Day-to-Day Naval Actions April 1940 through September 1940

Day-to-day naval actions from October 1940 through May 1941. Provides detailed information on movements of all identifiable vessels of Allied, Axis, and neutral countries, plus convoy movements and minefields. Information is broken down by month, then by geographical area, date, and time. This series is an invaluable source for historians, students, and anyone interested in the naval history of World War II.

This volume covers day-to-day naval actions during March-June 1943. The Allies attacked German U-boats day and night, forcing their withdrawal from the vital North Atlantic convoy routes, clearing the way for the eventual invasion of Europe from Britain. In the Bismarck Sea, Allied aircraft destroyed an entire Japanese troop convoy bound for New Guinea. In the Komandorski Islands, the U.S. Navy engaged a superior Japanese force and out fought them. After this loss, the Japanese commander was fired in disgrace. The Allies isolated the German and Italian troops fighting in Tunisia with an air and sea blockade. Without support from Italy, Tunisia fell. U.S. aircraft ambushed Japanese Admiral Yamamoto while he was en route to an inspection visit in the Solomon Islands. The U.S. 7th Infantry Division liberated Attu Island in the Aleutian Islands.

Captain Roskill has long been recognised as the leading authority on The Royal Navy s part in the Second World War. His official History (originally published for the HMSO) is unlikely even to be superceded. His narrative is highly readable and the analysis is clear. Roskill describes sea battles, convoy actions and the contribution made by technology in the shape of Asdic & Radar. Contents: Maritime War and MaritimeStrategy-MaritimeWar-The British Shore Organisation-The Development of Sea-Air Co-operation-Allied and Enemy War Plans and Dispositions-Opening Moves in Home Waters 3rd September-31st December 1939-Ocean Warfare 3rd September-31st December 1939-The Sea Approaches and Coastal Waters 1st January-31st May 1940-The Home Fleet 1st January-9th April 1940-The Norwegian Campaign 8th April-15th June 1940-The Control of the Narrow Seas 10th May-4th June 1940-The Withdrawal from Europe 5th-25th June 1940-The Control of Home Waters 30th May-31st December 1940-Ocean Warfare 1st January-31st December 1940-Coastal Warfare 1st June 1940-31st March 1941-The Campaign of the North-West Approaches 1st June 1940-31st March 1941-Ocean Warfare 1st January-31st May 1941-The Home Fleet 1st January-31st May 1941-The Africian Campaigns 1st January-31st May 1941-The Battle of the Atlantic 1st April-31st December 1941-Home Waters and the Arctic 1st June-31st December 1941-Coastal Warfare 1st April-31st December 1941-The African Campaigns 1st June-31st December 1941-Ocean Warfare 1st June-31st December 1941-Disaster in the Pacific December 1941

The Mediterranean is the maritime crossroads where Europe, Asia, and Africa meet. More major naval actions were fought there than in the Atlantic or Pacific yet remarkably little has been written about the subject. Th is fresh study of the Mediterranean’s naval war analyzes the actions and performances of the five major navies—British, Italian, French, German, and American—during the entire five-year campaign and examines the national imperatives that drove each nation’s maritime strategy. Struggle for the Middle Sea provides a history of the entire campaign from all perspectives and covers Germany’s largely unknown—and remarkably successful—struggle to employ sea power in the Mediterranean after the Italian armistice. Defense & Foreign Affairs Strategic Policy (August 2009) has called it “a new and stunningly important view of World War II” and “a fabulously readable and important book.”

“A top-of-the-line examination of operations in north European waters during the first eight months of [WWII] . . . by far the best work on that subject.”—Stone & Stone The term “the phony war” is often applied to the first months of the Second World War, a term suggesting inaction or passivity. That may have been the perception of the war on land, but at sea it was very different. This new book is a superb survey of the fierce naval struggles, from 1939 up to the invasion of Norway in April 1940. The author begins the book with the sinking of the German fleet at Scapa Flow in 1919 and then covers the rebuilding of the Kriegsmarine and parallel developments in the Royal Navy and summarizes relevant advances in European navies. The main part of the book then describes the actions at sea starting with the fall of Poland. There is a complex, intertwined narrative that follows. The sinking of Courageous, the German mining of the British East Coast, the Northern Patrol, the sinking of Rawalpindi, small ship operations in the North Sea and German Bight, the Altmark incident are all covered. Further afield the author deals with the German surface raiders and looks at the early stages of the submarine war in the Atlantic. As with his previous books, Geirr Haarr has researched extensively in German, British, and other archives, and the work is intended to paint a balanced and detailed picture of this significant period of the war when the opposing naval forces were adapting to a form of naval warfare quite different to that experienced in WWI.