Barrie Pitt

Volume 5 of an 8 volume series, (pages 1793-2240), also known as Purnell's History of the Second World War. The chapter headings are Pre D-Day, Hitler's fortress Europe. Pre D-Day, The Allied war machine. Pre D-Day, Europe's secret armies. D-Day. Battle of the Hedgerows. The great Marianas Turkey shoot. The bomb plot. The red army bursts into Poland. Allies smash, two German armies. Prisoner on the Kwai. Paris freed!. Arnhem. Inside the camps. The incredible career of Richard Sorge, Stalin's man in Tokyo. The strange career and spectacular death of the Tirpitz. The Soviet viw of "Liberation."

Volume 6 of an 8 volume series, (pages 2241-2688), also known as Purnell's History of the Second World War The chapter headings are The red Army's drive to the gates of Berlin. Bombing. Battle of the Bulge, Hitler's last gamble. Battle of the Bulge, the Allies hit back. Iwo Jima. "Whatever the enemy does, he can never reckon on a capitulation". Victory in Italy. Into the heart of Hitler's Reich. Fall of Berlin. Hitler dead - Doenitz appointed Führer. Fire raids on Japan. Cult of the Kamikazes. The race to Rangoon. Japan's last hope: 28 million volunteers. Hiroshima, Nagasaki. The war, an overview

Volume 7 of an 8 volume series, (pages 2689-3136), also known as Purnell's History of the Second World War. The chapter headings are "The greatest thing in history?". The perils of peace. The big four take over. Facing up to defeat. Brave new world?. Blister gas, chlorine gas, blood gas, nerve gas. The Propaganda war. Hitler's foreign legions. U-Boat, one of the deadliest weapons of the war. Dambusters. Tanks, guns, men. Heraldry of war. Waffen-SS. Czechoslovakia fights back. Belsen. The soldier

Volume 8 of an 8 volume series, (pages 3137-3584), also known as Purnell's History of the Second World War. The chapter headings are Life at home. The leaders and their generals. Chiang and his generals. Diplomacy in war. Strategy et tactics. Forts. Trials at Nuremberg. Struggle over Israel. France retreats from empire. Indonesia. Vietnam's fight for freedom. The spread of communism. The years of reconstruction. Artists at war. Chronology 1933 - 1944. Chronology 1945 - 1949, bibliography

Volume 4 of an 8 volume series, pages 1345-1792, also known as Purnell's History of the Second World War. The chapter headings are Tunisia, Guadalcanal. Wingate minus myth. Africa, the end. Battle for the Sealanes. The greatest tank battle in history. Italians quit and turn on their dictator. Allies invade Italy. "The Bolshevik Horde". Did the Germans stop Monty?. War at the top. Guadalcanal to Bougainville. Marines at Tarawa!. Was Anzio worth it?. Cassino falls. RAF raider destroyed. Kohima and Imphal

Volume 3 of an 8 volume series, pages (897-1344) also known as Purnell's History of the Second World War The chapter headings are 1000 bomber raid, birth of the Allied Blitz. How?: This man - and 1000 like him - took the 15000 man American force on Corregidor. Banzai. Showdown at Midway. Tobruk Falls. The Siege of Sebastopol. First Alamein, 8th Army Outwits Rommel at the Gateway to Cairo. Suicide invasion, what went wrong at Dieppe?. The most vicious battle of the war, Stalingrad. Alamein, Montgomery's desert triumph. Guadalcanal, Japan's first land defeat. Operation Torch. Life in France. Scrap the battle fleet, Adolf Hitler. Death of an army. The crime at Katyn Wood

Volume 2 of an 8 volume series, (pages 449-896), also known as Purnell's History of the Second World War. The chapter headings are Hitler's revenge on Yugoslavia. Hitler drives the Allies out of Greece. How Crete was lost, the Allied view, the German view. Desert tragedy: Frenchman fights, Frenchman in Syria. The Bismarck: in triumph and defeat. Resistance begins. Duels with the Afrika Korps. Operation Barbarossa. Barbarossa!. Russia blunts the Blitzkrieg. Target Rommel. Pearl Harbor. Malaya. Battle for Moscow. Hit and run, the big commando raids begin. The General who never lost a battle.

The definitive history of the Desert War. ‘Comes as close as any work yet published to being a definitive account of the battles between German and Allied armies in the Sahara.’ --Financial Times Pitt reconstructs one of the most dramatic theatres of the Second World War, drawing together every aspect of an epic campaign fought across 3000 miles of desolate and inhospitable terrain. Each volume in the series centres upon a decisive event in the Desert War, taking the reader from the outbreak of fighting in 1940 to El Alamein, the greatest breakthrough in the struggle against the Axis. Volume Two of The Crucible of War trilogy covers General Auchinleck’s command — a period of disaster and defeat for the British Army, driven back towards Cairo by the Africa Korps under the tactical genius of Rommel. The book ends however with the replacing of Auchinleck by Montgomery in August 1942. Auchinleck's Command is essential reading for anyone interested in WW2, the British Army (it's strengths and weaknesses) and military leadership.

Volume 1 of an 8 volume series, also known as Purnell's History of the Second World War.

Book one (1) of two (2) books. 1941 & 1942. 1941 is the start of the war in North Africa or the Western Desert. The push of the Italians, counter of the British, entry of the African Corps and Rommel. Tanks, planes and other machines’ of war described. Strong points and short falls of commanders and nations. Read slowly, enjoy and look for book 2 (1942)

Time-Life Books: World War II: Volume 5

"This is the story of two great naval battles of the First World War and the ultimate triumph of British revenge at sea. In 1914 Great Britain's naval supremacy was challenged for the first time since Trafalgar. The East Asiatic Cruiser Squadron of the Imperial German Navy, under the command of Vice-Admiral Graf von Spee, itching for battle, found and shattered a British fleet at Coronel, in Chile. The Royal Navy had been defeated, and in Britain public bewilderment soon turned to anger. First Lord of the Admiralty Winston Churchill, and Lord Fisher, First Sea Lord, ordered the destruction of von Spee's ships, sending a powerful force to the Southern Seas which included the battle-cruisers Invincible and Inflexible. Just five weeks after their earlier victory, the Germans went to attack the Falklands, only to fall into the clutches of a now powerful, and prepared, British fleet; there ensued the Battle of the Falkland islands, and a famous victory for the Royal Navy. The British had wreaked their revenge on the Germans."--BOOK JACKET.