Operation Biting
The 1942 Parachute Assault to Capture Hitler's Radar
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Operation Biting
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Narrated by:
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Max Hastings
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John Hopkins
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By:
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Max Hastings
About this listen
In this enthralling history, internationally bestselling author Max Hastings recounts the odds-defying Operation Biting, a 1942 parachute commando raid on Northern France to steal vital components of German intelligence—one of the most thrilling British commando raids of World War II, and one of the most successful.
In February 1942, RAF intelligence was baffled by a newly identified radar network on the coast of Nazi-occupied Europe, codenamed Würzburg. British intelligence proposed an assault to capture key components. Incredibly brave agents of the French Resistance risked their lives to probe the German defenses on the Normandy coast. Then a company of Airborne forces were dropped into France in the dead of night amid heavy snow. Launching their attack, the allied soldiers dismantled the German’s radar, and after three nail-biting hours and a fierce battle with Wehrmacht defenders, escaped in the nick of time using landing-craft that carried them back across the stormy seas to Portsmouth.
Operation Biting retells this dramatic operation through a gallery of amazing characters from Winston Churchill, who promoted the raid, to Lord Mountbatten, who commanded Combined Operations, to the brave unsung commandos who fought their way through enemy territory.
A cliffhanger of a story that ratchets the suspense to the last page, Operation Biting sheds new light on an exciting and little-known chapter of the Second World War.
Supplemental enhancement PDF accompanies the audiobook.
PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.
©2024 Max Hastings (P)2024 HarperCollins PublishersListeners also enjoyed...
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 13
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 10
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Story4 out of 5 stars 11
The untold story of four special operations officers who fought together behind enemy lines across multiple theaters of World War II, and then continued to serve, officially and unofficially, for decades after in the hottest parts of the Cold War.
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1 out of 5 stars
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Disappointing
- By thecol on 10-16-24
By: Shannon Monaghan
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The Secret War
- Spies, Ciphers, and Guerrillas, 1939-1945
- By: Max Hastings
- Narrated by: Steven Crossley
- Length: 30 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 386
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 342
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 337
Spies, codes, and guerrillas played unprecedentedly critical roles in the Second World War, exploited by every nation in the struggle to gain secret knowledge of its foes, and to sow havoc behind the fronts. In The Secret War, Max Hastings presents a worldwide cast of characters and some extraordinary sagas of intelligence and resistance, to create a new perspective on the greatest conflict in history.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Better read than listened to
- By B. In -t Veld on 03-25-17
By: Max Hastings
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Max Hastings on War
- By: Max Hastings
- Narrated by: Max Hastings
- Length: 13 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 19
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 13
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 13
Hastings has been a life-long student of warfare, a ‘chronicler of conflict’, working first as a foreign correspondent on battlefields, then as a prolific prize-winning historian of the 20th century’s greatest struggles. He has now been studying warfare for over fifty years, published thirty books, and given hundreds of talks and lectures. Here are thirteen of the best. Addressing questions of truth versus myth and revisiting many last-generation narratives, Hastings leads us through the most important conflicts in recent times.
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1 out of 5 stars
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War is hell get over it
- By lawrence c. on 11-09-23
By: Max Hastings
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Cassino '44
- The Brutal Battle for Rome
- By: James Holland
- Narrated by: Al Murray
- Length: 19 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 23
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 21
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 21
As the new year of 1944 began in Italy, the Allied army’s momentum had ground to a halt just south of the vaunted German Gustav Line of defense, far short of their initial objective of liberating Rome by Christmas. The fighting up the Italian peninsula had been brutal—rugged terrain, fierce resistance, terrible weather. While Allied leaders in London prepared for the cross-Channel invasion of France later that spring, the war in the West hinged in Italy.
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5 out of 5 stars
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No “petulant hatred” found
- By Gabby J on 11-21-24
By: James Holland
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Operation Chastise
- The RAF's Most Brilliant Attack of World War II
- By: Max Hastings
- Narrated by: Max Hastings, Peter Noble
- Length: 11 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 129
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 105
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Story5 out of 5 stars 105
The attack on Nazi Germany’s dams on May 17, 1943, was one of the most remarkable feats in military history. The absurdly young men of the Royal Air Force’s 617 Squadron set forth in cold blood and darkness, without benefit of electronic aids, to fly lumbering heavy bombers straight and level towards a target at a height above the water less than the length of a bowling alley. Yet this story has never been told in full. Max Hastings takes us back to the May 1943 raid to reveal how the truth of that night is considerably different from the popularized account most people know.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Wish He Had Stuck to the Core Story
- By John on 06-22-20
By: Max Hastings
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Churchill's Citadel
- Chartwell and the Gatherings Before the Storm
- By: Katherine Carter
- Narrated by: Harrie Dobby
- Length: 12 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 10
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 10
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 10
In the 1930s, amidst an impending crisis in Europe, Winston Churchill found himself out of government and with little power. In these years, Chartwell, his country home in Kent, became the headquarters of his campaign against Nazi Germany. He invited trusted advisors and informants, including Albert Einstein and T. E. Lawrence, who could strengthen his hand as he worked tirelessly to sound the alarm at the prospect of war.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Excellent Book, Narrator Good but “Admirality”??
- By J P. Rich on 04-02-25
By: Katherine Carter
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The Wehrmacht's Last Stand: The German Campaigns of 1944-1945
- Modern War Studies
- By: Robert M. Citino
- Narrated by: Tom Beyer
- Length: 25 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 39
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 36
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 36
By 1943, the war was lost, and most German officers knew it. What kept the German army going in an increasingly hopeless situation? Where some historians have found explanations in the power of Hitler or the role of ideology, Robert M. Citino, the world's leading scholar on the subject, posits a more straightforward solution: Bewegungskrieg, the way of war cultivated by the Germans over the course of history. In this book, Citino charts the path by which Bewegungskrieg, or a "war of movement," inexorably led to Nazi Germany's defeat.
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5 out of 5 stars
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The fake English with a pseudo German accent,
- By Neil on 11-29-24
By: Robert M. Citino
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The Korean War
- By: Max Hastings
- Narrated by: Frederick Davidson
- Length: 17 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 352
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 265
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 264
It was the first war we could not win. At no other time since World War II have two superpowers met in battle. Max Hastings, preeminent military historian, takes us back to the bloody, bitter struggle to restore South Korean independence after the Communist invasion of June 1950.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Inspiring and Hard Hitting
- By David Ewing on 08-06-07
By: Max Hastings
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World War Two
- A Graphic Account of the Greatest and Most Terrible Event in Human History (All You Need to Know)
- By: Sir Max Hastings
- Narrated by: Jon Connell
- Length: 3 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 9
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 8
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 9
Within Western culture, World War Two continues to exercise an extraordinary fascination for generations unborn when it took place. The obvious explanation is that it was the greatest and most terrible event in human history. Within the vast compass of the struggle, some individuals scaled summits of courage and nobility, while others plumbed depths of evil, in a fashion that compels the awe of posterity.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Takeaways from our most eloquent living historian
- By Ted on 10-16-22
By: Sir Max Hastings
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SBS – Silent Warriors
- The Authorised Wartime History
- By: Saul David
- Narrated by: John Hopkins
- Length: 14 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall5 out of 5 stars 13
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 11
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 11
Britain’s SBS - or Special Boat Service - was the world’s first maritime special operations unit. Founded in the dark days of 1940, it started as a small and inexperienced outfit that leaned heavily on volunteers’ raw courage and boyish enthusiasm. It would become one of the most effective fighting forces of the Second World War - and has served as a model for Special Forces ever since.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Great book
- By Amazon Customer on 05-03-25
By: Saul David
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Leyte Gulf
- A New History of the World's Largest Sea Battle
- By: Mark E. Stille
- Narrated by: John Chancer
- Length: 14 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 70
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 63
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 63
Pacific War expert Mark Stille examines the key aspects of battle of Leyte Gulf, the largest naval encounter in history and probably the most decisive naval battle of the entire Pacific War, with new and insightful analysis and dismantles the myths surrounding the respective actions and overall performances of the two most important commanders in the battle, and the “lost victory” of the Japanese advance into Leyte Gulf that never happened.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Perhaps a little scholarly
- By Michael Kiehn on 11-14-24
By: Mark E. Stille
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Book and Dagger
- How Scholars and Librarians Became the Unlikely Spies of World War II
- By: Elyse Graham
- Narrated by: Saskia Maarleveld
- Length: 10 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 41
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 38
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 38
At the start of WWII, the U.S. found itself in desperate need of an intelligence agency. The Office of Strategic Services (OSS), a precursor to today’s CIA, was quickly formed—and, in an effort to fill its ranks with experts, the OSS turned to academia for recruits. Suddenly, literature professors, librarians, and historians were training to perform undercover operations and investigative work—and these surprising spies would go on to profoundly shape both the course of the war and our cultural institutions with their efforts.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Libraries!!! Winning!!!
- By M Fox on 03-06-25
By: Elyse Graham
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Operation Vengeance
- The Astonishing Aerial Ambush That Changed World War II
- By: Dan Hampton
- Narrated by: John Pruden
- Length: 11 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 161
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 144
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 144
In 1943, the United States military began to plan one of the most dramatic secret missions of World War II. Its code name was Operation Vengeance. Naval Intelligence had intercepted the itinerary of Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto, the commander in chief of the Japanese Combined Fleet, whose stealth attack on Pearl Harbor precipitated America’s entry into the war. Harvard-educated, Yamamoto was a close confidant of Emperor Hirohito and a brilliant tactician who epitomized Japanese military might.
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1 out of 5 stars
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I want 1/2 my money back
- By DPM on 08-11-20
By: Dan Hampton
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Vietnam
- An Epic Tragedy, 1945-1975
- By: Max Hastings
- Narrated by: Max Hastings, Peter Noble
- Length: 33 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall5 out of 5 stars 1,711
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 1,505
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Story5 out of 5 stars 1,496
Vietnam became the Western world’s most divisive modern conflict, precipitating a battlefield humiliation for France in 1954, then a vastly greater one for the US in 1975. Max Hastings has spent the past three years interviewing scores of participants on both sides, as well as researching a multitude of American and Vietnamese documents and memoirs, to create an epic narrative of an epic struggle. Here are the vivid realities of strife amid jungle and paddies that killed two million people.
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5 out of 5 stars
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A more nuanced view than Ken Burns' companion book
- By Vu on 10-21-18
By: Max Hastings
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The Rise of Germany, 1939-1941
- The War in The West, Volume 1
- By: James Holland
- Narrated by: Paul Boehmer
- Length: 27 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 320
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 281
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 282
For seven decades, our understanding of World War II has been shaped by a standard narrative built on conventional wisdom, propaganda, the dramatic but narrow experiences of soldiers on the ground, and an early generation of historians. For his new history, James Holland has spent over 12 years unearthing new research, recording original testimony, and visiting battlefields and archives that have never before been so accessible.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Good Book painfully read
- By richard on 01-21-16
By: James Holland
Great story well told.
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Just excellent. So enjoyable.
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Another Tour de Force by Sir Max Hastings
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Not as great as most of his other books
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