Browsing: Military

A Brief History On August 12, 1944, German Nazi troops finished off a massacre of between 40,000 and 50,000 Poles, many of them Jewish.  The excuse for this massacre was to put down the Warsaw Uprising and to discourage any further resistance to the occupying forces. Digging Deeper After the Germans took over Poland in 1939 (with the Soviets coming in through Poland’s back door, stabbing their neighbor in the back), the conquered Poles were treated like subhuman slaves.  Finally in 1944, partisan forces rose up and fought back against the Nazi overlords in an attempt to kick the Germans…

A Brief History On August 9, 1945, a Boeing B-29 bomber named “Bockscar” dropped the second atomic bomb on Japan, incinerating 39,000 people within seconds.  In the following weeks, thousands more would die from exposure and their injuries, and more would keep dying from radiation-related illnesses for years to come.  The Japanese quickly surrendered after this second nuclear attack, but the question of whether or not this bomb was necessary still haunts Americans to this day. Digging Deeper “Bockscar” was part of a special B-29 unit specially trained for dropping atomic bombs.  The bombers were modified B-29s that had their bomb…

A Brief History On August 8, 1918, the Allied offensive known as the “Hundred Days Offensive” began with the start of the Battle of Amiens.  Allied forces swept 7 miles into German lines, an incredible distance when in the previous 4 years, progress had been measured in feet or yards.  The Battle of Amiens was the first in a string of victories that would carry the Allies to victory in World War I but also inevitably sow the seeds of World War II! Digging Deeper Both sides experienced tremendous effects on morale due to the huge early Allied success of the…

A Brief History On August 7, 1942, U.S. Marines landed on an island few Americans had ever heard of, Guadalcanal in the Solomon Islands.  After months of being on the defensive, defensive victories at Coral Sea and Midway combined with the rapid buildup of troops and industrial production gave the U.S. its first opportunity to start taking instead of losing ground in the Pacific theater of World War II. Digging Deeper Although obscure in the minds of Americans, Guadalcanal is not an insignificant island.  Sprawling over 2000 square miles and with mountains soaring over 8,000 feet, it is the world’s 110th largest island, about the…

A Brief History On August 4, 70 A.D., the Romans punished the rebellious Jews by destroying the Second Temple on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem.  In 66 A.D., the Jews had rebelled against Roman rule, and four years later, the Romans retook Jerusalem. (See our other articles about the Second Temple, Jerusalem, and Israel.  These links are just some of our Jerusalem and Israel related articles.  For more articles, use the search function.) Digging Deeper The original temple was built around 1000 B.C. and was known as Solomon’s Temple.  After it was destroyed around 586 B.C., construction of the Second…