The AGM-119B Kongsberg Penguin Slated for the RAN’s ill-fated Kaman SH-2G Seasprite helicopters, and fitted with an Australian-manufactured warhead, the Penguin is a 1960s-era remarkably durable “shoot-and-scoot” high subsonic sea skimmer anti-ship missile. Each Seasprite was planned to carry two missiles. (Kongsberg graphic) The Norwegian Kongsberg Penguin has been operating successfully from ships, helicopters and […]
Operation Strangle: Naval aviation in Korea. by Fred LanePaper presented at the Aviation Historical Society of Australia, Sydney, 7 July 2004. To understand naval aviation in the Korean War, it is necessary to understand the context. Before the Americans dropped the Hiroshima and Nagasaki atom bombs, a highly successful Pacific War had been waged between […]
Operation Strangle: Naval aviation in Korea. by Fred Lane Paper presented at the Aviation Historical Society of Australia, Sydney, 7 July 2004. To understand naval aviation in the Korean War, it is necessary to understand the context. Before the Americans dropped the Hiroshima and Nagasaki atom bombs, a highly successful Pacific War had been waged […]
Jutland 1916 Book review by Fred Lane Steel, N. and P. Hart. Jutland 1916: Death in the grey wastes. Cassell: London, 2003. 439pp. Photographs and Maps. Paperback $19.75. The biggest naval battle since Trafalgar in 1805 was the 1916 Battle of Jutland. Fought during 31 May and the early hours of 1 June, […]
The Stalingrad siege Book review by Fred Lane Beevor, A. (1998) Stalingrad. Penguin Books. 494pp, including maps, photos, index and comprehensive chapter footnotes. Paperback $35 Retired British Army officer Antony Beevor won many literary prizes and reviewer acclaim with this book. Together with Harrison Salisbury’s description of the 900-day siege of Leningrad (Salisbury 1969) and […]
The fall of Berlin Book review by Fred Lane Beevor, A. (2002) Berlin: The downfall 1945. Penguin Books: London. 490 pp including index and footnotes. $35.00. Antony Beevor has done it again. On top of his excellent description of the siege of Stalingrad (Naval Officers Club Newsletter 51 pp. 23-4), he now describes in authoritative […]
The Battle of Antietam/Sharpsburg More American soldiers (617,528) died during the 1861-65 American Civil War than in any other conflict involving Americans. The next worse loss of life was in WW II when 407,316 were killed (Morison and Commager 1950, p. 653). These figures cannot compare to the millions of Russian, German and other European […]
Bantry, the unknown invasion by Tom De Voil This is a true story of bad timing, missed communications, confusing orders and changes in plans. The Commander-in-Chief goes missing, there is inclement but predictable weather and bad intelligence. Where did it occur? Bantry is a picturesque township of about 3000 people at the head of Bantry […]
The Battle of North Cape and HMS Belfast By Richard Johnstone-Bryden. Reprinted with permission of the editor, Broadsheet, 2003. Since 1971 the heavy (sic) cruiser HMS Belfast has been preserved in the Pool of London as the last of the big gun armoured ships to have served in the Royal Navy during the Second World […]
The Rufigi Delta and HMAS Pioneer HMAS Pioneer, the RAN’s old Pelorus class light cruiser, fired more shots in anger than any other RAN ship in WW I. Most of her angst was directed towards the blockade and destruction of the commerce raider SMS Königsberg and other targets in German East Africa between 6 July […]
