Military History

An essential guide to Nelson's Navy for all those with an interest in the workings of the greatest fleet of the sailing era.

Combat Soldiers is a work of historical, comparative sociology examining the evolution of infantry tactics in the American, Australian, Canadian, British, French, German, and Italian armies from the First World War to the present in order to address a key question in the social sciences of how social solidarity (cohesion) is generated and sustained

Originally published: Boston, Mass.: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1991.

Following the attack on Pearl Harbor, the Japanese offensive in the Far East seemed unstoppable. This book examines the events and evidence surrounding the Java Sea Campaign, reconstructing battles that in hindsight were all but hopeless and revealing where fatal mistakes and missed opportunities condemned the Allied forces.

From an expert on the Eastern Front of World War II, this book chronicles the cataclysmic experience of the region that includes modern-day Lithuania, Estonia and Latvia.

Where Men Win Glory is a profoundly eloquent and affecting account of heroism - a millionaire sports star who gave it all up after the terrorist attacks of 9/11, to fight for his country with the US Army in Afghanistan: only to be killed by one of his own platoon. The gripping story of the life and death of a true American hero.

"As a sniper, I've killed more than a few Nazis. I have a passion for observing enemy behavior. You watch a Nazi officer come out of a bunker, acting all high and mighty, ordering his soldiers every which way, and putting on an air of authority. The officer hasn't got the slightest idea that he only has seconds to live." Vassili Zaitsev's account o

With illustrations and an introduction by historian Martin Robson, The Spitfire Pocket Manual is an essential volume for any Spitfire enthusiast.

He learnt to fly at a BFTS in America and went on the fly Spitfires with No 72 and No 1 Squadrons, finally being awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross in 1944.

Hitler's Vikings

"Fever of War" examines the impact of the deadly 1918 influenza epidemic on the American army, its medical officers, and their profession. The tragedy begins with overly confident medical officers who understated the severity of the epidemic.

Analyses the performance of two key parties engaged in fighting during World War II.

A finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, this updated version offers an unsurpassed history of the Revolutionary War and captures the profound and passionate struggle to found a free nation. Middlekauff undertakes the difficult task of separating the real from the mythic with great success.

This is the riveting story of Noor Inayat Khan, a descendant of an Indian prince, Tipu Sultan (the Tiger of Mysore), who became a British secret agent for SOE during World War II. Noor was one of only three women SOE agents awarded the George Cross and, under torture, revealed nothing, not even her real name.

An in-depth investigation into the history and exploits of the Commandos

New York Times bestselling author, Richard Miniter, joins forces with #1 New York Times bestselling co-author of American Sniper, Scott McEwen, to write the provocative true history of the most controversial and top-secret unit in the American Armed Forces, the Navy SEALs.

Covers the Allied Invasion (OVERLORD) and breakout from the German Army's viewpoint. This book presents an original treatment of the historic events of June-August 1944 and the result of research with many accounts from both sides.

During the second world war Eric Lomax was forced to work on the notorious Burma-Siam Railway and was tortured by the Japanese for making a crude radio. Left emotionally scarred and unable to form normal relationships Lomax suffered for years until, with the help of his wife Patti and the Medical Foundation for the Care of Victims of Torture.

* A unique record of one woman's experience of twenty-five of the most cataclysmic years in modern history - and a Virago Classic bestseller - with a new introduction by Mark Bostridge

This is the authoritative reference on samurai life and warfare published outside of Japan.

Vital reading for anyone concerned with how refugee flows affect the dynamics of conflicts around the world.

For five years during World War II, Denmark was occupied by Germany. While the Danish reaction to this period of its history has been extensively discussed in Danish-language publications, it has not until now received a thorough treatment in English. Set in the context of modern Danish foreign relations, and tracing the country's responses to successive crises and wars in the region, Danish Reactions to German Occupation brings a full overview of the occupation to an English-speaking audience. Holbraad carefully dissects the motivations and ideologies driving conduct during the occupation, and his authoritative coverage of the preceding century provides a crucial link to understanding the forces behind Danish foreign policy divisions.Analysing the conduct of a traumatised and strategically exposed small state bordering on an aggressive great power, the book traces a development from reluctant cooperation to active resistance. In doing so, Holbraad surveys and examines the subsequent, and not yet quite finished, debate among Danish historians about this contested period, which takes place between those siding with the resistance and those more inclined to justify limited cooperation with the occupiers - and who sometimes even condone various acts of collaboration.Praise for Danish Reactions to German Occupation'Carsten Holbraad's scrupulously impartial survey of Denmark's history in the Second World War and of Danish historiography concerning the period is a great boon to Anglophone readers. Almost all of the hundreds of works he cites are available only in Danish, and most English-language studies of his topic are badly dated.'Michigan War Studies Review

Peter Zinoman's original and insightful study focuses on the colonial prison system in French Indochina and its role in fostering modern political consciousness among the Vietnamese. Using prison memoirs, newspaper articles, and extensive archival records, Zinoman presents a wealth of significant new information to document how colonial prisons, rather than quelling political dissent and maintaining order, instead became institutions that promoted nationalism and revolutionary education.

Year of the Locust captures in page-turning detail the end of the Ottoman world and a pivotal moment in Palestinian history. In the diaries of Ihsan Hasan al-Turjman (1893-1917), the first ordinary recruit to describe World War I from the Arab side, we follow the misadventures of an Ottoman soldier stationed in Jerusalem. There he occupied himself by dreaming about his future and using family connections to avoid being sent to the Suez. His diaries draw a unique picture of daily life in the besieged city, bringing into sharp focus its communitarian alleys and obliterated neighborhoods, the ongoing political debates, and, most vividly, the voices from its streets-soldiers, peddlers, prostitutes, and vagabonds. Salim Tamari's indispensable introduction places the diary in its local, regional, and imperial contexts while deftly revising conventional wisdom on the disintegration of the Ottoman Empire.

Revolution, the fourth volume of Peter Ackroyd's enthralling History of England begins in 1688 with a revolution and ends in 1815 with a famous victory. In it, Ackroyd takes readers from William of Orange's accession following the Glorious Revolution to the Regency, when the flamboyant Prince of Wales ruled in the stead of his mad father, George III, and England was - again -at war with France, a war that would end with the defeat of Napoleon at Waterloo.Late Stuart and Georgian England marked the creation of the great pillars of the English state. The Bank of England was founded, as was the stock exchange, the Church of England was fully established as the guardian of the spiritual life of the nation and parliament became the sovereign body of the nation with responsibilities and duties far beyond those of the monarch. It was a revolutionary era in English letters, too, a time in which newspapers first flourished and the English novel was born. It was an era in which coffee houses and playhouses boomed, gin flowed freely and in which shops, as we know them today, began to proliferate in our towns and villages. But it was also a time of extraordinary and unprecedented technological innovation, which saw England utterly and irrevocably transformed from a country of blue skies and farmland to one of soot and steel and coal.

This biography of Ataturk aims to strip away the myth to show the complexities of the man beneath. Born plain Mustafa in Ottoman Salonica in 1881, he trained as an army officer but was virtually unknown until 1919, when he took the lead in thwarting the victorious Allies' plan to partition the Turkish core of the Ottoman Empire. He divided the Allies, defeated the last Sultan and secured the territory of the Turkish national state, becoming the first president of the new republic in 1923. He imposed coherence, order and mordernity and in the process, created his own legend and his own cult.

A pacy, compelling and penetrating account from Wolfson Prize-winning author Norman Stone, that shows World War Two in a fresh new lightThe Second World War is the nightmare that sits at the heart of the modern era - a total refutation of any notion of human progress and a conflict which still haunts us seventy years on.Norman Stone's gripping new book aims to tell the narrative of the war in as brief a compass as possible, making a sometimes familiar story utterly fresh and arresting. As with his highly acclaimed World War One: A Short History, there is a compelling sense of a terrible story unfolding, of a sceptical and humorous intelligence at work, and a wish to convey to an audience who may well have no memory of the conflict just how high the stakes were.This is a beautifully written, clever and imaginative attempt to convey what can almost not be conveyed. About the author:Norman Stone is one of Britain's greatest historians. His major works include The Eastern Front, 1914-1917 (winner of the Wolfson Prize and published by Penguin), Europe Transformed and The Atlantic and Its Enemies (published by Penguin). He has taught at the universities of Cambridge, Oxford and Bilkent, where he is now Director of the Turkish-Russian Centre. He lives in Ankara.Reviews:'Professor Norman Stone has achieved the impossible; he has somehow written a comprehensive history of the Second World War in just under 200 pages, summarising the entire conflict while leaving out nothing of importance and bringing his lifetime of study of the subject to bear in a witty, incisive and immensely readable way ... Norman Stone has proved yet again that he is one of the most original, witty and powerful British historians writing today' Andrew Roberts, Standpoint'The joy and strength of this compact history, besides its trenchancy and, in the publishers' words, the "e;sceptical and humorous intelligence at work"e;, is its narrative clarity ... a book to clear the mind after the grand tour of the big volumes' Allan Mallinson, The Times'Novices will receive a painless introduction, but educated readers should not pass up the highly opinionated prologue and epilogue and the author's trademark acerbic commentary throughout ... Readers of all stripes ... will find plenty to ponder' Kirkus Reviews

From the moment it began in 1936, the Spanish Civil War became the political question of the age. Hitler and Mussolini quickly sent aircraft, troops and supplies to the right-wing generals bent on overthrowing Spain's elected government. Millions of people around the world felt passionately that rapidly advancing fascism must be halted in Spain; if not there, where? More than 35,000 volunteers from dozens of other countries went to help defend the Spanish Republic.Adam Hochschild, the acclaimed author of King Leopold's Ghost, evokes this tumultuous period mainly through the lives of Americans involved in the war. A few are famous, such as Ernest Hemingway, but others are less familiar. They include a nineteen-year-old Kentucky woman, a fiery leftist who came to wartime Spain on her honeymoon; a young man who ran away from his Pennsylvania college and became the first American casualty in the battle for Madrid; and a swashbuckling Texas oilman who covertly violated US law and sold Generalissimo Francisco Franco most of the fuel for his army. Two New York Times reporters, fierce rivals, covered the war from opposite sides, with opposite sympathies. There are Britons in Hochschild's cast of characters as well: one, a London sculptor, fought with the American battalion; another, who had just gone down from Cambridge, joined Franco's army and found himself fighting against the Americans; and a third is someone whose experience of combat in Spain had a profound effect on his life, George Orwell.