Following the raid on Pearl Harbor and the entry of the United States
into World War II, President Franklin D. Roosevelt identified the
European theatre as his country's priority. Their first joint operation
with the British was an amphibious invasion of French North Africa,
designed to relieve pressure on their new Soviet allies, eliminate the
threat of the French navy joining the Germans, and to shore up the
vulnerability of British imperial possessions and trade routes through
the Mediterranean.
Operation Torch was the largest and most complex amphibious invasion of
its time. In November 1942, three landings took place simultaneously
across the French North African coast in an ambitious attempt to trap
and annihilate the Axis' North African armies between the invading
forces under General Eisenhower and British Field-Marshall Montgomery's
Eighth Army in Egypt.
Using full-color artwork, maps, and contemporary photographs, this is
the thrilling story of this complex operation.