World War II in Photographs

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1942

BELOW

American victims of the death march. In the

controversial Far East war crimes trials the

Japanese Lieutenant General Homma Masaharu

was held responsible for the death march, whose

excesses he blamed on officers under his

command: he was executed on April 3, 1946.

181

1942

THE BATTLE FOR THE PACIFIC

Japanese strategy in the Pacific was initially successful, and a short-

lived ABDA (American-British-Dutch-Australian) Command

collapsed before the Japanese advance. But although the Japanese

won the battle of the Java Sea in February and hammered the British

Admiral Somerville's Far Eastern Fleet on a raid into the Indian

Ocean in April, they lost a carrier in the Coral Sea in May. The

following month they lost four large carriers at Midway, and with

them the prospect of maintaining the initiative in the central Pacific.

ABOVE

The cruisers HMS Dorsetshire and Cornwall

under air attack, April 5: both were sunk.

So great was the superiority shown by

Japanese aircraft on the Indian Ocean raid

that Somerville sent his elderly battleships to

safety in the East African port of Mombasa.

182

1942

RIGHT

The Battle of the Coral Sea was the first

major naval action in which opposing

warships did not sight one another.

American aircraft sank the light carrier

Shoho, but the USS Lexington - "Lady Lex''

- was hit by bombs and torpedoes and

sank after a huge internal explosion.

Here members of her crew can be seen

jumping from the stricken vessel.

ABOVE

In May the Japanese attacked the island of

Midway, then America's most westerly

outpost, having first diverted part of the US

Pacific Fleet to the north. On June 4, Japanese

aircraft attacked Midway, doing widespread

damage and killing these servicemen.

183

1942

ABOVE

Thereafter the Japanese plan went badly

wrong, and in the fierce battle that followed

three Japanese carriers were sunk and

another so badly damaged that she had to be

scuttled. Here US Douglas Dauntless planes

fly high above a burning Japanese carrier.

184

1942

ABOVE

The carrier USS Yorktown at Midway

under air attack which damaged her

badly, leaving her to be finished

off by a submarine on June 7.

185

THE EASTERN FRONT AND STALINGRAD

In Russia the Germans survived the crisis of the Russian winter

counteroffensive, and in April 1942 Hitler issued orders for Operation

Blue, a major offensive in the south aimed at the oilfields of the

Caucasus. In June the attack began well, with scenes reminiscent of

victories the previous year, and the Germans pushed deep into the

Caucasus. But by mid-September the offensive had stalled, and

German 6th Army was making heavy weather of its attack on

Stalingrad, on the Volga. On November 19, the Russians launched

carefully husbanded reserves to began the attack which led to the

encirclement of the 6th Army in one of the war's most terrible battles.

ABOVE

A Russian heavy machine-gun

in the snow, winter 1941-42.

186

1942

ABOVE

The Russian winter not only caught the

Germans without proper clothing but

caused serious difficulties for vehicles not

designed with this climate in mind. Here a

tank drags an assault gun from a snowdrift.

RIGHT

Although the Germans occupied the

Crimea in 1941, the naval base of

Sevastopol held out. It was eventually

taken in July 1942 after heavy bombardments

which reduced the city to rubble.

187

1942

LEFT

Sevastopol, besieged by the British and

French in the Crimean War of 1854-56,

was well-provided with modern defences.

These women, described in the original

caption as sewing underwear and warm

clothing for the city's defenders, are probably

sheltering beneath the older fortifications.

BELOW

In early August 6th Army destroyed

most of a Russian army in the bend

of the Don north of Kalach. This is

the apocalyptic scene on the river

bank in the first week of August.

188

1942

Operation Edelweiss, initiated when Hitler

cancelled Operation Blue in July, sent Army

Group A deep into the Caucasus. Here a

German anti-tank unit is silhouetted by

smoke from burning oilfields at Maikop, fired

by their defenders, in the last week of August.

189

ABOVE

1942

RIGHT

Operation Heron saw Army Group B

drive for the Volga with the aim of taking

Stalingrad and extending down the river

as far as Astrakhan. Here German infantry

move up as Stalingrad burns on the horizon.

LEFT

The bitter fighting at Stalingrad placed

overwhelming emphasis on the courage

and determination of small groups of men

fighting in what soon became a blighted

landscape. Here a German machine-gun

detachment - the empty ammunition boxes

to its rear are evidence of heavy fighting -

defends the ruins of suburban cottages.