Ed Ruggero - Books

Combat Jump: The Young Men Who Led the Assault Into Fortress Europe, July 1943 (HarperCollins 2003)

As the Allies prepared to invade Sicily in July 1943, the US Army deployed a new type of combat outfit: the paratroopers of the 505 Regimental Combat Team. Their mission was to jump behind enemy lines, seize the approaches to the invasion beaches and hold off German counterattacks until the invading troops came ashore.
By first light on D-Day, July 10, it looked as if the mission would fail. Inexperienced pilots, lost or blown off course, dropped eighty percent of the troopers from one to sixty miles from their targets. The American commander, Colonel Jim Gavin, landed so far from his objective that he was not even sure he was in Sicily. Nearly everything that could go wrong did, and yet—in their very first combat action—the paratroopers managed to accomplish their missions. The costly lessons they learned shaped the war in Europe for, without Sicily, there might have been no airborne invasion of France on June 6, 1944. Combat Jump recounts the extraordinary contributions these young men made when their country called them to war.

“Ruggero is a first-rate storyteller, abetted by the vivid memories of the soldiers who lived through it.”

DENVER POST