US Army

  • Spearhead: An American Tank Gunner, His Enemy, and a Collision of Lives in World War II

    ByNorm Haskett Reading Time: 1 minute

    NEW YORK TIMES, WALL STREET JOURNAL, AND USA TODAY BESTSELLER • “A band of brothers in an American tank . . . Makos drops the reader back into the Pershing’s turret and dials up a battle scene to rival the peak moments of Fury.”—The Wall Street Journal

    From the author of the international bestseller A Higher Call  comes the riveting World War II story of an American tank gunner’s journey into the heart of the Third Reich, where he will meet destiny in an iconic armor duel—and forge an enduring bond with his enemy.

    When Clarence Smoyer is assigned to the gunner’s seat of his Sherman tank, his crewmates discover that the gentle giant from Pennsylvania has a hidden talent: He’s a natural-born shooter.

    At first, Clarence and his fellow crews in the legendary 3rd Armored Division—“Spearhead”—thought their tanks were invincible. Then they met the German Panther, with a gun so murderous it could shoot through one Sherman and into the next. Soon a pattern emerged: The lead tank always gets hit.

    After Clarence sees his friends cut down breaching the West Wall and holding the line in the Battle of the Bulge, he and his crew are given a weapon with the power to avenge their fallen brothers: the Pershing, a state-of-the-art “super tank,” one of twenty in the European theater.

    But with it comes a harrowing new responsibility: Now they will spearhead every attack. That’s how Clarence, the corporal from coal country, finds himself leading the U.S. Army into its largest urban battle of the European war, the fight for Cologne, the “Fortress City” of Germany.

    Battling through the ruins, Clarence will engage the fearsome Panther in a duel immortalized by an army cameraman. And he will square off with Gustav Schaefer, a teenager behind the trigger in a Panzer IV tank, whose crew has been sent on a suicide mission to stop the Americans.

    As Clarence and Gustav trade fire down a long boulevard, they are taken by surprise by a tragic mistake of war. What happens next will haunt Clarence to the modern day, drawing him back to Cologne to do the unthinkable: to face his enemy, one last time.

    Praise for Spearhead

    “A detailed, gripping account . . . the remarkable story of two tank crewmen, from opposite sides of the conflict, who endure the grisly nature of tank warfare.”—USA Today (four out of four stars)

    “An engaging story of blood, sweat and tears . . . a wonderful homage to the Greatest Generation.”—The Providence Journal

  • Sons and Soldiers: The Untold Story of the Jews Who Escaped the Nazis and Returned with the U.S. Army to Fight Hitler

    ByNorm Haskett Reading Time: 1 minute

    NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • “An irresistible history of the WWII Jewish refugees who returned to Europe to fight the Nazis.” —Newsday

    They were young Jewish boys who escaped from Nazi-occupied Europe and resettled in America. After the United States entered the war, they returned to fight for their adopted homeland and for the families they had left behind. Their stories tell the tale of one of the U.S. Army’s greatest secret weapons.

    Sons and Soldiers begins during the menacing rise of Hitler’s Nazi party, as Jewish families were trying des-perately to get out of Europe. Bestselling author Bruce Henderson captures the heartbreaking stories of parents choosing to send their young sons away to uncertain futures in America, perhaps never to see them again. As these boys became young men, they were determined to join the fight in Europe. Henderson describes how they were recruited into the U.S. Army and how their unique mastery of the German language and psychology was put to use to interrogate German prisoners of war.

    These young men—known as the Ritchie Boys, after the Maryland camp where they trained—knew what the Nazis would do to them if they were captured. Yet they leapt at the opportunity to be sent in small, elite teams to join every major combat unit in Europe, where they collected key tactical intelligence on enemy strength, troop and armored movements, and defensive positions that saved American lives and helped win the war. A postwar army report found that nearly 60 percent of the credible intelligence gathered in Europe came from the Ritchie Boys.

    Sons and Soldiers draws on original interviews and extensive archival research to vividly re-create the stories of six of these men, tracing their journeys from childhood through their escapes from Europe, their feats and sacri-fices during the war, and finally their desperate attempts to find their missing loved ones. Sons and Soldiers is an epic story of heroism, courage, and patriotism that will not soon be forgotten.

  • Patton’s First Victory: How General George Patton Turned the Tide in North Africa and Defeated the Afrika Korps at El…

    ByNorm Haskett Reading Time: 1 minute

    American troops invaded North Africa in November 1942, but did not face serious resistance until the following February, when they finally tangled with Rommel’s Afrika Korps—and the Germans gave the inexperienced Americans a nasty drubbing at Kasserine Pass. After this disaster, Gen. George Patton took command and reinvigorated U.S. troops with tough training and new tactics. In late March, at El Guettar in Tunisia, Patton’s men defeated the Germans. It was a morale-boosting victory—the first American success versus the Germans and the first of Patton’s storied World War II career—and proved to the enemy, the British, and the Americans themselves that the U.S. Army could fight and win.