker of inflicting a crushing defeating against Maj. Gen. "Stonewall" Jackson at Cedar Mountain on August 9, suffered through the hardships of Pope's campaign before and after the Battle of Second Manassas, and its resurgence after entering Maryland and joining the reorganized Army of the Potomac. The men of this small corps, who would later wear a five-pointed star as their insignia, went on to earn a solid reputation in the Army of the Potomac at Antietam that would only grow during the battles of 1863.Bryan's study, a hybrid unit history and leadership and character assessment, puts the XII Corps' actions in proper context by providing significant and substantive treatment to its Confederate opponents. His unique study, based on extensive archival research, newspapers, and other important resources, is a compelling story of a little-studied yet consequential corps and fills a gaping historiographical gap that has longed needed to be filled.

In war, every action has a beginning and an end. Echo Among Warriors is a story of close combat between two opposing, equally committed adversaries. The powerful narrative immerses the reader in both sides of the battle, playing and replaying the same battle sequence from alternating viewpoints – through the eyes of the Marines and through the eyes of the North Vietnamese. The bullet fired from a Marine's M-16 at a silhouetted enemy solider crouched on the jungle path will in the next chapter tear into the flesh of that crouched NVA trooper. The story – unfolding from the initial contact to the final horrific ending – represents just one of perhaps thousands of deadly encounters that reflect the reality of battle: a mind-numbing, intensely personal experience, that forever changes the participant.

Pickett's charge has just ended, the battle of Gettysburg is over. The Confederate army is defeated and must retreat to the Potomac River forty miles away with thousands of wagons full of wounded soldiers, provisions and tens of thousands of animals. Asa Helms, a private in the Twenty-Sixth North Carolina Infantry, joined the army to oppose the Yankee's invasion of his "country. " He is torn between serving his country with honor and going home to take care of his wife who is in great need. He faces a long, seemingly impossible march with little food, little hope and the Yankees on his heels. Captain Louis Young, aide-to-camp to Confederate General James Pettigrew, is fighting to preserve a culture and a lifestyle and possible domination by the despicable Yankees. The defeat at Gettysburg, the horrendous condition of the army and the endless resources of the enemy are causing him to doubt the ability of the Confederacy to gain another major victory and thus independence. His objective is to get the rebel army across the Potomac River to preserve it to fight another day. Colonel George Gray, an Irishman, is colonel of the Sixth Michigan Cavalry. He is hell-bent on putting down the rebellion before it divides the country that has been so good to him. He is neither a soldier, nor an accomplished equestrian, and has gotten on the wrong side of his superior, General George Custer, with whom he is in constant conflict. He sees a chance to cut off the Confederate army and end the war before it reaches the Potomac River.The journey ends at the Potomac River where each soldier must face the bitter realities of this unnatural war. Asa must choose between escaping across the river or remaining with his wounded friend and facing certain captivity.

Jeffrey Hunt’s Meade and Lee After Gettysburg: The Forgotten Final Stage of the Gettysburg Campaign, from Falling Waters to Culpeper Court House, July 14-31, 1863 exposes for Civil War readers what has been hiding in plain sight for 150 years: The Gettysburg Campaign did not end at the banks of the Potomac on July 14, but deep in central Virginia two weeks later along the line of the Rappahannock.Contrary to popular belief, once Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia slipped across the swollen Potomac back to Virginia the Lincoln administration pressed George Meade to cross quickly in pursuit—and he did. Rather than follow in Lee’s wake, however, Meade moved south on the east side of the Blue Ridge Mountains in a cat-and-mouse game to outthink his enemy and capture the strategic gaps penetrating the high wooded terrain. Doing so would trap Lee in the northern reaches of the Shenandoah Valley and potentially bring about the decisive victory that had eluded Union arms north of the Potomac.The two weeks that followed was a grand chess match with everything at stake—high drama filled with hard marching, cavalry charges, heavy skirmishing, and set-piece fighting that threatened to escalate into a major engagement with the potential to end the war in the Eastern Theater. Throughout, one thing remains clear: Union soldiers from private to general continued to fear the lethality of Lee’s army.Meade and Lee After Gettysburg, the first of three volumes on the campaigns waged between the two adversaries from July 14 through the end of 1863, relies on Official Records, regimental histories, letters, newspapers, and other sources to provide a day-by-day account of this fascinating highstakes affair. The vivid prose, coupled with original maps and outstanding photographs, offers a significant contribution to Civil War literature.Thanks to Hunt these important two weeks—until now overshadowed by the battle of Gettysburg and almost completely ignored by writers of Civil War history—have finally gotten the attention they have long deserved. Readers will never view the Gettysburg Campaign the same way.

1970 - the height of the Vietnam War. A group of young Forward Air Controllers based in Thailand are assigned with supporting the Truck War and the People's War in southern Laos, where the fate of the Vietnam War, and Laos' very future, is being decided. Tasked with shutting down the Ho Chi Minh Trail - the North Vietnamese supply lines running into South Vietnam - literally stopping the constant stream of trucks in their tracks, these American airmen, call sign "Nail," fly missions 24 hours a day. Daily they run the gauntlet of intense anti-aircraft fire to bring in accurate attacks by American fighter bombers. At night, streams of red tracers scream up from the ground, seeking the metallic flesh of their fragile craft. During the day, they search the skies for the telltale black puffs of smoke that reveal the self-destructive warheads of the North Vietnamese gunners. Even when tragedy befalls the group, they perserve with their mission. But will courage and dedication be enough?

The Second Nagorno-Karabakh war – fought between Armenia and Azerbaijan between September 24 and November 10, 2020 – was the first war in history won primarily by unmanned systems. This 44-day war resulted in a decisive military victory for Azerbaijan. Armenia was outfought, outnumbered, and outspent and lost even though they controlled the high ground in a mountainous region that favored traditional defense. Azerbaijan's alliance with Turkey, and close technological support from Israel, strategically isolated Armenia. In addition, Turkey's posturing influenced the Russians not to intervene to support Armenia. That Azerbaijan attacked Armenia during the pandemic was an additional factor. The fact that Azerbaijan won the war is not extraordinary, considering the correlation of forces arrayed against Armenia. What is exceptional is that this was the first modern war primarily decided by unmanned weapons. In this war the Turkish-made BAYRAKTAR TB2 Unmanned Air Combat Vehicle (UCAV) and the Israeli-made HAROP Loitering Munition (LM) dominated the fighting and provided Azerbaijan with a war-winning advantage.