This is John Batchelor, conversation with the author Michelle Parody, his new book The Light of Battle.

This is the story of Eisenhower from 1942 in the end of the North African campaign when he is assigned to be

supreme commander Allied Expeditionary Force, the Operation Overlord, the Second Front, the invasion of France via Normandy.

It is a very careful interweaving of the personalities and the struggles and the battles, verbal battles for the combined chiefs and actual battles

and the preparation for Overlord and the capture of Rome and the anticipation of other operations across this vast canvas of the

European War. This particular anecdote however is about Eisenhower's relationship with a young Irish woman named

Kaye Somersby who was his driver from 42 on and how Kaye Sommercby could drive.

She had volunteered into the Ambulance Corps

and driven during the Blitz and Russia in London

before Eisenhower arrived. This episode is Kay showing her skill set in a

blackout in a fog to deliver Eisenhower and his aides to the proper address without a miss.

Also there's much more to say about Sommer's B but she's extremely winning,

especially in Michelle Perides' presentation.

The Light of Battle, the Story of Eisenhower and the Operation Overlord, the Invasion of France, and and the emergence of America as a superpower

competing with and eventually overwhelming the French Empire the British

Empire the Russian Soviet Empire, till we get used to what we know now as the American

Empire in the latter part of the 20th century.

Michelle Peridae, there's much more of this coming in the next weeks.

Thank you.

Yeah, it's a wonderful moment.

So Eisenhower, as you know,

and briefly in the United States where he's, you know, just

...