History Forum / War History / World War II / January 2010

Somewhere I read that Arthur T Harris, when stationed in the middle east
in the late twenties, used poison gas bombs on civilians. However, I can
find only few references for that on the internet. Can anybody confirm this?
Furthermore, I am looking for good books that cover the ...

I've recently run accross an assertion about the initial planning for
Pearl Harbor:  That the air strike was at first intended to be a
suicide mission.  The claim reads:
"[Yamamoto's] idea was that planes would leave their carriers so far

I came across the following web page
 http://whatreallyhappened.com/WRHARTICLES/pearl.html
that gives a list of evidence and chronology
supporting the theory that FDR knew of and wanted

The thread on submarine cleanliness inspires this. How did the major
combattants rate in providing nutrition for troops and sailors? I
recall reading here that one spec for K-Rations was that they have a
taste equivalent to a boiled potato to prevent troops from consuming

Do you have any information on a Karl Genz - supposedly executed k~1941?
Gad Ben-Ami
Israel

A fascinating program, IMO.  It makes a pretty strong case for having
found the fifth, or 'missing', Japanese mini-sub that was a part of
the Pearl Harbor attack.  What was shown in the video certainly looked
like one of the subs.  It showed several characteristic features,

In a discussion with someone the other day, this subject came up. We
kicked around the usual suspects- P-51 Mustang; Spitfire, ME-109, Zero.
But- I remember reading several years ago that the real answer was the
twin-engined P-61 Black Widow night-fighter; the P-61 could reportedly

WW2 submarines were extremely dirty and filthy places.
I can remember reading of German U-boats with problems of moldy food, dirt
and insufficient washing.  
Did they get used to it? How did the sailors feel about it? What did they

At the risk of stepping in it (like discussing tanks or bombers) it
seems to me that Douglas MacArthur has generated at least as much
historian controversy as perhaps Bernard Montgomery or George Patton.
I have always been puzzled by why FDR and George Marshall endured his

I was reading about Manstein's horrendous problems during and after
the Stalingrad Relief column effort, and read a casual remark about
Turkish battalions in south Russia at the time. How many Turkish
troops were in Russia?

An ex-British colleague of mine claims that an older neighbor who
served in 100 Group told him about an experiment with an airborne
radar system meant to vector Beaufighters onto Luftwaffe nightfighters
over the Continent, much in the manner of the current E-3 AWACS.

There must have been some, however few, Japanese soldiers or probably
airmen captured in the early campaigns of the war, Malaya-Singapore,
the Philippines and Indonesia that were in turn liberated by the
surrender of Allied forces.

What was their escape plan?  Were they to meet up with their mother
subs and escape?
Craig

Did any ETO troops see action in the Pacific between May-August 1945?
I know there was mobilization to move the troops to the Pacific for
the impending invasion of Japan but am not sure how far along it got.
Thx - Craig

In a recent thread the subject of German air
attacks on the USSR came up. As noted
elsewhere this is an obscure area for westerners.
One question occurred to me.