Quotes from Alex Kershaw

The content of your character is your choice. Day by day, what you choose, what you think, what you do—is who you become. Your integrity is your destiny Ã¢â'¬Â¦ it is the light that guides your way. —HERACLITUS

Like his other books, Kershaw has written a rousing tale of little-known heroes . . . The Few marks Kershaw as a master storyteller." — Booklist

His only realistic hope of survival was to order his own artillery to fire on his positions to stall the German attack. Some of his own men might be killed, but "pulling the chain," as it was called, was his only option.

Indeed, good leaders were often good actors, able to convince their men if not themselves that they would somehow prevail.

Italian foe in Sicily. From now on, the men

Although most well-informed people have heard of Wallenberg today, many, including Jews, know less about him than about Oscar Schindler, who saved far fewer people and in any case profited from their forced labor.

Ninety percent of all German combat deaths had in fact occurred fighting the Soviets, who had suffered and sacrificed most to defeat Hitler: an astounding 65 percent of all Allied fatalities.

Parisians were starting to chafe against rationing and other restrictions despite their occupiers going to extraordinary lengths to foster good relations. German soldiers were not allowed to smoke or loosen their ties in public, buy cocaine in bars, go swimming in the Seine, sing or dance in the street

Here we are, a quarter of a century later," declared Clark, "with the same Allies as before, fighting the same mad dogs that were let loose in 1918." Clark

It is better to be here ready to protect the peace than to take blind shelter across the sea, rushing to respond only after freedom is lost. We've learned that isolationism never was and never will be an acceptable response to tyrannical governments with an expansionist intent.

Patton was being driven in a jeep. Just days before, the silver-haired Seventh Army commander had admitted to a fellow general that the two things he loved most in life were "fucking and fighting.

The news was far from encouraging. The Germans were waging a stunningly successful campaign of blitzkrieg—lightning war—coordinating massed tank attacks with strikes from the air, in particular from a new dive bomber, the Junkers 87, which