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On the morning of December 16, 1944 the US Army held the Ardennes Forest with a thin screen line of green units and exhausted units being brought back up to strength.

Through the morning fog came the spearhead of a massive German counteroffensive, designed to blunt the Allied drive toward Germany, and eventually recapture Antwerp, hopefully destroying one or more Allied field armies, and buying time for future German weapon systems to be brought into the fight.

While some units were initially overwhelmed, and the bonds of the Anglo-American alliance were sometimes sorely tested, eventually the US Army rallied, regained the initiative, stymied the enemy drive, and heaped thousands upon thousands of casualties upon the Germans when they could least afford them.

The Ardennes, commonly known as  the Battle of the Bulge, remains the largest battle the US Army has ever fought.

The official Army history of the battle has some of the most moving portrayals of men in battle you will ever read.

We've usually discussed the "Variable Time" or "VT" proximity fuse in World War II in the context of anti-aircraft artillery, particularly its use by the US Navy to counter Japanese kamikaze attacks. 

But once the VT fuse was in service, it became apparent that it would have applications for conventional artillery, and of course, aerial weapons. Enjoy some interesting splodey!

On this day in 1939, the first major surface action of World War Two took place off the coast of South America, when a squadron of cruisers of the Royal Navy engaged the German pocket battleship Admiral Graf Spee. The three cruisers of the Royal Navy would be roughly handled by the Graf Spee, but in turn inflicted critical damage to her. The damage was not a direct threat to the ship, but through some diplomatic maneuvers, and some disinformation, led German commander, Captain Langsdorff, to scuttling the Graf Spee rather than facing a battle he felt he could not win. 

As the Battle of Britain came to a close, the Royal Navy began to realize that eventually, the British and her allies would have to return to the European continent in force, and that mean amphibious operations. 

Their experience in World War I at Gallipoli had taught some hard lessons. The challenge of an amphibious operation wasn't usually the initial assault waves of infantry, but rather reinforcing the troops ashore with combined and supporting arms, and building up sufficient strength to allow for a breakout from the beachhead. And that meant vehicles. Lots of vehicles. At that time, the only practical landing craft for bringing ashore tanks and similar large vehicles was the Landing Craft, Mechanized. A rather small (roughly 50' long) lighter with a bow ramp, the LCM could land a single medium tank. The problem was, the LCM couldn't cross long distances under her own power. 

Faced with that problem, the Royal Navy conceived of a mother ship that could carry a large number of pre-loaded LCMs across an ocean, and put the LCMs into the the waters just offshore of the assault beaches. 

But Britain was struggling to build enough merchantmen and small escorts just to keep the lifeline of supplies across the Atlantic open. The British asked the United States to consider building these ships. And we did. The Landing Ship, Dock, was born. That the British got the underlying concept right is reflected by the fact that to this day, LSDs form an important part of today's US Navy amphibious forces. 

Clan battles are fast, close, and brutal. Of course, I'm not sharing video of the times where I get mauled. But my all time highest damage games were both this week, and both in clan battles. Which, considering there's considerably less health to harvest, is saying something. 

Some teams just can't be carried.