Naval War

In Too Far on a Whim, Tyler A. Pitrof presents a high-spirited revision of the US Navy's commitment to high-steam propulsion systems, the mainstay of its World War II fleets. Pitrof's research persuasively demonstrates that in its war against the Imperial Japanese Navy, the US Navy succeeded despite its high-steam propulsion systems rather than because of them. Pitrof provides an account that extends far beyond technology and into matters of naval hierarchies and bureaucracy, strategic theory, and ego.

One of the lesser-known stories of the Civil War is the role played by escaped slaves in the Union blockade along the Atlantic coast. From the beginning of the war, many African American refugees sought avenues of escape to the North. Due to their sheer numbers, those who reached Union forces presented a problem for the military. Fortunately, the First Confiscation Act of 1861 permitted the seizure of property used in support of the South's war effort, including slaves. Eventually regarded as contraband of war, the runaways became known as contrabands.

Sailors who served aboard one of many L.S.T.s: This book is to hopefully help the world know just what these truly brave young men went through serving aboard their ship during World War Two, and how their brave contributions contributed to the Allies’ triumphs over both the Japanese and Germans during the war. Listen to the book to become aware of their exciting and unbelievable story.

April 1945. The end of World War II finally appears to be nearing. The Nazis are collapsing in Europe, and the Americans are vastly overpowering the Japanese in the Pacific. For a group of pilots in their early 20s who were trained during the twilight of the war, the biggest concern is that they'll never actually see real action and will go home without having a chance to face the enemy.

This story has been written in response to a demand for some account of the very generally misunderstood submarine campaign and, particularly, of the means by which it was defeated. While opinions may differ to a certain extent as to the influence exerted upon the campaign by the various forms of tactics, the means and weapons employed, and the general strategy adopted, I have given what I believe to be a consensus of the best-informed opinion upon these matters; I have taken advantage of all of the information now available to ensure accuracy in the account.

Tom Swift and His Aerial Warship, volume 18 in the Tom Swift series, finds our hero building an airship - but not just any airship: this is a battleship of the air, complete with cannons, bombs, and able to stay in the air for at least two weeks on a single tank of gas. It is no surprise that the Swift shops are soon infested with spies and evildoers bent on stealing Tom's ideas, and even better yet, his airship. Will the forces of evil steal Tom's airship and his ideas? Tune in and find out.

A gripping first-hand description of the salvage operations at the port of Massawa on the Red Sea coast of Eritrea during the early days of World War II. When forced from the region, Italian troops had scuttled many ships to block the important harbour, which was vital to the British war effort. Ellsberg, an American salvage officer, was placed in charge and a small group of workers under his direction accomplished an almost Herculean task with virtually no resources.

Acclaimed WWII historian and military intelligence expert John Prados offers a provocative reassessment of the Allies’ battle for the Solomon Islands - a turbulent, dramatic campaign that, he argues, was the true turning point of the Pacific conflict.

With all the immediacy of an eyewitness account, Anthony Pitch recounts the dramatic story of the British invasion of Washington, D.C. in the summer of 1814. The British torched the Capitol, the White House, and other buildings, setting off an inferno that illuminated the countryside for miles around and sent President James Madison galloping out of town. The author's gripping account also describes the valiant defense of nearby Fort McHenry and the story of the writing of The Star Spangled Banner.

On 6th June 1944, HMS Belfast supported troops in action on the beaches of Normandy in the campaign to liberate Europe from Nazi Germany. This audiobook recounts this extraordinary story, focusing on the dramatic events of 6th June but setting the context of the ship's history in the Arctic Convoy Service and Battle of North Cape. It describes the build-up to D-Day as seen and experienced by Belfast's people and explains her role in the longer Battle for Normandy.

Examines the underlying causes of Pearl Harbor and the revisionist theories that high officials knew of the attack. Gordon W. Prange is the author of Miracle at Midway and At Dawn We Slept. This title is the sequel to At Dawn We Slept.

Danger's Hour explores the May 11, 1945, attack on the USS Bunker Hill, one of the deadliest kamikaze attacks of World War II. The book details the story of the ship herself (a technological marvel), her crew, and her kamikaze adversaries. Maxwell Taylor Kennedy shows how crucial this battle was to victory in the Pacific, even though it was overshadowed by the almost simultaneous surrender of the Nazis in Europe. With this extensive research, Kennedy tells the human story on both sides of the battle.

The US Navy's first planned battle of WWII is told through the extraordinary, little-known story of USS Duncan, the first Allied warship to penetrate a Japanese battle line. From their first encounter with their celebrated captain and tyrannical executive officer to a deadly night afloat in shark-infested waters to a homecoming turned into a PR campaign, The Gun Club is a vivid day-to-day account of life on a warship, told largely in the words of the survivors, and is one of the most detailed and compelling accounts of a war cruise ever written.

His Majesty's Submarine Unbeaten was last heard from via a signal sent to Flag Officer Submarines on November 1, 1942. The signal simply stated: "Operation Bluestone completed". After this date the 58-meter British U-Class submarine inexplicably disappeared. Unbeaten was fully operational for just over two years. During its short tenure, Unbeaten successfully returned to war-torn Malta many times, symbolically flying its Jolly Roger.

On December 7, 1941, even as Japanese carrier-launched aircraft flew toward Pearl Harbor, a small American cargo ship chartered by the army reported that it was under attack from a submarine halfway between Seattle and Honolulu. After that one cryptic message, the humble lumber carrier Cynthia Olson and her crew vanished without a trace, sparking one of the most enduring nautical mysteries of the war. What happened to the ill-fated ship? What happened to her crew?

On August 14, 1945, Alfred Eisenstaedt took a picture of a sailor kissing a nurse in Times Square, minutes after they heard of Japan's surrender to the United States. Two weeks later LIFE magazine published that image. It became one of the most famous WWII photographs in history (and the most celebrated photograph ever published in the world's dominant photo-journal), a cherished reminder of what it felt like for the war to finally be over.

War at Sea is a dramatic global tour of this remote museum and other formerly lost traces of humanity's naval heritage. It is also an account by the world's leading naval archaeologist of how underwater exploration has discovered these remains, thus resolving mysteries, adding to our understanding of the past, and providing intimate details of the experience of naval warfare.

Simmering racial tensions inflamed by discriminatory punitive measures sparked a violent confrontation aboard the USS Kitty Hawk while it was engaged in air strikes off the coast of North Vietnam. The US Navy charged Black sailors with rioting and assaults on White sailors in an incident referred to as a race riot, while totally ignoring violent unprovoked assaults committed by White sailors and Marines.

Admiral Bertram Ramsay may not be the most familiar World War II commander, but he was critical to the Allied victory. He orchestrated the dramatic evacuation of British expeditionary forces at Dunkirk, planned the invasions of North Africa and Sicily, and worked closely with General Dwight Eisenhower on Operation Neptune, the Allied landings on the beaches of Normandy. In this magisterial biography, over a decade in the making, Andrew Gordon captures Ramsay’s complex, conflicted nature.

More than 800 sailors served aboard the Sterett during her hazardous and demanding duties in World War II. This is the story of those men and their beloved ship, recorded by a junior officer who served on the famous destroyer from her commissioning in 1939 to April 1943, when he was wounded at the Battle of Tulagi. Peppered with the kind of vivid, authentic details that could only be provided by a participant, the book is the saga of a gallant fighting ship that earned a Presidential Unit Citation for her part in the Third Battle of Savo Island, where she took on a battleship.