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[Superangela]

I just checked and yep, I ordered it :) It's already on my to read list...

['Aussie Rick', Moderator]

The author wrote an excellent account on the bombing raid against Hamburg in 1943, one of the best accounts I have read on the subject so I have high hopes for "Savage Continent".

[Superangela]

'Aussie Rick' wrote: "The author wrote an excellent account on the bombing raid against Hamburg in 1943, one of the best accounts I have read on the subject so I have high hopes for "Savage Continent"."

Can't wait to get it!

[[deleted user]]

Whats a good book on arnhem? Ive found three that look good 1)Arnhem by John Nichol 2)The Devil's Birthday: The Bridges to Arnhem, 1944 Geoffrey Powell 3)Arnhem 1944: The Airborne Battle What out of the three is best?

[[deleted user]]

Has anyone read Battle of the Bulge, Volume 3: The 3rd Fallschirmjager Division in Action, December 1944-January 1945? Dose it cover Operation Stoesser(Falcon)the last Fallschirmjager combat jump?

[Ethan]

@Matt My two favorite Arnhem books are A Bridge Too Far by Cornelius Ryan and A Bridge At Arnhem by Charles Whiting. I haven't read the ones you mentioned but I have heard good reviews about the Arnhem 1944 one. Hope that helps! ;-)

[Manray9]

Matt wrote: "Whats a good book on arnhem? Ive found three that look good 1)Arnhem by John Nichol 2)The Devil's Birthday: The Bridges to Arnhem, 1944 Geoffrey Powell 3)Arnhem 1944: The Airborne Battle What out o..."

Matt: For personal accounts try:

Arnhem by Major-General R. E. Urquhart

I Was A Stranger by General Sir John Hackett

A Drop Too Many: A Paratrooper at Arnhem by Major-General John Frost

The first two are impressive. I recently purchased Frost's book, but haven't read it yet.

[carl]

here's my suggestion. you may get a few others from this group ...

It Never Snows in September: The German View of Market-Garden and the Battle of Arnhem, September 1944

['Aussie Rick', Moderator]

I agree with Carl, one of my favourite books on Arnhem is It Never Snows in September, but also A Bridge too Far and Martin Middlbrooks account.

by Robert Kershaw

by Cornelius Ryan

by Martin Middlebrook

[Geevee, Assisting Moderator British & Commonwealth Forces]

Matt wrote: "Whats a good book on arnhem? Ive found three that look good 1)Arnhem by John Nichol 2)The Devil's Birthday: The Bridges to Arnhem, 1944 Geoffrey Powell 3)Arnhem 1944: The Airborne Battle What out o..."

Matt I personally like Middlebrook's (your number 3). There are some good personal experiences and small unit histories available too. Manray's are good too as is Ethan's and AR's recommendation on Cornelius Ryan's book.

[[deleted user]]

thanks all! i have read a bridge to far long ago. do like Middlebrooks books!

['Aussie Rick', Moderator]

Matt wrote: "thanks all! i have read a bridge to far long ago. do like Middlebrooks books!"

I don't think you will be disappointed, its a very detailed but easy to read account.

[Dj]

Matt wrote: "Whats a good book on arnhem? Ive found three that look good 1)Arnhem by John Nichol 2)The Devil's Birthday: The Bridges to Arnhem, 1944 Geoffrey Powell 3)Arnhem 1944: The Airborne Battle What out o..."

I have read the Devil's Birthday, it is a pretty good book. A Bridge Too Far is very good, if dated.
After the ones you got have been digested I would suggest you might try,

It is a other side of the hill book on the topic.

[Lee]

This book covers the whole autumn campaign that included the Arnhem drop. I have mixed feelings about the author's tone, he intends to be a myth-buster or revisionist, and is very critical of the planning and execution of the whole of Market-Garden. That said, his analysis isn't far wrong, IMO.

[Jane]

For a completely new, never before published slant on the military intelligence available just prior to the Market Garden Campaign at Arnhem, you might like to read Secrets, Spies and Spotted Dogs. This story came out of an adopted daughter connecting with her biological family in England in 2005. She then learns that her her mother, a British soldier and Dutch by marriage was sent by the Dutch in WWII to spy on the German defences in Arnhem just prior to the Market Garden campaign. Sceptical and wary, the author speaks to experts, and examines the verbal, written and circumstantial evidence to support these stories. Few books about Arnhem written in English describe, acknowledge or analyse the Dutch contribution to the military intelligence available to the Allies in the week leading up to the launch. Secrets, Spies and Spotted Dogs: Unravelling Mysterious Family Connections Behind a Secret Adoption

[A.L.]

I’ve been doing a little research on US executive order 9279, issued in December 1942. It included a paragraph that said males 18-35 years old could only be inducted into the armed services under the Selective Training and Service Act. In other words (if I’m reading it right), no more voluntary enlistment in the United States until the war was over. The draft would decide who should serve in which branch and who should work in factories, etc. Has anyone read more about this? Does anyone know how well it was enforced? I’ve seen it mentioned in books and a few places online, but without much detail. I’d love a book recommendation.

I vaguely remember one of my grandpas saying he didn’t understand why they didn’t want them to volunteer (I think he graduated high school in 1944. He ended up in the Navy, but he passed away a few years ago so I can’t ask him.) Another grandpa didn’t remember much about the draft, but he was a little on the young side at the time. He just remembers his older brother lying about his age (he was 15 but said he was 17) and joining the Navy, with his mother’s permission.

[Eileen]

Jane wrote: "For a completely new, never before published slant on the military intelligence available just prior to the Market Garden Campaign at Arnhem, you might like to read Secrets, Spies and Spotted Dogs...."

That book sounds good, Jane.

['Aussie Rick', Moderator]

Interesting question A.L., hopefully someone in the group will come up with an answer and a good book recommendation.

[A.L.]

Thanks, Rick. Maybe the subject isn't big enough for a book. But even a chapter (or a full paragraph) would be better than the sentence or two I keep finding!

[Lee]

To A.L.: mostly, volunteering was taken away because the Army realized that the smarter guys were volunteering for the Navy or Army Air Force, and the brave ones were joining the Marines, leaving the (ground) Army with....

Also, the number of men needed was only going to increase once the ground war really began in France. Even then, the number of riflemen needed was higher than projected, and emergency measures had to be taken.

[A.L.]

Lee wrote: "To A.L.: mostly, volunteering was taken away because the Army realized that the smarter guys were volunteering for the Navy or Army Air Force, and the brave ones were joining the Marines, leaving t..."

Thanks Lee!

[Jane]

Eileen wrote: "Jane wrote: "For a completely new, never before published slant on the military intelligence available just prior to the Market Garden Campaign at Arnhem, you might like to read Secrets, Spies and ..."

I hope you have a chance to read it Eileen. I'd be interested to know what you think.

[Shawn]

It seems I have talked myself into writing a third book. It will combine elements of the first two, being a hard-boiled detective novel set in WW2 USA.

"It was 1943 in San Diego. Rationing was something new. Smuggling was considerably older."

There are a few character sketches in progress, but very little of the historical background. I want this to be a bit of info-tainment, so I'm looking for more research material.

I am just a bit into the stupefyingly thick Call to Arms, which must have some detail on rationing and black markets in it. I'm open to any suggestions on WW2 home front life, rationing, and particulars to SW California and Mexico.


I'm also open to a tax-deductible trip to see the Taffy-3 memorial in San Diego.

['Aussie Rick', Moderator]

Sounds like an interesting and hopefully fun project Shawn. I am sure a few members will be able to come up with some research suggestions for you :)

[Manray9]

A minor aspect of WW II aviation that has interest for me is flight ops off battlewagons and cruisers during WW II. I mean the gutsy airmen who flew the Vought OS2U Kingfisher and Curtiss SOC Seagull aircraft catapulted off the big gun vessels. These aircraft are usually referred to as scout planes, spotter planes, or float planes. The Aussies had a squadron of Kingfishers for maritime air patrol during the war too. Any recommendations on the subject? I would be particularly interested in memoirs or personal accounts of pilots or aircrew.

['Aussie Rick', Moderator]

Good subject to read up on Manray9 but I've got no idea on any good books, hopefully someone in the group will pop up with a few suggestions on good titles to check out.

[carl]

MR9, chapter 12 The Battle of Kagoshima Bay is
just what you're looking for. Only a few pages, but
Hellcat & Kingfisher featured ! Kingfisher launched
from light cruiser USS Astoria. (hey it's a start)


Great American air battles of World War II

[Manray9]

carl wrote: "MR9, chapter 12 The Battle of Kagoshima Bay is
just what you're looking for. Only a few pages, but
Hellcat & Kingfisher featured ! Kingfisher launched
from light cruiser USS Astoria. (hey it's a..."

Thanks, Carl.

[carl]

MR, here's a site w/great Pacific footage,
but more specifically, if you scroll down about 14 videos, there's a 3 minute Kingfisher takeoff and recovery. The recovery looks like something we might pay for at the beach these days... pilot has to get out and grab the crane line.

http://mighty90.com/Film_Footage.html

[Manray9]

carl wrote: "MR, here's a site w/great Pacific footage,
but more specifically, if you scroll down about 14 videos, there's a 3 minute Kingfisher takeoff and recovery. The recovery looks like something we might ..."

Thanks, Carl. That's some of the best OS2U footage I've seen. Here's a description of what's shown in the film from:

American Cruisers of World War II: A Pictorial Encyclopedia by Steve Ewing`

When the cruiser pilot returned from his usually thankless and non-glorious flight, he first had to find his ship, which quite often was not where he expected to find it, then he had to wait for his cruiser to make a sharp turn to knock down the top of the waves and create a slick in the lee of the ship. Landings were still a controlled crash similar to landing on a carrier. Then the pilot had to taxi in the open sea to catch the ship, taxi onto a sled, and cut the engine and engage a hook from the cruiser's crane onto a ring at the top of the wing. The plane would then be lifted aboard while the cruiser continued to steam at 3 to 6 knots.

I still haven't found a good book on scout plane ops off big gun ships.

[Mike, Assisting Moderator US Forces]

Manray9, I haven't found anything, other than a few pictures in my Air War Volume 1; Terror From the Sky/Tragic Victories, Air War Volume 2: Outraged Skies/Wings of Fire. I would find an account of these pilots very interesting.

[carl]

Manray9 wrote: "Thanks, Carl. That's some of the best OS2U footage I've seen. Here's a description of what's shown in the film from:."

All right ! Good description you found too !

[carl]

MR, Looking around for info, a friend sent me 2 articles on Kingfishers. The first from '45 details the training, the second from Air & Space from 2005.

If you'd like to see them, or anyone else, let me know at kwtheaker@rocketmail.com.

[Manray9]

carl wrote: "MR, Looking around for info, a friend sent me 2 articles on Kingfishers. The first from '45 details the training, the second from Air & Space from 2005.

If you'd like to see them, or anyone els..."

Carl: I posted the Air & Space article yesterday on the Aviation thread. That's how I found:

Slingshot Warbirds: World War II U.S. Navy Scout-Observation Airmen

[carl]

Love the name, Slingshot !

[Feliks]

Open memo to anyone/everyone:

As you know, I moderate a group called WWII Spy Fiction Readers.

But lately I am just not happy with the state of my group's bookshelf. It is just not beefy enough. It's lagging behind the market. Getting stale.

Right now it seems like there's a flood of great new nonfiction books about WWII missions out there. I can't keep up with it.

So I'm asking for help from anyone, in steering me to any new 'mission' or 'operation' related books I can add to my group's nonfiction-shelves.

Stuff like this: The Forgotten 500: The Untold Story of the Men Who Risked All For the Greatest Rescue Mission of World War II

or Escape From Davao: The Forgotten Story of the Most Daring Prison Break of the Pacific War

I'll take any title you deem appropriate.

Thanks!
Feliks

['Aussie Rick', Moderator]

I'm sure you will get quite a few recommendations Feliks, I'll try and send you a few soon as well.

[Feliks]

I believe it. You guys can rattle off book titles like songs off a radio.

Its amazing how many fresh WWII books are being written lately isn't it?

[Feliks]

p.s. I'm pretty stoked that a Pulitzer-Prize winning author joined one of my other Goodreads groups this week. Dang!

Will send him over here if he expresses an interest. He got his Pulitzer for a WWII topic, after all.

(Y'know of course that you boys are listed in the 'allied groups' directory found on the frontpage of all my outfits...)

['Aussie Rick', Moderator]

You are right about the amount of books coming out on various WW2 subjects, the problem is sorting the good from the bad. I don't mind the challenge though :)

[A.L.]

Feliks wrote: "Open memo to anyone/everyone:

As you know, I moderate a group called WWII Spy Fiction Readers.

But lately I am just not happy with the state of my group's bookshelf. It is just not beefy enough. ..."

Here are some ideas on missions/operations (some I've read, some I haven't so I'm just guessing):
Ghost Soldiers: The Epic Account of World War II's Greatest Rescue Mission
We Die Alone: A WWII Epic of Escape and Endurance
Operation Autonomous: With S.O.E. in Wartime Romania
The Secret Rescue: An Untold Story of American Nurses and Medics Behind Nazi Lines
Lost in Shangri-la: A True Story of Survival, Adventure, and the Most Incredible Rescue Mission of World War II
A Spy in Rome
Operation Mincemeat: How a Dead Man and a Bizarre Plan Fooled the Nazis and Assured an Allied Victory
The Envoy: The Epic Rescue of the Last Jews of Europe in the Desperate Closing Months of World War II
The Secret Capture: U-110 and the Enigma Story
Into the Fire: Ploesti, The Most Fateful Mission of World War II

Here are some maybes on WWII espionage. Not sure if they're what you're looking for:
Between Silk and Cyanide: A Codemaker's War, 1941-1945
The White Rabbit: The Secret Agent the Gestapo Could Not Crack
The Ultra Secret
Sisterhood of Spies
Spyglass: An Autobiography
Operatives, Spies, and Saboteurs: The Unknown Story of the Men and Women of World War II's OSS
Flames in the Field: The Story of Four SOE Agents in Occupied France

[Feliks]

Hurrah! Good stuff!

['Aussie Rick', Moderator]

Well done A.L., saves me a bit of time :)

[Manray9]

Feliks wrote: "Open memo to anyone/everyone:

As you know, I moderate a group called WWII Spy Fiction Readers.

But lately I am just not happy with the state of my group's bookshelf. It is just not beefy enough. ..."

Feliks: Here are a few --

The Jungle Is Neutral by Freddie Spencer Chapman. Chapman was a leader of a British "stay behind" force in Malaya.

Beyond the Chindwin: Being an Account of the Adventures of Number Five Column of the Wingate Expedition Into Burma, 1943 by Bernard Fergusson. Fergusson commanded a brigade of Chindits in Burma and went on to be Director of Combined Ops and later Governor General of New Zealand.

My Own River Kwai by Pierre Boulle. Boulle, of course, wrote Bridge over the River Kwai, but he had his own adventure as a Free French agent attempting to infiltrate Vichyite French Indochina. He was captured and mistreated by the Petainists.

Seven Men At Daybreak by Alan Burgess. The story of the men who killed Heydrich.

Alone on Guadalcanal: A Coastwatcher's Story by Martin Clemens

A Different Kind of War: The Unknown Story of the U.S. Navy's Guerrilla Forces in World War II China by Milton Miles. Admiral Miles led the SACO (Sino-American Cooperative Organization) team which trained and fought with Chinese guerillas, rescued downed flyers in occupied China, and collected valuable weather data for air ops over China and Japan.

['Aussie Rick', Moderator]

Thanks Manray9 for those suggestions for Feliks bookshelf's.

['Aussie Rick', Moderator]

I forgot to ask if you had Max Hastings new book on your shelves:


by Max Hastings
Description:
Examining the espionage and intelligence stories of World War II, on a global basis, bringing together the British, American, German, Russian and Japanese histories.

Spies, codes and guerillas played critical roles in the Second World War, exploited by every nation in the struggle to gain secret knowledge of its foes, and to sow havoc behind the fronts. In The Secret War, Max Hastings presents a worldwide cast of characters and some extraordinary sagas of intelligence and Resistance, to create a new perspective on the greatest conflict in history.

Here are not only Alan Turing and the codebreaking geniuses of Bletchley Park, but also their German counterparts, who achieved their own triumphs against the Allies. Hastings plots the fabulous espionage networks created by the Soviet Union in Germany and Japan, Britain and America, and explores the puzzle of why Stalin so often spurned his agents, who reported from the heart of the Axis war machine.

The role of SOE and American’s OSS as sponsors of guerilla war are examined, and the book tells the almost unknown story of Ronald Seth, an SOE agent who was ‘turned’ by the Germans, walked the streets of Paris in a Luftwafe uniform, and baffled MI5, MI6 and the Abwehr as to his true loyalty. Also described is the brilliantly ruthless Russian deception operation which helped to secure the Red Army’s victory at Stalingrad, a ruse that cost 70,000 lives.

The Secret War links tales of high courage ashore, at sea and in the air to the work of the brilliant ‘boffins’ at home, battling the enemy’s technology. Most of the strivings, adventures and sacrifices of spies, Resistance, Special Forces and even of the codebreakers were wasted, Hastings says, but a fraction was so priceless that no nation grudged lives and treasure spent in the pursuit of jewels of knowledge. The book tells stories of high policy and human drama, mingled in the fashion that has made international bestsellers of Max Hastings’ previous histories, this time illuminating the fantastic machinations of secret war.

[Feliks]

These all look fresh and new to my eyes. Except for 'Seven Men at Daybreak'. I believe I've seen that as a movie starring the great Richard Basehart. I'm glad to be reminded of that one.

Much obliged!

[Mike, Assisting Moderator US Forces]

Fantastic recommendations all, my TBR list is about to groan again. I am continually amazed at the expertise we have on this group!

[Feliks]

Expertise of any type is getting harder and harder to find in the internet era.

All I typically run into are 'experts' in search engine use, experts in web browser add-ons, experts in on-line gaming.

Very few people lately with rich life experiences or hands-on skillsets. Makes me puke!

[Manray9]

Feliks wrote: "Expertise of any type is getting harder and harder to find in the internet era.

All I typically run into are 'experts' in search engine use, experts in web browser add-ons, experts in on-line gam..."

The Internet is a great tool, but it should be used in conjunction with a well-calibrated BS meter.