This article was written by the war correspondent Fairfax Downey (1894 - 1990) for a magazine that catered to American veterans of W.W. I, and it seemed that he simply could not contain his enthusiasm for the U.S. infantry's newest rifle: the M-1 Garand:
"What a gun it is! Its nine pound weight swings easily through the manual of arms. The eight-round clip (three more shots than the we used to have with the '03 Springfield) slips in easily and the breech clicks closed. The old range scale slide has vanished; range and windage adjustments are made simply by turning two knobs... The new semi-automatic means, among other things, that the fire power of troops armed with it has increased at least two and a half times over the old Springfield."
For further magazine reading about John Garand and his rifle, click here.
Attached is the sweetest conte crayon illustration ever to depict a Tiger tank is accompanied by some vital statistics and assorted observations that were recorded by the U.S. Department of War and printed in one of their manuals in March of 1945: "This tank, originally the Pz. Kpfw. VI, first was encountered by the Russians in the last half of 1942, and by the Western Allies in Tunisia early in 1943..." Click here to read about the German King Tiger Tank.
Click here to read a 1944 article about the Tiger Tank.
The first use of napalm in the Second World War was by the U.S. Army Air Corps flying over Germany. This article reported that it was used by Navy over Saipan, the Army over Tinian and the Marines over Peleliu:
"Now it is possible to tell one of the more dramatic fire-bomb stories: [During an eight day period] last October, on a section of Peleliu no bigger than a city block, the Death Dealer Squadron of the Second Marine Air Wing dropped more than 32,000 gallons of flaming gasoline on Jap cave positions and wiped them out."
Click here to read about one of the greatest innovations by 20th Century chemists: plastic. The war was over when the U.S. Army Ordnance Department began snooping around all the assorted ÜBER-secret weapons labs and work shops where the pointiest headed Nazis were developing some truly far-seeing weaponry, inventions that they were never able to perfect (thankfully).
One of the most striking aspects of the attached article is the part when you recognize that it was the Nazi scientists who first conceived of such space-based weaponry as the "Star Wars" technology that was ushered in during the Reagan presidency (i.e.: the "Strategic Defense Initiative"). While in pursuit of their nefarious tasks, these same scientists also conceived of harnessing the powers of the sun in order to advance Hitler's queer vision of the perfect world.
Click here to read about the firm belief held by the German Army concerning the use of motorcycles in modern war.
The B-17 Flying Fortress was "the most fabulous combat plane ever built. Like Douglas' unretireable DC-3 airliner, the B-17 is history written in metal, a pivot of progress which helped influence an entire generation".
"Perhaps more than any other plane, the B-17 beat Hitler. Its 640,036 tons of bombs on Europe, nearly the total dropped by all other U.S. planes combined, knocked out much of his industry, oil and railroads... The B-17 unveiled the era of strategic air power and turned man's eye to the stratosphere and beyond".
Click here to read about the P-47 fighter plane.
When the National Advisory Committee on Aeronautics was let-in on the secret that the U.S. Army intended to manufacture and deploy wooden gliders, a red light went on in their collective heads as they all remembered how susceptible wood and canvas aircraft had been in attracting lightning bolts. This article outlines the steps that were taken to remedy the problem. |