June 10th, 1942...Another Japanese officer hears the news of Midway in a PoW camp in Tennessee. Kazuo Sakamaki, sole survivor of the midget sub attack on Pearl Harbor, is the sole Japanese PoW. He and his submarine have gone from California to Tennessee, the former in captivity with Japanese civilian internees, the latter on show to sell War Bonds. Sakamaki hears the Japanese version of the battle, but believes what he reads in American newspapers. On his long journey to Tennessee, Sakamaki has seen countless factories, endless fields of grain, and massive cities, revealing the full power of the American economy, and knows that Japan is in for a long, bloody, and futile, war.

In Japan, however, the "great victory" is announced on radio with fanfares and the "Battleship March." Japan has "secured supreme power in the Pacific" and the war has been "indeed determined with one battle." Japan claims to have sunk two American carriers, bombed Midway and Dutch Harbor, and taken two Aleutian islands. The radio announcers denounce American reports that Japan lost four carriers at Midway. Not until after the war will the Japanese people learn of the disaster. Tokyo stages a flag procession and victory parade.

King George VI departs Scapa Flow, and as his ferryboat departs, it signals "Zebra-Tommy-Monkey," which means "splice the main brace." The British Sailors recognize that as an order of an extra gill of rum for all hands. The "dry" American ships cannot comply.

The Chinese withdraw from Chekiang Province's city of Chuhsien after four days of hard fighting.

The USS Santa Fe, a light cruiser, is launched in Camden, NJ, six months ahead of schedule.

At 5 a.m., in Lidice, Czechoslovakia, the school doors are unlocked, and the village's women emerge to find their village a shambles, the street strewn with the remnants of their belongings. Women and children are herded into trucks, and driven off, while the men are lined up in the courtyard of the Horak farm. The 198 women and 98 children are driven to Kladno, and locked up in the school gym for three days without food or sanitation. One frightened woman prematurely gives birth.

There, an SS team props up a line of mattresses against the barn wall to prevent ricochets, and brings out the men and boys, 10 at a time, and shoot all 173 to death, from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. until every living being left in town...including dogs in their kennels...are dead. Some of the victims are visitors from nearby towns, who were in Lidice for a nip of beer at the village's bars, bringing the death toll to 192.

After the massacre, German engineers, under the eye of the new Reichsprotector, Kurt Daluege -- a former sanitary engineer and concentration camp boss -- destroy the village. Engineers set the buildings on fire with gasoline. Troops pull down the walls, and use bulldozers to flatten the ruins, uproot the fruit trees, and fill in the lake. They even divert the stream. Plows are driven back and forth across the rubble, so that no recognizable outline should remain. When all is done, the Germans put up a barbed wire fence warning that trespassers will be shot. Lidice is reduced to a brown blotch of broken rubble, obscene and sterile amid the growing crops.

Daleuge has the entire affair filmed, including the piles of dead men, the tumbled graves in the desecrated cemetery, and officers in snappy uniforms inspecting the debris.

Another Blitzkrieg in the East as two German armies of 33 division, five of them panzer, attack from Kharkov on the Volchansk Front, a massive assault that will roll on until the 26th, scattering the Soviets ahead of them.

Col. Gunther Baade, a German English-speaking officer who keeps a dress in his bags (in case he has to make a sudden escape) is ordered to attack Bir Hacheim. Despite his eccentricities, Baade is a fierce fighter, and he hammers the French back. 110 Stukas drop 130 tons of bombs on the position. Rommel reports that he can take the fort the next day. The French have no mortar ammunition left. Koenig orders the breakout by night, making detailed plans. Units in contact with the enemy are to stay in position until the last moment. Two companies will remain behind as a deception party. All secret documents are carried out. The retreat heads southwest, to fool the Germans.

At 10:30 p.m. the convoys move out. German artillery opens up, burning several vehicles. The breakout becomes a nightmare of bursting shells and parachute flares, machine gun fire, and infantry battles. French troops run into German minefields.

June 11th, 1942...The court-martial of German army captain Michael Kitzelmann ends in Orel. Kitzelmann, who won an Iron Cross Second Class for bravery, has spoken out against atrocities being committed on the Eastern Front. "If these criminals should win," he has told his fellow officers, "I would have no wish to live any longer." Kitzelmann's wish is granted. He is shot by a firing squad that day.

American aircraft start pounding Kiska to destroy the new Japanese base, to regain this piece of American soil. The air raids do damage to both sides, with the Alaskan weather as the victor.

Two convoys set sail for Malta, "Harpoon" from Gibraltar being the first. This force features five freighters, an American tanker, Kentucky, an AA cruiser, nine destroyers, and four minesweepers, all British . The covering force to the Sicilian Channel consists of two carriers, a battleship, three cruisers, and eight destroyers.

The second convoy, leaving from Port Said, has 11 freighters, escorted by seven light cruisers and 26 destroyers, reinforced by the already strained Royal Navy Eastern Fleet from the Indian Ocean. The two convoys face German and Italian aircraft, E-boats, and submarines, not to mention the Italian Navy, with its 15-inch gun battleships.

By dawn at Bir Hacheim, the French are still struggling to break out from their positions. More than 1,500 Frenchmen have reached British lines, a number that rises to 2,000 by 8 a.m., and includes General Koenig by noon. 2,700 of the original 3,600 Frenchmen have successfully withdrawn in the face of the Afrika Korps, an impressive military feat, as a withdrawal is one of the most difficult of all operations. Rommel pays tribute, writing that "In spite of all our security measures, the greater part of the garrison broke out...under the leadership of their commander, General Koenig."

That morning, the 90th Light Division finally occupies Bir Hacheim. The Germans capture 500 wounded men and 1,200 separate positions for infantry and heavy weapons.

The 14-day defense of Bir Hacheim has bought time for the 8th Army. Rommel cannot resume the offensive until late on the 11th, which gives the British time to start withdrawing their infantry west of Tobruk. French casualties are 900, 24 75mm guns, and most of the brigade's transport. The Germans have lost 51 tanks, five self-propelled guns, 15 armored cars, and seven planes.

But now the southern half of the Gazala Line no longer exists, and the British, down to 250 tanks, must retreat in the face of Rommel's 160 German and 60 Italian machines.

June 12th, 1942...USS Washington gets back to work, sailing for Hvalfjordur in Iceland. Her mission is to provide a cover force for a new convoy bound for Russia. This convoy will consist of 37 ships -- 20 American, 12 British, two Russian, and one each from Panama, the Netherlands, and Norway -- loaded with 300 aircraft, 600 Sherman tanks, 4,000 trucks and jeeps, and 150,000 tons of general military cargo, enough to equip 50,000 Soviet troops. The convoy will be called PQ-17.

George John Dasch, a German spy, climbs out of U-202 at 8 p.m., just off the Long Island Coast. He and his team of spies, dressed as German marines, are part of Operation Pastorius, a Nazi attempt to infiltrate saboteurs into America. Dasch's team is to destroy the hydroelectric plants at Niagara Falls, the Alcoa factories in Illinois, Tennessee, and New York, the Philadelphia Salt Company's cryolite plant in Philadelphia, and bomb locks on the Ohio River. A second team is to destroy the Pennsylvania Railroad station in Newark, NJ, the Hell Gate Bridge in New York, and locks in St. Louis and Cincinnati. Both teams are also to plant bombs in Jewish-owned department stores, to create terror.

Each group has $50,000 for living expenses and bribes, and each member carries $4,000 on a money belt, and four waterproof wooden crates, each twice the size of a shoebox, full of dynamite, incendiary bombs, timing devices, fuses, and wire.

Dasch and his party row ashore, change into civilian clothes, and start to bury their supplies. As they do, a US Coast Guardsman, SN John Cullen, wanders up. Dasch intercepts Cullen and tells him they are stranded fishermen, but don't want to go to the Coast Guard station, as they don't have any IDs or permits. Cullen gets suspicious. As Dasch, a glib English- speaker, tries to negotiate his way out of trouble, one of his team, Ernest Burger, walks up and asks Dasch a question in German. Dasch tells Burger in English to go away, but Cullen knows something is wrong.

Dasch offers the Coast Guardsman a $100 bribe to forget about this incident. "I wouldn't want to kill you," Dasch says. "Forget about this and I'll give you some money and you can have a good time." Cullen refuses. Dasch grabs Cullen's light and shines it on his own face. "You'll be meeting me in East Hampton sometime. Do you know me?"

"No sir, I never saw you before in my life."
"My name is George John Davis. What's yours?"
"Frank Collins," Cullen lies, and he bolts into the fog.

Cullen, however, has returned to his post, summoned his shipmates, who dug up the beach, find the munitions crates and German uniforms, and alert the FBI.

Ten Poles, accused of sabotage in an iron foundry in the Silesian town of Dabrowa Gornicza, are hanged at a street corner, and left hanging as a warning to future saboteurs.

Radio Berlin reports a great victory at Bir Hacheim and adds that the "white and colored Frenchmen taken at Bir Hacheim, since they do not belong to a regular army...will be executed." Charles De Gaulle issues a counter-threat, warning that his troops will retaliate against German PoWs. Radio Berlin does a fast backtrack the same day, saying, "On the subject of the French forces who have been captured in the fighting at Bir Hacheim, no misunderstanding is possible. General de Gaulle's men will be treated as soldiers."

General Sir Claude Auchinlek sends a congratulatory note to the 1st Free French Brigade for their successful stand at Bir Hacheim.

In Libya, Rommel attacks (his favorite tactic) and hurls his tanks against two British armoured brigades. The RAF flies 600 sorties against the Afrika Korps, as the tank battle moves to a climax. The German Panzers drive on Tobruk, attempting to cut off the northern half of the 8th Army. The British finally attack at noon with two armoured brigades, 2nd and 4th, hurling the Grant tanks against Rommel's Mark III Panzers. 21st Panzer Division crashes into 4th Armoured's right flank and knocks out 20 tanks in minutes. 15th Panzer blasts through the British. By nightfall, the British are facing numerical inferiority and a critical loss of morale. The British are down to 70 tanks and 30th Corps on the verge of dissolution. Even so, Lt. Col. H.R.B. Foote of 7th Royal Tank Regiment refuses to relinquish command despite a series of painful wounds, earning himself a Victoria Cross.

The Halpro mission, one of the forgotten accomplishments of World War II, rolls out of the Nile Delta, as American B-24 bombers fly 900 miles from Egypt to Rumania, to bomb the oilfields at Ploesti. Col. Harry Halverson leads the strike. Several of the B-24s are forced to land in Turkey, low on fuel, and the crews are interned. This is the first strategic attack by American forces on Europe, and it does little damage.

June 13th, 1942...The Japanese light cruiser Nagara arrives at Kure in Japan, and transfers her wounded to the hospital ship Hikawa Maru. Wounded survivors of Midway are told not to go to Tokyo, as they will be arrested. The defeat must be kept secret.

Thousands of miles away, USS Enterprise secures her main engines and doubles up her lines at Pearl Harbor, ambulances lined up in the sunshine. The harbor is lined with spectators from the base, who are too stunned by the victory to cheer.

New York holds a "New York At War" Parade, and 2.5 million people mass to watch the 11-hour parade by 500,000 soldiers from US and Allied armed forces. President Roosevelt issues a call for American people to turn in "every bit of rubber you can possibly spare -- and in quantity and any form" to gasoline stations.

Meanwhile, the FBI takes over the case of the German spies, imposing a news blackout, FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover orders the largest manhunt in FBI history.

Nonetheless, Dasch and Burger, dining at the Hotel Martinique in Manhattan, both decide to betray the spy operation, believing that they were identified by Cullen, and surrender might save their lives.

At Peenemunde on Germany's Baltic coast, Dr. Werner Von Braun launches a 12-ton rocket with a one-ton warhead before Luftwaffe Field Marshal Erhard Milch and Minister for Armaments Albert Speer. This rocket, called the "A4" by the Germans, is to have a range of 200 miles. However, the test ends in failure. Though the rocket is successfully fired, it crashes to earth a mile away, baffling Von Braun's scientists, and not impressing Speer and Milch.

In North Africa, both sides are exhausted in the intense heat around the Knightsbridge. The Germans attack positions held by the Scots Guards and South Africans, who fight to the last gun. By nightfall, the 201st Guards Brigade must retreat. Rommel writes, "This brigade was almost the living embodiment of the virtues and faults of the British soldier -- tremendous courage and tenacity combined with a rigid lack of mobility."

General Ritchie, commanding the 8th Army, decides to retreat.

In Kladno, Czechoslovakia, the 198 women and 98 children deported from Lidice, still unfed and ignorant of their husbands' deaths, are packed into cattle cars and buses, children separated from their mothers. The women are sent by rail to Ravensbruck concentration camp, where 35 are sent on to Auschwitz, where they are used for medical experiments. None survive the war.

The rest are swallowed up in Ravensbruck for three years of toil, starvation, and beatings. Only 143 survive to see liberation, and search for their lost children.

The 99 children are taken away. Eight, under one year old, are taken to a hospital in Prague to be reared as Germans. The rest go to Lodz in Poland, where the SS Race and Resettlement Office pick out nine more as suitable for Germanization. They are allocated to German families where they are brought up to forget their Czech origins. These 17 survive to be returned to their own people.

As for the remaining 82 children, they are sent to gas chambers at Chemnitz, on the orders of SS Col. Adolf Eichmann.

The Nazis make no effort to hide what they have done, broadcasting their deed to the world, saying that the inhabitants of Lidice had killed Heydrich, and were "in the active service of the enemy abroad. As a consequence, all the men have been shot, the women taken to concentration camps, and the children placed in suitable educational institutions. Houses and buildings have been razed to the ground, and the name of the village wiped out."

Three towns in the United States promptly change their names to Lidice.