The Tank Museum
Published 2 Sep 2022Join Curator David Willey in his latest Tank Chat as he delves into the Springer, a German demolition vehicle.
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January 5, 2023
Tank Chats #162 | Springer | The Tank Museum
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January 3, 2023
1943 in Numbers – WW2 Special
World War Two
Published 1 Jan 2023This war is massive. Our chronological coverage helps give us an understanding of it, but sometimes statistics help us understand the bigger picture.
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January 1, 2023
Canadians Take Little Stalingrad – WW2 – 227 – December 31, 1943
World War Two
Published 31 Dec 20221943 reaches its end with no end in sight for the war. In Italy, the Canadians take Ortona after bloody close fighting, the US Marines advance on New Britain, and a new Soviet offensive makes huge gains in the USSR. This isn’t enough for the Allies, though, who have a big shake up in their European Command to help prepare for future attacks.
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December 30, 2022
Stalin Deports An Entire Ethnicity – War Against Humanity 093
World War Two
Published 29 Dec 2022The last week of 1943 is a busy one. Stalin deports the Kalmyk minority from Kalmykia, the escapees from Fort IX get away, and the US President moves to found the post-war UN.
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My Top 10 Favorite Avalon Hill Games
Legendary Tactics
Published 1 Apr 2021Avalon Hill has such a rich history as a board game company, and has contributed so much to our hobby, our sense of history, and our lives. I sat down to reminisce about my top 10 favorite Avalon Hill games of all time. Are these the best games of all time? What games would make your list? Let us know in the comment section below.
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December 29, 2022
Anti-Tank Chats #5 | PIAT | The Tank Museum
The Tank Museum
Published 26 Aug 2022Bring up the PIAT! Join Stuart Wheeler as he takes a look at the iconic WW2 British anti-tank weapon — the PIAT. With thanks to @The Armourer’s Bench and @History in Firearms
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December 28, 2022
The Myth of the Nazi Police State – WW2 Documentary Special
World War Two
Published 27 Dec 2022The popular image of the Gestapo is as black leather-jacketed fiends whose spies keep the nation under constant surveillance. They are so powerful that the terrified population has no choice but to sell out its family and friends. But how true is this? Are all Germans living in fear of the Gestapo all the time?
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December 26, 2022
The Battle of Ortona with Jayson Geroux
OTD Canadian Military History
Published 21 Dec 2022Join me as I welcome Jayson Geroux to the OTD channel to discuss the Battle of Ortona. We will be discussing the urban combat that took place in Ortona in December 1943. [The discussion of the actual battle begins around the 6 minute mark.]
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2nd Canadian Infantry Brigade Christmas celebrations in Ortona, 1943
The folks at the World War Two channel on YouTube posted this to their community page on Christmas Day:
On Christmas Day, 25 December 1943, the 1st Canadian Infantry Division is still engaged in brutal urban combat against the 1. Fallschirmjäger-Division for control over the town of Ortona. But among the rubble of the “Italian Stalingrad”, soldiers of the Seaforth Highlanders of Canada, along with other units [of the 2nd Canadian Infantry Brigade], manage to keep the Christmas spirit alive.
Colonel S. W. Thomson will recount this most unusual Christmas celebration many years later:
“I knew that we would be fully engaged with the enemy on Christmas day. However our most enterprising Quartermaster, Captain Bordon Cameron, was anxious to provide something special for the men at Christmas. Three companies were in the line with one in reserve, often the norm. We decided to feed the reserve company first and feed the remaining companies in relays. as one company finished it would go forward some 300 or 400 yards and relieve the next. Tables, linen, chinaware and candles were scrounged by the reserve company. The tables were set up in rows in our great church Santa Maria with four foot thick walls and my rear H.Q. What a picture, what an appropriate setting for a Christmas dinner on Dec. 25.
“Soup, roast pork, vegetables and Christmas pudding along with a bottle of beer for each of the tattered, scruffy, war weary soldiers was served by HQ and B echelon staff. The Q.M. boys excelled themselves, the impossible had happened. There was a spirit of good-fellowship throughout the church. The signals officer Lieutenant Wilf Gildersleeve played the organ, and our much loved padre Roy Durford led the carol singing. Pipe Major Esson played his pipes several times during the meals drowning out the odd enemy shell burst outside.
“Christmas in Ortona, the meal, yes, but the spirit of the occasion, the look on the faces of those exhausted, gutsy men on entering the church is with me to-day and will live forever.”
To all our followers, readers, and viewers: We wish you a Merry Christmas!
From: Canadian Military History, Vol. 2 (1993)
Picture: Canadian soldiers celebrate Christmas in Ortona, Italy
Source: Canadian Armed Forces
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December 25, 2022
Stalin’s Christmas Surprise – Major Offensives to Come – WW2 – 226 – December 24, 1943
World War Two
Published 24 Dec 2022Twas the night before Christmas and the war was grinding on. The Moro River Campaign continues in Italy with Canadian infantry pushing past the Gully and into “Little Stalingrad”. Generally, the Allied advance to Rome is turning into a stalemate though, but Winston Churchill still believes an amphibious landing is the way to break this. Joseph Stalin also has some pretty big plans to bring the USSR back to its pre-Barbarossa borders. In the Pacific, there is attrition over Rabaul and stalemate on Bougainville.
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December 23, 2022
A Jungle Miracle – War Against Humanity 092
World War Two
Published 22 Dec 2022Two escapes, one from the Nazis in Kovno (Kaunas) Lithuania, from the prison at Fort IX, and one from Japanese terror on Panay in the Philippines this week, will help to document the crimes of the Axis powers.
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December 21, 2022
The Nazi Quest for Thor’s Hammer – WW2 Documentary Special
World War Two
Published 20 Dec 2022Books, films, and comics are filled with Nazi scientists and explorers travelling the globe to get their hands on ancient artifacts or summoning daemons with black magic. But how much of it is grounded in reality? Well, some of it. In the neo-pagan religion invented by Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler, the world can only be explained through the occult.
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December 18, 2022
A Super Bomber to Break Japan – WW2 – 225 – December 17, 1943
World War Two
Published 17 Dec 2022This war has now lasted as long as the Great War did, but there’s no signs of it slowing. The Soviets have three offensives going on on the Eastern Front, in Italy the Allies are attacking at San Pietro and over the Moro River, in the Pacific there are Allied landings on New Britain, but in Pacific Command, the big talk is all about a new super bomber.
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December 17, 2022
The RAF’s Worst Day of the War – War Against Humanity 091
World War Two
Published 15 Dec 2022The United Nations Allies has some success bombing the Nazi German Reich, but it comes at a heavy price. In the village Kalavryta in Greece, the Wehrmacht massacre hundreds of men and boys.
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December 14, 2022
The Polish Armed Forces in Exile
World War Two
Published 13 Dec 2022The Polish state was the first to fall in this war, yet across the globe Polish soldiers are fighting on land, air, and sea as part of the United Nations alliance. The story of the tens of thousands of men and women fighting for Polish liberation is equal parts hope and hardship as they battle the enemy and even sometimes their own allies.
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