WW II Historical Thread, Discussion, Pics, Videos

[Miragedriver]

Soldiers from the US 89th Infantry Division cross the Rhine River from St.Goar to St.Goarshausen in assault boats under German fire, 26th March 1945.

Photographer's note: "I drew an assault boat to cross in - just my luck. We all tried to crawl under each other, the lead was flying around like hail."

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[Miragedriver]

Pz. IV (L/43) Ausf.G Nº812 of Panzer-Regiment 25/7.Panzer-Division at the harbour of Toulon in France, during 'Operation Lila'. Friday 27th of November 1942.
(In the background is the French Dunkerque-class battleship 'Strasbourg')

On November 27, the Germans commenced "Unternehmen Lila" with the goal of occupying Toulon and seizing the French fleet. Comprising of elements from the 7. Panzer-Division and SS-Panzergrenadier-Division "Das Reich", four combat teams entered the city around 04:30. Fort Lamalgue, along with Admiral André Marquis, was captured swiftly.
The attack came as a complete surprise to the Vichy officers, but Contre-Admiral Dornon transmitted the order to scuttle the fleet to Admiral de Laborde aboard the flagship 'Strasbourg'. Laborde was taken aback by the German operation, but repeated orders to prepare for scuttling, and to fire on any unauthorized personnel approaching the ships.
Advancing through Toulon, the Germans occupied heights overlooking the harbor and air-dropped mines to prevent a French escape. Reaching the gates of the naval base, the Germans were delayed by the sentries who demanded paperwork allowing admission. By 05:25, German tanks entered the base and de Laborde issued the scuttle order from his flagship 'Strasbourg'. Fighting soon broke out along the waterfront, with the Germans coming under fire from the ships. Out-gunned, the Germans attempted to negotiate, but were unable to board most vessels in time to prevent their sinking. German troops were successful in boarding the cruiser 'Dupleix' and closed its sea valves, but were driven off by explosions and fires breaking out in its turrets. Soon the Germans were surrounded by sinking and burning ships.

By the end of the day, they had only succeeded in taking three disarmed destroyers, four damaged submarines, and three civilian vessels. In the fighting of November 27th, the French lost 12 killed and 26 wounded, while the Germans suffered one wounded.
In scuttling the fleet, the French destroyed 77 vessels, including 3 battleships, 7 cruisers, 15 destroyers, and 13 torpedo boats. Five submarines managed to get underway, with three reaching North Africa, one in Spain, and the last was forced to scuttle at the mouth of the harbor. The surface ship 'Leonor Fresnel' also escaped. While Charles de Gaulle and the Free French severely criticized the action, stating that the fleet should have tried to escape, the scuttling prevented the ships from falling into Axis hands. Salvage efforts begun but none of the larger ships saw service again during the war.

After the liberation of France, de Laborde was tried and convicted of treason for not trying to save the fleet. Found guilty, he was sentenced to death. This was soon commuted to life imprisonment before he was granted clemency in 1947.



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[Miragedriver]

Sad images of WWII Airplane graveyards & storage sites

These are very sad images of, now priceless, warbirds that were left to rot outside to be recycled later.

During and after WWII crash landed and unrecoverable airplanes were cast aside on massive airplane piles and left for another day when there would be time to recycle them. As the war progressed wrecked enemy airfields also fell into Allied hands, with destroyed airplanes of course.

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[Miragedriver]

I find this among the most fascinating and terrifying videos made off WW2, when thinking about being on the ground at the receiving end.

Stuka Yu-87g firing 37mm FlaK rounds against tanks.

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[Miragedriver]

The United States was the only country to equip its troops with an auto-loading rifle as the standard infantry weapon of WWII. It gave their troops a tremendous advantage in firepower, and led General George Patton to call the M1 Garand, “The greatest battle implement ever devised.”

After several years of testing, on 3 Aug 1933, United States Army's Springfield Armory's weapon designer (Canadian born) John C. Garand received official designation "M1" for his prototype semi-automatic rifle design T1E2. In May 1934, 75 of them went to field trials; 50 were given to the infantry, and 25 to the cavalry. After initial problems were addressed, the M1 Garand rifles were ordered in large numbers. Initial production difficulties meant the first delivery was not done until Sep 1937, but by the time the European War began in Sep 1939, 100 rifles were made each day. By 10 Jan 1941, 600 rifles were being built per day. By the end of the year, the US Army considered its ranks fully equipped with M1 Garand rifles.

The M1 Garand rifles were semi-automatic, meaning that although each trigger pull resulted in a single round being fired just like their bolt-action contemporaries, between each shot there was nothing that needed to be done in order to load the next round. This design allowed the Americans the ability to fire more shots against their German and Japanese counterparts, who continued to use bolt-action rifles as the standard infantry weapon. Another advantage of the design was the rifles' simple construction. In the field, a soldier could disassemble his rifle using only a rifle sound, therefore allowing him to easily clean and maintain his weapon between engagements. General George S. Patton referred to the M1 Garand design as "the greatest implement of battle ever devised."

The M1 Garand rifles were clip-fed. When the last round of a clip was fired, a metallic pinging noise was made as the clip was ejected. The sound would become an unique characteristic of these rifles.


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[Miragedriver]

The strain and fatigue of 23 days on the line is shown by Marines of Combat Team 'C', 2/7th US Marines, 1st Marine Division seen here displaying Japanese battle flags captured during the Battle of Cape Gloucester. 14-15th January 1944.

New Britain was defended by the Imperial Japanese Army's 17th Division, under Major General Iwao Matsuda; reinforced by the 65th Independent Mixed Brigade and elements of the 51st Division, known as the Matsuda Force.
The 7th Marines, were relieved after taking Hill 660. They trapped the Japanese between 60mm mortar fire in front and 81mm and artillery fire in back, then overlapped the impact areas; over 100 Japanese were caught in the open and killed.

Later the 5th Marines attacked and neutralized Matsuda's Command Post. New Britain cost the reinforced 1st Marine Division 310 killed in action and 1,083 wounded. The remains of the Matsuda Force were ordered back to Rabaul to defend the base. For the rest of the war, 40,000 Japanese starved and were harassed by a much smaller Allied force.
1st Marine Division was relieved by the US Army's 40th Infantry Division and prepared for the Peleliu operation.


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[Miragedriver]

European Eastern Front Pictures 1941-1945

This was a very interesting and brutal match between the Axis Powers (mostly German) and the then Soviet Union. Many of the photos of the campaign posted here are published but there are several unpublished:

Please feel free to contribute and add descriptions to any photos posted. I have more photos of the Axis Forces (i.e. German, Italy, Romania, and Hungary) than I do of the Soviet forces, especially in at the beginning of the campaign (Barbarossa).

Enjoy.

 

[Miragedriver]

Operation Barbarossa:
German forces on the offensive against Soviet Forces in occupied Poland

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[Miragedriver]

Operation Barbarossa:

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[Miragedriver]

Operation Barbarossa:

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