The Philippines were declared an American Territory on January 4, 1899, and fortification construction soon began on the islands in the mouth of Manila Bay. Among the sites built were Fort Mills (Corregidor), Fort Frank, and the formidable "concrete battleship" of Fort Drum. The defenses suffered constant Japanese bombardment during World War II, leading to the surrender of American forces. In 1945 the forts were manned by Japanese soldiers determined to hold out to the bitter end. This title details the fortifications of this key strategic location, and considers both their effectiveness and historical importance.

“This is state-of-the-art alternate history, nothing less.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review) When the Great War engulfed Europe in 1914, the United States and the Confederate States of America, bitter enemies for five decades, entered the fray on opposite sides: the United States aligned with the newly strong Germany, while the Confederacy joined forces with their longtime allies, Britain and France. But it soon became clear to both sides that this fight would be different—that war itself would never be the same again. For this was to be a protracted, global conflict waged with new and chillingly efficient innovations—the machine gun, the airplane, poison gas, and trench warfare. Across the Americas, the fighting raged like wildfire on multiple and far-flung fronts. As President Theodore Roosevelt rallied the diverse ethnic groups of the northern states—Irish and Italians, Mormons and Jews—Confederate President Woodrow Wilson struggled to hold together a Confederacy still beset by ignorance, prejudice, and class divisions. And as the war thundered on, southern blacks, oppressed for generations, found themselves fatefully drawn into a climactic confrontation . . .

[Includes 11 tables, 25 maps and 71 illustrations] The soldier reading these pages would do well to reflect on the wisdom of the statement exhibited in a Japanese shrine: "Woe unto him who has not tasted defeat." Victory too often leads to overconfidence and erases the memory of mistakes. Defeat brings into sharp focus the causes that led to failure and provides a fruitful field of study for those soldiers and laymen who seek in the past lessons for the future. The statesman and the unformed citizen reading these pages will realize that our military means as well as our estimates and plans must always be in balance with our long-range national policy. This lesson-signposted by the Battle of Manila Bay; the Treaty of Paris, signed in December 1898 when we decided to keep the Philippines; the Washington Conference of 1921-22; and the Manchurian Crisis of 1931-we ignored before Pearl Harbor. The result was defeat on the field of battle and the loss of the Philippine Islands.

A detailed and fascinating exploration of the 1945 US combined land, naval and air operation to retake Corregidor and the other Japanese-held islands in Manila Bay from a determined and well-entrenched enemy. The islands guarding the entrance to Manila Bay, Luzon, had been seized by the Japanese in May 1942. In February 1945, US forces were back, and closed in on Manila from the north and south against heavy Japanese resistance. A joint US parachute and amphibious assault was planned to capture the largest island Corregidor, using the much-reinforced 503rd PRCT and elements of the 24th Infantry Division and 2nd Engineer Special Brigade. Facing them were over 6,000 Japanese troops recently evacuated from Bataan, where they had been cut off by advancing US forces. General MacArthur desired the island, once a symbol of American defiance, to be liberated with a flourish. This superbly illustrated work examines the ambitious US assault on Corregidor, which witnessed the most dangerous and risky parachute drop in airborne history, and vicious, desperate fighting by the defenders as they sought to prevent American troops from taking the island. It also covers the recapture of other islands defending Manila Bay: El Fraile/Fort Drum, Caballo, and Carabao.