Second World War

Mary Heimann restores Czechoslovakia to its pivotal role in the Munich Crisis.

What can the historian learn from writing fiction? Lisa Hilton, whose first novel is set in south-west France, discovered revelations about the area as well as her approach to interpreting the past.

Janet Voke meets Joachim Rønneberg, survivor of one of the most daring actions of the Second World War: the sabotage of a German heavy water plant deep in occupied Norway.

The American soldiers who fought their way through the islands of the Pacific during the Second World War encountered fierce Japanese resistance but few local people. That all changed with the invasion of the Mariana Islands, says Matthew Hughes.

Richard Overy looks behind the myth of a vulnerable island defended by a small band of fighter pilots to give due credit to the courage of the redoubtable civilian population.

Nigel Jones celebrates a great humanitarian who navigated the perilous paths between good and evil, a mission that was to cost him his life.

Kathryn Hadley joins a group of schoolteachers and police officers in an innovative project that seeks ways to better understand the Holocaust.

Dan Stone looks at how historians’ understanding of the Holocaust has changed since the end of the Cold War with the opening of archives that reveal the full horror of the ‘Wild East’.

Dan Plesch describes how President Roosevelt’s introduction of a global day of solidarity in June 1942 successfully promoted the ideals of the United Nations and his Four Freedoms, boosting morale in the worldwide fight against fascism.

Exiled in London in June 1940, with France on the brink of defeat, Charles de Gaulle broadcast a speech that was to create an enduring bond between him and his country, writes Jonathan Fenby.