United States Army in World War II is the official history of the ground forces of the United States Army during World War II. The 78-volume work was originally published beginning in 1946. [1]
The work describes and to a degree evaluates the ground operations of the Army in 21 volumes. Additional volumes address grand strategy; recruitment, organization, and training; the service forces; the technical services; and special studies; again almost exclusively those of the ground forces. Three additional volumes provide a pictorial account. (Air operations, logistics, and training are presented in a separate seven-volume series, The Army Air Forces in World War II .) Different authors or teams wrote most of the accounts, though some authors wrote more than one. Most of the authors were serving or retired officers though enlisted personnel and professional historians also contributed.
The volumes devoted to operations are grouped by theater and campaign. (See the list of titles below.) Battles are described at a unit level appropriate to the size of the engagement. In some cases authors detail the actions of units as small as an infantry company, though most battles are presented at the battalion or regimental level. Many accounts of individual heroism are included, especially actions which resulted in the award of the Medal of Honor.
Each volume includes some photographs. Operations volumes include small maps within the text and larger fold-out maps attached inside the back cover. All operations volumes include bibliographical notes, a glossary, a list of code names, and a list of military map symbols. Some include additional features such as a table of equivalent U.S. and German, Italian, or Japanese ranks.
More than two-thirds of the volumes of the history are devoted to subjects other than actual operations. (See the list of titles below.) These provide information which is not appropriate for a purely operational history but is important for an understanding of the Army's activities as a whole during the war.
THE WAR DEPARTMENT
Title | Author(s) | Year Published |
---|---|---|
Chief of Staff: Prewar Plans and Preparations | Mark Skinner Watson | 1950 |
Washington Command Post: The Operations Division | Ray S. Cline | 1951 |
Strategic Planning for Coalition Warfare: 1941–1942 | Maurice Matloff and Edwin M. Snell | 1953 |
Strategic Planning for Coalition Warfare: 1943–1944 | Maurice Matloff | 1959 |
Global Logistics and Strategy: 1940–1943 | Richard M. Leighton and Robert W. Coakley | 1955 |
Global Logistics and Strategy: 1944–1945 | Robert W. Coakley and Richard M. Leighton | 1968 |
The Army and Economic Mobilization | R. Elberton Smith | 1959 |
The Army and Industrial Manpower | Byron Fairchild and Jonathan Grossman | 1959 |
THE ARMY GROUND FORCES
Title | Author(s) | Year Published |
---|---|---|
The Organization of Ground Combat Troops | Kent Roberts Greenfield, Robert R. Palmer, and Bell I. Wiley | 1947 |
The Procurement and Training of Ground Combat Troops | Robert R. Palmer, Bell I. Wiley, and William R. Keast | 1948 |
THE ARMY SERVICE FORCES
Title | Author(s) | Year Published |
---|---|---|
The Organization and Role of the Army Service Forces | John David Millett | 1954 |
THE WESTERN HEMISPHERE
Title | Author(s) | Year Published |
---|---|---|
The Framework of Hemisphere Defense | Stetson Conn and Byron Fairchild | 1960 |
Guarding the United States and its Outposts | Stetson Conn, Rose C. Engelman, and Byron Fairchild | 1964 |
THE WAR IN THE PACIFIC
Title | Author(s) | Year Published |
---|---|---|
Strategy and Command: The First Two Years | Louis Morton | 1962 |
The Fall of the Philippines | Louis Morton | 1953 |
Guadalcanal: The First Offensive | John Miller | 1949 |
Victory in Papua | Samuel Milner | 1957 |
CARTWHEEL: The Reduction of Rabaul | John Miller | 1959 |
Seizure of the Gilberts and Marshalls | Philip A. Crowl and Edmund G. Love | 1955 |
Campaign in the Marianas | Philip A. Crowl | 1960 |
The Approach to the Philippines | Robert Ross Smith | 1953 |
Leyte: The Return to the Philippines | M. Hamlin Cannon | 1954 |
Triumph in the Philippines | Robert Ross Smith | 1963 |
Okinawa: The Last Battle | Roy E. Appleman, James M. Burns, Russell A. Gugeler, and John Stevens | 1948 |
THE MEDITERRANEAN THEATER OF OPERATIONS
Title | Author(s) | Year Published |
---|---|---|
Northwest Africa: Seizing the Initiative in the West | George F. Howe | 1957 |
Sicily and the Surrender of Italy | Albert N. Garland and Howard McGaw Smyth | 1965 |
Salerno to Cassino | Martin Blumenson | 1969 |
Cassino to the Alps | Ernest F. Fisher, Jr. | 1977 |
THE EUROPEAN THEATER OF OPERATIONS
Title | Author(s) | Year Published |
---|---|---|
The Supreme Command | Forrest C. Pogue | 1954 |
Cross-Channel Attack | Gordon A. Harrison | 1951 |
Breakout and Pursuit | Martin Blumenson | 1961 |
The Lorraine Campaign | Hugh M. Cole | 1950 |
The Siegfried Line Campaign | Charles B. MacDonald | 1963 |
The Ardennes: Battle of the Bulge | Hugh M. Cole | 1965 |
Riviera to the Rhine | Jeffrey J. Clarke and Robert Ross Smith | 1992 |
The Last Offensive | Charles B. MacDonald | 1973 |
Logistical Support of the Armies, Volume I | Roland G. Ruppenthal | 1953 |
Logistical Support of the Armies, Volume II | Roland G. Ruppenthal | 1959 |
THE MIDDLE EAST THEATER
Title | Author(s) | Year Published |
---|---|---|
The Persian Corridor and Aid to Russia | Thomas Hubbard Vail Motter | 1952 |
THE CHINA-BURMA-INDIA THEATER
Title | Author(s) | Year Published |
---|---|---|
Stillwell’s Mission to China | Charles F. Romanus and Riley Sunderland | 1953 |
Stillwell’s Command Problems | Charles F. Romanus and Riley Sunderland | 1956 |
Time Runs Out in CBI | Charles F. Romanus and Riley Sunderland | 1959 |
THE TECHNICAL SERVICES
Title | Author(s) | Year Published |
---|---|---|
The Chemical Warfare Service: Organizing for War | Leo P. Brophy and George J. B. Fisher | 1959 |
The Chemical Warfare Service: From Laboratory to Field | Leo P. Brophy, Wyndham D. Miles, and Rexmond C. Cochrane | 1959 |
The Chemical Warfare Service: Chemicals in Combat | Brooks E. Kleber and Dale Birdsell | 1966 |
The Corps of Engineers: Troops and Equipment | Blanche D. Coll, Jean E. Keith, and Herbert H. Rosenthal | 1958 |
The Corps of Engineers: Construction in the United States | Lenore Fine and Jesse A. Remington | 1972 |
The Corps of Engineers: The War against Japan | Karl C. Dod | 1966 |
The Corps of Engineers: The War Against Germany | Alfred M. Beck, Abe Bortz, Charles W. Lynch, Lida Mayo, and Ralph F. Weld | 1985 |
The Medical Department: Hospitalization and Evacuation, Zone of the Interior | Clarence McKittrick Smith | 1956 |
The Medical Department: Medical Service in the Mediterranean and Minor Theaters | Charles M. Wiltse | 1965 |
The Medical Department: Medical Service in the European Theater of Operations | Graham A. Cosmas and Albert E. Cowdrey | 1992 |
The Medical Department: Medical Service in the War against Japan | Mary Ellen Condon-Rall and Albert E. Cowdrey | 1998 |
The Ordnance Department: Planning Munitions for War | Constance McLaughlin Green, Harry C. Thomson, and Peter C. Roots | 1955 |
The Ordnance Department: Procurement and Supply | Harry C. Thomson and Lida Mayo | 1960 |
The Ordnance Department: On Beachhead and Battlefront | Lida Mayo | 1968 |
The Quartermaster Corps: Organization, Supply, and Services, Volume I | Erna Risch | 1953 |
The Quartermaster Corps: Organization, Supply, and Services, Volume II | Erna Risch and Chester L. Kieffer | 1955 |
The Quartermaster Corps: Operations in the War against Japan | Alvin P. Stauffer | 1956 |
The Quartermaster Corps: Operations in the War against Germany | William F. Ross and Charles F. Romanus | 1965 |
The Signal Corps: The Emergency (to December 1941) | Dulany Terrett | 1956 |
The Signal Corps: The Test (December 1941 to July 1943) | George Raynor Thompson, Dixie R. Harris, Pauline M. Oakes, and Dulany Terrett | 1957 |
The Signal Corps: The Outcome (mid-1943 through 1945) | George Raynor Thompson and Dixie R. Harris | 1966 |
The Transportation Corps: Responsibilities, Organization, and Operations | Chester Wardlow | 1951 |
The Transportation Corps: Movements, Training, and Supply | Chester Wardlow | 1956 |
The Transportation Corps: Operations Overseas | Joseph Bykofsky and Harold Larson | 1957 |
SPECIAL STUDIES
Title | Author(s) | Year Published |
---|---|---|
Chronology: 1941–1945 | Mary H. Williams | 1960 |
Buying Aircraft: Matériel Procurement for the Army Air Forces | I. B. Holley | 1964 |
Civil Affairs: Soldiers Become Governors | Harry L. Coles and Albert K. Weinberg | 1964 |
The Employment of Negro Troops | Ulysses Lee | 1966 |
Military Relations between the United States and Canada, 1939–1945 | Stanlye W. Dziuban | 1959 |
Rearming the French | Marcel Vigneras | 1957 |
Three Battles: Arnaville, Altuzzo, and Schmidt | Charles B. MacDonald and Sidney T. Mathews | 1952 |
The Women's Army Corps | Mattie E. Treadwell | 1953 |
Manhattan: The Army and the Atomic Bomb | Vincent C. Jones | 1985 |
PICTORIAL RECORD
Title | Author(s) | Year Published |
---|---|---|
The War against Germany and Italy: Mediterranean and Adjacent Areas | John C. Hatlem and Kenneth E. Hunter | 1951 |
The War against Germany: Europe and Adjacent Areas | Kenneth E. Hunter | 1951 |
The War against Japan | Kenneth E. Hunter and Margaret E. Tackley | 1952 |
The works were first published by the Historical Division, Department of the Army, from March 28, 1950 called the Office of the Chief of Military History and from June 15, 1973, the Center of Military History. They are in a large format, 7¼” x 10”, with green cloth covers and no dust jackets. The cover has only the eagle insignia of the Army; the title, author, and other data are on the spine. Many volumes have been reprinted by the Center of Military History in the same format beginning in the 1980s, and most are available as PDF downloads. [2]
The operations-oriented volumes and some others were reprinted by The National Historical Society during the 1990s in a 50th Anniversary Commemorative Edition series. They are 7” x 9” with a hard cover (without a dust jacket) whose face is a black-and-white photograph with the title superimposed. They omitted the original editions’ fold-out maps but instead printed them in two separate atlases.
Two volumes, ‘’Cross Channel Attack’’ and ‘’The Ardennes: Battle of the Bulge’’, were reprinted in the 1990s by Konecky & Konecky in a large 8½” by 11” format. They, too, omitted the fold-out maps. Other publishing houses have also reprinted selected volumes.
The European Theater of Operations, United States Army (ETOUSA) was a Theater of Operations responsible for directing United States Army operations throughout the European theatre of World War II, from 1942 to 1945. It commanded Army Ground Forces (AGF), United States Army Air Forces (USAAF), and Army Service Forces (ASF) operations north of Italy and the Mediterranean coast. It was bordered to the south by the North African Theater of Operations, United States Army (NATOUSA), which later became the Mediterranean Theater of Operations, United States Army (MTOUSA).
The dust jacket of a book is the detachable outer cover, usually made of paper and printed with text and illustrations. This outer cover has folded flaps that hold it to the front and back book covers.
China Burma India Theater (CBI) was the United States military designation during World War II for the China and Southeast Asian or India–Burma (IBT) theaters. Operational command of Allied forces in the CBI was officially the responsibility of the Supreme Commanders for South East Asia or China. However, US forces in practice were usually overseen by General Joseph Stilwell, the Deputy Allied Commander in China; the term "CBI" was significant in logistical, material and personnel matters; it was and is commonly used within the US for these theaters.
The Mediterranean Theater of Operations, United States Army (MTOUSA), originally called the North African Theater of Operations (NATOUSA), was the American term for the theater of operations covering North Africa and Italy during World War II. American operations in the theater began with the Allied Expeditionary Force, which landed on the beaches of northwest Africa on November 8, 1942, in Operation Torch. They ended in the Italian Alps some 31 months later with the German surrender in May 1945.
The Aleutian Islands campaign was a military campaign conducted by the United States and Japan in the Aleutian Islands, part of the Territory of Alaska, in the American Theater and the Pacific Theater of World War II starting on June 3, 1942. In the only two invasions of the United States during the war, a small Japanese force occupied the islands of Attu and Kiska, where the remoteness of the islands and the challenges of weather and terrain delayed a larger American-Canadian force sent to eject them for nearly a year. The islands' strategic value was their ability to control Pacific transportation routes and so US General Billy Mitchell stated to the U.S. Congress in 1935, "I believe that in the future, whoever holds Alaska will hold the world. I think it is the most important strategic place in the world."
The History of the Great War Based on Official Documents by Direction of the Committee of Imperial Defence is a series of 109 volumes, concerning the war effort of the British state during the First World War. It was produced by the Historical Section of the Committee of Imperial Defence from 1915 to 1949; after 1919 Brigadier-General Sir James Edmonds was Director. Edmonds wrote many of the army volumes and influenced the choice of historians for the navy, air force, medical and veterinary volumes. Work had begun on the series in 1915 and in 1920, the first volumes of Naval Operations and Seaborne Trade, were published. The first "army" publication, Military Operations: France and Belgium 1914 Part I and a separate map case were published in 1922 and the final volume, The Occupation of Constantinople was published in 2010.
Panzer Battles is the English language title of Friedrich von Mellenthin's memoirs of his service as a staff officer in the Panzerwaffe of the German Army during World War II.
Marvel Masterworks is an American collection of hardcover and trade paperback comic book reprints published by Marvel Comics. The collection started in 1987, with volumes reprinting the issues of The Amazing Spider-Man, The Fantastic Four, The X-Men, and The Avengers. Approximately 10 issues are reprinted in each volume. In 2021, Masterworks will publish its 300th volume. The Masterworks line has expanded from such reprints of the 1960s period that fans and historians call the Silver Age of Comic Books to include the 1930s–1940s Golden Age; comics of Marvel's 1950s pre-Code forerunner, Atlas Comics; and even some reprints from the 1970s period called the Bronze Age of Comic Books.
Ken Holt is the central character in a series of 18 mystery stories for adolescent boys written by Sam and Beryl Epstein under the pseudonym Bruce Campbell. The series was published by Grosset & Dunlap between 1949 and 1963.
Australia in the War of 1939–1945 is a 22-volume official history series covering Australian involvement in the Second World War. The series was published by the Australian War Memorial between 1952 and 1977, most of the volumes being edited by Gavin Long, who also wrote three volumes and the summary volume The Six Year War.
The Official History of the Canadian Army in the Second World War was a three volume set of books, based on the wartime work of the Historical Section of the General Staff. The Canadian Army had a dedicated set of officers in the Second World War who studied and recorded various facets of wartime history for posterity.
Rice Army Air Field is an abandoned World War II airfield in Rice Valley of the southern Mojave Desert, located 1-mile (1.6 km) east-southeast of the community of Rice. The airfield is located in Riverside County just south of the San Bernardino county line and State Route 62.
The Japanese occupation of Kiska took place between 6 June 1942 and 28 July 1943 during the Aleutian Islands Campaign of the American Theater and the Pacific Theater of World War II. The Japanese occupied Kiska and nearby Attu Island in order to protect the northern flank of the Japanese Empire. Along with the Attu landing the next day, it was the first time that the continental United States was occupied by a foreign power since the War of 1812, and was one of the only two invasions of the United States during World War II.
The Senshi Sōsho, also called the Kōkan Senshi (公刊戦史), is the official military history of Imperial Japan's involvement in the Pacific War from 1937 to 1945. The task of compiling the official account of the Japanese involvement in World War II began in October 1955 with the opening of the War History Office. Its main function was to serve as educational research material for the Self-Defense Forces. The office was led by Colonel Nishiura Susumu, a senior official in the War Ministry during the war. The publisher was Asagumo Shimbunsha.
The United States Army Air Forces was the major land-based aerial warfare service component of the United States Army and de facto aerial warfare service branch of the United States during and immediately after World War II (1941–1945). It was created on 20 June 1941 as successor to the previous United States Army Air Corps and is the direct predecessor of the United States Air Force, today one of the six armed forces of the United States. The AAF was a component of the United States Army, which on 2 March 1942 was divided functionally by executive order into three autonomous forces: the Army Ground Forces, the United States Army Services of Supply, and the Army Air Forces. Each of these forces had a commanding general who reported directly to the Army Chief of Staff.
The Northwest African Troop Carrier Command (NATCC) was a sub-command of the Northwest African Air Forces which itself was a sub-command of the Mediterranean Air Command (MAC). These new Allied air force organizations were created at the Casablanca Conference in January 1943 to promote cooperation between the British Royal Air Force (RAF), the American United States Army Air Force (USAAF), and their respective ground and naval forces in the North African and Mediterranean Theater of Operations (MTO) during the Second World War. Effective from February 18, 1943, the NATCC and other MAC commands existed until December 10, 1943 when MAC was disbanded and the Mediterranean Allied Air Forces (MAAF) were established. Brigadier General Paul Williams was the commander of NATCC.
The Desert Training Center (DTC), also known as California–Arizona Maneuver Area (CAMA), was a World War II training facility established in the Mojave Desert and Sonoran Desert, largely in Southern California and Western Arizona in 1942.
The Civil War book series chronicles in great detail the American Civil War. Published by Time Life the series was simultaneously released in the US and Canada between 1983 and 1987, with subsequent identical reprints in the late 1980s - early 1990s following suit for foreign, though untranslated, dissemination as well. Some titles focused on a specific topic, such as the blockade, and spies, but most volumes concentrated on the battles and campaigns, presented in chronological order.
History of U.S. Marine Corps Operations in World War II is the official history of the Corps during the war. Its five volumes were published beginning in 1958.
CMH Pub 11-9