While previous writers have focused primarily on strategic, military, and intelligence factors, Walter Grunden underscores the dramatic scientific and technological disparities that left Japan vunerable and ultimately led to its defeat in World War II.

Critical Acclaim for Secret Weapons of World War II "Breuer has produced yet another collection of rip-roaring tales. . . . A delightful addition to the niche that Breuer has so successfully carved out." -Publishers Weekly "It is Breuer's portrayal of the competition for technological superiority between the Allies and the Nazis that grabs the reader and shows the significance of each wartime discovery and invention." -State Journal-Register, Springfield, Illinois In the fast-paced, suspenseful Secret Weapons of World War II, noted military historian William Breuer chronicles the clandestine battle that occurred between the brilliant scientists and codebreakers of the Allies and the Axis powers. Re-creating the covert missions, hoaxes, spying, conspiracies, and electronic sleuthing, Breuer deftly uncovers the spectacular feats of the fascinating men and women who determined the outcome of the war-providing an unprecedented look at the least-known operations and plots conducted by both sides.

Broken down by weapon types, the book includes reference tables, diagrams, colorful maps, charts and photographs, presenting all the core data in easy-to-follow formats.

“A riveting tale told through personal accounts and sketches along the way—ultimately, a story of success against great odds. I enjoyed it enormously.” —Tom Brokaw The first book to tell the full story of how a traveling road show of artists wielding imagination, paint, and bravado saved thousands of American lives—now updated with new material. In the summer of 1944, a handpicked group of young GIs—artists, designers, architects, and sound engineers, including such future luminaries as Bill Blass, Ellsworth Kelly, Arthur Singer, Victor Dowd, Art Kane, and Jack Masey—landed in France to conduct a secret mission. From Normandy to the Rhine, the 1,100 men of the 23rd Headquarters Special Troops, known as the Ghost Army, conjured up phony convoys, phantom divisions, and make-believe headquarters to fool the enemy about the strength and location of American units. Every move they made was top secret, and their story was hushed up for decades after the war's end. Hundreds of color and black-and-white photographs, along with maps, official memos, and letters, accompany Rick Beyer and Elizabeth Sayles’s meticulous research and interviews with many of the soldiers, weaving a compelling narrative of how an unlikely team carried out amazing battlefield deceptions that saved thousands of American lives and helped open the way for the final drive to Germany. The stunning art created between missions also offers a glimpse of life behind the lines during World War II. This updated edition includes: A new afterword by co-author Rick Beyer Never-before-seen additional images The successful campaign to have the unit awarded a Congressional Gold Medal History and WWII enthusiasts will find The Ghost Army of World War II an essential addition to their library.

In his Foreword, Professor Jones writes 'Mr Collier takes the opportunity to review the contributions of all forms of Intelligence, and the use and misuse that was made of them, in all the major phases of World War II. His task has required very wide reading of the great volume of original documents and derivative literature now available, and I admire the judgement that is evident throughout the book. Within the limits of treating the widest aspects of Intelligence in World War II in a small compass, Mr Collier has told the whole truth, fortunately without it turning out to be very unfavorable; and in the lessons to be drawn from it we indeed have one element of security if properly applied'.Basil Collier throws fresh light on the low priority given to Intelligence between the wars; the tendency of ministers and senior officials to rely less on intelligence reports than their own individual hunches; the failure to foresee the invasion of Norway; why, even with the aid of Enigma it was impossible to turn the scales in Crete, and why the Americans, though privy to some of Japans most closely guarded secrets, allowed the Pearl Harbor attack to take them by surprise.

The gripping story of a chemical weapons catastrophe, the cover-up, and how one American Army doctor’s discovery led to the development of the first drug to combat cancer, known today as chemotherapy. On the night of December 2, 1943, the Luftwaffe bombed a critical Allied port in Bari, Italy, sinking seventeen ships and killing over a thousand servicemen and hundreds of civilians. Caught in the surprise air raid was the John Harvey, an American Liberty ship carrying a top-secret cargo of 2,000 mustard bombs to be used in retaliation if the Germans resorted to gas warfare. When one young sailor after another began suddenly dying of mysterious symptoms, Lieutenant Colonel Stewart Alexander, a doctor and chemical weapons expert, was dispatched to investigate. He quickly diagnosed mustard gas exposure, but was overruled by British officials determined to cover up the presence of poison gas in the devastating naval disaster, which the press dubbed "little Pearl Harbor." Prime Minister Winston Churchill and General Dwight D. Eisenhower acted in concert to suppress the truth, insisting the censorship was necessitated by military security. Alexander defied British port officials and heroically persevered in his investigation. His final report on the Bari casualties was immediately classified, but not before his breakthrough observations about the toxic effects of mustard on white blood cells caught the attention of Colonel Cornelius P. Rhoads—a pioneering physician and research scientist as brilliant as he was arrogant and self-destructive—who recognized that the poison was both a killer and a cure, and ushered in a new era of cancer research led by the Sloan Kettering Institute. Meanwhile, the Bari incident remained cloaked in military secrecy, resulting in lost records, misinformation, and considerable confusion about how a deadly chemical weapon came to be tamed for medical use. Deeply researched and beautifully written, The Great Secret is the remarkable story of how horrific tragedy gave birth to medical triumph.

“Inside information on a wondrously droll, highly classified yarn from WWII . . . A well-told, stranger-than-fiction tale that could make a terrific movie.” —Kirkus Reviews The plan: attach small incendiary bombs to millions of bats and release them over Japan’s major cities. As the bats went to roost, a million fires would flare up in remote crannies of the wood and paper buildings common throughout Japan. When their cities were reduced to ashes, the Japanese would surely capitulate . . . Told here by the youngest member of the team, this is the story of the bat bomb project, or Project X-Ray, as it was officially known. In scenes worthy of a Capra or Hawks comedy, Jack Couffer recounts the unorthodox experiments carried out in the secrecy of Bandera, Texas, Carlsbad, New Mexico, and El Centro, California, in 1942-1943 by “Doc” Adams’ private army. This oddball cast of characters included an eccentric inventor, a distinguished Harvard scientist, a biologist with a chip on his shoulder, a movie star, a Texas guano collector, a crusty Marine Corps colonel, a Maine lobster fisherman, an ex-mobster, and a tiger. The bat bomb researchers risked life and limb to explore uncharted bat caves and “recruit” thousands of bats to serve their country, certain that they could end the war with Japan. And they might have—in their first airborne test, the bat bombers burned an entire brand-new military airfield to the ground. For everyone who relishes true tales of action and adventure, Bat Bomb is a must-read. Bat enthusiasts will also discover the beginnings of the scientific study of bats.

Get the hidden stories of World War II, from classified weapons programs and top-secret technology to covert operations and clandestine missions from both the Allied and Axis sides. World War II in Secret profiles the many undisclosed and secretive stories of World War II, complete with copious illustrations and photographs drawn from the archives of all the major Allied and Axis powers. Espionage, radio, radar, and codes technology, resistance movements and saboteurs, weapons programs, camouflage and suberterfuge, and covert operations are all explored and uncovered to their smallest detail. Many techniques and technologies were either created or perfected during World War II. Many, such as the German use of blitzkrieg, radar, a human torpedo, the Enigma code, Barnes Wallis' bouncing bombs, soldiers on steroids, armies on amphetamines, America's Nisei, Project Z, Operation Bagration, the Double Cross, ghost armies, V weapons, the Wunderwaffen, and the Manhattan Project changed the course of world history forever. Award-winning military history author Gavin Mortimer explains them all, along with a few that didn't work at all, such as the Great Panjandrum and the Giant Dart. Explore the mysteries and secrets of World War II from both sides!

"This was a secret war, whose battles were lost or won unknown to the public ... No such warfare had ever been waged by mortal men."SIR WINSTON CHURCHILLThe Second World War, Vol. II