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VFW: Woodstock Wasn't the Only Thing Happening 40 Years Ago By Colleen Raezler (Bio | Archive) August 12, 2009 - 13:47 ET    While some in the media have been dusting off their love beads, bell-bottoms and broomstick skirts in an effort to wax nostalgic about Woodstock, the VFW has reminded its members that the world did not stop for those four days in August 1969. In fact, for 109 American soldiers, the world ended that weekend.VFW Magazine honored those soldiers in the August 2009 cover story, "While Woodstock Rocked, GIs Died." Much has been made over the "half...

\ Photo: Seizo Yamada (7 km northeast of Hiroshima)

British historian Andrew Roberts has claimed in a new book -- The Storm of War -- that wrong clothing and not ghastly wintry conditions led to Germany's defeat in Russia in 1941. In an extract from his new book, Roberts claims that Hitler's troops were fatally ill equipped for the 1941 invasion of Russia. He also blames dictator Adolf Hitler for that defeat, saying the Nazi leader failed to take care of his troops' needs and was more proud of his hardiness in the cold, boasting how "having to change into long trousers was always a misery to me." Prior...

Rather than absolving him of his sins, former Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara’s pseudo-mea culpa, “In Retrospect: Tragedy and Lessons of Vietnam,” is a self-indictment. His lesser crime is self-indulgence. His arrogance and duplicity during the Vietnam conflict is echoed throughout his book as he recounts his mismanagement of the war. If as he admits, ignorance was his guiding light, then, it has grown to be a beacon today, proving that he has learned little about Vietnamese communism in the almost three decades that it took him to write his book. Besides the war, another tragedy is that McNamara seems...

July 1, 1863 The Battle of Gettysburg begins The largest military conflict in North American history begins this day when Union and Confederate forces collide at Gettysburg. The epic battle lasted three days and resulted in a retreat to Virginia by Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia. Two months prior to Gettysburg, Lee had dealt a stunning defeat to the Army of the Potomac at Chancellorsville. He then made plans for a Northern invasion in order to relieve pressure on war-weary Virginia and to seize the initiative from the Yankees. His army, numbering about 80,000, began moving on June...

On May 6, 1945, Edward Kennedy, chief of the Associated Press western front staff dispatched the scoop of a lifetime. At General Dwight Eisenhower's headquarters at Reims, France, General Gustaf Jodl, German army chief of staff, signed the terms of surrender at 7:41 p.m. central war time. The European Theater of World War II was officially over. Less than 12 hours later, at 8:35 a.m. central war time on May 7, Kennedy's dispatch was released by the New York desk of the Associated Press, and the world went wild with joy. The Minneapolis Morning Tribune ran the headline, "Announcement Due...

A bullet tore through Staff Sgt. Leonard Lomell's right leg as he stepped into the frigid Atlantic at Omaha Beach. "I had stepped in a bomb crater, and went to the bottom," Lomell, of Toms River, N.J., said this week. "As I came up, my guys pulled me [out] and pulled me onto the beach." It was June 6, 1944 -- D-Day. Lomell and his men were among the first American Soldiers to step out of landing craft and into the murderous German gunfire at Normandy. Today, 65 years later, the nation pauses to remember the largest water invasion in...

~ D-DAY June 6, 1944 ~ Encyclopedia Britannica NORMANDY INVASION May 1944 had been chosen at the conference in Washington in May 1943 as the time for the invasion. Difficulties in assembling landing craft forced a postponement until June, but June 5 was fixed as the unalterable date by Eisenhower on May 17. As the day approached and troops began to embark for the crossing, bad weather set in, threatening dangerous landing conditions. After tense debate, Eisenhower and his subordinates decided on a 24-hour delay, requiring the recall of some ships already at sea. Eventually, on the morning of...

NORMANDY, France (Army News Service, June 1, 2009) -- When the time comes Saturday, to honor the servicemen who fought and died supporting the D-Day invasion of Normandy 65 years ago, thousands are expected to flock to the shores of Utah Beach and Omaha Beach to pay homage to the bravery and sacrifice of these heroes. The 18th Military Police Brigade, based in Germany, was designated to plan, coordinate and conduct all U.S. support to the Normandy ceremonies commemorating the 65th anniversary of D-Day. For the execution of Task Force Normandy 65, weeks of careful planning and coordination have gone...

D-Day bomb raids were 'close to a war crime' says author The RAF bombing raids in Normandy following the D-Day invasion were 'close to a war crime', a leading British historian has claimed. Antony Beevor has singled out Bomber Command's massive raids on the key city of Caen for particular criticism,... ...made ahead of next week's 65th anniversary of the D-Day landings. Beevor was accused of trying to generate publicity for his latest book... Caen became a crucible of ferocious fighting during the campaign due to its vital strategic position... Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery hoped his troops would capture Caen...

The Washington Times has partnered with the Internet company Footnote.com on a new project that transforms Washington's Vietnam war memorial wall into an interactive, personal journey on the Web. The Interactive Vietnam Veterans Memorial allows you to search the names on the wall and to drill down into the government's official war records to learn details about each of the 58,000-plus heroes enshrined on the wall. You can also add your own personal stories, remembrances and photographs. (edit) Start by clicking on the "Search the Wall" box, where you can select "Search" or "View." Once you find the name...

NEWPORT NEWS — Jim Kennedy slogged onto Utah Beach in 1944 and saw the bloated bodies of American servicemen in the water. The tide washed them out. The tide washed them back in. It was three weeks after D-Day, June 6, 1944. The drama of the landing had passed, and the grim work of cleaning up the beach had begun. The Allies were pushing inward. And Kennedy's own story was just about to start. He belonged to a unit of U.S. Army deep sea divers who were dispatched to the port city of Cherbourg. The Allies had captured it after...

Army News videos: Historian explains battle of Passchendaele, Part 1Historian explains battle of Passchendaele, Part 2Thursday, April 23, 2009 Ottawa, ON – Norman Leach discusses the bravery and strategy of WWI Canadian soldiers.

America’s Great Betrayal By Humberto Fontova FrontPageMagazine.com | Friday, April 17, 2009 "They fought like Tigers," wrote CIA officer Grayston Lynch, who helped train these Cuban freedom-fighters. "But their fight was doomed before the first man hit the beach." Lynch, knew something about fighting – and about long odds. He carried scars from Omaha Beach, the Battle of the Bulge, and Heartbreak Ridge. But in those battles, Lynch and his band of brothers could count on the support of their own chief executive. At the Bay of Pigs, Lynch and his band of Cuban brothers learned – first in speechless...

NORFOLK - Twenty years ago today, a routine exercise turned into disaster aboard the USS Iowa when an explosion in a gun turret killed 47 crewmen. Today, around 250 people whose lives were touched by that day are expected to gather at Naval Station Norfolk to remember the men who perished and, hopefully, to heal some old wounds. They will gather at Iowa Point, where a small memorial at the water's edge pays tribute to the fallen sailors. Crew and family members will speak, and Norfolk Mayor Paul Fraim will offer remarks. The names of the dead will be read...

VA Hospital Pulls 'Japs Surrender' Headline from Historical Display Wednesday, March 11, 2009By Pete Winn, Senior Writer/Editor Americans raising flag on Mt. Suribachi, Iwo Jima (AP photo/Rosenthal) (CNSNews.com) - The director of the VA hospital in Indianapolis has removed a World War II-era newspaper front page from a historical display at the hospital because it contains the headline, “Japs Surrender.”  The hospital has replaced it with another newspaper, whose headline says “Peace.” Linda Jeffrey, the public affairs officer at the Roudebush VA Medical Center in Indianapolis, explained the action. “We have a hallway in our outpatient clinics that has a lot...

ARLINGTON, Va. — Sixty-four years ago on Feb. 23, 1945, U.S. Marines stormed the sands of Iwo Jima and raised the American flag atop Mount Suribachi. In honor of the 64th anniversary of that historic event, dozens of spectators and Marines, including nine individuals who fought in the Battle of Iwo Jima, gathered at the Marine Corps War Memorial today for a flag-raising ceremony. One of the Iwo Jima veterans present at the event acted as a forward observer during the battle, calling for and guiding indirect artillery fire from the island. “The [flag-raising] brings back so many memories,” said...

US troops have raised the Stars and Stripes over Iwo Jima four days after landing on the Japanese-held volcanic island. The 28th Regiment of the 5th Marine Division took Mount Suribachi at 1030 local time. The extinct volcano offers a strategic vantage point for the ongoing battle for control of the island. Lying in the north-west Pacific Ocean 650 miles (1,045 kms) from Tokyo, Iwo Jima would serve as a useful base for long-range fighters to cover B-29 Superfortresses in a bombing campaign against the Japan's capital. Although the Stars and Stripes are flying over the island the battle is...

Feb. 15, 1898: A terrific explosion rips through the bow of USS Maine anchored in Havana Harbor, Cuba. Almost everyone in the forward third of the vessel is instantly killed. Black smoke and seawater begin pouring into the remaining spaces. The dying ship, its bulkheads groaning under the stress of collapse, is then rocked by a series of jarring secondary explosions. Capt. Charles Sigsbee, the Maine’s skipper, orders “Abandon ship!” Within minutes, 260 U.S. sailors and Marines are dead. Convinced that the explosion (the cause of which is still being debated) is the result of a mine or the work...

DALLAS — After four years of painstaking labor, artisans of the Vought Aircraft Retirees Club have restored an icon of U.S. aviation history, a World War II-vintage F4U Corsair fighter plane.Working with pieces and parts from several wrecked and scrapped aircraft and building many others themselves from drawings, the retirees have spent thousands of hours and hundreds of thousands of dollars re-creating a version of the distinctive, gull-winged plane that Japanese soldiers and sailors dubbed "Whistling Death."Rebuilding the Corsair, one of two great fighter planes — the other was the Grumman F6F Hellcat — that enabled Navy and Marine pilots...