“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.

Describes the top secret missions and projects of both sides during World War II and discusses the impact of these projects on the outcome of the war and their effect on the course of history.

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!

Phelps reveals how the Tizard Mission was the turning point in the technological war, giving Great Britain the weapons it desperately needed to defend itself during and laying the groundwork for much of the United States's postwar economic boom.

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.

The award-winning New York Times bestseller about the American women who secretly served as codebreakers during World War II--a "prodigiously researched and engrossing" (New York Times) book that "shines a light on a hidden chapter of American history" (Denver Post). Recruited by the U.S. Army and Navy from small towns and elite colleges, more than ten thousand women served as codebreakers during World War II. While their brothers and boyfriends took up arms, these women moved to Washington and learned the meticulous work of code-breaking. Their efforts shortened the war, saved countless lives, and gave them access to careers previously denied to them. A strict vow of secrecy nearly erased their efforts from history; now, through dazzling research and interviews with surviving code girls, bestselling author Liza Mundy brings to life this riveting and vital story of American courage, service, and scientific accomplishment.

Top-Secret Project Zebra was/is the only time in history that Soviet airmen were trained in America by Americans. Their mission: to fly a state-of-the-art amphibious warplane produced in Philadelphia. Incredibly, 185 of these huge, heavily-armed PBN-Nomad, painted with bright Red Army stars, were then ferried to the sleepy, patriotic town of Elizabeth City, North Carolina, without a single media leak. There, 11 hand-picked Naval officers befriended and trained 300+ Soviet airmen over a period of 18 months before the planes were dispatched to the Atlantic and Pacific theaters where they destroyed numerous Nazi U-Boats and Japanese submarines without losing a single plane. Project Zebra was more than a military mission. It became a historic human event. The Soviet and American teams shared experiences that created bonds of trust and mutual respect, despite their language barriers and cultural differences -- something that might serve us well to model during these uncertain Russian-American moments. Project Zebra was declassified on December 31, 2012, and remains one of WWII's last never-been-told stories. Until now!

This new addition to the highly successful 'Secret Projects' series adds a new dimension to the weird, wonderful and wacky ideas that were developed to conquer space

Featuring the obscure, the unusual, the unbuilt and the unseen. The secret is out - Secret Projects is back. This is a new title in this highly acclaimed series, this time looking at concepts developed by the US aircraft industry in the years immediately prior to and during World War 2. This book includes and describes the major fighter and bomber proposals form the American aircraft industry which embrace various fighter and interceptor concepts, medium, heavy and intercontinental bombers, attack aircraft and anti-submarine aircraft, both for the USAF and US Navy. Particular emphasis is placed on 'Circular Proposals' - a system of submitting designs against requirements circulated around the industry by the Army Air Force in the 1930s and early 1940s. The illustrations show drawings and photographs of unbuilt designs merged with the history and photographs of real aeroplanes. Very little has been published previously about American projects from this time period and much of the material will not have been seen widely before. it will therefore be fascinating reading for all lovers of the previously highly successful 'Secret Projects' series and aviation historians.