The Battle of the Bulge, also known as the Ardennes Campaign, was fought from December 16, 1944 to January 25, 1945. The idea behind the German Offensive was to capture the Port of Antwerp, thus depriving the Allies of a very critical seaport resulting in the Allies being pushed out of this area of operation. The result would be a very big loss and, it was hoped, cause the British and Americans to sign a separate peace agreement.     The Germans were having a difficult time and losing ground in the East. By defeating the Allies, in the West, they could then focus on the Soviets. As such, the German High Command developed several plans, one of which included a Blitzkrieg through the Ardennes, which was not heavily defended. The attack was approved by Hitler and assigned to Field Marshals Walter Model and Gerd von Rundstedt. Both thought this offensive was too ambitious and tried to limit the attack and stop at the Meuse River, to no avail.  &nb... » Click here for the full story.

    THIS MONTH, seventy years ago, the Red Army and its new allies, the Royal Romanian Army and the Royal Bulgarian Army, began an offensive designed to capture the Hungarian capital of Budapest.  The Hungarian city can trace its roots back 2,000 years and is actually two cities, Buda and Pest, located on opposite sides of the Danube River.     On October 30, 1944, the 2nd and 3rd Ukranian Fronts commanded by Marshals Rodion Malinovsky and Fyodor Ivanovitch Tolbukhin, together with the 1st and 4th Romanian Armies, commanded by Nicolae Macici and Gheorghe Avramescu, and the 1st Bulgarian Army, commanded by Vladimir Stoychev, totaling 1,000,000 soldiers, commenced the Budapest Strategic Offensive Operation. It was an attempt to capture the Hungarian capital. By November 2, it had resulted in the capture of the southern suburbs of Alag and Kisalag. That initial effort ceased on November 24, 1944.     A renewed Soviet/ Romanian/ Bulgar... » Click here for the full story.

      In the spring of 1944, President Franklin D. Roosevelt was a sick man.  Far beyond his unprecedented break with tradition by running for his Third Term in 1940, he was, by far, the longest serving president in the history of the United States.     He was, however, just a shadow of his former robust (even though polio-stricken) self of the 1932, 1936 and 1940 campaigns. The strain of office and the terrible burden of a World War were definitely showing in his demeanor and appearance. And for the first time in 80 years the country was going through a presidential election during wartime.  It would seem that the very nature of the conflict of war would give pause to potential candidates from the opposing Republican Party. This was not the case, however, by a long shot. Predominant among the possible candidates of the GOP was Wendell Willkie, the unsuccessful nominee of the party in 1940.  Willkie was still a robust and active figur... » Click here for the full story.

      THIS WEEK, 70 years ago, Army Group North, commanded by Ferdinand Schörner, remained trapped in the Courland Peninsula, which became known as the Courland Pocket. The Courland Peninsula is located in Latvia and is bordered on the east by the Gulf of Riga and the west by the Baltic Sea. Army Group North had become trapped there when the Red Army had launched Operation Bagration, in June, which tore a gaping hole in the German lines on the Eastern Front.     A land connection between Army Group North and Army Group South was first cut when the 5th Guards Tank Army, commanded by Marshal of Armoured Troops Pavel Rotmistrov, of First Baltic Front commanded by Ivan Bagramyan of Armenia, reached the Baltic coast near the 700-year-old town of Tukums, on the west side of the Bay of Riga, on July 30, 1944. This earned General Bagramyan his first Hero of the Soviet Union star.     Connection between the two Army Groups was reestabli... » Click here for the full story.

    THIS WEEK, seventy years ago, on October 23, 1944, the opening phase of the Battle of Leyte Gulf took place around the Philippine Islands. The Imperial Japanese Navy made its last determined effort to challenge the U.S. Navy and launched Operation SHO-1, the Japanese plan conceived to destroy the U.S. Naval units supporting the invasion forces. The goal of this operation was to stop General MacArthur from controlling the Philippine Islands. This plan was prepared by the Japanese several months before the actual U.S. landings on the Island of Leyte on October 20, 1944.     The defense of the Philippines was deemed crucial to the survival of the  Japanese Empire. Without the Philippines all lines of communications would be cut and the essential supplies of oil from the Dutch East Indies (currently Indonesia), and raw materials from South East Asia would be lost. The Japanese command knew that if the Philippines were lost, then the war was also lo... » Click here for the full story.

    THIS WEEK, seventy years ago, General Douglas MacArthur, Supreme Commander of Allied Forces in the Southwest Pacific Area, made good on his promise to return to the Philippines, which he had abandoned, when, on March 12, 1942, he left embattled American and Filipino forces at Bataan and Corregidor and sailed to the safety of Australia.  For abandoning his troops, General MacArthur was awarded, at the instigation of General George C. Marshall, the Medal of Honor.  Since his father, Arthur, had received the same honor, they became the only father and son to have received the Medal of Honor, until 2001 when Theodore Roosevelt received it for his service during the Spanish-American War. General Theodore Roosevelt, Jr. received it for his service during the Normandy Invasion in June 1944. Both Roosevelts received their awards posthumously.     In July 1944, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt met with General MacArthur in Hawaii, “to de... » Click here for the full story.

      THIS WEEK, 70 years ago, American soldiers of the following divisions were engaged in capturing the 1,900 year old city of Aachen: 1st Infantry; Second Armored; Third Armored; 9th Infantry; 28th Infantry; 29th Infantry Division; 30th Infantry.     Aachen is the western most German city, located 38 miles southwest of Cologne, along the borders of Belgium and the Netherlands. During the reign of the Emperor, Charlemagne, in the Eighth Century, the city had served as his capital, and continued to be the site of the coronation of his successors for the next 600 years. Upon the death of Charlemagne, he was buried in the Aachen Cathedral, which would see the coronation of 30 German kings and 12 queens. Today Aachen has a population of 240,000.     Seventy years ago, the city had been incorporated into the Siegfried Line, Germany’s defensive system on its western border. At the time, its population numbered about 165,000. Now ... » Click here for the full story.

      BY THIS WEEK, 70 years ago, General George S. Patton’s Third Army’s race across France had come to a screeching halt. There were three reasons for this: (1) lack of fuel; (2) the diversion to liberate Paris; (3) German fortification at, and defense of, Metz. But for the first two, after the destruction of two German field armies and the loss of three very competent and respected Field Marshals - Gerd von Rundstedt (discharge), Erwin Rommel (injuries/suicide) and Günther von Kluge (suicide) - the path to Germany was wide open.     The 3,000-year-old city of Metz is located in the Lorraine region of Northeast France, at the confluence of the Moselle and Seille Rivers, near the borders of Germany and Luxembourg.  Today, the city has a population of about 125,000. During the war, its population fluctuated between 70,000 - 75,000. From the Franco/Prussian War of 1871, until the end of World War I, it had been a part of the Ger... » Click here for the full story.

    THIS WEEK, seventy years ago, the Red Army recaptured the750 year-old city of Riga, which is, and was, the capital, and largest city, of Latvia.  Today, the city has a population of 700,000, which is more than one-third of Latvia’s population, and it is almost evenly divided between Russians and Latvians. The city is located on the Gulf of Riga, at the mouth of the Daugava River.     Latvia had only been an independent country since the end of WWI, in 1918. Prior to that, it had been, from 1611, a part of, first the Kingdom of Sweden, and then, beginning in 1710, it was incorporated, in three stages over 85 years, into the Russian Empire.  While a part of the Swedish Kingdom, Riga was the largest city in Sweden and was the largest port in the Russian Empire.     On October 5, 1939, Latvia, with the Red Army at its borders, and the German Wehrmacht and the Red Army having just divided Poland between them, executed an a... » Click here for the full story.

    Seventy years ago on Sunday September 17, 1944, 500 gliders and 1,500 air transports flew from their bases in England destined for Holland. This air armada carried elements of the First Allied Airborne Army to land it behind German lines, along a highway in Holland, that stretched for more than 60 miles. This airborne army was to occupy a corridor leading to the town of Arnhem across the lower Rhine river. The goal of this gigantic air drop was to establish a bridgehead across the Rhine river which would enable the British Second Army to cross it and move into the northern plain of Germany to facilitate the destruction of German Army Group B. Like all the other military operations before it, the purpose of this one was to end the war in Europe quickly and send the boys home by Christmas.     After the Allied breakout from Normandy, in August 1944, their forces moved very rapidly across France and into Belgium. Attacking on a broad front, the Allie... » Click here for the full story.