No previous book has been devoted to Marine Corps armor in World War II. Gilbert's gripping narrative combines exhaustive detail on Marine armor and combat with moving eyewitness accounts, never before published, of what it was actually like to be a Marine tanker in action in the Pacific.

Marine Tank Battles In The Pacific

History

Gilbert, Oscar E.

Americas

Da Capo Press

The Continentals had no doubt: Banastre Tarleton was the most barbaric and hated officer in America. Given his historical importance, surprisingly little has been written about the dashing cavalry leader. Oscar and Catherine Gilbert rectify this oversight with Bloody Ban: Banastre Tarleton and the American Revolution, 1776-1783, the first modern biography to appear in more than half a century.Tarleton enjoyed a meteoric rise in rank and stature. He began the war at age 22 in 1776 as a cornet (lieutenant), and by 1781, the 26-year-old was a lieutenant colonel and leader of the feared Loyalist British Legion ("Tarleton's Raiders"), a combined arms brigade recruited in the northern colonies and sent south to terrorize and subdue its rebellious citizenry. Lord Cornwallis considered him his right-hand man, and entrusted Tarleton with the most difficult of missions.The cavalryman came to fame early by capturing Gen. Charles Lee, second in rank only to George Washington. In early battles like Paoli (September 1777), Tarleton learned that surprise attacks and ruthless violence--18th century "shock and awe" tactics--resulted in victory. His transfer south to help "roll up" the rebels from South Carolina to Virginia triggered a brutal partisan war. Though his personal behavior proved impeccable, from his first notable skirmish at Monck's Corner (April 14, 1780) Tarleton failed to control the excesses of his favored Green Dragoons, including rape. At the Waxhaws (May 29, 1780), the Legion massacred surrendering Continentals and mutilated the wounded. "Tarleton's Quarter" became the byword of the rebel militia: No quarter asked or given. His reputation for invincibility was punctured at Blackstock's Farm (November 20, 1780), after which he lied to Cornwallis to conceal his defeat, and the ramifications of his tactical rashness at The Cowpens (January 17, 1781) played a major role in the eventual defeat of the British.After the war Tarleton returned to Britain where, despite a scandalous personal life and massive gambling debts he parlayed his fame and royal connections into higher rank and a long career in Parliament. Nearly two centuries after his death the question remains: Was Banastre Tarleton the Revolution's finest cavalry leader, or a charlatan and war criminal?The authors utilized period records and personal accounts to unravel the complex story (and debunk several myths) of Tarleton's extraordinary career. As Bloody Ban makes clear, the cavalryman possessed an exceedingly talented military mind, but was consumed by overweening ambition that clouded his judgments. His growing penchant for unprepared frontal assaults no matter the odds, and willingness to push his troops beyond the limits of endurance in his quest for glory, proved the bane of his career.The smooth prose, exceptional research, and original maps make Bloody Ban: Banastre Tarleton and the American Revolution, 1776-1783 one of the most important books on the Revolutionary War.

Bloody Ban: Banastre Tarleton and the American Revolution, 1776 – 1783 (Casemate Illustrated Special, CISS0011)

Biographies & Memoirs

Gilbert, Catherine R.

Historical

Savas Beatie

In the aftermath of Vietnam a new generation of Marines was determined to wage a smarter kind of war. The tank, the very symbol of power and violence, would play a key role in a new concept of mobile warfare, not seen since the dashes of World War II. The emphasis would be not on brutal battles of attrition, but on paralyzing the enemy by rapid maneuver and overwhelming but judicious use of firepower. Yet in two wars with Iraq, the tankers, as well as the crews of the new Light Armored Vehicles, quickly found themselves in a familiar role—battering through some of the strongest defenses in the world by frontal assault, fighting their way through towns and cities. In America’s longest continual conflict, armored Marines became entangled in further guerilla war, this time amid the broiling deserts, ancient cities, and rich farmlands of Iraq, and in the high, bleak wastes of Afghanistan. It was a familiar kind of war against a fanatical foe who brutalized civilians, planted sophisticated roadside bombs, and seized control of entire cities. It has been a maddening war of clearing roads, escorting convoys, endless sweep operations to locate and destroy insurgent strongholds, protecting voting sites for free elections, and recapturing and rebuilding urban centers. It’s been a war in which the tanks repeatedly provided the outnumbered infantry with precise and decisive firepower. The tankers even added a new trick to their repertoire—long-range surveillance. Our fights against Iraq in 1991 and in the post-9/11 years have seen further wars that demanded that unique combination of courage, tenacity, professionalism, and versatility that makes a Marine no better friend, and no worse enemy. This book fully describes how our Marine Corps tankers have risen to the occasion. Table of Contents Preface Acknowledgments Glossary Prologue 1. A Brutally Complex World 2. Operation Desert Shield 3. The Storm Breaks 4. Intervallum 5. Into Iraq 6. Bridges In The Desert—An-Nasiriyah 7. The Low Road To Baghdad 8. The Prize 9. Return To Iraq 10. Tipping Point: The Second Battle Of Fallujah 11. Harrying The Insurgency 12. Afghanistan—Winding Down Epilogue Where Are They Now? References Cited Index

Marine Corps Tank Battles in the Middle East

Middle East

Casemate

Winner of THE GENERAL WALLACE M. GREENE, JR. AWARD for outstanding nonfiction In May 1943 a self-described “really young, green, ignorant lieutenant” assumed command of a new Marine Corps company. His even younger enlisted Marines were learning to use an untested weapon, the M4A2 “Sherman” medium tank. His sole combat veteran was the company bugler, who had salvaged his dress cap and battered horn from a sinking aircraft carrier. Just six months later the company would be thrown into one of the ghastliest battles of World War II. On 20 November 1943 the Second Marine Division launched the first amphibious assault of the Pacific War, directly into the teeth of powerful Japanese defenses on Tarawa. In that blood-soaked invasion, a single company of Sherman tanks, of which only two survived, played a pivotal role in turning the tide from looming disaster to legendary victory. In this unique study Oscar Gilbert and Romain Cansiere use official documents, memoirs, interviews with veterans, as well as personal and aerial photographs to follow Charlie Company from its formation, and trace the movement, action—and loss—of individual tanks in this horrific four-day struggle. The authors have used official documents and interviews with veterans to follow the company from training through the brutal 76-hour struggle for Tarawa. Survivor accounts and air photo analysis document the movements –and destruction – of the company’s individual tanks. It is a story of escapes from drowning tanks, and even more harrowing escapes from tanks knocked out behind Japanese lines. It is a story of men doing whatever needed to be done, from burying the dead to hand-carrying heavy cannon ammunition forward under fire. It is the story of how the two surviving tanks and their crews expanded a perilously thin beachhead, and cleared the way for critical reinforcements to come ashore. But most of all it is a story of how a few unsung Marines helped turn near disaster into epic victory. Table of Contents ACKNOWLEDGMENTS PREFACE Romain Cansiere PREFACE Ed Gilbert FOREWORD Edward L. Bale, Jr., Colonel, USMC (Ret) 1 A NEW DOCTRINE FOR A NEW WAR 2 SALAD DAYS—FORMATION AND TRAINING 3 THE TANKS OF CHARLIE COMPANY 4 THE CLOTHES ON THEIR BACKS—CLOTHING AND EQUIPMENT 5 OBJECTIVE: CODE NAME HELEN 6 DAY ONE—THE REEF 7 DAY ONE—INLAND 8 DAY TWO—SECURING THE BEACHHEAD 9 DAY THREE—SWEEPING THE ISLAND 10 DAY FOUR—THE FINAL CARNAGE 11 AFTERMATH EPILOGUE: The Legacy of Tarawa LATER LIFE APPENDIX A: Charlie Company Chronology APPENDIX B: Tank Company Organization and Equipment APPENDIX C: Inside the M4A2 Tank APPENDIX D: Charlie Company Personnel at Tarawa APPENDIX E: Historical Research and Photographic Analysis NOTES REFERENCES CITED

Tanks in Hell: A Marine Corps Tank Company on Tarawa

Cansière, Romain

Following their defeat at Saratoga in upstate New York in 1777, the British decided to implement a Southern Strategy against the American insurgents, a plan to “roll up” the rebellious colonies from Georgia through the Carolinas to Virginia. Instead, they triggered a savage partisan war of raids, ambushes, assassinations, and large pitched battles that rivaled any fought in the northern colonies. Untrained Patriot militiamen—occasionally stiffened by contingents of the Continental Line—were pitted against Britain’s Cherokee and Creek allies, and Loyalist militia and British regulars led by General Cornwallis and his two ablest subordinates, Patrick Ferguson and the ruthless Banastre “Bloody Ban” Tarleton. In October 1780 the Loyalist militia was virtually destroyed at King’s Mountain, the battle that Lord Clinton, the British commander in Chief, said was “the first link in a chain of events that followed each other in regular succession until they at last ended in the total loss of America.” Other defeats at Blackstock’s Farm and Cowpens, and a Pyhrric victory at Guilford Courthouse, gutted the British Southern Army and drove Cornwallis north to encirclement and surrender at Yorktown. This study uses battlefield terrain analysis and the words of the officers and common soldiers, from pension records and little-known interviews, to bring to life the crucial role of one militia regiment—the Second Spartans of South Carolina--that fought in virtually every action of the vicious back-country war that decided the fate of America. Or as one private in the Second Spartans said, expressing admiration for his colonel: “. . . a few Brave Men stood true for the cause of liberty.” Table of Contents ACKNOWLEDGMENTS SOURCES AND ADDITIONAL RESOURCES AUTHORS’ PREFACE PROLOGUE: WILLIAM BLACKSTOCK’S PLANTATION, SOUTH CAROLINA, 20 NOVEMBER 1780 1 INTRODUCTION 2 A PEOPLE BRED TO WAR 3 THE BACK COUNTRY AND THE FIRST CHEROKEE WAR 4 POLITICAL MANEUVERING, 1769–1775 5 WAR COMES TO THE SOUTH 6 THE GEORGIA CAMPAIGN, 1779 7 THE BRITISH ASCENDANCY 8 THE IMPERCEPTIBLE TURNING OF THE TIDE 9 CHASING FERGUSON: THE POLITICS OF MILITIA COMMAND 10 KING’S MOUNTAIN, 7 OCTOBER 1780: THE DAY OF BATTLE 11 KING’S MOUNTAIN AFTERMATH 12 BLOODY BAN TASTES DEFEAT: BLACKSTOCK’S FARM, 20 NOVEMBER 1780 13 THE CALM AT THE STORM’S EYE 14 THE COWPENS, 17 JANUARY 1781 15 COWPENS AFTERMATH 16 GRINDING DOWN THE BRITISH 17 FINIS IN THE SOUTH, 1782 EPILOGUE APPENDIX A: THE MANY VERSIONS OF COWPENS ENDNOTES INDEX

True for the Cause of Liberty: The Second Spartan Regiment in the American Revolution

The Casemate Short History Series presents readable and entertaining introductions to military history topics. Today tanks are synonymous with the modern army; imposing, essential pieces of high-technology equipment, seemingly impregnable. But how did the tank come into being, and how did it develop and influence conflict in the 20th and 21st centuries? Why do different countries use tanks so differently in combat and what was the biggest tank-on-tank battle? The Casemate Short History of Tanks addresses all these questions and more in an informative and entertaining introduction to this iconic weapon of the last hundred years. Tanks first ventured into battle on the Somme in 1916, and by the end of the war countries were beginning to choose “heavy” or “light” tank designs to suit their preferred doctrine. Design stagnated between the wars, until World War II brought about rapid change. Tanks would prove integral to fighting in almost every theater; the Germans swept across Europe using tanks to spearhead their blitzkrieg method of war, until Soviet tanks proved more than their match and led to some epic tank battles on a huge scale. After World War II, tank designs became increasingly sophisticated, and armor undertook a variety of roles in conflicts, with mixed results. American armor in Korea was soon forced into an infantry support role, which it reprised in Vietnam, while Soviet armor was defeated in guerrilla warfare in Afghanistan. However, tanks played a pivotal role in the American “shock and awe” doctrine in two wars in Iraq, and tanks remain a crucial weapons system on the battlefield. Table of Contents Tank Component Terminology Introduction Timeline 1: The Great War of 1914-18 and the Birth of the Tank 2: The Inter-War Years 3: World War II 4: The Cold War and Wars of National Liberation 5: Wars of the Regional Powers 6: The Arab-Israeli Wars 7: The New Order in the Middle East and Beyond 8: The Present and the Future of the Tank Acknowledgements

Tanks: A Century of Tank Warfare (Casemate Short History)

Military

“Retreat, hell! We just got here!” The words of Captain Lloyd Williams at Belleau Wood in June 1918 entered United States Marine Corps legend, and the Marine Brigade’s actions there—along with the censor’s failure to take out the name of the Brigade in the battle reports—made the Corps famous. The Marines went to war as part of the American Expeditionary Force, bitterly resented by the Army and General Pershing. The Army tried to use them solely as labor troops and replacements, but the German spring offensive of 1918 forced the issue. The French begged Pershing to commit his partially trained men, and two untested American divisions, supported by British and French units, were thrown into the path of five German divisions. Three horrific weeks later, the Marines held the entirety of Belleau Wood. The Marines then fought in the almost forgotten Blanc Mont Ridge Offensive in October, as well as in every well-known AEF action until the end of the war. This book looks at all the operations of the Marine Corps in World War I, covers the activities of both ground and air units, and considers the units that supported the Marine Brigade. It examines how, during the war years, the Marine Corps changed from a small organization of naval security detachments to an elite land combat force. Table of Contents List of Plates Authors’ Preface Maps 1 Background to War 2 Making Marines 3 Over There 4 Into the Lines—Les Eparges 5 Belleau Wood 6 Replacements 7 The Sick, the Wounded, and the Dead 8 Soissons 9 The Women Marines 10 St. Mihiel 11 Always on the Job: The Atlantic Fleet and Foreign Interventions 12 Blanc Mont Ridge 13 Marine Aviation 14 Meuse-Argonne 15 Victory and Occupation 16 Aftermath Appendix: Equipment and Weapons Endnotes Bibliography Index

First to Fight: The U.S. Marines in World War I

The outbreak of the Korean conflict caught America (and the Marine Corps) unprepared. The Corps' salvation was the existence of its Organized Reserve (an organization rich in veterans of the fighting in World War II), the availability of modern equipment in storage and, as always, the bravery, initiative, and adaptability of individual Marines. In this follow-up to his enormously successful Marine Tank Battles in the Pacific (Combined Publishing, 2000), Oscar Gilbert presents an equally exhaustive and detailed account of the little-known Marine tank engagements in Korea, supported by 48 photographs, eight original maps, and dozens of survivor interviews. Marine Corps Tank Battles in Korea details every action, from the valiant defense at Pusan and the bitter battles of the Chosin Reservoir, to the grinding and bloody stalemate along the Jamestown Line. Many of these stories are presented here for the first time, such as the unique role played by tanks in the destruction of the ill-fated Task Force Drysdale, how Marine armor played a key role in the defense of Hagaru, and how a lone tank made it to Yudamni and then led the breakout across the high Toktong Pass. Marine tankers--individually and as an organization--met every challenge posed by this vicious, protracted, and forgotten war. It is a story of bravery and fortitude you will never forget. Table of Contents Prologue The Unexpected War The Defense of the Pusan Perimeter The Inchon and Seoul Operations The Chosin Reservoir Campaign—Encirclement The Chosin Reservoir Campaign—Breakout Offensives and Counteroffensives, 1951–1952 Battles for the Jamestown Line, 1952–1953 Armistice and Withdrawal Epilogue

Marine Corps Tank Battles in Korea

In 1965 the large, loud, and highly visible tanks of 3rd Platoon, B Company, 3rd Tank Battalion landed across a beach near Da Nang, drawing unwelcome attention to America’s first, almost covert, commitment of ground troops in South Vietnam. As the Marine Corps presence grew inexorably, the 1st and 3rd Tank Battalions, as well as elements of the reactivated 5th Tank Battalion, were committed to the conflict. For the United States Marine Corps, the protracted and bloody struggle was marked by controversy, but for Marine Corps tankers, it was marked by bitter frustration as they saw their own high levels of command turn their backs on some of the hardest-won lessons of tank-infantry cooperation learned in the Pacific War and in Korea. Nevertheless, like good Marines, the officers and enlisted men of the tank battalions sought out the enemy in the sand dunes, jungles, mountains, paddy fields, tiny villages, and ancient cities of Vietnam. Young Marine tankers fresh out of training, and cynical veterans of the Pacific War and Korea, battled two enemies. The battle-hardened Viet Cong were masters of the art of striking hard, then slipping away to fight another day. The highly motivated troops of the North Vietnamese Army, equipped with long-range artillery and able to flee across nearby borders into sanctuaries where the Marines were forbidden to follow, engaged the Marines in brutal conventional combat. Both foes were equipped with modern anti-tank weapons, and sought out the tanks as valuable symbolic targets. It was a brutal and schizophrenic war, with no front and no rear, absolutely no respite from constant danger, against a merciless foe hidden among a helpless civilian population. Some of the duties the tankers were called upon to perform were long familiar, as they provided firepower and mobility for the suffering infantry in a never-ending succession of search and destroy operations, conducted amphibious landings, and added their heavy guns to the artillery in fire support missions. Under constant threat of ambushes and huge command-detonated mines that could obliterate tank and crew in an instant, the tankers escorted vital supply convoys, and guarded the engineers who built and maintained the roads. In their “spare time” the tankers guarded lonely bridges and isolated outposts for weeks on end, patrolled on foot to seek out the Viet Cong, operated roadblocks and ambushes, shot up boats to interdict the enemy’s supply lines, and worked in the villages and hamlets to better the lives of the brutalized civilians. To the bitter end—despite the harsh conditions of climate and terrain, confusion, endless savage and debilitating combat, and ultimate frustration as their own nation turned against the war—the Marine tankers routinely demonstrated the versatility, dedication to duty, and matchless courage that Americans have come to expect of their Marines. OSCAR E. GILBERT, Ph.D., is a former marine artilleryman and currently a geoscientist living in Texas. His previous published works include the widely acclaimed “Marine Tank Battles in the Pacific” (2001) and “Marine Corps Tank Battles in Korea” (2003). Table of Contents PREFACE ACKNOWLEDGMENTS PROLOGUE 1TWO THOUSAND YEARS OF WAR 21965: TAKING MEASURE 31966: THE NVA MOVES SOUTH 41967: A GROWING MOMENTUM 51968: CRISIS AND DECISION 61969: ON THE ROPES 71970–1975: WITHDRAWAL AND FINAL SPASMS EPILOGUE WHERE ARE THEY NOW? CHAPTER NOTES REFERENCES AND BIBLIOGRAPHY INDEX

Marine Corps Tank Battles in Vietnam

One of the most difficult types of warfare to master, landing on a hostile beach requires scrupulous planning and intense coordination between the forces in the air, sea and land. With a history reaching back to the Persians landing on the Greek shores at the Battle of Marathon in 490 BC, it was the First World War that marked the beginning of modern amphibious warfare, with the Royal Marines combining their efforts with the Royal Navy. Despite the disastrous Gallipoli amphibious operation to seize the Dardanelles Straits in 1915, the Royal Navy and US Marine Corps continued to develop new landing crafts throughout the inter-war years. The Second World War proved more successful for amphibious warfare, with the Japanese invasion of the Philippines in 1941 crushing the American forces who were defending the Pacific islands and the D-day landings by the Allied troops in 1944 initiating the beginning of the end of the war in Europe. This accessible short history looks at the historical development of amphibious warfare, telling the stories of particular landings, and the units that have taken part in this unique type of warfare. The Royal Marines and US Marine Corps continue to evolve and play a crucial role in defense today, with specialized amphibious warfare ships being deployed to enable elite forces to respond promptly to threats across the globe.

Amphibious Warfare: Battle on the Beaches (Casemate Short History)

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