The D Day Training Pocket Manual 1944

Using excerpts from contemporary training manuals, this pocket manual is an insight into the preparation of the troops involved in Operation Overlord. The success of the D-Day landings on June 6, 1944, depended on thousands of troops carrying out their mission and the seamless coordination of the amphibious landings with paratrooper and glider assaults. The troops not only had to be trained up ready for their own roles, but to work alongside other troops, often coordinating activities and communicating with other troops while in unfamiliar terrain and under fire. This pocket manual brings together excerpts from Allied manuals used in the preparation for D-Day, including amphibious landings and managing beachheads, pathfinder, paratrooper, and glider pilot training, and infantry and armored fighting in the bocage countryside. “Chris McNab is a prolific writer who knows what he is doing, as this book shows; and this volume will fit well with its stable mates.” —War History Online

During World War II, it quickly became apparent that the physical and tactical demands placed upon paratroopers required men of exceptional stamina, courage and intelligence. To create these soldiers, levels of training were unusually punishing and protracted, and those who came through to take their “wings” were a true elite. The Paratrooper Training Pocket Manual 1939–1945 provides an unusually detailed look into what it took to make a military paratrooper during the Second World War, and how he was then utilized in actions where expected survival might be measured in a matter of days. Using archive material from British, U.S., German and other primary sources—many never before published—this book explains paratrooper theory, training, and practice in detail. The content includes: details of the physical training, instruction in static-line parachute deployment, handling the various types of parachutes and harnesses, landing on dangerous terrain, small-arms handling, airborne deployment of heavier combat equipment, landing in hostile drop zones, tactics in the first minutes of landing, radio comms, and much more. Featuring original manual diagrams and illustrations, plus new introductory text explaining the history and context of airborne warfare, The Paratrooper Training Pocket Manual 1939–1945 provides a detailed insight into the principles and practice of this unique type of combat soldier.

In this study, the author traces the reasons for the British Army's tactical weakness in Normany to flaws in its training in Britain. The armour suffered from failures of experience. Disagreements between General Montgomery and the War Office exacerbated matters.

A military history detailing the key role two US Army special forces commanders and their infantry divisions played in during the second world war. Generals during World War II usually stayed to the rear, but not Matthew Ridgway and Maxwell Taylor. During D-Day and the Normandy campaign, these commanders of the 82nd “All-American” and the 101st “Screaming Eagle” Airborne Divisions refused to remain behind the lines and stood shoulder-to-shoulder with their paratroopers in the thick of combat. Jumping into Normandy during the early hours of D-Day, Ridgway and Taylor fought on the ground for six weeks of combat that cost the airborne divisions more than forty percent casualties. The Paratrooper Generals is the first book to explore in depth the significant role these two division commanders played on D-Day, describing the extraordinary courage and leadership they demonstrated throughout the most important American campaign of World War II.

During World War II, the US Army and its allies faced a formidable challenge: the need to assault Hitler's 'Fortress Europe' from the sea. As a result, during 1941–45, the US Army had to add amphibious assault to its list of combat capabilities. Officers and troops from across the US Armed Forces had to develop the techniques and technologies to assault the coasts of Axis-occupied Europe, from logistics to beach assault and beachhead consolidation, and more. In order to win and hold a contested beachhead in the face of bitter enemy resistance, the amphibious-warfare specialists played a variety of essential battlefield roles; if the US troops could not establish a beachhead quickly, they risked being thrown back into the sea. For their part, the Germans had to devise a practical defensive doctrine that made the most of the limited resources and troops available and the terrain. The German infantry defenders immediately around the landing areas had to be able to call upon support from nearby artillery, mechanized troops, and armoured forces to have a chance of containing the enemy beachhead. This illustrated study analyses the specialist beach-landing troops involved in three key battles – the Allied amphibious landings at Salerno and Anzio in Italy, and Omaha Beach in Normandy – focusing upon the US Army's various types of beach-assault specialists and their German opponents, whose combat experience and effectiveness varied considerably. Each of the three featured battles is then examined in detail, exploring how the Germans made defensive preparations; how the US troops planned to overcome them; and the immediate actions undertaken by the US amphibious specialists and their German opponents both during and following the main assault landings.

Excerpts from the many unofficial “manuals” avidly bought by members of the British Home Guard desperate to prepare for invasion during World War II. How would you clear a stoppage on a Bren Gun while in action? What is the most effective way to clear a wood of enemy forces? How best could you counter a landing by enemy airborne forces in your area? What measure can you take to help ensure accurate rifle fire at night? What qualities should you look for when selecting a patrol commander? Just a few of the practical questions posed—and answered—in the selection of publications included in The Home Guard Training Pocket Manual. Numerous manuals and training pamphlets were privately published during World War II to supplement the slim official Home Guard manual produced by the War Office. Covering everything from patrolling, night fighting, drill and small arms proficiency to the legal powers of the Home Guard, these manuals were welcomed by the men of local Home Guard units keen to do everything possible to prepare for possible invasion—when they would be the first line of defense. This pocket manual collates a selection of material from these fascinating publications, often written by serving soldiers and reprinted multiple times due to demand.

An incredible insight into the origins, training and earliest operations of the special service volunteer soldiers who formed the original units of the world's most famous military force. The Special Air Service was the brainchild of Scots Guards' officer Lieutenant David Stirling, serving with No 8 Commando. He advocated a specially organised, specially equipped and specially trained unit dedicated to the 'unrelenting pursuit of excellence' that could act covertly and operate behind enemy lines to gain intelligence, destroy enemy aircraft and attack their supply and reinforcement routes. The 1st SAS Regiment was officially designated after successful raids against enemy airfields in the Middle East in 1941-1942. In May 1943 a 2nd SAS Regiment was raised in Algeria and would also serve in Sicily and Italy. SAS troopers were at the forefront of the action on D-Day, serving behind the enemy lines, assisting the French Resistance in diversionary attacks and in support of Allied armies. The SAS served with great distinction through 42 significant actions in Belgium, the Netherlands and Germany until the end of the war in Europe. This new addition to this bestselling pocket-book series is compiled from wartime and post-war memorandums, manuals and documents. They include unit after-action reports and lecture notes from the centres used to train special services soldiers, gathered from the Liddell Hart Military Archive, National Archives, wartime periodicals and post-war memoirs. The book covers: - training methods - weapons handling - fieldcraft - sabotage training - operations in North Africa and the Middle East (1941–1942), Sicily and Italy (1943) and France (1944–1945)