Machinery & Gear | War History

Two Jet Fighters Sent Up to Shoot Down a WWII Warbird in 1956 – They Blasted 208 Rockets at it, it Survived

In August 1956, a drone went rogue over Southern California, threatening cities, including Los Angeles. In its aftermath, over 1,000 acres were destroyed, forests and…

The Dawn of the Submarine: U-21 sinks HMS Pathfinder

In 1914 submarines were still a novel idea. Many nations had not utilized them until 1900, Germany not until 1906. Soon their worth would be…

The Schneider CA1 Was The First Operational Tank Ever – A First In Military History

The beginning of armored weaponry dates back to the days of the First World War when a stalemate occurred on the Western Front due to…

Unique Guns of Battlefield 1 – The History behind the Game

While WWI did not consist of soldiers running about with 900 round-per-minute submachine guns, the guns of the video game Battlefield 1 did exist in…

Myths Of The Montana Class Battleships

War History Online presents this Guest Article by Chris Knupp. Artist’s impression of the Montana class Battleship Myth #1: The Montana class Ignored the Panama Canal…

The Oslo Report: How a German Scientist Gave Away Nazi Military Secrets and Why Britain Almost Ignored Him

Early in the Second World War, the British received a dossier of Nazi military secrets. The extraordinary contents had been sent at great personal risk…

Saddam’s Secret Super Gun – Project Babylon

Project Babylon was an Iraqi code name for the construction of a supergun, commissioned by Sadam Hussein in 1988. The engineer in charge of the…

Kaiten: The Japanese Suicide Submarines in WWII

During the last months of World War II, as the Japanese were becoming desperate, they turned to a new kind of weapon. While it incorporated…

U-Boat 96, and the film Das Boot

In 1981, a film was released which is still cited as one of Germany’s greatest cinematic triumphs. It followed the exploits of U-96, a German…

How the British Military Learned in Advance About the V2 Rocket – and How They Responded

The V2 rocket and its predecessor V1 had the potential to transform the Second World War. The world’s first long-range unmanned missiles, they were a…

The RAF and the Luftwaffe: Different Ways They Approached WWII

One of the most crucial conflicts of the Second World War was between the air forces of Britain and Germany. The Royal Air Force (RAF)…

British Naval Intelligence: Well Equipped for WW2 But Often Lacking Material

At the outbreak of the Second World War, much of the British military were not equipped for dealing with military intelligence. The exception was the…