World War II Reading List

Title: Battle Cry

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Battle Cry follows the fortunes of a Marine outfit from boot camp to Guadalcanal, Tarawa, and elsewhere in the Pacific during World War II. Many of the events are based on the author’s WWII experience with the 6th Marine Regiment. The interactions of the characters and their ability to develop “esprit de corps” is a […]

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Title: The War Journal of Major Damon “Rocky” Gause

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The true, first-person account of a captured World War II soldiers incredible escape and courageous journey home, discovered after more than fifty years. Of all the heroic stories to come out of World War II, few are so extraordinary as that of Major Rocky Gause, who was captured by the Japanese, escaped from the infamous […]

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Title: Retribution: The Battle for Japan, 1944-45

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By the summer of 1944 it was clear that Japan’s defeat was inevitable, but how the drive to victory would be achieved remained unclear. The ensuing drama—that ended in Japan’s utter devastation—was acted out across the vast theater of Asia in massive clashes between army, air, and naval forces.  In recounting these extraordinary events, Max […]

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Title: Pacific Blitzkrieg: World War II in the Central Pacific

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Lacey closely examines the planning, preparation, and execution of ground operations at the corps and division level for five major invasions in the Central Pacific: Guadalcanal, Tarawa, the Marshall Islands, Saipan, and Okinawa. The commanders had to integrate the U.S. Army and Marine Corps into a single operational force, something that would have been difficult […]

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Title: Grunts Inside the American Infantry Combat Experience, World War II Through Iraq

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John C. McManus covers six decades of warfare in which the courage of American troops proved the crucial difference between victory and defeat. Based on years of archival research and personal interviews with veterans, Grunts demonstrates the vital, and too often forgotten, importance of the human element in protecting the American nation, and advances a […]

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Title: American Military History, vol. 2, The United States Army in a Global Era, 1917-2008

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Created initially as a Reserve Officers’ Training Corps textbook, this second volume in a two-volume overview of the Army’s story covers the period from World War I to the early days of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Written in an engaging style and enhanced by sophisticated graphics and recommended readings, the work is an […]

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Title: The Second World War

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This book approaches the war from a thematic and periodic standpoint. The course of the war is divided into six passages and attached to each is an analytical narrative of a battle, which exemplifies a mode of warfare special to this war, such as city sieges, an air battle, an airborne operation, an aircraft carrier […]

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Title: The Doolittle Raid: America’s Daring First Strike Against Japan

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On April 18, 1942, 16 B-25s launched from the carrier Hornet, under the command of Lt. Col. Jimmy Doolittle, flew 650 miles to Japan, dropped their bombs on Tokyo and other targets, and escaped to China and neutral Soviet territory. Although a very small affair in comparison with the B-29 strikes three years later, the […]

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Title: Once An Eagle

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Once An Eagle is the story of one special man, a soldier named Sam Damon, and his adversary over a lifetime, fellow officer Courtney Massengale. Damon is a professional who puts duty, honor, and the men he commands above self interest. Massengale, however, brilliantly advances by making the right connections behind the lines and in […]

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Title: No Ordinary Time: Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt: The Home Front in World War II

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“No Ordinary Time” is a monumental work, a brilliantly conceived chronicle of one of the most vibrant and revolutionary periods in the history of the United States. With an extraordinary collection of details, Goodwin masterfully weaves together a striking number of story lines– Eleanor and Franklin’s marriage and remarkable partnership, Eleanor’s life as First Lady, […]

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