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Comprehensive Military History Podcast

The great military achievements of history and the colorful people that made it happen are given critical analysis in the History Network Podcast. Here qualified narrators examine the ancient battles, strategic innovations, brilliant commanders and major blunders that have set the course of history. Whether it be about the Battle of Thermopylae or the life of General Patton, this is one podcast the military buff should not miss.

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1210 Irish Volunteers in the Second World War

Author: TheHistoryNetwork.org
Mon, May 07, 2012

John Kelly, who had left rural County Kilkenny in 1935 to join the British army, found himself sitting in a bar in newly-liberated Tunis is 1943, having a drink with some American conscript soldiers. Upon hearing his accent, the Americans said "Say, you guys are neutral, you're not in the war at all!" John explained he was a pre-war volunteer, causing the Americans to exclaim "Are you god damn mad or something?" It was a fair question. Why did John, and tens of thousands of other Irish men and women, voluntarily leave the safety of neutral Ireland and risk death or injury to fight in the Second World War? Dur: 31mins File: .mp3

The Lancaster Bomber was one of the finest heavy bombers in the service of any nation during the second world war. It was the plane which the dambusters flew with the bouncing bomb, the plane which bombed the Tirpitz and the plane which night after night pounded Germany, delivering two-thirds of all the bombs dropped. Dur: 24 mins File: .mp3

Vimy ridge is an escarpment in France close to the Belgium border, gently rising on one side and somewhat steeper on the reverse, it has clear views for miles around from its crest. During the first months of the first world war it was seized by the Germans, who for nearly three years, tenaciously held on it to it against French assaults. At the end of 1916 the Canadians took responsibility for that part of the front line... Dur: 22mins File: .mp3

VTOL stands for Vertical Take off and Landing. While helicopters clearly fit a description of vertical take off and landing, the terms VTOL V/STOL STOVL and the like are reserved for aircraft who also fly conventionally using forward thrust to create the necessary lift to remain airbourne. Dur: 33mins File: .mp3

In 1208, Pope Innocent III called forth a crusade to destroy enemies of the Catholic Church. This crusade was not to fight Muslim armies in the Middle East or Spain, but rather to fight fellow Christians in southern France. Soldiers from northern France, under the leadership of the French crown, marched south to destroy the Cathar heresy infesting the land. Dur: 39mins File: .mp3

World War II began in the early hours of the 1st September 1939 when the elderly German battleship Schleswig-Holstein opened fire on the Polish garrison at Westerplatte. Over 2000 German aircraft, mainly dive-bombers attacked, targeting Polish airfields with the aim of destroying the Polish air force on the ground, but the Poles had scattered their aircraft to satellite airfields. 60 divisions of German infantry, supported by Slovakian collaborators, almost three thousand panzers and artillery pieces flooded across the border. Dur 35mins File: .mp3

Lieutenant General Sir Henry George Wakelyn Smith, 1st Baronet of Aliwal was one of the most incredible soldiers of the British Empire making his name during the Napoleonic Peninsular Campaign, where he would rescue his future Spanish born wife, before volunteering to service in America where he witnessed the burning of Washington. Dur: 32mins File: .mp3

In the summer of 1779, American Major General John Sullivan marched his 5,000 Continentals into the Finger Lakes region of western New York. Known as Sullivan's Expedition, it was the longest military campaign of the American Revolutionary War. Ordered by General George Washington, this campaign was a direct invasion into the once impenetrable Iroquois Confederacy lands in retaliation for several brutal massacres by British Rangers and their Indian allies. Dur: 43mins File: .mp3

On May 7th 1954 the French garrison at Dien Bien Phu surrendered to Ho Chi Minh's Communist forces. For the last 54 days it had been cut off and the surrender was the culmination of an operation that had seen the French troops almost constantly under-fire for 209 days. Comprehensibly beaten it signaled the end of French Indochina. Dur 22mins File: .mp3

The Late Roman Empire and its successor state, the Byzantine Empire, relied heavily on mercenary units to make up the bulk of their armies, as well as personal bodyguards to the emperors. The Varangian Guard was one such elite unit, forever immortalised in history for their famed "berserk-rage" and unwavering loyalty to the throne. Dur: 37mins File: .mp3

During the American Civil War, the common term used was "sharpshooter", which pays tribute to the Sharps Rifles that were used at the time by civil war snipers. The Sharps rifle was renowned for its long range and accuracy, and they were issued only to the best shots. Dur: 22mins File: .mp3

Now in control of much of the Middle East, the British occupied the land with little thought of the future. The Secretary of State for India had asked her opinion on which way the political winds were blowing among the various constituencies: the educated Sunnis in town, the Shiite majority in the provinces, the large Jewish community in Baghdad, the Christians in Mosul. The British did not know how they would govern the territory and requested the advice of their experts. Dur: 34mins File: .mp3

In 1918, after years of devastating warfare, the Ottoman Empire finally collapsed and the British, expanding into the Middle East, attempted to control the area. However, the area proved to be too vast and troublesome for the British Empire. Dur: 22mins File: .mp3

The wounding of Joseph Johnston at the battle of Seven Pines in 1862 gave General Lee his first major field command with the Army of North Virginia. The coming year would catapult him to the most prominent soldier in the confederacy and prove his doubters of the previous year wrong...those who had criticism him for his lack of aggression. Dur:34mins File:.mp3

Robert E Lee commanded the Confederate forces to their defeat during the American civil war and in doing so he created a myth around himself. He was a statesmen, a gentleman, a great commander, keeping overwhelming northern forces at bay for 3 years - an American Hannibal (as it were) fighting a lost cause. In defeat he has become an iconic American hero mentioned in the same breath as George Washington. Dur: 18mins File: .mp3

The Anglo-Irish conflict of 1919-21 is a deeply complicated and contradictory issue in Irish history. This is reflected in the fact that there is no agreed title for it: it is variously referred to as the Anglo-Irish War, the Sinn Fein War, the War of Independence, the Tan War or, more simply, the Troubles. Dur: 28mins File: .mp3

On the 31st of January 1713, Turkish artillery opened fire on a small Swedish camp located in the town of Bender, the westernmost town of the Ottoman Empire, located in present-day Moldavia. These were the opening shots of what would soon develop into a prolonged engagement known as the Kalabalik. Dur:32mins  File:.mp3

The names of the Roman emperors Tiberius, Caligula and Claudius are well known, and so too are their stories. Hardly known at all is the story of Tiberius' brother and Claudius' father, the man known to historians as Drusus the Elder, who was considered in his own lifetime as an all-Roman hero, a potential successor to Augustus and the person who might restore the Republic. Dur: 28mins File: .mp3

For three years Great Britain and the United States fought a war ultimately the outcome of which would in essence be to neither's advantage. To Britain, mired in war with Napoleonic France, it was little more than a side show, in America it would see their capital Washington captured, burned and initially her armies humiliated before honour could be restored. Dur: 23mins File: .mp3

One of the most famous encrypted messages to be intercepted was The Zimmerman Telegram in 1917. The Telegram was part of a German effort to distract the U.S. and divert American aid going to the Triple Entente, being the United Kingdom, France and the Russian Empire. Germany had long sought to incite a war between Mexico and the U.S., which would have tied down American forces and slowed the export of American arms. Dur: 31mins File: .mp3

In 1940 18 year old trainee navigator, Frank Stone, was shot down on his second bombing mission.

He eventually ended up in Sagan StalagLuft III - the camp made renowned in the classic war movie "The Great Escape". One of the infamous three tunnels, Tom, Dick and Harry, was dug from the hut in which Frank was billeted.

For the past thirty years Frank has been sharing his experiences of the camp, explaining how they planned and achieved everything and telling of his own part in the greatest escape story of the Second World War.

This is the first of four excerpts from a full 87 minute DVD which is available direct from Frank.

For more information on the full DVD please see our website. All proceeds to the Bomber Command Memorial Fund.

While many have a nostalgic love affair with the Spitfire, and rightly so, and many view it as synonymous with the Battle of Brittain - and it was - it was in fact the Hawker Hurricane, first emerging from Sir Sydney Camm's drawing board in 1934, which accounted for over half of the German Aircraft shot down by the RAF during the Battle of Britain. Dur: 17mins File: .mp3

Fancisco "pancho" Villa's journey though his 45 years of life certainly wasn't ordinary! Born a humble peasant, he became an outlaw, a revolutionary, the Americans invaded Mexico in pursuit of him, before eventually retiring on a Generals salary from the government he tried to bring down. He has become a "Robin Hood" type hero, brutal and violent he forced the wealthy into funding him, he even had his own money printed in competition with the Mexican Peso. His luck did of course run out when he was gunned down by a gang in the street. Dur: 19mins File: .mp3

The day after Napoleon proclaimed France an Empire and volunteered himself as Emperor, in 1804, he elevated 18 men to the status of Marshal's of the Empire. All were from the military but from extremely eclectic backgrounds...some former Royalist military officers and soldiers, others had risen rapidly through the ranks during the years of revolutionary fervour. By the time of his eventual fall from power, after Waterloo, 26 would have held the Marshal's baton, three would die in battle, others had betrayed their Emperor and Country, some would mutiny leading to Napoleon's downfall and yet others would serve their country loyally beyond Napoleon's tenure... Dur: 16mins File: .mp3

The idea for submarines had been around throughout the 19th century but it was only during the First World War that they were a viable weapon. These early craft were used basically as under water attack boats, it wasn't until Allied Command in 1918 had a problem of attacking Austrian ships in port did two Italian officers trained in underwater demolition come forward with the idea of a small underwater chariot to carry them into the harbour. This niche craft would be built by all major nations to attack harbours and inlets, it would be a midget submarine that suffered the first Japanese casualties of world war two hit by the first shots fired by an American of world war two, at Pearl Harbour. Dur: 17mins  File: .mp3

Audie Murphy came from humble begins to find fame during the second world war. After a number of heroic actions and feats of dering-do he finished the war as Americas most highly decorated combat soldier. One of his 33 medals was the Medal of Honour... Dur: 16mins File: .mp3

The Graf Spee at the outset of the second world war was one of the most modern and feared ships of the German fleet. A Deutschland class cruiser, what the British referred to as a “pocket battleship”, she was considerably smaller than a true battleship, her armor and guns far inferior to those of battleships and battle cruisers, however, she could outgun any contemporary cruiser. In the first major naval engagement of the war she had been raiding in the South Atlantic when on her way home she spotted a British Cruiser Squadron and attacked. Dur: 17mins File: .mp3

Two new troops of Artillery were formed in 1813 and were armed with the new rockets, which General Congreve had been developing, testing, and advocating for some years previously. Dur: 19mins  File: .mp3

After the stunning German victory at Tanga the war seemed to peter out as quickly as it had flared up in East Africa. The British General Aitken was relieved of command following the disaster but his successor, General Wapshare fared little better. Denied reinforcements by the War Cabinet in London he launched a small scale offensive into German territory capturing a German plantation at Jassini. Dur: 31mins  File: .mp3

The lasting image of the First World War is that of trench warfare. However, far away from the trenches of the Western Front an extraordinary struggle was fought in a remote corner of Africa. When Germany went to war in August 1914 it possessed but few colonial possessions mainly situated in Africa. Dur: 23mins File: .mp3

In 1857 the Indian troops of the British East India Company mutinied at the town of Meerut, this would be the spark that triggered rebellion throughout British controlled central and northern India. Within days Sir Henry Lawrence, 1700 troops and some 1200 civilians were under siege at Lucknow defending the British Commissioner's residency. Dur: 23mins File: .mp3

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