51 Results for : materiel
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The Silent Service in World War II: The Story of the U.S. Navy Submarine Force in the Words of the Men Who Lived It , Hörbuch, Digital, ungekürzt, 604min
When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, the US Navy had a total of 111 submarines. However, this fleet was not nearly as impressive as the number suggests. It was mostly a collection of aging boats from the late teens and early twenties, with only a few of the newer, more modern Gato-class boats. Fortunately, with the war in Europe was already two years old and friction with Japan ever increasing, help from what would become known as the Silent Service in the Pacific was on the way: there were 73 of the new fleet submarines under construction. The Silent Service in World War II tells the story of America's intrepid underwater warriors in the words of the men who lived the war in the Pacific against Japan. The enemy had already begun to deploy advanced boats, but the U.S. was soon able to match them. By 1943, the new Gato-class boats were making a difference, carrying the war not just to the Japanese Imperial Navy but to the vital merchant fleet that carried the vast array of materiel needed to keep the land of the Rising Sun afloat. As the war progressed, American success in the Solomons, starting with Guadalcanal, began to constrict the Japanese sea lanes, and operating singly or in wolfpacks, they were able to press their attacks on convoys operating beyond the range of our airpower, making daring forays even into the home waters of Japan itself in the quest for ever more elusive targets. Also taking on Japanese warships, as well as rescuing downed airmen (such as the grateful first President Bush), US submarines made an enormous contribution to our war against Japan. ungekürzt. Language: English. Narrator: Tom Perkins, Jo Anna Perrin. Audio sample: https://samples.audible.de/bk/tant/011228/bk_tant_011228_sample.mp3. Digital audiobook in aax.- Shop: Audible
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Lessons in Leadership: My Life in the US Army from World War II to Vietnam (American Warrior Series) , Hörbuch, Digital, ungekürzt, 655min
John R. Deane, Jr. (1919-2013) was born with all the advantages a man needs to succeed in a career in the US Army, and he capitalized on his many opportunities in spectacular fashion.The son of one of George C. Marshall's closest assistants, Deane graduated from West Point with the first class of World War II and served in combat under the dynamic General Terry de la Mesa Allen, Sr.After the war, he too charge of a German espionage unit in operations against the Soviets, personally leading the first foot patrol following the course of the Berlin Wall as it was being constructed, participated in the 1965 Dominican Republic intervention, and saw combat in Vietnam. In 1975, he received his fourth star and became commander of the US Army Materiel Development and Readiness Command.In Lessons in Leadership, this exceptional soldier not only discusses working with some of the army's most influential and colorful leaders -including James M. Gavin, William E. DePuy, William Westmoreland, and Creighton Abrams, Jr. - but also the many junior officers who helped him develop the leadership skills for which he became well known. Throughout, he offers eyewitness accounts of key Cold War era events as well as wise observations concerning the leadership and management challenges facing the Department of Defense.The book is published by The University Press of Kentucky. The audiobook is published by University Press Audiobooks.Praise for the book:"Every leader in today's Army can draw lessons from his words." (General Barry R. McCaffrey, USA (retired))"An excellent study in leadership and contributes much to understanding the history of the Army in which the author served." (Army Magazine)"A fascinating look at army life from the 1940s through the 1970s." (Journal of America's Military Past) ungekürzt. Language: English. Narrator: Laurence Lukas. Audio sample: https://samples.audible.de/bk/acx0/187394/bk_acx0_187394_sample.mp3. Digital audiobook in aax.- Shop: Audible
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The First Sino-Japanese War: The History and Legacy of the Conflict That Doomed the Chinese Empire and Led to the Rise of Imperial Japan , Hörbuch, Digital, ungekürzt, 75min
Completing the Meiji Restoration that heralded the dawn of a new era for both Japan and Asia, the island nation found itself thrust into the modern world, a world of industry and conquest. Flexing its new muscles, the burgeoning power soon came to blows with the regional power that for centuries dominated the area politically and culturally: China. Also seeking to modernize in the wake of Western exploitation, China struggled to adapt to the changing times, doing everything it could to maintain a balance between modernity and tradition. Japan found that balance, and, with its new industry desperate for raw materials, looked to the peninsula of Korea for new markets and resources. China, in contrast, refused to strike such a balance, adopting a veneer of modernity while maintaining the status quo, both domestically and with regards to Korea. For decades Korea existed as a protectorate of China, paying homage to the mighty Chinese dynasties while minding its own business as best it could. However, sensing weakness in the former regional power after being defeated by the Europeans during the Second Opium War, escalating tensions over Korea between the old power of China and the new power of Japan led to the First Sino-Japanese War. In its first modern war, the modernized Japanese empire went to war against the dominant power in the region, and though interested Western powers favored China, Japan won the day, claiming Korea as their conquest and permanently upsetting the balance of power in the region. The conflict paved the way for the future Empire of Japan and the collapse of the Qing Dynasty. Though both nations modernized, and China far outweighed Japan in terms of men and materiel potential, the island nation handily won its first modern war. ungekürzt. Language: English. Narrator: Colin Fluxman. Audio sample: https://samples.audible.de/bk/acx0/116920/bk_acx0_116920_sample.mp3. Digital audiobook in aax.- Shop: Audible
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The Mystery of the Lady Be Good: The History of the World War II Plane's Disappearance and Discovery , Hörbuch, Digital, ungekürzt, 78min
Nazi Germany's North African defeat opened up the possibility of taking the war in the West to the European continent for the first time since France's lightning conquest by the Wehrmacht in 1940. The British and Americans debated the merits of landing in France directly in 1943, but they ultimately opted against it. Complex reasons lay behind England's successful insistence on the Mediterranean theater rather than the French theater as the scene of the next western Allied strike against Nazi Germany. Chief among these remained Britain's determination to keep a postwar empire, one that Churchill and his cabinet hoped would include Iraq and Iran, the source of oil needed to ensure that England continued to "rule the waves" with a powerful modern navy. This strategic imperative, indeed, formed the backbone of the British choice of Sicily as the target for military operations in the summer of 1943. While the Germans sent men and materiel to aid in holding the island, the Allies, though allowing the invasion force to stand idle, undertook massive preparations of their own. The logistical corps of both the American and British armies stockpiled huge amounts of food, medical supplies, ammunition, spare parts, and gasoline for their invading soldiers. Seeing to every detail, the assiduous quartermasters even accumulated a store of 144,000 condoms, a large stock of chewing gum, and a supply of rat traps to deal with vermin. Naturally, the preparations also included bombing missions over Italy ahead of an amphibious landing, and on April 4, 1943, one of the planes that took off from Libya to bomb Naples was the Lady Be Good, a B-24D Liberator bomber with a crew that had never flown a combat mission. The operation, which included over a dozen planes, was undone by poor flying conditions almost from the start, and the Lady Be Good never even made into formation with the others attacking Naples, thus flying out the mission on its own. ungekürzt. Language: English. Narrator: Kenneth Ray. Audio sample: https://samples.audible.de/bk/acx0/098467/bk_acx0_098467_sample.mp3. Digital audiobook in aax.- Shop: Audible
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America’s Buried History: Landmines in the Civil War , Hörbuch, Digital, ungekürzt, 323min
Despite all that has been published on the American Civil War, one aspect that has never received the in-depth attention it deserves is the widespread use of landmines across the Confederacy. These “infernal devices” dealt death and injury in nearly every Confederate state and influenced the course of the war. Kenneth R. Rutherford rectifies this oversight with America’s Buried History: Landmines in the Civil War, the first book devoted to a comprehensive analysis and history of the fascinating and important topic. Modern landmines were used for the first time in history on a widespread basis during the Civil War when the Confederacy, in desperate need of an innovative technology to overcome significant deficits in materiel and manpower, employed them. The first American to die from a victim-activated landmine was on the Virginia Peninsula in early 1862 during the siege of Yorktown. Their use set off explosive debates inside the Confederate government and within the ranks of the army over the ethics of using “weapons that wait.” As Confederate fortunes dimmed, leveraging low-cost weapons like landmines became acceptable and even desirable. The controversial weapon was the brainchild of Confederate General Gabriel J. Rains (who had experimented with explosive booby traps in Florida two decades earlier during the Seminole Wars, and other Confederates soldiers developed a sundry of landmine varieties, including command-controlled and victim-activated. The devices saw extensive use in Virginia, at Port Hudson in Louisiana, in Georgia, the Trans-Mississippi Theater, during the closing weeks of the war in the Carolinas, and in harbors and rivers in multiple states. Debates over the ethics of using mine warfare did not end in 1865, and are still being waged to this day. Dr. Rutherford, who is known worldwide for his work in the landmine discipline, and who himself lost his legs to a mine in Africa, relies on a host of primary and secondary ungekürzt. Language: English. Narrator: John Harrison Gass. Audio sample: https://samples.audible.de/bk/acx0/205387/bk_acx0_205387_sample.mp3. Digital audiobook in aax.- Shop: Audible
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The Powder River Expedition of 1865: The History of the Controversial Campaign against Native Americans in the Montana and Dakota Territories , Hörbuch, Digital, ungekürzt, 120min
The Bozeman Trail ran through the Powder River country, which included the traditional hunting grounds of Lakota, Cheyenne, and Arapaho peoples. Attempts by the natives to prevent encroachment and armed defense of settlers along the trail led to conflicts in short order. Due to the presence of the Sioux in the region, as early as 1864, travelers were advised not to traverse the Bozeman Trail except in very large wagon trains. The US Army also suffered - that year, when a party led by Captain Townshend and several soldiers set out along the Trail with a wagon train, the Sioux attacked his train, killing four soldiers in the assault.In response to Sioux raids along the Bozeman Trail, the United States Army closed the trail in 1865 to mount the Powder River Expedition against the Sioux alliance that kept ravaging settlers and the beleaguered Crows. With the Civil War nearing its end, spare men were hard to come by, but still, the Powder River Expedition was prepared under the leadership of Brigadier General Patrick Connor.Charged with keeping the roads and trails of the plains open, Connor’s expedition was war in all but name. Underequipped, and without enough men, the expedition turned out to be little more than a series of limited skirmishes, fortification construction, and requisitions for more men and materiel. Almost from the start, the expedition faced trouble. The various division commanders had a foggy notion of which parts of the Powder River Country they were to march through, with the varied surveys of the region not helping. The biggest problem, however, was the soldiers’ refusal to march. Occurring at the climax of the Civil War, the expedition’s soldiers expected to be discharged and allowed to return to their homes, not stuck in the middle of nowhere, fighting another battle. Dissuaded from mutiny with the helpful aid of artillery, the various divisions finally got underway in July.The expedition faced vast open country, and that ungekürzt. Language: English. Narrator: Daniel Houle. Audio sample: https://samples.audible.de/bk/acx0/226312/bk_acx0_226312_sample.mp3. Digital audiobook in aax.- Shop: Audible
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Submarine Warfare in World War I: The History and Legacy of the German U-boats and Allied Efforts to Counter Them , Hörbuch, Digital, ungekürzt, 91min
Submarine warfare began tentatively during the American Civil War (though the Netherlands and England made small prototypes centuries earlier, and the American sergeant Ezra Lee piloted the one-man "Turtle" vainly against HMS Eagle near New York in 1776). Robert Whitehead's invention of the torpedo introduced the weapon later used most frequently by submarines. Steady improvements to Whitehead's design led to the military torpedoes deployed against shipping during both World Wars. World War I witnessed the First Battle of the Atlantic, when the Kaiserreich unleashed its U-boats against England. During the war, the German submarines sent much of the British merchant marine to the bottom. Indeed, German reliance on U-boats in both World War I and World War II stemmed largely from their nation's geography. The Germans eventually recognized the superiority of the Royal Navy and its capacity to blockade Germany's short coastline in the event of war. While the British could easily interdict surface ships, submarines slipped from their Kiel or Hamburg anchorages unseen, able to prey upon England's merchant shipping. The sleek hunter-killers lurking beneath the waves, using periscopes to close in unnoticed on their prey, added a new, nerve-wracking element to naval warfare. The mere threat of submarine attack immediately altered naval tactics and strategies employed by both the Western Allies and the Central Powers, shifting them towards a more cautious approach, especially at the war’s start when the submarine threat remained untested. During World War I, German U-boats operated solo except on one occasion. Initially, the British and nations supplying England with food and materiel scattered vessels singly across the ocean, making them vulnerable to the lone submarines. However, widespread late war re-adoption of the convoy system tipped the odds in the surface ships' favor, as one U-boat skipper described: "The oceans at once became bare ungekürzt. Language: English. Narrator: Bill Hare. Audio sample: https://samples.audible.de/bk/acx0/110814/bk_acx0_110814_sample.mp3. Digital audiobook in aax.- Shop: Audible
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Stealing the General: The Great Locomotive Chase and the First Medal of Honor , Hörbuch, Digital, ungekürzt, 911min
On April 12, 1862—one year to the day after Confederate guns opened on Fort Sumter and started the Civil War—a tall, mysterious smuggler and self-appointed Union spy named James J. Andrews and 19 infantry volunteers infiltrated Georgia and stole a steam engine called the General. Racing northward at speeds near 60 miles an hour, cutting telegraph lines, and destroying track along the way, Andrews planned to open East Tennessee to the Union army, cutting off men and materiel from the Confederate forces in Virginia. If they succeeded, Andrews and his raiders could change the course of the war. But the General’s young conductor, William A. Fuller, chased the stolen train - first on foot, then by handcar, and finally aboard another engine, the Texas. He pursued the General until, running out of wood and water, Andrews and his men abandoned the doomed locomotive, ending the adventure that would soon be famous as “The Great Locomotive Chase.” But the ordeal of the soldiers involved was just beginning. In the days that followed, the raiders were hunted down and captured. Eight were tried and executed as spies, including Andrews. Eight others made a daring escape, including two assisted by a network of slaves and Union sympathizers. For their actions, before a personal audience with President Abraham Lincoln, six of the raiders became the first men in American history to be awarded the Medal of Honor—the nation’s highest decoration for gallantry. Americans North and South, both at the time and ever since, have been astounded and fascinated by this daring raid. But until now, there has not been a complete history of the entire episode and the fates of all those involved. Based on eyewitness accounts, as well as correspondence, diaries, military records, newspaper reports, deposition testimony, and other primary sources, Stealing the General is a blend of meticulous research and compelling narrative that is destined to becom ungekürzt. Language: English. Narrator: Bronson Pinchot. Audio sample: https://samples.audible.de/bk/blak/004307/bk_blak_004307_sample.mp3. Digital audiobook in aax.- Shop: Audible
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Submarine Warfare in the Atlantic: The History of the Fighting Under the Waves Between the Allies and Nazi Germany During World War II , Hörbuch, Digital, ungekürzt, 106min
Danger prowled under both the cold gray waters of the North Sea and the shimmering blue waves of the tropical Atlantic during World War II as Adolf Hitler's Third Reich attempted to strangle Allied shipping lanes with U-boat attacks. German and British submarines combed the vast oceanic battlefield for prey, while scientists developed new technologies and countermeasures. Submarine warfare began tentatively during the American Civil War (though the Netherlands and England made small prototypes centuries earlier, and the American sergeant Ezra Lee piloted the one-man Turtle vainly against HMS Eagle near New York in 1776). Britisher Robert Whitehead's invention of the torpedo introduced the weapon later used most frequently by submarines. Steady improvements to Whitehead's design led to the military torpedoes deployed against shipping during both World Wars. World War I witnessed the First Battle of the Atlantic, when the Kaiserreich unleashed its U-boats against England. During the war's 52.5 months, the German submarines sent much of the British merchant marine to the bottom. Indeed, German reliance on U-boats in both World War I and World War II stemmed largely from their nation's geography. The Germans eventually recognized the primacy of the Royal Navy and its capacity to blockade Germany's short coastline in the event of war. While the British could easily interdict surface ships, submarines slipped from their Kiel or Hamburg anchorages unseen, able to prey upon England's merchant shipping. During World War I, German U-boats operated solo except on one occasion. Initially, the British and nations supplying England with food and materiel scattered vessels singly across the ocean, making them vulnerable to the lone submarines. However, widespread late war re-adoption of the convoy system tipped the odds in the surface ships' favor, as one U-boat skipper described: "The oceans at once became bare and empty; for long periods at a time the U ungekürzt. Language: English. Narrator: Dan Gallagher. Audio sample: https://samples.audible.de/bk/acx0/073327/bk_acx0_073327_sample.mp3. Digital audiobook in aax.- Shop: Audible
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Submarine Warfare in World War II: The History of the Fighting Under the Waves in the Atlantic and Pacific Theaters , Hörbuch, Digital, ungekürzt, 179min
Danger prowled under both the cold gray waters of the North Sea and the shimmering blue waves of the tropical Atlantic during World War II as Adolf Hitler's Third Reich attempted to strangle Allied shipping lanes with U-boat attacks. German and British submarines combed the vast oceanic battlefield for prey, while scientists developed new technologies and countermeasures. During World War I, German U-boats operated solo except on one occasion. Initially, the British and nations supplying England with food and materiel scattered vessels singly across the ocean, making them vulnerable to the lone submarines. However, widespread late war re-adoption of the convoy system tipped the odds in the surface ships' favor. However, even the wolf-pack proved insufficient to defeat the Atlantic convoys and stop Allied commerce - the precise opposite of the Pacific theater, where America's excellent submarine forces annihilated much of Japan's merchant marine and inflicted severe damage on the Imperial Japanese Navy. Submarines exercised a decisive impact on the outcome of the Pacific Theater in World War II. The US submarine fleet, largely though not exclusively under the overall command of Vice Admiral Charles Lockwood, strangled the supply lines and shipping traffic of the Empire of Japan. Their commerce raiding crippled both Japan's ability to keep its frontline units supplied and to manufacture the weapons, vessels, and vehicles needed to successfully carry on the struggle. The United States and Japan both produced excellent, high-tech submarines in the context of the World War II era. Japanese I-boats showed excellent seakeeping capabilities and offered the versatility created by their large size, including the ability to serve as motherships for midget submarines or aircraft carriers for scouting aircraft or even specialized bombers. The Type 93 Long Lance and Type 95 torpedoes they carrier packed enough punch to sink capital ships like ba ungekürzt. Language: English. Narrator: Dan Gallagher. Audio sample: https://samples.audible.de/bk/acx0/073733/bk_acx0_073733_sample.mp3. Digital audiobook in aax.- Shop: Audible
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