A disastrous offensive launched by the Red Army in May, 1942 around Kharkov ended in a rout that paved the way for a renewed German offensive deep into southern Russia and the Ukraine beginning on June 23, 1942. The goal was to break Soviet resistance by capturing the oilfields of the Caucasus and the River Volga at Stalingrad. The Red Army was onc…

The fate of Europe hung in the balance at Leipzig in October, 1813. His invasion of Russia had ended in failure in December 1812, and Napoleon Bonaparte was now beset by defections of allied nations who had marched with him and pursued by a Russian army entering Germany intent on revenge. Determined to maintain his dominance of continental Europe, …

The United States was caught unprepared for a surprise Japanese air attack on December 7, 1941 and suffered its worst naval defeat in history. With successive invasions and defeats in Guam and the Philippines, including the surrender of its remaining army at Corregidor, the United States was losing the war in the Pacificto Japan in June, 1942. Yet …

On August 27, 1914, a bare three weeks into the First World War, the hopes and dreams of the French to liberate their lost provinces of Alsace and Lorraine by beating the German Army were in ashes. Hard and costly defeats had been inflicted on their army by a seemingly relentless grey tide of German soldiers backed by heavy artillery, the likes of …

This pivotal battle of the four Italian Wars of Independence in the mid-19th century was, in its day, the greatest European battle fought since the end of the Napoleonic Wars in 1815. The appalling carnage that resulted from three armies desperate struggle in suffocating summer heat in northern Italy shocked the civilized world. Swiss businessman H…

The Battle of Koniggratz, fought on July 3, 1866, was the largest military battle on the continent of Europe between the end of the Napoleonic Wars in 1815 and the Battle of the Somme during the First World War in 1914. Another improbable battle in this series, it seemed at the outset of the war that Prussia would be slowly crushed by the vast reso…

In 1781, the American Revolutionary War had been going on for over six years with more defeats for George Washington and the cause of American independence than victories. The British army under the command of Sir Henry Clinton, based in New York, together with a large fleet commanded by Admiral Thomas Graves, appeared impregnable and invincible. T…

In October 1805, Britain had been almost continuously at war with Napoleonic France and under the constant menace of invasion across the narrow English Channel at Boulogne. There stood nearly a quarter million men under the personal command of Napoleon himself. The Armee d'Angleterre was the finest army on the continent of Europe and stood ready to…

After a dizzying rise to power, the 35 year old Napoleon Bonaparte faced his downfall in the summer of 1805 when first Russia and then Austria allied themselves with Britain to destroy the French Empire. A fourth great power, the kingdom of Prussia, waited in the wings for Napoleon to falter and would then join the alliance too. Deciding not to wai…

The State of Israel faced mortal danger in June, 1967. Surrounded on three sides by hostile Arab states, armed to the teeth with the latest Soviet equipment, on paper, the odds of Israel's survival did not look good. Yet in six days that stunned the world, Israel not only survived, but routed three armies and tripled the size of its territory at th…

As Winston Churchill watched the French army march past on Bastille Day, 1939, amid the tensions of Europe, he exclaimed "Thank God for the French army ..." and with good reason. France had the best equipped and largest army on the continent. Further bolstered by the virtually impregnable Maginot Line on its eastern border with Germany, a fleet sec…

The Great Northern War pitted the Swedish Empire at the peak of its power against its southern and eastern neighbors, Denmark, Poland-Lithuania, Saxony and seemingly weak and backward Russia in a war that raged from 1700-1721. The Swedish army was the terror of Europe and was led by Sweden's young king, Charles XII, who had ascended the throne at t…

The greatest military battle ever fought on the North American continent, Gettysburg has often been considered the turning point of the American Civil War. Flushed with success from its smashing rout of the Union forces at Chancellorsville in May 1863, the Confederate government agreed to the audacious plan of their commander, Robert E. Lee, to inv…

The most famous battle of all time, Waterloo reached iconic status within days as news of the defeat of the greatest military leader in Europe spread throughout Europe, just as the return of Napoleon from exile in Elba had done 100 days earlier. In a desperate bid to quickly defeat the Duke of Wellington and his Prussian ally, Field Marshal Gebhard…

The Battle of Moscow is in some respects the most colossal and deadly campaign in all human history. Millions of soldiers and civilians fought a desperate and savage battle under the most dire climatic conditions and bleak terrain. At stake was the extinction of the Soviet state and the fulfillment of the Nazi dictator's fantasy of conquest. In Oct…

This is the introductory episode to the series and describes the Battle of Tannenberg that occurred in the opening months of the First World War. With most of its army concentrated in France and Belgium, the German master plan for fighting a two front war called for only a small field army to delay and contain an anticipated Russian invasion of Pru…