The World War II Multimedia Database

In March 1942, the Allies were on the retreat everywhere. Most of the targets the Japanese high command had wanted were in their hands, or soon would be. The Americans began to realize that a bold stroke was needed to raise the morale of the public and of the fighting forces.

The crushing defeats the Allies suffered since 1939 were beginning to take their toll on Allied morale. Even though the Battle of Britain had staved off German victory, little success had happened since then.

9/5/2006 David Frost will be executive producer, Peter Jackson will direct. Part of the controversy over the use of the word ”nigger” is being debated on the web. The original movie used the word as both the name of the squadron mascot and the operation. I doubt Jackson will use that word, as he faced some criticism for his treatment of blacks in both Lord of the Rings and King Kong.

Adolf Hitler had completed Anschluss with Austria and now was looking towards lands not traditionally part of “Greater Germany.” The Sudetenland, a narrow strip of mountainous land in Czechoslovakia, held a predominantly ethnic German population on the border with Germany.

Premiere: Sacremento, CA Film Festival 9/9/2005

Limited US Release 9/11/2005

In 1941, thousands of German paratroops dropped on to the island of Crete. After suffering horrendous casualties, they took the island, leading to yet another amphibious operation to evacuate Allied soldiers. Still, thousands of Greek, British and Commonwealth soldiers were captured.

On May 7, 1942, Rear Admiral Frank Fletcher stood on the bridge of his flagship, and looked at the radiogram the combat information center had just handed him. Wainwright had surrendered, the Philippines were held by the Japanese.

A common language, history, and culture bound the United States and the United Kingdom closer together than any other nation. Helping to cement that friendship was the close relationship of US President Franklin D. Roosevelt and UK Prime Minister Winston S. Churchill.

When Sun Yat Sen declared the Republic of China on October 10, 1911, China embarked on 40 years of internal struggle and civil war. Warlords quickly took over sections of the country and ruled them as individual fiefdoms. Fifteen years later, in 1926, Chiang Kai Shek took control of the Kuomintang Party (as it was known in the West,) and the Army. He began a campaign to overthrow them.

With the fall of Poland, thousands of POWs were taken by the German Army, and millions more before the war was over. The question of what to do with those POWs would lead to some of the worst atrocities of the war.