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Keep Calm And Carry On: Uncovering The True Blitz Spirit, Lauren Niedergeses

Honors Program: Senior Projects (Public)

First shown by Britain’s civilian population during the Blitz, this Blitz Spirit is widely understood today as a heroic display of courage, cheerfulness, unity, and the ability to “keep calm and carry on” in the face of danger and discomfort. Drawing from radio broadcasts, photographs, propaganda posters and films, and the wartime morale reports of Mass-Observation, I seek to uncover the true Blitz Spirit and how it became an integral – if somewhat mythicized – element of Britain’s modern identity. First, I explore the emergence of the Blitz Spirit during World War II, identifying gaps between reality and propagandistic myth. …

Interview With Robert Majors, Zach S. Henderson Library Special Collections

Zach S. Henderson Library Special Collections Oral History Collection

Robert Majors was interviewed by Esther Mallard, December 4, 1992. Find this collection in the University Libraries' catalog!

Interview With Johnny Aldrich, Zach S. Henderson Library Special Collections

Zach S. Henderson Library Special Collections Oral History Collection

A part of the "Our Home Town Heroes" series. Johnny Aldrich interviewed by Dr. Daniel Good, November 13, 1999. Find this collection in the University Libraries' catalog!

Framing The Future Of The Us Military Profession, Richard A. Lacquement Jr., Thomas P. Galvin

Books, Monographs & Collaborative Studies

The military profession needs to be redefined by examination of its expertise and jurisdictions of practice, whereas previously the focus was on securing its professional identity. Twenty years ago, the original Future of the Army Profession research project responded to growing concerns among officers that the Army was no longer a profession in light of the post–Cold War drawdown and the onset of global operations including Iraq and Afghanistan. Today, the profession faces recurrent challenges raised by the changing character of war, the renewal of great-power competition, crises surrounding issues of sexual harassment and assault, the effects of a major …

“To Die Gallantly”?—The Role Of The Surface Fleet In German Naval Strategy, 1919–41, Peter Hooker

Naval War College Review

While the U-boat dominated Germany’s naval war from 1942 on, its surface fleet played a far more significant strategic role to that point than is appreciated. The construction of that fleet was not the result of myopia but of considered appraisals of the German navy’s performance in the First World War and the development of naval technology during the interwar period.

The Impact Of The United States Army Nurses Corps On The United States Army Fatality Rate In The Mediterranean And European Theater Of Operations During World War Ii, Joshua Benjamin Groomes

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

World War II was the most devastating war in human history in terms of loss of life. The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, plunged the United States into war. Less than seven thousand military nurses were on active duty at the time of the attack. By the end of the war, there were over fifty-thousand active-duty nurses. The army nurses performed under fire in field and evacuation hospitals, on hospital trains and ships, and as flight nurses on medical evacuation transport aircraft. The skill and dedication of the Army Nurses Corps insured a 95% survival rate …

Last Mission To Tokyo: The Extraordinary Story Of The Doolittle Raiders And Their Final Fight For Justice, Jacob Meusch, Michel Paradis

Naval War College Review

No abstract provided.

Redeployment Of The German Brest Group Through The English Channel, 11–13 February 1942 (Operation Cerberus), Milan Vego

Naval War College Review

In this redeployment—a nearly unique operation—the Germans were highly successful in both planning and execution, while the British response was incoherent and poorly coordinated and executed, providing a rich trove of operational lessons still valid today.

For Cause And Countries: Initial, Sustaining, And Combat Motivation In The Royal Air Force Eagle Squadrons, 1940-1942, Timothy Defazio

Master's Theses

Before the United States entered the Second World War, 245 American pilots pledged their service to the Royal Air Force (RAF). Organized into 71, 121, and 133 Squadrons, collectively known as the Eagle Squadrons, these foreign volunteers present an intriguing avenue of soldier motivation analysis. Employing the conceptual framework offered by John Lynn and James McPherson, this thesis analyzes three components of the Eagles’ motivation—initial, sustaining, and combat.

Viewed in context, the Eagles’ decision to join a beleaguered air force reflected a commitment to ideological principles, as the desires to defend England and curb German aggression figured largely into their …

The Impact Of French Algeria’S Participation During The First And Second World Wars On The Algerian Nationalist Movement, Reide Prunty

West Virginia University Historical Review

The colonial relationship between France and French Algeria reached its boiling point during the Algerian War of Independence in 1954 after more than a century of French imperial subjugation. Before this pivotal year, French Algeria was required to support France through two total and primarily European wars. While Algerians believed that such a sacrifice for their imperial mother nation was cause for equality under French law, France was committed to the continued oppression of its colony. This essay argues that French Algeria’s contribution to the French war effort during the First and Second World Wars served as a catalyst to …

Interwoven Histories: A Chinese Family, A Yale Graduate And The Nanking Massacre, Isabella Yang

The Yale Undergraduate Research Journal

Following the fall of Nanjing, the Republic of China’s capital, in December 1937 during World War II, Japanese soldiers conducted a series of atrocities against civilians in the region that lasted for months, infamously known as the Nanking Massacre. This paper takes a microhistorical approach to examining how these atrocities permanently affected civilians’ lives. Relying on oral histories and primary sources at the Yale Divinity Library, it explores two interwoven histories of wartime survivors: one of the Cao family residing just outside Nanjing when the atrocities happened, and another of a Yale graduate named Miner Searle Bates who took advantage …

Blitzkrieg: The Evolution Of Modern Warfare And The Wehrmacht’S Impact On American Military Doctrine During The Cold War Era, Briggs Evans

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The evolution of United States military doctrine was heavily influenced by the Wehrmacht and their early Blitzkrieg campaigns during World War II. This thesis traces the origins of this development and shows how the context of the Cold War led to a heavy influence by the Wehrmacht on American military doctrine. By analyzing studies conducted by the United States Army Historical Division from 1946-1961, I will show how these studies left a profound impact on American Military doctrine, particularly in the context of the Cold War. I will show the development of the Active Defense Doctrine and AirLand Battle during …

From “Angelegenheit Großdeutschlands” To “Österreichische Abende”: Programming The 1945 Salzburg Festival, Rachel E. Scott

Faculty and Staff Publications – Milner Library

Österreichische Abende, or Austrian Evenings, were a series unique to the 1945 Salzburg Festival. These six solo recitals, five of which featured singers, highlighted Austrian musical culture by recruiting Austrian performers to perform Austrian music in an Austrian setting. For the first time since the Annexation in 1938, Salzburg Festival administrators had the opportunity, albeit with limited resources, to assert an identity separate from Germany. By leveraging available resources, collaborating strategically with occupiers, evoking nostalgia, and providing a sacred space, these small-scale recitals were integral to the first post-war season of the Salzburg Festival and its subsequent revival.

“Vincere!”: The Italian Royal Army’S Counterinsurgency Operations In Africa, 1922–1940, Charles D. Melson, Federica Saini Fasanotti

Naval War College Review

No abstract provided.

Six Victories: North Africa, Malta, And The Mediterranean Convoy War, November 1941–March 1942, Fabio De Ninno, Vincent P. O’Hara

Naval War College Review

No abstract provided.

Scratch One Flattop: The First Carrier Air Campaign And The Battle Of The Coral Sea, Nicholas Evan Sarantakes, Robert C. Stern

Naval War College Review

No abstract provided.

One Approach, Two Results—The French Army, The U.S. Marines, And The Frontal Assault During The World Wars, Ethan S. Rafuse

Naval War College Review

The French army’s 1940 campaign was disastrous, whereas the U.S. Marine Corps cracked the problem of making an opposed amphibious landing, keying victory over imperial Japan. But despite these military organizations’ different approaches, a closer examination reveals that the two services shared more in common in the problems they faced and the answers they developed than their operational results suggest.

The Logistics Considerations Of The Landing Ship Tank And Its Evolution As An Auxiliary Repair Ship In World War Ii, Joel H. Berry Iii

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

This study reveals how the US Navy’s Landing Ship Tank (LST) of World War II functioned in logistics support roles from the outset of its wartime participation and to a greater degree than many military planners ever envisioned. The ship’s simple design proved so versatile that, within one year of the first LST, the Navy began converting dozens of the ships to Landing Craft Repair Ships (ARL) and other auxiliary classes supporting myriad naval logistics tasks. Both the standard LST and the ARL made significant logistics contributions to the war effort well beyond amphibious assaults.

Matthew Ridgway And The Value Of Persistent Dissent, Conrad C. Crane

The US Army War College Quarterly: Parameters

Army General Matthew Ridgway’s actions throughout his career provide a valuable example of the appropriate time and place for serious dissent by military leaders. Ridgway demonstrated the importance of selectively and pragmatically expressing open disagreement in response to operational decisions a military leader deems unnecessarily risk American lives and economic resources

Pennies From Heaven: Death And The Afterlife In World War Ii Fantasy Films, Elise Williamson

Film and Media Studies (MA) Theses

Wartime fantasy films produced by major Hollywood studios during World War II integrate the supernatural (i.e., ghosts, angels, and the afterlife) into wartime settings with relevant protagonists and themes to address the psychological trauma of wartime death and loss. Three case studies – The Human Comedy (Clarence Brown, 1943), A Guy Named Joe (Victor Fleming, 1943), and Between Two Worlds (Edward A. Blatt, 1944) – explore fantasy narratives and conventions unconventionally blended with the war film genre, and illustrate how the war film setting (home front vs. combat front vs. war zone) influences character focus (civilians vs. military), the …

The United States And Its Coercive Democratization Attempts In Japan And Iraq, Noah Shepardson

College Honors Program

The United States engaged in coercive democratization (bringing democracy to a country via coercive measures such as occupation) endeavors in both Japan and Iraq, achieving drastically different results. The democratization of Japan is typically regarded as the gold standard of coercive democratization due to Japan’s rapid social and economic development following the United States’ occupation of the country in the years after World War II. The United States’ democratization effort in Iraq, on the other hand, has failed to create such prosperous conditions and has arguably made Iraq more unstable. This thesis seeks to identify why coercive democratization worked in …

Memory, Identity, And World Ii In Australia: Liz Reed's "Bigger Than Gallipoli", Christopher T. Lough

Student Publications

This paper is structured as a review of Liz Reed's 2004 study Bigger Than Gallipoli: War, History, and Memory in Australia, an analysis of the Australian government's public commemoration of the Second World War from 1994-95. Critiquing certain aspects of Reed's methodology, I bring in some of Jill Ker Conway's insights on Australian identity from her 1989 memoir The Road from Coorain, as well as other scholars of historical memory and political theory. While Reed makes some important insights on the merits and deficiencies of political nostalgia, I argue that her book represents a missed opportunity overall.

The Fallacy Of Contract In Sexual Slavery: A Response To Ramseyer's "Contracting For Sex In The Pacific War", Yong-Shik Lee, Natsu Taylor Saito, Jonathan Todres

Michigan Journal of International Law

Over seven decades have passed since the end of the Second World War, but the trauma from the cruelest war in human history continues today, perpetuated by denial of responsibility for the war crimes committed and unjust attempts to rewrite history at the expense of dignity, life, and justice for the victims of the most serious human rights violations. The latest such attempt is a troubling recharacterization of the sexual slavery enforced by Japan during the Second World War as a legitimate contractual arrangement. A recent paper authored by J. Mark Ramseyer, entitled “Contracting for Sex in the Pacific War,” …

Warhorses Amongst War Machines: The German Army's Use Of Horses And Cavalry During World War Ii, Katherine V. Mcfarland

Senior Theses

This thesis explores the role of the horse as used by the German Army throughout the Second World War. Contrary to the propagandic image of a mechanized Germany and of the blitzkrieg, the reality of warfare at the time remained primarily dependent on the horse, as man and beast continued to engage in conflict side by side. Horses served a variety of uses within the German forces, from mounted cavalry to hauling artillery, with disasters and successes throughout the war. Employing vast numbers of horses, the Germans allocated extensive resources, and often found themselves relying on the animal when vehicles …

Hm 28: To The Java Sea: Selections From The Diary, Reports, And Letters Of Henry E. Eccles, 1940-1942, John B. Hattendorf, Pelham Boyer

Historical Monographs

The three-year span between 1940 and 1942 was critical in Henry Eccles’s life and career. These years mark not only the beginnings of the direct involvement of the United States in World War II but also Eccles’s first surface warship command, the command that earned him high professional recognition—the Navy Cross and the Silver Star. The diary, reports, and letters assembled here allow the modern reader an unusual opportunity to enter a very different world and a very different time in naval history. The contents document Lt. Cdr. Henry E. Eccles’s trip by passenger ships from New York to Manila, …

Hm 27: Major Naval Operations In European Waters, 1939–1945, Milan Vego

Historical Monographs

This work is the second and last sequel to Major Naval Operations, published by the Naval War College Press in 2008 as Newport Paper 32. The first sequel, Major Fleet-versus-Fleet Operations in the Pacific War, 1941–1945, was published (as Historical Monograph 22) by the Naval War College Press / Government Printing Office in 2014; a second edition came out in 2016. The focus of that volume was on the description and analysis of three major fleet-versus-fleet operations. In contrast, this work, Major Naval Operations in European Waters, 1939–1945 (twenty-seventh in the Naval War College Press’s Historical Monograph series), looks …

Seapower, Geostrategic Relations, And Islandness: The World War Ii Destroyers For Bases Deal, Colin Flint

Political Science Faculty Publications

The Destroyers for Bases deal was signed on March 27, 1941, and transferred fifty aging US destroyers to Great Britain in exchange for 99-year leases of bases on the British controlled islands of Newfoundland, Bermuda, Trinidad, Jamaica, Antigua, St. Lucia, the Bahamas, and one in British Guiana. The deal highlights how US strategic planners came to see the value of the islands because of their relationality. Three forms of relationality are discussed: the land/sea dialectic; spatial connectivity; and the changing geopolitical balance of power. Relationality is a factor in four strategic calculations: other islands; other continents; other oceans; and the …

For The New Rainbow Soldier Booklet, 42nd Infantry Division

Wilfrid S. Mailhot, Jr. Ephemera

No abstract provided.

Parameters Winter 2020, Usawc Parameters

The US Army War College Quarterly: Parameters

No abstract provided.

The Long-Term Effects Of Japan’S Traumatic Experience In The Second World War And Its Implications For Peace In Northeast Asia, Eugen Koh, Tadashi Takeshima

New England Journal of Public Policy

This article is an introductory report on the work of a Japanese study group whose primary aim is peacemaking, which it seeks by promoting a greater understanding of the long-term effects of their country’s traumatic experience of the Second World War. The group does not adopt a position of victimhood but seeks to understand the full picture of Japan’s role in the war, including its role as perpetrator. We came together with the shared assumption that the country’s inability to take responsibility for its role of the war is inextricably tied to its own traumatization. If this assumption is true, …