It has been a long day with another, longer one coming tomorrow but I would be remiss if I did not mention that today is the 80th anniversary of the American invasion of North Africa. One of the Second World War’s great ironies is that American troops’ first major engagement in the Atlantic Theater came largely against . . . the Vichy French. It was all over in seventy-two hours but don’t let the quick timeline fool you. It all could have gone so differently. The truth is we were fortunate things went the way they did. Marshall, Eisenhower and all the others had a steep learning curve.
(image/American troops land near Algiers, 8 November 1942/FDR Library)
The Strawfoot 
Rick Atkinson’s first volume on the maturing US
Army trilogy is terrific about this first US effort
on the African front.
Yes, that’s the definitive book on that phase of the war in the Atlantic. And right now Atkinson is at work on volume two of his Revolutionary War trilogy.