email from library said:
. ). I'm not a fan of Stephen Ambrose as I find him too sycophantic and Nationalistic.....but the subject matter is just so enthralling. A single company from the 101st Airborne fighting from D-Day, through the Battle of Normandy, Market-Garden, The defense of Bastogne during the Battle of The Bulge through to capturing the Eagles Nest at Berchesgarden right at the end of the war.
Felix, did you manage to get hold of Armageddon then? It's a great book. I wouldn't put Hastings up there with Antony Beevor as a WW2 historian but he's still pretty good. I know lots don't like him cos of his Tory allegiances and the shite he writes for the Daily Mail but when it comes to the Second World war he knows his onions
I think I mentioned to you once before that I always struggled to get into the Pacific Campaign in the way that I love reading about the battles in Europe but I recently re-read an old one from my bookshelf called "The Pacific" by Hugh Ambrose (Stephen Ambrose's son). There was an HBO mini-series made out of the book...kind of "Band of Brothers" style....Now there's a book I'm sure you've read....Band of Brothers...I must have read that about 10 times (it is only short
I don't think there was any light infantry company (among the Western Allies) in the whole of WW2 that fought quite as well as those chaps.
It's still sitting at the library, which fucking closed for 10 days over the festive period.
I haven't read any Ambrose (that I remember) but I'm extremely familiar with the Band of Brothers miniseries. I have the box set on DVD and I've watched it a few times. Fantastic stuff. And I know how you feel about the Pacific side of things, it's never really grabbed me that much compared to the European theatre. It's bad enough the players of Easy Company seeming to win the war on their own without any Allied help, and that's even worse in "The Pacific" series (which is an excellent watch too, regardless.)
I must urge you again to go and watch the German 3-part mini-series "Generation War", a.k.a. "Unsere Mütter, unsere Väter". Absolutely brilliant. If you can't find it online, I could burn it on a DVD and send it to you.
On a slightly different subject, are you interested in the Cold War too, specifically about the civil contingency planning aspect of it in the UK? Secret bunkers, ROC posts, radar stations, troop build ups, training for local government, Regional Seats of Government, the American military presence in the UK, locations of nuclear weapons, etc. etc.??
This book is one of my prized possessions:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/War-Plan-UK-Defence-Britain/dp/0091506719
It was deleted many years ago, and after a long wait I managed to pick up a falling-to-bits copy from ebay for about £27 or something silly. If your library has a copy, see if you can acquire it.
) I received an amazing book one xmas (which I seem to have now lost), all about the cold war. I contained A whole load of original (well copies of originals) booklets and the like that were issued to families detailing instructions in the event of a Soviet first strike with thermonuclear weapons (or the H-Bomb as it was known back then) along with what were at the time classified orders detailing a response. It was fascinating stuff, I can't believe I've lost it . 
![:\](https://bluelight.org/xf/BL_Images/Orig_Emoji/wrygrin.gif "wry grin :\")
i tend to work from the assumption that everyone has ultimately got everything in common (or to metaphorically abbreviate we all share the same 'soul' at a quantum level) - this pan-hippy philosophy (empirically proven to myself by myself) informs all my politics. But it takes a bit of effort to stop my self-righteousness on politics overshadowing it.)On a slightly different subject, are you interested in the Cold War too, specifically about the civil contingency planning aspect of it in the UK? Secret bunkers, ROC posts, radar stations, troop build ups, training for local government, Regional Seats of Government, the American military presence in the UK, locations of nuclear weapons, etc. etc.??
This book is one of my prized possessions:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/War-Plan-UK-Defence-Britain/dp/0091506719
It was deleted many years ago, and after a long wait I managed to pick up a falling-to-bits copy from ebay for about £27 or something silly. If your library has a copy, see if you can acquire it.
