The Second World War saw huge advancements in military tactics and technology occurring at an unprecedented pace. One such development was the employment of forces able to deploy at short notice by parachute across the globe, utilising the opportunities created by the advancements in aeronautical technology. These forces were created to deliver an in-depth shock effect, and few have attracted more attention than Britain’s famed Parachute Regiment. This formation was born from the humble beginnings of a fledgling unit drawn together from the British Army and Royal Air Force after Winston Churchill called for a new capability to be created following German airborne successes in the opening stages of the Second World War.
Clandestine radio operators had one of the most dangerous jobs of World War 2. Those in Nazi-occupied Europe for the SOE, MI6 and the OSS had a life-expectancy of just six weeks. In the Gilbert Islands the Japanese decapitated 17 New Zealand ‘Coastwatchers’.
These ‘behind the lines’ highly skilled agents’ main tasks were to maintain regular contact with their home base and pass vital intelligence back. As this meticulously researched book reveals, many operators did more than that. Norwegian Odd Starheim hi-jacked a ship and sailed it to the Shetlands. In the Solomon Islands Jack Read and Paul Mason warned the defenders of Guadalcanal about incoming enemy air raids giving American fighters a chance to inflict irreversible damage on the Japanese Air Force. In 1944 Arthur Brown was central to Operation Jedburgh’s success delaying the arrival of the SS Das Reich armoured division at the Normandy beach-heads. The author also explains in layman’s terms the technology of 194
The Republic P-47 proved to be a formidable ground-attack aircraft and in RAF service was especially devastating during the fighting in Burma in 1945. There, the Thunderbolt was deployed using the ‘cab rank’ system that proved so effective for the Hawker Typhoons during the Battle for Normandy. Flying standing patrols close to the front line, as and when they were needed the Thunderbolts would be directed to specific targets by ground controllers deployed among the Army units in contact with the enemy. The effects of the aerial bombardment the Thunderbolts unleashed was all too often devastating.
Though he only joined 34 Squadron in 1945, Angus Findon quickly found himself embroiled in the last battles of the Second World War – as the many entries in his pilot’s logbook testify. In particular, he and his fellow Thunderbolt pilots, often operating alongside RAF Spitfires, played a vital part in the Battle of the Sittang Bend.
With the Middle East in a state of persistent change and upheaval, there has long been a need for a comprehensive, yet readable, study that can give the intelligent and interested ‘lay-person’ a greater understanding of this diverse, complex region.
Dorset magazine, February 2021
This book looks at some of the men who lost their lives but of whom there were no remains, and at the impact this must have had on the families who awaited news of their loved ones. The amazing thing is that the organisations who continue to search for these lost lives are still turning up information. Brilliant.
Books Monthly
I enjoyed reading these compelling stories of eight missing soldiers from the First World War. Their backgrounds, families and the sad circumstances of their deaths with no known grave are each sympathetically told so that it feels like you knew them. As the majority of the world was affected by this global conflict, this book also highlights the worries and hardships that most of our families must have experienced at the time. As such, this tells us some of what our own grandparents, great grandparents etc. must have gone through too.