Innovating Victory: Naval Technology in Three Wars, studies how the world's navies incorporated new technologies into their ships, their practices, and their doctrine. It does this by examining six core technologies fundamental to twentieth-century naval warfare including new platforms (submarines and aircraft), new weapons (torpedoes and mines), and new tools (radar and radio). Each chapter considers the state of a subject technology when it was first used in war and what navies expected of it. It then looks at the way navies discovered and developed the technology's best use, in many cases overcoming disappointed expectations. It considers how a new technology threatened its opponents, not to mention its users, and how those threats were managed. Innovating Victory shows that the use of technology is more than introducing and mastering a new weapon or system. Differences in national resources, force mixtures, priorities, perceptions, and missions forced nations to approach the problems presented by new technologies in different ways. Navies that specialized in specific technologies often held advantages over enemies in some areas but found themselves disadvantaged in others. Vincent P. O'Hara and Leonard Heinz present new perspectives and explore the process of technological introduction and innovation in a way that is relevant to today's navies, which face challenges and questions even greater than those of 1904, 1914, and 1939.

Building upon the expertise of the authors and historians of the Naval Institute Press, the Naval History Special Editions are designed to offer studies of the key vessels, battles, and events of armed conflict. Using an image-heavy, magazine-style format, these Special Editions should appeal to scholars, enthusiasts, and general readers alike. The German heavy cruiser Prinz Eugen was a remarkable vessel by any standard. She was arguably one of the most handsome major warships ever constructed. The third ship of the Admiral Hipper-class and named for a French hero of the Austrian Empire, the ship represented the spirit and tradition of the old Austro-Hungarian Royal and Imperial navy. She participated in some of the most interesting naval actions of World War II in European waters including the Battle of the Denmark Strait where she helped the German battleship Bismarck sink the British battlecruiser Hood, and the Channel Dash ten months later when she sailed through the English Channel in broad daylight, successfully repelling British sea and air attacks along the way. She fought the Russians in the Baltic and was the largest German warship to survive the war. Handed over to the Americans as a war prize and given hull number IX-300, she was sunk in an atomic bomb test at Bikini Atoll in the Marshall Islands. Today, her wreck is a popular dive attraction in shallow water at Kwajalein Atoll. This book provides more than just a complete record of Prinz Eugen's career. The collection of maps and photographs reveals every aspect of her brief but intense time afloat and O'Hara reviews her design and equipment with meticulous detail. When launched, the German cruiser was one of the most technologically advanced warships afloat with the world's best electronics suite, and with sensors so advanced, the Americans had nothing similar (her hydrophones detected Hood at more than twenty miles). This is an in-depth look at the remarkable career of a remarkable ship.

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In July 1943 Benito Mussolini, Italy's warlord and the father of fascism fell from power in a hastily arranged plot, the details of which even today remain controversial. A cabal of generals took the nation's reins and bungled their way toward an accommodation with the Allies. When General Eisenhower announced an armistice with Italy on the evening of 8 September he believed he had struck a deal that included Italian military cooperation against the Germans. In fact, the generals had promised more than they could deliver and Germany's terrible, swift reprisal shattered Italy's confused air force and army. The armistice likewise caught the navy by surprise, with its battleships raising steam to attack the Allied fleet landing at Salerno. Nonetheless, the Regia Marina obeyed its government's orders and honored the pact the generals had negotiated. Rather than evaporating like Italy's other services, however, it proceeded to fight a three-week campaign against Germany, without Allied support, and in the process retained complete control of its ships, regardless of the ports necessity forced them to seek refuge in.

This is the story of the Regia Marina and the Italian armistice of September 1943. It is a deeply-researched and highly readable exploration of this confusing and fascinating corner of history. It refutes the conventional notion that Italy's fleet abjectly surrendered to Allied power. It shows how the navy paved Italy's path from enemy to co-belligerent with the blood and unconquered spirit of its men. Despite German and Allied intentions to secure Italy's fleet for their own uses, it remained Italian to the end: a dark navy - not victorious, but undefeated.

Vincent P. O'Hara and Enrico Cernuschi have collaborated for publications including "Warship, World War II Magazine, World War II Quarterly, " and the new "Seaforth Naval Review." Mr. O'Hara has written several books including "Struggle for the Middle Sea: the Great Navies at War in the Mediterranean 1939-1945" (Annapolis, 2009). Mr. Cernuschi is a regular contributor to Rivista Marittima and Storia Militare. He has published a dozen books including "Le navi da guerra italiane 1940-1945" (Parma, 2003) and "Domenico Cavagnari: Storia di un Ammiraglio" (Rome, 2001) About DARK NAVY The huge tragedy suffered by the Italian navy and nation has been reduced, until today, to a brief mention in the very few books available abroad about the Regia Marina's war between 1940 and 1945. It is thus quite important that a new essay directed toward English speaking readers is dedicated, at last, to these events, allowing them to sortie beyond the confines of Italian naval historiography--which has long debated these themes--and beyond the scanty circulation abroad of the Italian language.--Erminio Bagnasco, editor of STORIA Militare

DARK NAVY is a masterful account of the Regia Marina's role in the Armistice of September 1943. The authors are to be commended for overturning the propagandist mythology which has often marred English-language histories of this difficult period in Italian history. A riveting story.--John Jordan, editor of WARSHIP

DARK NAVY gives an excellent overview of the naval, air, and land impact on the Italian military at the time of the 8 September 1943 Armistice. It clearly shows the hesitancy of various leaders, on both sides, as they grappled with "what to do?" in this radically changed wartime environment and gives solid detail on the actions that resulted.--Jack Greene, author (with Alessandro Massigiani) of NAVAL WAR IN THE MEDITERRANEAN 1940-1943.

World War II had many superlatives, but none like Operation Torch—a series of simultaneous amphibious landings, audacious commando and paratroop assaults, and the Atlantic's biggest naval battle, fought across a two thousand mile span of coastline in French North Africa. The risk was enormous, the scale breathtaking, the preparations rushed, the training inadequate, and the ramifications profound. Torch was the first combined Allied offensive and key to how the Second World War unfolded politically and militarily. Nonetheless, historians have treated the subject lightly, perhaps because of its many ambiguities. As a surprise invasion of a neutral nation, it recalled German attacks against countries like Belgium, Norway, and Yugoslavia. The operation's rationale was to aid Russia but did not do this. It was supposed to get Americans troops into the fight against Germany but did so only because it failed to achieve its short-term military goals. There is still debate whether Torch advanced the fight against the Axis, or was a wasteful dispersion of Allied strength and actually prolonged the war. Torch: North Africa and the Allied Path to Victory is a fresh look at this complex and controversial operation. The book covers the fierce Anglo-American dispute about the operation and charts how it fits into the evolution of amphibious warfare. It recounts the story of the fighting, focusing on the five landings—Port Lyautey, Fédala, and Safi in Morocco, and Oran and Algiers in Algeria—and includes air and ground actions from the initial assault to the repulse of Allied forces on the outskirts of Tunis. Torch also considers the operation's context within the larger war and it incorporates the French perspective better than any English-language work on the subject. It shows how Torch brought France, as a power, back into the Allied camp; how it forced the English and the Americans to work together as true coalitions partners and forge a coherent amphibious doctrine. These skills were then applied to subsequent operations in the Mediterranean, in the English Channel, and in the Pacific. The story of how this was accomplished is the story of how the Allies brought their power to bear on the enemy's continental base and won World War II.

World War II had many superlatives, but none like Operation Torch - a series of simultaneous amphibious landings, audacious commando and paratroop assaults, and the Atlantic's biggest naval battle, fought across a two thousand mile span of coastline in French North Africa. The risk was enormous, the scale breathtaking, the preparations rushed, the training inadequate, and the ramifications profound. Torch was the first combined Allied offensive and key to how the Second World War unfolded politically and militarily. Nonetheless, historians have treated the subject lightly, perhaps because of its many ambiguities. As a surprise invasion of a neutral nation, it recalled German attacks against countries like Belgium, Norway, and Yugoslavia. The operation's rationale was to aid Russia but did not do this. It was supposed to get Americans troops into the fight against Germany but did so only because it failed to achieve its short-term military goals. There is still debate whether Torch advanced the fight against the Axis, or was a wasteful dispersion of Allied strength and actually prolonged the war. Torch: North Africa and the Allied Path to Victory is a fresh look at this complex and controversial operation. The book covers the fierce Anglo-American dispute about the operation and charts how it fits into the evolution of amphibious warfare. It recounts the story of the fighting, focusing on the five landings - Port Lyautey, Fedala, and Safi in Morocco, and Oran and Algiers in Algeria - and includes air and ground actions from the initial assault to the repulse of Allied forces on the outskirts of Tunis. Torch also considers the operation's context within the larger war and it incorporates the French perspective better than any English-language work on the subject. It shows how Torch brought France, as a power, back into the Allied camp; how it forced the English and the Americans to work together as true coalitions partners and forge a coherent amphibious doctrine. These skills were then applied to subsequent operations in the Mediterranean, in the English Channel, and in the Pacific. The story of how this was accomplished is the story of how the Allies brought their power to bear on the enemy's continental base and won World War II.

Building upon the expertise of the authors and historians of the Naval Institute Press, the Naval History Special Editions are designed to offer studies of the key vessels, battles, and events of armed conflict. Using an image-heavy, magazine-style format, these Special Editions should appeal to scholars, enthusiasts, and general readers alike. In 1939 the battleship was the queen of the seas. Battleships were designed to project power. They were the biggest and most powerful ships afloat, and the yardsticks by which the world judged naval strength. Within this context, the German battleship Tirpitz (sister ship of Bismarck) was one of the most effective instruments of naval power ever deployed. The British called her "The Beast". She spent the greater part of the Second World War tucked away in isolated fjords north of the Arctic Circle--where she became known as, "The Lonely Queen of the North." She sortied only three times and never fired her guns at an enemy warship. Yet, against this menace the British exerted unequaled effort. At all times they kept a pair of modern battleships standing by to face her should she sail; they built mini-submarines that could operate in the waters of the fjords; they repeatedly massed aircraft carrier strike forces in futile efforts to knock her from the war. At last, they invented massive ordnance--the Tallboy bomb, the largest non-nuclear explosive device of the war. Sending their heaviest bombers against her, and after three years of sustained effort, the Beast was sunk. The remarkable career of this remarkable ship is the subject of this authoritative and heavily illustrated Special Edition. It considers Tirpitz's design, her construction, her historical context and all of her operations. The power of this individual ship and the influence she exerted on the entire course of the war makes for an enlightening demonstration of the sometimes very unexpected way sea power can be expressed.

Building upon the expertise of the authors and historians of the Naval Institute Press, the Naval History Special Editions are designed to offer studies of the key vessels, battles, and events of armed conflict. Using an image-heavy, magazine-style format, these Special Editions should appeal to scholars, enthusiasts, and general readers alike. USS Massachusetts (BB-59) is the third ship of the South Dakota-class, whose short but intense career encapsulates the story of the U.S. Navy in World War II. Laid down in July 1939. She was launched three months before Pearl Harbor. Her massive 16-inch/45 caliber Mark 6 guns were the first of their type to fire on an enemy in combat during World War II, and they also held the distinction of discharging the last 16-inch salvos of the war. Her shells fell on targets from Casablanca to the suburbs of Tokyo. She engaged an enemy battleship and protected one of the most important American amphibious operations of the war. She scored several of the longest-range gunfire hits against a moving target in the history of naval warfare, and this during her shakedown cruise with a crew that was 80 percent straight from the recruiting center. After this remarkable beginning, Massachusetts served in the Pacific, in the Gilberts, Marshalls, Philippines, and in the Okinawa and Japanese campaigns. This Naval History Special Edition tells how she was constructed, manned, and was equipped. This work is richly illustrated with an outstanding collection of photographs covering her entire career. The content draws upon her war diaries, her action reports, and the oral histories of the men who served aboard her. This book tells the story of each of the eleven battle starts earned by Massachusetts. It is the story of the U.S. Navy's unprecedented triumph in World War II.

Six Victories examines one of the most interesting and instructive naval campaigns of World War II: the war on traffic in the Mediterranean during the fall and winter of 1941-42. It is a cautionary tale of how sea power was practiced, and how it shifted 180 degrees overnight. Based on British and Italian archival sources, the book emphasises strategic context, the role of intelligence, and the campaign's logistics. In October 1941, the British Admiralty based a surface strike force in Malta to attack Axis sea lanes between Italy and Africa. Aided by Ultra intelligence, submarines, and bombers based in Malta, this force dominated the Central Mediterranean. From the end of October through the middle of December 1941, less than a third of the supplies shipped from Italian ports arrived in Libya. Shortages of ammunition and fuel finally compelled the Afrika Korps to retreat four hundred miles. Then, in the space of thirty hours, this all changed. First, Italian naval forces broke the blockade by fighting through a major convoy that arrived in time to blunt the British advance; next, the strike force plowed into a minefield laid by Italian cruisers; and finally, in a daring attack, Italian commandos crippled the Mediterranean Fleet's battleships in port. The swing in fortune was immediate and dramatic. Six Victories breaks new ground in the historiography of World War II. A compelling story, it relates lessons that are relevant today and should be required reading for all who practice the art of power at sea, and for those who want to understand the intricate and interrelated factors that are the foundations of military success.