Army Attack #45

During the Battle of the Bulge, Corporal Al Hurlburt must race to demolish a stone bridge before the German Fifth Panzer Division uses it to cut off 250,000 American troops—but with his lieutenant wounded and a terrified young draftee named Lykens as his only support, he faces a desperate stand against Sgt. Otto Berchner's seasoned Nazi forces. As German tanks close in and Hurlburt fights to set the charges, a crucial problem threatens to undo everything: the demolition fuses have gone missing. Caught between a determined enemy and the clock, Hurlburt and Lykens must find a way to hold the line and complete their mission before the bridge falls into German hands.

Caught between two advancing armies, P.F.C. Lykens must shepherd his wounded Lieutenant across a freezing river while German forces close in from both banks—all to deliver demolition fuses that could stop Nazi tanks from crossing a critical bridge. As artillery shells rain down and the odds mount against survival, Lykens pushes forward through the merciless squeeze, driven by the knowledge that failure means far more than just his own death. Nicholas A. Alesia illustrates this desperate river crossing in "The Fugitives," a tense six-page war story that captures the brutal calculus of combat.

During the Battle of the Bulge, Corporal Al Hurlburt and P.F.C. Lykens find themselves in a desperate fight to destroy a strategic stone bridge before Nazi forces can use it to encircle American armies—all while the dedicated German sergeant Berchner hunts them with his machine pistol. As tanks close in and explosives must be set, the young replacement soldier discovers that courage and quick thinking might be the only weapons left. With Hitler himself watching the battle's progress from Berlin, this stone bridge becomes the flashpoint where one slug could change everything.

During the spring of 1951 in Korea, a scared young soldier in Baker Company faces his first real test under fire as the Chinese launch an attack on the American positions. Paralyzed by fear, he struggles with the choice between staying hidden and finding the courage to fight—a private battle playing out in his mind even as the enemy wave surges forward. This is the moment every fighting man must confront: can fear be overcome when it matters most?