Battlefield Action #19

This May 1958 Charlton war anthology puts you right in the mud with a remarkably tense cover by Pat Masulli and Dick Giordano — a grimly determined soldier crouches in close-up, rain dripping from his helmet, pistol in hand, while a column of red-starred enemy troops advances just beyond the rubble behind him. The composition pulls off something genuinely effective: the tight focus on that weathered face against the looming patrol conveys the coiled stillness of a soldier who knows he's badly outnumbered. A solid ten-cent package of Cold War-era combat tension, including the story "Pre-Dawn Assault.