Hitler's forces had pressed in on the small Belgian town in a desperate offensive designed to push back the Allies, starting the Battle of the Bulge. So far, the US soldiers had managed to repel waves of attackers and even a panzer onslaught, but as their ammunition dwindled, the weary paratroopers of the 101st Airborne could only hope for a miracle--a miracle in the form of General George S. Patton and his Third Army. More than a hundred miles away, Patton, ordered to race his men to Bastogne, was already putting in motion the most crucial charge of his career. Tapped to spearhead his counterstrike against the Wehrmacht was the Fourth Armored Division, a bloodied but experienced unit that had fought and slogged its way across France. But blazing a trail into Belgium meant going up against some of the best infantry and tank units in the German Army. Failure to reach Bastogne in time could result in the overrunning of the 101st--a catastrophic defeat that could turn the tide of the war and secure victory for the Nazis.

William E. DePuy was likely the most important figure in the recovery of the United States Army from its collapse after the defeat in Vietnam. That is a rather large claim, and it suggests a precedence over a number of other distinguished officers, both his contemporaries and successors. But it is a claim that can be justified by the test of the “null hypothesis:” Could the Army that conducted the Gulf War be imagined without the actions of General DePuy and those he instructed and inspired? Clearly, it could not. There are a few officers of the period about whom one can make the same claim. To judge properly the accomplishments of General DePuy and his talented subordinates at the US Army Training and Doctrine Command (TRADOC), one must understand the sense of crises and defeat that pervaded the Army in the 1970s. By 1973, the United States had lost the war in Vietnam. Only the most optimistic or naïve observer held out hope that the Geneva Accords would provide security for the Republic of South Vietnam. The US Army was in a shambles, with discipline destroyed and the chain of command almost nonexistent. The “All Volunteer Army” was borne on a wave of permissiveness that compounded the problems of restoring discipline. Moreover, the army was ten years behind its most likely enemy in equipment development, and it had no warfighting doctrine worthy of the same. With the able assistance of the commander of the Armor Center, General Donn Starry, General DePuy wrenched the Army from self-pity and recrimination about its defeat in Vietnam into a bruising doctrinal debate that focused the Army's intellectual energies on mechanized warfare against a first-class opponent. Critics might argue correctly that that the result was incomplete, but they out not to underestimate how far the Army had to come just to begin the discussion. General DePuy also changed the way Army battalions prepared for war. He made the US Army a doctrinal force for the first time in history. Ably seconded by General Paul Gorman, DePuy led the Army into the age of the Army Training and Evaluation Program (ARTEP). The intellectual and training initiatives were joined then, with a third concern of General DePuy's TRADOC: the development of a set of equipment requirements, with a concentration of effort on a limited number, ultimately called the “Big Five.” The result was the suite of weapons that overmatched the Iraqis in Operation Desert Storm – Apache attack helicopters, M1 tanks, Bradley fighting vehicles, Patriot air defense missiles, and Black Hawk assault helicopters. General DePuy championed the recruitment of a high-quality soldiery, an effort beyond his own significant responsibilities but, even so, one he never ceased to support and forward.

The story opens in the stinking latrines of the Schubin camp as an American and a Canadian lead the digging of a tunnel which enabled a break involving 36 prisoners of war (POWs). The Germans then converted the camp to Oflag 64, to exclusively hold US Army officers, with more than 1500 Americans ultimately housed there. Plucky Americans attempted a variety of escapes until January, 1945, only to be thwarted every time. Then, with the Red Army advancing closer every day, camp commandant Colonel Fritz Schneider received orders from Berlin to march his prisoners west. Game on! Over the next few days, 250 US Army officers would succeed in escaping east to link up with the Russians - although they would prove almost as dangerous as the Nazis - only to be ordered once they arrived back in the United States not to talk about their adventures. Within months, General Patton would launch a bloody bid to rescue the remaining Schubin Americans. In The Big Break, this previously untold story follows POWs including General Eisenhower's personal aide, General Patton's son-in-law, and Ernest Hemingway's eldest son as they struggled to be free. Military historian and Paul Brickhill biographer Stephen Dando-Collins expertly chronicles this gripping story of Americans determined to be free, brave Poles risking their lives to help them, and dogmatic Nazis determined to stop them.

"Part of The US Army Large-Scale Combat Operations Series, Deep Operations compares and contrasts US and Soviet theoretical approaches to deep operations. It provides readings that outline the theoretical approach to conducting deep operations in order to prevail and win. The US Army may be well served to look at how operations were done in the past in order to gain insight into not only what an adversary is doing, but why they are doing operations in a certain way"--

Troy H. Middleton (1889-1976) was the youngest colonel in the American Expeditionary Force in France during World War I. Later, he served as commander of the Army’s 45th Division and then the VIII Corps. During World War II, Middleton spent more time in combat than any other general officer. General Middleton made key tactical decisions in the largest and most complex military action in which the U.S. Army has ever been involved—the Battle of the Bulge. In 1951, Louisiana State University’s board of supervisors appointed Middleton president of the university. He had previously served at the school as commandant of cadets, professor of military science, dean, and vice president. While president of LSU, Middleton oversaw a sustained period of growth and academic achievement. Like many other university presidents in the Jim Crow era, throughout his tenure at LSU, he also staunchly upheld his institution’s deeply-racist segregationist policies. In this thoroughly researched biography, Frank James Price tells Middleton’s life story from his boyhood plantation days in Copiah County, Mississippi, to his public service achievements after his retirement as president of Louisiana State University in 1962. In much of the book, the author, through taped interviews, allows Middleton to tell his own story. In researching the book, Price interviewed and/or corresponded with General Dwight D. Eisenhower, General Omar Bradley, and other personal acquaintances of General Middleton.