Showing results by publisher "Tantor Media" in Military

George Koval was born in Iowa. In 1932, his parents, Russian Jews who had emigrated because of anti-Semitism, decided to return home to live out their socialist ideals. George, who was as committed to socialism as they were, went with them. There, he was recruited by the Soviet Army as a spy and returned to the US in 1940. A gifted science student, he enrolled at Columbia University, where he knew scientists soon to join the Manhattan Project, America's atom bomb program.

Most histories of the US Army in World War II view the Mediterranean Theater of Operations primarily as a deadly training ground for very green forces, where lessons learned on the beaches of Oran, in the hills of the Kasserine Pass area, and at the collapse of the Tunis bridgehead all contributed to later success in Western Europe. Steven Barry, however, contends that victory in the MTO would not have materialized without the leadership of battalion-level commanders. They operated at a high level, despite the lack of combat experience for themselves and their troops.

The intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM), designed to quickly deliver thermonuclear weapons to distant targets, was the central weapons system of the Cold War. ICBMs also carried the first astronauts and cosmonauts into orbit. More than a generation later, we are still living with the political, technological, and scientific effects of the space race, while nuclear-armed ICBMs remain on alert and in the headlines around the world. Christopher Gainor explores the US Air Force's decision, in March 1954, to build the Atlas, America's first ICBM.

The Marine Corps has always considered itself a breed apart. Since 1775, America's smallest armed service has been suspicious of outsiders and deeply loyal to its traditions. Marines believe in nothing more strongly than the Corps' uniqueness and superiority, and this undying faith in its own exceptionalism is what has made the Marines one of the sharpest, swiftest tools of American military power. Along with unapologetic self-promotion, a strong sense of identity has enabled the Corps to exert a powerful influence on American politics and culture.

In this powerful reassessment of the postwar order in Europe, Norman Naimark suggests that Joseph Stalin was far more open to a settlement on the continent than we have thought. Through revealing case studies from Poland and Yugoslavia to Denmark and Albania, Naimark recasts the early Cold War by focusing on Europeans' fight to determine their future. As nations devastated by war began rebuilding, Soviet intentions loomed large. Stalin's armies controlled most of the eastern half of the continent, and in France and Italy, communist parties were serious political forces.

When Dwight Eisenhower graduated from West Point in 1915, few would have predicted he was destined for greatness. Yet the young officer made the most of the opportunities he was given, made a lasting impression on superiors, and eventually gained a reputation as an excellent staff officer.

In 1856, South Carolina Congressman Preston Brooks assaulted Massachusetts Senator Charles Sumner with a cane in the United States Capitol, defending his family's honor and the rights of slaveholders. In beating Sumner unconscious, Brooks fueled a nationwide clash over slavery that ended in civil war. Southern historian Paul Quigley brings Brooks to life more vividly than ever, revealing how his personal struggles shaped the fateful decision to attack Sumner.

Negotiations between the United States and the Taliban led to the 2020 Doha Agreement, which intended to end the American presence in the country and bring peace. Despite the failure of the Taliban to honor all aspects of the agreement, the Biden administration then determined to completely withdraw from the country, a withdrawal that would play out alongside Taliban advances into August 2021. After the Taliban took control of Kabul and declared victory, the next two weeks saw an increasingly chaotic non-combatant evacuation operation.

Major Peter Weaver's military career is remarkable for its breadth, from the Royal Tank Corps, to the infantry, but also as an engineer and on colonial and special operations. Hearing accounts of the rise of Hitler, he joined the Territorials. The outbreak of war saw him rapidly promoted, volunteering for the Auxiliary Units, the secret force created in case of German invasion.

In telling this story, Sheehy takes listeners into the cockpit and into the lives of his fellow pilots—past and present—as they struggle with the seemingly never-ending threat of wildfires.

When Hitler's Nazis marched into Poland, it brought an abrupt, cruel end to Jack Eisner's childhood, shattered his loving family, and turned his peaceful Jewish community into a nightmarish world of atrocity and murder. Instead of entering the Warsaw Music Conservatory, to which he'd won a scholarship, Jack found himself climbing cemetery walls, leaping over rooftops, and tunneling through sewers with a gang of fellow teenagers to smuggle food, hope, and survival into his besieged home.

The German Army lost two consecutive wars and the conclusion is often drawn that it simply wasn't able to cope with its opponents. This image is constantly reinforced in literature and in the media, where seemingly brainless operating German units led by fanatical officers predominate. Nothing was as far from the truth. The records show that the Germans consistently outfought the far more numerous Allied armies that eventually defeated them: their relative battlefield performance was at least 1.5 and in most cases three times as high as that of its opponents.

Innovating Victory: Naval Technology in Three Wars studies how the world‘s navies incorporated new technologies into their ships, their practices, and their doctrine. It does this by examining six core technologies fundamental to twentieth-century naval warfare including new platforms (submarines and aircraft), new weapons (torpedoes and mines), and new tools (radar and radio).

Thousands of miles away from where her son was deployed, a powerful premonition is devastatingly confirmed by a knock on the door from two faceless strangers bearing the news that her son had stepped on an improvised explosive device in the poppy fields of Afghanistan. He had lost both of his legs and suffered multiple other injuries, including partial amputation of all the fingers of his left hand. For forty-eight days she stood at his bedside.

One of America's most controversial generals, Douglas MacArthur's rise through the US Army's ranks was meteoric. However, he did not lead large formations of men in combat until he assumed command of forces in the Philippines in 1941. When war commenced with the bombing of Pearl Harbor, MacArthur's performance on the battlefield was a failure: he underestimated the Japanese, and his poorly trained forces were outmaneuvered and outfought by a much smaller invading force.

Gestapo Hunter explores the charmed life and exceptional career of Ted Sismore, widely considered one of the RAF's very best wartime navigators and leaders. A quiet, unassuming man who was nicknamed "Daisy" on account of his youthful complexion, Ted was one of only a handful of aircrew to complete a tour of operations in Blenheims in the summer of 1941.

The island city of Tyre along the coast of Lebanon was for centuries an impregnable fortress and key to unlocking Phoenician and Persian power in the Near East. Its fall was first prophesied in the Book of Ezekiel; but it would not be Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, who would take the city as the Bible foretold, but a Macedonian warrior king, Alexander. Alexander's siege of 332 BC was one of the most remarkable events in the classical world. The Siege of Tyre is the first book-length treatment of this critical and fascinating campaign

Robert J. Patterson examines so-called "traditional" slave narratives alongside writings from non-enslaved Black people in the nineteenth century, the imaginative works of twentieth century fiction, and twenty-first century cinema to create a compelling and informative introduction to the long historical arc of slavery woven into the cultural and political fabric of America.

The rhyme and language of a writer's voice is the living soul of narrative. The evolution of John Hay's voice, established during his formative and college years at Brown University and echoed during his time with Abraham Lincoln, is documented in Lincoln's Speechwriter through evidence of Hay's distinct voice and Lincoln's ability to engage audiences, fused into something remarkable.

Artem Chapeye reveals his war, intimate and senseless, withholding nothing about his motivations, his nightmares, his new relationship with the world. Here one man, a pacifist turned fighter, a story writer turned soldier considers the reasons for and reactions to war on a very personal level. Chapeye investigates his role in the Ukrainian people's defense against the Russian army and his responsibilities as a father, a writer, a soldier, and a man of conviction.