General Tomoyuki Yamashita is remembered as one of Japan’s most prominent military leaders of World War II. He became famous for leading the Japanese invasion of Malaya and the capture of Singapore in February 1942, an unexpected victory that shocked the British Empire. Newspapers around the world called him the "Tiger of Malaya." Just four … Read more
In the summer of 1909, a 33-year-old educator from Louisville stepped off a train in a small American town carrying little more than a notebook and a letter of introduction from the Carnegie Foundation. He was not a doctor and had never set foot in an operating room. His name was Abraham Flexner, and over … Read more
On the evening of December 11, 1936, a man sat before a microphone at Windsor Castle and told the world he was leaving. His voice was calm, his diction precise. He said he had found it impossible to carry the heavy burden of responsibility without the help and support of the woman he loved. The … Read more
On the night of May 11, 1969, a six-man American reconnaissance team northeast of Quan Loi base camp found itself surrounded by roughly 30 enemy soldiers closing in from every direction. Rain had driven off the gunships meant to support them, the radio was fading, and reinforcements were not coming. Team leader Sergeant Orman Crabtree … Read more
On December 7, 1941, a battleship still carried on Japanese naval books as “Battleship No. 1” fired nine shells from her 18-inch guns across 32. 5 kilometers. That ship, later named Yamato, was built to a width of 127 feet—so broad she could not fit through the Panama Canal, which had locks only 110 feet … Read more
In 1846, as the Mexican-American War loomed, a 16-year-old Samuel Chamberlain arrived in San Antonio, Texas, after a turbulent journey that began with his expulsion from a Christian school in Boston for repeated fights, some involving his teachers. His route took him through Illinois, St. Louis, and New Orleans before he landed at Port Lavaca, … Read more
A routine training flight ended in catastrophe in January 1973, when Alexander Onassis, the 24-year-old sole heir to one of the world’s largest shipping fortunes, was killed in a plane crash just seconds after takeoff from Athens’ Hellenikon Airport. The aircraft’s right wing dropped immediately after leaving the runway, and the plane hit the ground … Read more
On June 22, 1941, German forces crossed the Soviet border, launching Operation Barbarossa. Behind the front lines came the Einsatzgruppen, mobile killing units tasked with annihilating entire populations in Eastern Europe. Among the first territories occupied by the Nazis was Latvia, one of the three Baltic states brutally annexed by Stalin in the summer of … Read more
She was everywhere in the portraits, and the portraits all agreed on her. The enormous hats that looked architectural rather than decorative. Brooches arranged on her chest like the accumulated weight of dynasty itself. The rigid posture, jaw set at precisely the angle of a woman who has never once doubted her right to occupy … Read more
The opening scenes of *Saving Private Ryan* gave millions a visceral sense of what the Normandy landings looked like. The ramp drops, the ocean erupts with machine-gun fire, and soldiers fall before they can even reach the sand. But amid that chaos, a specific group of men moved against the tide of fire. While infantry … Read more