Operation Barbarossa: Did you mean...?

A photograph of German Waffen SS motorcyclists during Operation Barbarossa, the attack by Adolf Hitler (1889-1945) on the USSR from June to December 1941. (Imperial War Museums)

A photograph showing a burning Russian village during Operation Barbarossa, the attack by Adolf Hitler (1889-1945) on the USSR from June to December 1941. (Imperial War Museums)

A photograph showing German troops on horseback passing a destroyed Soviet T-26 tank during Operation Barbarossa, the attack by Adolf Hitler (1889-1945) on the USSR from June to December 1941. Horses were used by both sides for want of mechanised...

Operation Torch (aka the North Africa landings) landed Allied troops in French Morocco and Algeria on 8 November 1942 with the aim of removing German and Italian forces from North Africa. The first jointly-planned Allied operation of the...

Operation Compass (9 Dec 1940 to 7 Feb 1941) was an Allied offensive in North Africa, which pushed Italian forces out of Egypt and then Cyrenaica (Eastern Libya). The Allied Western Desert Force, led by Lieutenant-General Richard O'Connor...

Operation Gomorrah (aka the Battle of Hamburg or Hamburg Air Offensive) was a sustained area bombing campaign of the German port of Hamburg in four night attacks by the Royal Air Force and two daytime attacks by the United States Air Force...

Operation Chastise, the 'Dambusters' raid, was an attack by a squadron of RAF Lancaster bombers on the dams of the Ruhr basin in Germany in May 1943. Led by Squadron Leader Guy Gibson, the bombers breached two dams causing enormous flooding...

This image, a miniature from the "Welfenchronik" (History of the Guelphs), which dates to the late twelfth century CE, shows Frederick I Barbarossa (r. 1152-1190 CE), flanked by his sons.

The Holy Roman Empire officially lasted from 962 to 1806. It was one of Europe’s largest medieval and early modern states, but its power base was unstable and continually shifting. The Holy Roman Empire was not a unitary state, but a confederation...

The Third Crusade (1189-1192 CE) was launched to retake Jerusalem after its fall to the Muslim leader Saladin in 1187 CE. The Crusade was led by three European monarchs, hence its other name of 'the Kings' Crusade'. The three leaders were...