'Preparing for the Final Battle' with Patrick K. O’Donnell, D. M. Giangreco & Nick Mueller

"Preparing for the Final Battle" explores the last year of World War II, focusing on the decisive campaigns and little-known intelligence operations that hastened the Allied victory. Featuring Patrick K. O’Donnell and D. M. Giangreco, the session highlights heroic OSS missions in the European Alps, the strategic importance of Soviet involvement in the Pacific, and the multifaceted decisions surrounding Japan's surrender. This session is part of The National WWII Museum's 2024 International Conference on World War II presented by the Pritzker Military Foundation, on behalf of the Pritzker Military Museum & Library. For more information: https://www.nationalww2museum.org/abo... The International Conference on World War II is the premier adult educational event bringing together the best and brightest scholars, authors, historians, and witnesses to history from around the globe to discuss key battles, personalities, strategies, issues, and controversies of the war that changed the world. Joining the featured speakers are hundreds of attendees who travel from all over the world to learn and connect with each other through engaging discussions, question-and-answer periods, book signings, and receptions throughout the weekend. Patrick O’Donnell is a best-selling, critically acclaimed military historian and an expert on elite units. The author of 13 books, including The Unvanquished, The Indispensables, Washington’s Immortals, Dog Company, Beyond Valor, and They Dared Return, he has received numerous national awards. He is a director and the historian for the OSS Society. O’Donnell served as a combat historian in a US Marine Corps rifle platoon during the Battle of Fallujah and is a professional speaker on America’s conflicts, espionage, special operations, and counterinsurgency. Over the past 30-plus years, O’Donnell has interviewed thousands of WWII veterans and members of elite and special operations units, amassing the most extensive private collection of oral histories on the subject. He has provided historical consulting for HBO’s award-winning miniseries Band of Brothers and for scores of documentaries produced by the BBC, Fox News, and the History Channel. D. M. Giangreco served as an editor of Military Review at the US Army Command and General Staff College, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, for 20 years and subsequently as the editor and publications director for the Foreign Military Studies Office, also at Fort Leavenworth. He is the award-winning author or coauthor of 14 books on military and sociopolitical subjects, including Hell to Pay: Operation Downfall and the Invasion of Japan, 1945-1947 as well as Eyewitness Pacific Theater: Firsthand Accounts of the War in the Pacific from Pearl Harbor to the Atomic Bombs. Giangreco’s most recent work is Truman and the Bomb: The Untold Story. The second volume of his book The Soldier from Independence: A Military Biography of Harry S. Truman will be released in 2025. Nick Mueller is Founding President & CEO Emeritus of The National WWII Museum. Mueller assisted historian Stephen E. Ambrose, PhD, in founding the institution, initially known as The National D-Day Museum, and led the organization as Chairman of the Board from 1998, through its fundraising and construction to the Grand Opening on June 6, 2000, and then as President & CEO for the next 17 years. Before stepping into the museum world, Mueller enjoyed a 33-year career as a professor of European history at the University of New Orleans. During his tenure there, he also served as Dean, Vice Chancellor, and founding President of the Research and Technology Park. He is also founder of UNO’s Metropolitan College, Business-Higher Education Council, and the university’s International Study Programs. Mueller was awarded the 2018 Pritzker Military Museum & Library Founder’s Award for his immense contribution to furthering the public’s understanding of the citizen soldier and the military’s role in a democracy. Mueller’s book about the D-Day invasion, Everything We Have, was released in 2019. His book Preserving the Legacy, which tells the comprehensive and compelling story of the Museum’s founding and first two decades, will be published by LSU Press in May 2025.