قبل از محو تلاش‌ها: راهنمای میدان‌های نبرد جنگ جهانی اول

From the Belgian coast, across the fields of Flanders, over the valley of the Somme and down the line to the Argonne: all the major battlefields of the First World War — Ypres, Arras, Cambrai, Amiens, St Quentin, Mons, Le Cateau, Reims, Verdun and St Mihiel — are criss-crossed in this book over more than thirty different routes, each clearly shown on a Michelin map. Every significant feature is described in detail. Indispensable for anyone contemplating a tour of the battlefields in Belgium and France, this book combines the years of knowledge, travel and research of its author, Rose Coombs, who worked at the Imperial War Museum in London for nearly forty years. Since her death in 1991, After the Battle’s Editor, Karel Margry, has traveled every route, checking and revising the text where necessary, as well as re-photographing every ­memorial. Many new ones are included, yet we have striven to keep true to the flavor of Rose’s original concept...before endeavors fade. 'If it is granted that the successful destruction of the target would warrant the possible expenditure of the entire force...' So wrote Major General Lewis Brereton, the US Ninth Air Force commander in the Middle East, as the planners contemplated the options of a high or low level attack on the oil refineries at Ploesti in Rumania. If this source of 40 per cent of Germany's oil could be eliminated, it would deal a vital bodyblow to the Third Reich's ability to wage war, and a surprise attack by heavy B-24 Liberators flying at tree-top height was considered the best method of achieving success. Three bomb groups from the Eighth Air Force based in Britain flew out to join two groups of the Ninth already in North Africa, the combined force of 179 aircraft destined to carry out the first massed low-level heavy bomber mission in history. The Ploesti Raid took place on Sunday, August 1, 1943 and, but for a navigational error which put the leading formation on a course away from the target, the operation might have resulted in the destruction of the seven chosen targets.