Displaying 1-10 of 24
Displaying 1-10 of 24
English shipbuilder Sir John Thornycroft, credited as a pioneer in the torpedo-boat industry, initially created the Miranda series of mahogany fast boats culminating in the Miranda IV, launched in 1910. This boat could reach speeds of up to 35 knots with a single 120hp petrol engine.
One of the more glamourous aspects of the Pacific War was the idealized picture of United States Navy (USN) PT Boats racing under fire to attack Japanese surface ships many times their size. Using their bravery and torpedoes, PT Boats were devastatingly effective, at least according to wartime propaganda. The reality of PT operations was much different but was still a compelling story.
The D-Day landings and their aftermath were among the most complex and important naval operations in history. With the target beaches divided into two areas of responsibility – one US-commanded, one British – this armada launched a month-long operation to first support the landings, then to protect, supply, and support the troops ashore, as they fought to expand their toehold in occupied Europe.
Japanese Combined Fleet 1942–1943 covers the period between August 1942 and November 1943, and begins with the first American offensive of World War II. This landing on Guadalcanal prompted a six-month grinding battle of attrition between August 1942 and February 1943 before the Japanese were forced to retreat from the island. During this contest, the IJN suffered heavy losses in aircraft, aircrew, and ships. In the ensuing campaign for the Central and Northern Solomons, the IJN was forced into a force preservation mode.
Most books on the Atlantic campaign paint it as a near-run thing for the Allies. The reality was much different. The first six months of the Atlantic campaign were only a skirmish. Following the Norwegian campaign, the Germans again turned their attention to cutting off British trade.
The three ships of the Midway class are the forgotten class of USN carriers. They were originally part of the USN’s immense ship-building programme during World War II. Building on the success of the Essex-class fleet carriers, the USN sought an even larger carrier with superior protection and a larger air group.
The prevailing view of the Battle of Midway is simplistic and in many ways simply wrong. Nevertheless, it has survived largely intact until the present day. All of the first accounts of the battle played up the superiority of the Japanese and their expectation of another victory. Even the titles of these books, like Incredible Victory and Miracle at Midway, suggested the inevitability of a Japanese victory. The sole Japanese account of the battle translated into English was easily woven into the standard account.
A common belief about the 1941 Pacific Fleet was it did not value aviation; that aircraft carriers and aircraft took a back seat to battleships. After all, the 1941 Pacific Fleet was America’s last mighty battleship fleet. It even says so in the book’s title. This offers an easy explanation for the surprise at Pearl Harbor, that the battleship types had ignored the threat naval aviation posed. The US Navy’s brown-shoe aviators tacitly encouraged this belief. They profited by laying the blame on the black-shoe surface warship types. It also deflected attention from naval aviators’ failure to detect the approaching Japanese fleet until too late.
Bouvet was to be the last of five 1st class battleships with similar general characteristics but of independent design subsequently known as the ‘Fleet of Samples’ (Flotte d’échantillons).
Although Italy was the smallest of the great powers fighting World War II, it still had colonies, settlements and interests from Africa to China and Latin America. As it was a co-belligerant state after the 1943 armistice (1), the Italian navy archives were not acquired by the Allies, nor by the Germans, as both the contemporary Rome Open City government and the later fascist Italian Social Republic were able to avoid these documents being seized or tampered with.
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