Second World War

The Spitfire Kids

Despite depictions of the Battle of Britain as a campaign waged by grown-up men and women, the average age of an RAF fighter pilot at the height of the Second World War was just 20 – with those involved in…

Barbarossa – the biggest invasion in history

David Porter analyses the tense relationship between the two most powerful dictators in Europe during the countdown to the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union.

The German invasion of Russia

David Porter analyses the largest military invasion in history.

The Past

Operation Barbarossa Quiz

When Napoleon invaded Russia in 1812, he had an army of approximately 685,000 men. How many times larger was the army with which Hitler invaded the Soviet Union on 22 June 1941?

Jet Man: the making and breaking of Frank Whittle, genius of the jet revolution

This is a fine, deeply researched book, with Frank Whittle’s story beginning with a lad of humble origin who, aged just 16, entered the RAF as an apprentice fitter, already with strong views about the viability of gas-turbine aero engines…

Facing the Mountain: the forgotten heroes of the Second World War

The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor of 80 years ago not only brought the United States into a war, but provoked a wave of hostility to Japanese immigrants and their children across America. Daniel James Brown here explores the lives…

Why We Fight – The Battle of Russia

Like all the Why We Fight films, it is a highly charged, emotional account, always looking to create maximum impact.

Stalin’s War

‘I trust no one, not even myself.’ So the merciless dictator of the Soviet Union reportedly once said. In this new book, Sean McMeekin explores the Second World War from Joseph Stalin’s perspective. From his complex relations with both Winston…

Churchill and Son

What did the leaders of the ‘Big Three’ superpowers during the Second World War have in common? Well, Franklin Roosevelt’s five children went through 19 marriages between them. Meanwhile, Stalin laughed off his son’s suicide attempt and chronically neglected his…

Military History Events, Lectures, and Exhibitions – May

The best military history events, lectures, and exhibitions in May 2021, including an online course delving into the discovery of King Richard III in a car park, and an exhibit on Disney wartime propaganda.

Disney goes to war

More than 90% of the Disney company’s wartime output was dedicated to assisting in the struggle against Japan, Nazi Germany, and their allies.

The Reckoning: the defeat of Army Group South, 1944

The Eastern Front remains the forgotten child of Western histories of the Second World War. Even the phrase ‘Eastern Front’ is a reflection of a Western-centric view that sees the struggle between the USSR and Germany as an afterthought compared…

War Classics – A Bridge Too Far

MHM Editor Neil Faulkner recalls one of the great works of military history.

LEFT Steven Spielberg with Tom Hanks on the set of Saving Private Ryan, the 1998 film which has since spawned several wartime miniseries.

Filming begins on new Spielberg WWII miniseries

The series is based on Donald L Miller’s non-fiction book of the same name on the American 8th Air Force.

World’s ‘deepest-known shipwreck’ surveyed in the Pacific Ocean

Heavily outnumbered and outgunned, she nonetheless fought valiantly against her larger opponents, allowing time for the escort carriers she was protecting to escape. Of the ship’s 327-man crew, only 141 survived the battle.

Military History Matters 121

• Airpower comes of age
• The fight to destroy Hitler’s Tirpitz
• The Swiss: a late medieval military elite
• Britain’s secret World War II resistance plans
• The Walcheren Expedition, 1809

The Past

IWM announces reopening dates with #MissingMuseums campaign

The #MissingMuseums campaign invites fans of the institution to use social media to share what they missed about its galleries and exhibitions during the last several months.

The Past

World’s ‘deepest-known shipwreck’ surveyed in the Pacific Ocean

The 115m long Fletcher-class destroyer sank in the Pacific Ocean during the Battle Off Samar on 25 October 1944.

The Past

New £50 note featuring Alan Turing revealed

During the Second World War, Turing worked at the British Government’s Code and Cypher School (GC&CS) at Bletchley Park in Buckinghamshire.

World News in Brief

Domesticating dogs A study published in Scientific Reports ( s41598-020-78214-4) has proposed a new theory in the complex debate surrounding the way in which dogs came to be domesticated by early humans. It suggests that the process may have centred…

Britain at war in colour

Britain at War in Colour, released later this spring, reveals 100 of the best original images from the IWM collection. Some of them have been previously published – either in American magazines after the war, or more recently in books – but others are appearing in print for the first time.

War Athletes: Keith Truscott

No other Australian was so dear to the public as ‘Bluey’ Truscott... He was idolised and idealised, but not put on a pedestal.

Sink the Tirpitz!

John Sweetman analyses the relative failure of repeated Fleet Air Arm attacks on the German battleship Tirpitz.

Britain’s secret resistance plans

The British authorities were preparing for a brutal underground war in the event of German invasion and occupation in 1940.

Secret Alliances

It is one of the great ‘what ifs?’ of World War II. What would have happened had the Nazis acquired a nuclear weapon? The consequences are unthinkable. The sabotaging of the Nazi nuclear programme was therefore one of the most…

Mission France

Despite the deserved praise for Special Operations Executive members Violette Szabo and Noor Inayat Khan, many of its other agents are forgotten. Kate Vigurs here attempts to redress the balance, looking at the widely varying experiences of all 39 women…