Plot Summary

Starting with the disastrous Allied assumption that the war in Europe would be over before the winter of 1944 (Hence the slang term). It covers the disastrous Operation Market Garden; the bloody invasion and battle of Peleliu; the incompetence of General Dahlquist and the rescue of the Lost Battalion by the 442nd during the horrendous Battle of Hürtgen Forest. General MacArthur returns to the Philippines, much of the Japanese fleet was destroyed at the Battle of Leyte Gulf, the heroism of the Japanese-American 442nd Regimental Combat Team; the thrill of the internees at the Santo Tomas internment camp in Manila in seeing American planes strafing Japanese ships in Manila Bay and the fall of Aachen, the first German city to be captured by the Allies. There are the experiences of black servicemen and those of American Indians. But the reality is that the war will not end in 1944, and more ground will have to be covered and lives lost to achieve the ultimate victory.