Showing titles in Naval Forces

No radio distress call ever crackled from the submarine USS Grunion. In 1942, under the fog of World War II, the vessel simply vanished without a trace. For nearly sixty-five years, only a dead silence lingered regarding the fate of the sub and its seventy-man crew—until now. Here author Peter F. Stevens reveals the incredible true story of the search for and discovery of the Grunion—as well as the navy’s shocking and willful cover-up of the submarine’s baffling disappearance.

On the morning of October 24, 1944, in the Sibuyan Sea amidst the Philippine Islands, VT-18, a close-knit squadron of six young American torpedo bomber pilots, departed the aircraft carrier USS Intrepid on a search and destroy mission. Their target: the super-battleship Musashi, the pride of the Imperial Japanese Navy. The pilots were tasked with preventing the immense enemy warship and the huge naval armada of which she was a part from inflicting unspeakable damage.

A daring captain. A ship full of weapons. And a sinister plot that could cripple Britain. In the heart of world war one, a devious plan devised by the German navy led to Naval Officer Captain Karl Spindler embarking on a perilous and secret mission. His task - to deliver German weaponry to Ireland and spark what would become the Easter Uprising. Departing from Norway with a disguised ship, Spindler undertook a perilous mission with a small crew and a hold full of explosives.

Forty years ago, in May 1968, the submarine USS Scorpion sank in mysterious circumstances with a loss of 99 lives. The tragedy occurred during the height of the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union.

Xi Jinping has made his ambitions for the People's Liberation Army (PLA) perfectly clear, first, that China should become a "great maritime power" and secondly, that the PLA "become a world-class armed force by 2050." China as a Twenty-First-Century Naval Power focuses on China's navy and how it is being transformed to satisfy the "world class" goal.

Admiral Hyman George Rickover (1899-1986) remains an almost mythical figure in the United States Navy. A brilliant engineer with a ferocious will and combative personality, he oversaw the invention of the world’s first practical nuclear power reactor. In this exciting biography, historian Marc Wortman explores the constant conflict Rickover faced and provoked, tracing how he revolutionized the navy and Cold War strategy.

For three millennia, the Mediterranean Sea served as the center of western civilization and the scene of many colossal wars and naval battles. In the early summer of 1940, this ancient body of water again played host to a new and extensive conflict as the Kingdom of Italy challenged Britain for dominance within the region. With France on the verge of collapse and Britain facing the prospect of imminent invasion, the Italians hoped to re-establish control over the Mediterranean.

Zero Point Four is a groundbreaking book written by six world-leading maritime, ocean, and security experts, and spearheaded by retired U.S. Coast Guard Rear Admiral James Watson. This audiobook explores how the U.S. - a maritime nation - finds itself on a dangerous precipice today. After World War II over half the world’s ocean-going commercial ships flew the U.S. flag. Today, it is less than 0.4%. This meticulously researched work scrutinizes the U.S. maritime industry’s significance to America through five ‘Principles’: National, Economic, Energy and Food, Climate, and Workforce Security.

On July 4, 1861, the schooner S. J. Waring set sail from New York on a routine voyage to South America. Seventeen days later it limped back into New York's harbor with the ship's black cook and steward at the helm. While the story of that ill-fated voyage is one of the most harrowing tales of captivity and survival on the high seas, it has been tragically lost to history. Now reclaiming William Tillman as the American hero he deserves to be, historian Brian McGinty takes listeners on a courageous journey.

His Majesty's Submarine Unbeaten was last heard from via a signal sent to Flag Officer Submarines on November 1, 1942. The signal simply stated: "Operation Bluestone completed". After this date the 58-meter British U-Class submarine inexplicably disappeared. Unbeaten was fully operational for just over two years. During its short tenure, Unbeaten successfully returned to war-torn Malta many times, symbolically flying its Jolly Roger.

If you like Max Hastings and World War II naval history, then you will love this autobiography, which gives an easy-to-understand insider view of life in the Royal Navy during the war. Ronnie Turner had set his sights on a career with the Royal Navy, and like Ant Middleton, he wouldn't stop until he'd achieved his goal of having "a smack at the boche". Drawn from Ronnie's illegal war diary, this enjoyable tale of pocket battleships, torpedoed crews, and Admiral Harwood's tattoos, all sprinkled with Spike Milligan-like humor, make this a story you won't want to put down.

This gripping personal account of life as a young World War Two submariner on two famous Royal Navy submarines, Thrasher and Trenchant gives vivid detail of depth charging, gun actions and other operations including sinking the Japanese cruiser Ashigara, the largest enemy warship sunk by a British submarine during the war, sinking the German U-boat U-859 with its secret cargo, towing a midget submarine to attack the German battleship Tirpitz in the Norwegian Fjords, and taking a group of SBS soldiers to carry out a daring raid in Sumatra.

From August 7th 1942 until February 24th 1944, the US Navy fought the most difficult campaign in its history. Between the landing of the 1st Marine Division on Guadalcanal and the final withdrawal of the Imperial Japanese Navy from its main South Pacific base at Rabaul, the US Navy suffered such high personnel losses that for years it refused to publicly release total casualty figures.

The year is 1652. General George Monck has been through an awful lot since he sat as a prisoner in the Tower of London eight years before. He had led his men admirably through campaigns in Ireland and Scotland, but still storm clouds surround his future. He had been away from his beloved Anne for many months and had come to London to find whether Ratsford was alive, and still proving to be an obstacle to their proposed marriage, or dead.

America’s most decorated warship of World War II, Enterprise was constantly engaged against the Japanese Empire, earning the title “the fightingest ship” in the navy. Her career was eventful, vital, and short. Commissioned in 1938, her bombers sank a submarine just ten days after the Pearl Harbor attack, claiming the first Japanese vessel lost in the war.

They were legalized pirates empowered by the Continental Congress to raid and plunder, at their own considerable risk, as much enemy trade as they could successfully haul back to America's shores. They played a decisive role in America's struggle for independence and later turned their seafaring talents to the slave trade, revealing the conflict between enterprise and morality central to American history.

More than 800 sailors served aboard the Sterett during her hazardous and demanding duties in World War II. This is the story of those men and their beloved ship, recorded by a junior officer who served on the famous destroyer from her commissioning in 1939 to April 1943, when he was wounded at the Battle of Tulagi. Peppered with the kind of vivid, authentic details that could only be provided by a participant, the book is the saga of a gallant fighting ship that earned a Presidential Unit Citation for her part in the Third Battle of Savo Island, where she took on a battleship.

In November 1972, the Coast Guard Cutter Jarvis ran aground during a violent storm in Alaska, puncturing its hull, with a temporary patch applied to stop the flooding. The following day, enroute back to Honolulu, another, more vicious, storm struck; Jarvis now struggled with over 13 feet of water in their engine room and no power. The nearest ship that volunteered to assist was scheduled to arrive 30 minutes after the Jarvis officers estimated the ship would be destroyed on the rocky coastline. This is the true story of the heroic efforts by the crew that saved the ship.

When Thomas Jefferson became president in 1801, America faced a crisis. The new nation was deeply in debt and needed its economy to grow quickly, but its merchant ships were under attack. Pirates from North Africa's Barbary coast routinely captured American sailors and held them as slaves, demanding ransom and tribute payments far beyond what the new country could afford.

During the summer of 1940, Hitler's Germany appeared unstoppable. The Nazis were masters of mainland Europe, in alliance with Stalin's Russia, and only the English Channel prevented an immediate invasion. Britain stood alone. Operation Sealion examines just how realistic the German threat of invasion was. The author studies the plans, the available capability and resources, and the Germans' record in Norway and, later, Crete. The author weighs these against the state of Britain's defenses and the relative strengths of the land, air, and naval forces.