The November 1942 invasion of North Africa, code-named "Operation Torch," was nothing less than a dress rehearsal for the invasion of France two years later. The first combined U.S.-British offensive of the war, it was a major tactical and moral victory for the Allies, and one of the great epics of World War II; but it was also a catalog of near disaster, confusion, blunder, and bitter conflict between senior commanders from both sides. Now, fifty years later, historian. Norman Gelb masterfully re-creates the remarkable story of this campaign, which developed the strategy and tactics crucial to Germany's ultimate defeat. His story begins in early 1942, when the United States, England, and the Soviet Union appeared locked in a losing struggle against the Axis powers. Yet just how and where to launch their offensive divided the Allies from the start: The Americans sought a frontal assault against Hitler's Fortress Europe--an invasion of. France aimed at opening the second front desperately urged by Stalin to keep the Soviets in the war. The British, convinced that a cross-Channel attack would be a devastating failure, proposed instead French North Africa. The story of how Churchill hijacked the direction of Allied strategy from Roosevelt's generals and determined the future course of World War II in Europe is as dramatic and suspenseful as was the planning and execution of Torch itself. The military. Operation was an intricate, multifaceted undertaking that included not only political intrigue, conspiracy, espionage, and diplomacy, but also modern airborne assault, massive disinformation programs, and the largest, most ambitious amphibious invasion plan ever devised. But Desperate Venture is, above all, a story of men: It was the baptism by fire for America's soldiers, most of whom would conclude their ocean crossing (still training en route) by hitting the beaches. And going directly into combat, as well as for Torch's untested Supreme Commander, Dwight D. Eisenhower, who had neither battle nor senior command experience. Gelb's account--involving, either directly or on the periphery, war planners in Washington and London and warriors like Generals Patton, Clark, Montgomery, and Rommel--also takes readers from the salons and souks of Casablanca and Algiers into the deepest reaches of the German High Command, whose warnings and. Predictions about the invasion were repeatedly spurned by a distracted and doubting Fuhrer. Impeccably researched and rivetingly told, Desperate Venture reveals how, from a politically determined and hastily cobbled-together operation, the Allies learned to work together for victory--and how that victory sowed the seeds of the defeat of Hitler's armies in the west.