Rock Force - The American Paratroopers Who Took Back Corregidor and Exacted

Informationen zum Autor Kevin Maurer is an award-winning journalist who has covered military operations for nearly two decades. He has been embedded with combat troops many times, including with the 82nd Airborne Division during the invasion of Iraq in 2003, and with a Special Forces team in Afghanistan for ten weeks in 2010. His books include the massively successful No Easy Day , the inside story of the Bin Laden raid, cowritten with former Navy SEAL Mark Owen. Klappentext From the #1 New York Times bestselling coauthor of No Easy Day comes a thrilling World War II story of the American airborne soldiers who captured a Japanese-held island fortress “ Rock Force  is a beautifully told story of war: the friendships, the courage and despair, and the terror... One of the most exciting books ever written about the Pacific War.”—Mitch Weiss, New York Times  bestselling coauthor of  Countdown 1945 In late December 1941, General Douglas MacArthur, caught off guard by the Japanese invasion of the Philippines, is forced to retreat to Corregidor, a jagged, rocky island fortress at the mouth of Manila Bay. Months later, under orders from the president, the general is whisked away in the dark of night, leaving his troops to their fate. It is a bitter pill for a fiercely proud warrior who has always protected his men. He famously declares "I shall return," but the humiliation of Corregidor haunts him, even earning him the derisive nickname "Dugout Doug." In early 1945, MacArthur returns to the Philippines, his eyes firmly fixed on Corregidor. To take back the island, he calls on the 503rd Parachute Infantry Regiment, a highly trained veteran airborne unit. Their mission is to jump onto the island—hemmed in by sheer cliffs, pockmarked by bomb craters, bristling with deadly spiky broken tree trunks—and wrest it from some 6,700 Japanese defenders who await, fully armed and ready to fight to the death. Drawn from firsthand accounts and personal interviews with the battle's surviving veterans, acclaimed war correspondent and bestselling author Kevin Maurer delves into this extraordinary tale, uncovering astonishing accounts of bravery and heroism during an epic, yet largely forgotten, clash of the Pacific War. Here is an intimate story of uncommon soldiers showing uncommon courage and winning, through blood and sacrifice, the redemption of General MacArthur. Leseprobe Chapter 1   Panama Jones and His Three Thousand Thieves   First Lt. Bill Calhoun felt two rough hands shake him awake. The tropical sun was blinding as he opened his eyes and tried to focus on the massive shadow over him. Slowly, the grizzled, unshaven face of an Aussie bulldozer driver, wearing a broad smile, came into focus.   "Merry Christmas, Yank," the man said in his thick Australian accent.   "Merry Christmas," Calhoun muttered back, sitting up and rubbing his eyes.   The Aussie moved on, and after a moment, Calhoun climbed out of his bedroll and stood in the morning brightness, lighting his first cigarette of the day. He was a lean young man, only twenty-two, with a thin mustache and wavy, thick dark hair. Despite his youth, he had a western gunfighter's seasoned squint, and at times his mouth wore a mischievous smirk. Like millions of young American men, he was far from home, fighting a war that sprawled from one end of the planet to another. But unlike most, he wore the jump boots of a paratrooper.   All around him the forty paratroopers in his unit climbed out of bunkers and fighting positions to stretch stiff joints or light up their own smokes. Calhoun was their leader, in charge of F Company's first platoon. The Aussie who had awoken him was part of a construction crew tasked with building an airfield on Mindoro Island, which the men of the 503rd Parachute Infantry Regim...

Product details

• Authors: Kevin Maurer
• Publisher: Dutton Books
• Languages: English
• Product format: Paperback / Softback
• Released: 31.08.2021
• EAN: 9781524744779
• ISBN: 978-1-5247-4477-9
• No. of pages: 320
• Dimensions: 138 mm x 208 mm x 17 mm
• Series: American War Heroes
• Subject: Non-fiction book > History > Miscellaneous