Search results for ""Author Wayne Vansant""

In The Red Baron, graphic artist and author Wayne Vansant illustrates the incredible story of Manfred von Richthofen, whose unparalleled piloting prowess as a member of the Imperial German Army Air Service made him a World War I celebrity, both in the air and on the ground. In his signature style, enjoyed by readers of Normandy and Bombing Nazi Germany, Vansant beautifully depicts the fearsome intelligence and mid-flight awareness that would earn Richthofen eighty documented air combat victories over the Western Front in the halcyon days of military aviation. From his beginnings as cavalry member and a pilot-in-training to the years he spent commanding Jasta 11 from the cockpit of his fabled red plane, to his eventual leadership of the ultra-mobile Jagdgeschwader 1 (aptly nicknamed Richtofen's Flying Circus by nervous foes because of the group's colorful airplanes and mobile airfields), The Red Baron brings the story of this legendary figure to life. Richthofen died young under controversial circumstances, but the Red Baron's astonishing skill and tactical acumen lived on far long after his death and helped usher in a new type of warfare that would reign supreme twenty-five years later: war in the air.

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Knights of the Skull is a full-color, graphic non-fiction series chronicling the development of the German Panzer (armored) forces in World War II. Beginning with the early campaigns in 1939–41, this first volume features the unleashing of Blitzkrieg in Poland in 1939, the incredible defeat of the western Allies in France in 1940, and then the legendary Gen. Erwin Rommel’s initial North African campaigns in 1941. With detailed, and historically accurate illustrations of vehicles, uniforms, locations, and characters, this vivid chronicle of the early years of World War II in Europe is not only an artistic look at the war, but is also a concise history of Germany's influential approach to armored warfare. Tactics developed and executed during Germany's 1939–41 campaigns changed warfare forever, and were honed throughout the remaining years of the war.

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Normandy depicts the planning and execution of Operation Overlord in 96 full-color pages. The initial paratrooper assault is shown, as well as the storming of the five D-Day beaches: Utah, Omaha, Gold, Juno, and Sword. But the story does not end there. Once the Allies got ashore, they had to stay ashore. The Germans made every effort to push them back into the sea. This book depicts the such key events in the Allied liberation of Europe as: 1. Construction of the Mulberry Harbors, two giant artificial harbors built in England and floated across the English Channel so that troops, vehicles, and supplies could be offloaded across the invasion beaches. 2. The Capture of Cherbourg, the nearest French port, against a labyrinth of Gennan pillboxes. 3. The American fight through the heavy bocage (hedgerow country) to take the vital town of Saint-Lô. 4. The British-Canadian struggle for the city of Caen against the "Hitler Youth Division," made up of 23,000 seventeen- and eighteen-year-old Nazi fanatics. 5. The breakout of General Patton's Third Army and the desperate US 30th Division's defense of Mortaine. 6. The Falaise Pocket, known as the "Killing Ground, " where the remnants of two German armies were trapped and bombed and shelled into submission. The slaughter was so great that 5,000 Germans were buried in one mass grave. 7. The Liberation of Paris, led by the 2nd Free French Armored Division, which had been fighting for four long years with this goal in mind.

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Knights of the Skull is a full-color, graphic non-fiction series chronicling the development of the German Panzer (armored) forces in World War II. Volume 2 starts with the April 1941 Balkans and Greece campaigns, then moves into the planning and early months of Operation Barbarossa—the German invasion of the Soviet Union in June 1941. With detailed, and historically accurate illustrations of vehicles, uniforms, locations, and characters, this vivid chronicle of the early years of World War II in Europe is not only an artistic look at the war, but is also a concise history of Germany's influential approach to armored warfare. Tactics developed and executed during Germany's 1939–41 campaigns changed warfare forever, and were honed throughout the remaining years of the war.

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Fought in the winter of 1944-1945, the coldest season in over 100 years, the Battle of the Bulge still ranks as the single largest battle ever fought by the United States Army. Thirty-one American divisions - fully one-third of the U.S. Army raised during World War II - saw action in this battle. This battle was truly a test: could this conscript army from a pacifistic democracy defeat the best remaining men and machines that Germany's totalitarian government could produce? In Battle of the Bulge, author and artist Wayne Vansant brings readers into the frozen foxholes, haunting forests, and devastated villages of the Ardennes during that freezing cold winter. With meticulous historical accuracy and hand-drawn visuals that can tell a story in ways words alone cannot, Vansant recounts the Bulge with insightful detail, replaying the thrusts and volleys of both the combined Allied and German forces during the tumultuous battle. This is a story of panic, fear, and physical misery; a story of how a generation of draftees, National Guardsmen, and a small core of regular officers and NCOs faced those three elements as snow piled around their foxholes and the incessant drumming of artillery splintered the woods that gave them shelter. It is the story of men, frozen and hurting, far from home and holding little hope of seeing it again until the killing finally ended. Above all, The Battle of the Bulge is a story of incredible triumph, now beautifully illustrated in graphic novel format for the first time.

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