The province of Egypt provides unique archaeological and documentary evidence for the study of the Roman army. In this fascinating social history Richard Alston examines the economic, cultural, social and legal aspects of a military career, illuminating the life and role of the individual soldier in the army.
Soldier and Society in Roman Eygpt provides a complete reassessment of the impact of the Roman army on local societies, and convincingly challenges the orthodox picture. The soldiers are seen not as an isolated elite living in fear of the local populations, but as relatively well integrated into local communities. The unsuspected scale of the army's involvement in these communities offers a new insight into both Roman rule in Egypt and Roman imperialism more generally.

eBook available with sample pages: 0203066731

The Soviet Union's last war was played out against the backdrop of dramatic change within the USSR. This is the first book to study the impact of the war on Russian politics and society. Based on extensive use of Soviet official and unofficial sources, as well as work with Afghan veterans, it illustrates the way the war fed into a wide range of other processes, from the rise of grassroots political activism to the retreat from globalism in foreign policy.

The final thrilling tale of the House of Appius Julianus.A new and deadly threat has emerged at the outskirts of the Roman Empire on the Danube, one that threatens to throw the entire region into chaos. Correus, risen to prefect of a cavalry ala on the border, and Flavius, advisor to the emperor, have both attempted to warn the erratic Domitian of the seriousness of this foe, but to no avail. With trouble at home in the form of an irate senator, as well as the impending doom of a devastating military loss, the two brothers must use their accumulated experience, grit and trust in each other to ensure their family's safety, once and for all. The final book in the epic Centurions series, and the first instalment for almost forty years, a moving and powerful adventure, and a must-read for all historical fiction fans, ideal for readers of Conn Iggulden, Rosemary Sutcliff and Simon Scarrow. Praise for Amanda Cockrell'A thrilling Roman adventure' Alex Gough, author of Emperor's Sword 'Amanda Cockrell has the finest sense of history, character, and narrative I've seen since Rosemary Sutcliff' Delia Sherman, author of The Porcelain Dove 'The novel is action-packed and descriptive at the same time, which lends to the successful scenes that the reader can enjoy' Historical Novel Society

V K Triandafillov was an outstanding young commander who shaped the military theory and doctrine of the Red Army as it came to grips with the problem of future war. A conscript soldier who rose through the ranks to become an officer in the Tsarist Army, he saw combat in both the First World War and the Russian Civil War. A student of some of the finest military specialists teaching the first generation of young Red commanders, he sought to link theory and practice by using past experience to comprehend future combat.

The regular Mounted Infantry was one of the most important innovations of the late Victorian and Edwardian British Army. Rather than fight on horseback in the traditional manner of cavalry, they used horses primarily to move swiftly about the battlefield, where they would then dismount and fight on foot, thus anticipating the development of mechanised infantry tactics during the twentieth century. Yet despite this apparent foresight, the mounted infantry concept was abandoned by the British Army in 1913, just at the point when it may have made the transition from a colonial to a continental force as part of the British Expeditionary Force. Exploring the historical background to the Mounted Infantry, this book untangles the debates that raged in the army, Parliament and the press between its advocates and the supporters of the established cavalry. With its origins in the extemporised mounted detachments raised during times of crisis from infantry battalions on overseas imperial garrison duties, Dr Winrow reveals how the Mounted Infantry model, unique among European armies, evolved into a formalised and apparently highly successful organisation of non-cavalry mounted troops. He then analyses why the Mounted Infantry concept fell out of favour just eleven years after its apogee during the South African Anglo-Boer War of 1899-1902. As such the book will be of interest not only to historians of the nineteenth-century British army, but also those tracing the development of modern military doctrine and tactics, to which the Mounted Infantry provided successful - if short lived - inspiration.

Incorporating research found in ancient literary, iconographic, epigraphic, and archaeological sources, this book explores the experiences of the soldiers who conducted battle on the small plains of ancient Greece.
The volume, which draws on the accumulated expertise of nine American and British scholars, emphasizes the actual techniques of fighting and practical concerns as the use of commands, music in warfare, the use of "dog-tags", and ritual on the battlefield.

eBook available with sample pages: 0203423631

This is the first study to analyze the content, training, and performance of a World War I draft division from its formation onward. The 82nd division consisted heavily of non-English speaking European immigrants and conscripts fresh from farming towns in Tennessee and North Carolina. Despite these apparent obstacles, it would evolve into an effective combat unit on the front lines of St. Mihiel and the Meuse-Argonne. These All-Americans would prove that they could fight and accomplish several difficult missions in the Great War.

From its birth at Camp Gordon, Georgia, to the battlefields of the Western Front, the 82nd division became a highly successful combat unit through good leadership and hard work. After initial training in France by both British and French forces, the 82nd entered the trenches to face the Germans. Given a difficult mission during the St. Mihiel offensive, the diverse division performed well; and during the Meuse-Argonne battle, it achieved its objectives despite heavy casualties. Despite an early lack of preparation, this force would be a true American success story.

The war in the Persian Gulf marked the greatest "projection of power" in history, dwarfing in its scale and speed even the D-day landings of 1944. It dramatically demonstrated the revolution in military affairs which has followed the end of confrontation in Europe. Yet the Gulf War and its aftermath also demonstrated the vast complexities of the projection of power, even in the favorable conditions witnessed in the Gulf.
In this important and timely study, Richard Connaughton, who has visited a peace-keeping operation in Kurdistan and has worked in close collaboration with U.S. military authorities, makes a valuable contribution to the study of international affairs. "Military Intervention in the 1990s" provides the first comprehensive professional study of the problems of future interventions in the context of a complex of political and military issues at the operational level.

At its height the Roman Empire stretched across Europe, North Africa and the Middle East, maintained by an army of modest size but great diversity. In popular culture these soldiers are often portrayed in a generic fashion, but continuing research indicates significant variations in Roman armour and equipment not only between different legions and the provincially-raised auxiliary cohorts that made up half of the army, but also between different regions within the empire. With reference to the latest archaeological and documentary evidence Dr D'Amato investigates how Roman Army units in the Western provinces were equipped, exploring the local influences and traditions that caused the variations in attire.

An in-depth illustrated study of the T-64 Battle Tank, the Soviet Union's most secret and controversial Cold War weapon. The T-64 tank was the most revolutionary design of the whole Cold War, designed to provide the firepower and armour protection of a heavy tank in a medium-weight design. It pioneered a host of new technologies including laminate armour, stereoscopic tank rangefinders, opposed-piston engines, smooth-bore tank guns with discarding sabot ammunition, and gun-fired guided projectiles. These impressive features meant that the Russians were loath to part with the secrets of the design, and the T-64 was the only Soviet tank type of the Cold War that was never exported. Written by an armour expert, this detailed technical history sheds light on the secrets behind the Cold War's most controversial tank, revealing how its highly advanced technologies proved to be both a blessing and a curse.

Failure to exploit the potential of an original idea is a recurring phenomenon in our national history. Few failures, however, can have been so costly in human life as that of our military commanders early in 1916 to appreciate that the tank was a war winning weapon. The slaughter of the Somme, Passchendaele and Ypres salient had to be endured before accepted conventional methods were abandoned and the tank given a chance. Bryan Cooper describes the early tank actions in vivid detail, with many eye-witness accounts. He tells of the courage and endurance of the crews not just in battle but in the appalling conditions in which they had to drive and fight their primitive vehicles. Scalded, scorched and poisoned with exhaust fumes, constantly threatened with being burned to death, these crews eventually laid the foundation for the Allied Victory in World War I. The book is well illustrated with many original photographs which give the present day reader a glimpse of the infancy of a dominant weapon of modern war.

This book looks at the militaries of the late-Soviet and post-Soviet republics. Beginning with the end of the Soviet era, it recognises that the successor states did not spring from nowhere, but inherited a legacy that influenced all that followed. The book discusses how politicians control the instruments that are the manifestation of the state's monopoly on violence, and how society views and supports the military. By taking a bottom up empirical approach that examines the personnel, leaders, organisations and institutions, and their outlook and attitudes, the book presents a comprehensive picture of the armed forces, showing how the armed forces are very significantly shaped by the surrounding political and social environment. The book goes on to examine the armed forces in action, and highlights that to truly understand the militaries, studies need to go beyond looking at the static structures.

Extensively illustrated with 52 detailed campaign and battle maps and diagrams, this book, originally published in 1990, surveys the evolution of warfare in Europe from Napoleon to the end of the twentieth century and in Asia from the Middle Ages. It considers the interaction of technology and warfare. With wide-ranging examples, the book includes two in depth case studies, one on the Soviet Operational Manoeuvre Group and its predecessors in the Russian Imperial Army, the other on the history of land warfare, including guerilla warfare, in Asia. In this book the author demonstrates that military history can be of immense practical help to the modern military analyst and professional. Now updated with a new introduction to take into account changes since 1990, this book remains of essential value to students, teachers & professionals in political & social history, international relations, defence, war & peace studies.

Plagued by unreliable vehicles and poorly thought-out doctrine, the early years of World War II were years of struggle for Britain's tank corps. Relying on tanks built in the late 1930s, and those designed and built with limited resources in the opening years of the war, they battled valiantly against an opponent well versed in the arts of armoured warfare. This book is the second of a multi-volume history of British tanks by renowned British armour expert David Fletcher MBE. It covers the development and use of the Matilda, Crusader, and Valentine tanks that pushed back the Axis in North Africa, the much-improved Churchill that fought with distinction from North Africa to Normandy, and the excellent Cromwell tank of 1944-45. It also looks at Britain's super-heavy tank projects, the TOG1 and TOG2, and the Tortoise heavy assault tank, designed to smash through the toughest of battlefield conditions, but never put into production.

Celebrated military historian James Holland chronicles the experiences in World War II of the legendary tank unit, the Sherwood RangersIn the annals of World War II, certain groups of soldiers stand out, and among the most notable were the Sherwood Rangers. Originally a cavalry unit in the last days of horses in combat, whose officers were landed gentry leading men who largely worked for them, they were switched to the "mechanized cavalry" of tanks in 1942. Winning acclaim in the North African campaign, the Sherwood Rangers then spearheaded one of the D-Day landings in Normandy on June 6, 1944, led the way across France, were the first British troops to cross into Germany, and contributed mightily to Germany's surrender in May 1945. Inspired by Stephen Ambrose's Band of Brothers, acclaimed WWII historian James Holland memorably profiles an extraordinary group of citizen soldiers constantly in harm's way. Their casualties were horrific, but their ranks immediately refilled. Informed by never-before-seen documents, letters, photographs, and other artifacts from Sherwood Rangers' families--an ongoing fraternity--and by his own deep knowledge of the war, Holland offers a uniquely intimate portrait of the war at ground level, introducing heretofore unknowns such as Commanding Officer Stanley Christopherson, squadron commander John Semken, and Sergeant George Dring, and other memorable characters who helped the regiment become the single unit with the most battle honors of any ever in the British army. He weaves the Sherwood Rangers' exploits into the larger narrative and strategy of the war, and also brings fresh analysis to the tactics used. Following the Sherwood Rangers' brutal journey over the dramatic eleven months between D-Day and V-E Day, Holland presents a vivid and original perspective on the endgame of WWII in Europe.

This book, originally published in 1977 examines in detail the organisation, training, and personnel of the British Army during the eighteenth century, and explains how the government policies of containing the enemy and colonial conquest were achieved. It also illustrates how the Army survived the constant nervousness of Parliament in reducing its strength after each emergency had passed. There are specific chapters devoted to the strategies of Marlborough, Amherst and Howe and to tactics as displayed at the battles of Ramillies, Fontenoy, Camden and Guildford Court House.

The military is supposed to stand aside from British society. This book illustrates that from the earliest times the British have relied on the military for the preservation of law and order. The creation of the professional police force in Britain habitually met with the stiffest opposition, and even after it came into existence in the 19th century, the military were still called in to suppress civilian disorders, often admidst the confusion and clumsiness tht led to incidents such as the notorious 'Peterloo massacre'. In the 20th century, the unarmed police had to become more used to dealing with riots, several of which are here discussed in meticulously researched detail.

The Germans transformed armoured warfare from a lumbering and ponderous experiment in World War I into something that could decide the outcome of conflicts. This technical and operational history is the definitive guide to the legendary Panzerwaffe, from its very infancy to the days when it made Europe its garden path at the height of Nazi German power. With rare and revealing combat reports, along with photographs sourced from previously unseen private and archival collections, it uncovers the technical and operational stories of the formidable armoured beasts that formed the backbone of the German war machine - tanks such as the Panzer I, II and 38(t).

First published in 1975. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

First published in 1975. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

A new study of tank warfare used in the Soviet offensive of Operation Bagration, which destroyed Army Group Center. Operation Bagration, the 1944 summer campaign on the Russian Front, has been called "Hitler's Greatest Defeat." The operation involved substantial tank and armored vehicles on both sides but the German forces were severely hampered by the transfer of dozens of Panzer divisions to France to repel an expected Allied invasion. Forced to make hard decisions, German tank forces in the central Belarus sector were weak compared to the heavy concentration of Panzers in northern Ukraine. The Red Army exploited this vulnerability, crushing Army Group Center, and pushing beyond the Soviet frontier into Poland and East Prussia. With this crucial victory secured, the Red Army conducted successive offensives beyond the Carpathian Mountains, arriving at the Vistula river in Poland, and forcing Romania to switch sides. The Red Army had embarked on a major tank modernization after the Kursk battles of 1943 and as a result, Operation Bagration saw the first widespread use of T-34-85 and IS-2 tanks as well as self-propelled guns. Germany's Panther tank finally reached technical maturity in the summer of 1944 but small numbers weakened its battlefield impact, while other innovations such as the Tiger II heavy tank failed to leave their mark. Using new photos and a fascinating selection of color illustrations explaining the camouflage and markings of these tanks, this book describes how the tanks and AFVs on both sides contributed to the eventual defeat of Army Group Center.

The soldiers fighting in the deserts of North Africa did not fight on a black & white canvas - the war was in color! This book, for the first time ever in print, presents a pictorial chronology of the campaign in Africa and the Deutschen Afrikakorps (DAK) - the German Afrikakorps - the way the soldiers themselves experienced it-the way they lived it: in color. It offers more than 150 photographs derived from what at that time, was revolutionary original color slide film. These pictures portray the leaders, men and equipment of the Afrikakorps from the arrival of its first units in Tripoli, Tunisia through its astounding advance across the Libyan Desert to Egypt and its eventual withdrawal back to Tunisia after the bitter, lost struggle with the British at El Alamein. Heavy artillery in position, antitank guns firing missions, cooks making noodles; Panzers on the move, aircraft, weapons and equipment - glimpses into the everyday existence of the Afrikakorps soldier in the wastes of the Libyan Desert and the rugged terrain of Tunisia - all of these are here in the original quality color - with many detailed captions. This book offers an entirely new view of the war in Africa that will prove a useful reference for veterans, historians, military modelers, re-enactors and militaria collectors alike. As an added bonus, the final section includes color photos of the subsequent events in Sicily and Southern Italy. A brief glossary is also included. This is how the war in Africa was really fought: in color!

A fascinating account of Russia's Five-Day War against Georgia in 2008, notable for its strategic mistakes which prompted President Putin to undertake major military reforms. After Georgia's independence from Russia in 1991, President Saakashvili invited NATO advisers to assist in military reforms. Separatist groups in Georgia's border provinces rebelled which led to fighting in South Ossetia during August 2008. The Russian Army invaded Georgia alongside these forces, stripped it of these rebellious provinces, and garrisoned them to maintain a threat over Georgia. But despite the inevitable outcome of this hugely unbalanced conflict, it revealed serious Russian military weaknesses and incompetence, and the NATO-trained and partly Western-equipped Georgian Army put up a much more successful local resistance than Russia had expected. The conflict also demonstrated the first use of Russian cyber-warfare, and its so-called 'hybrid warfare' doctrine. Author Mark Galeotti is an expert in the field of international relations and a former Foreign Office adviser on Russian security affairs. In this book, he provides a vivid snapshot of the Russian, Georgian, Abkhazian and South Ossetian forces and gives an in-depth analysis of the conflict. Using meticulous color artwork for uniforms, insignia and equipment, rare photographs and detailed 'fact-boxes' for significant units and individuals, this book is a compelling guide to Russia's Five-Day War in Georgia.

A new illustrated study of the devastating, but little-known, Soviet armored blitzkrieg against the Japanese in the last weeks of World War II, and how it influenced Soviet tank doctrine as the Cold War dawned. Although long overshadowed in the West by the dropping of the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the USSR's lightning strike into Manchuria in August 1945 was one of the most successful and unique campaigns of the era. Soviet forces, led by over 5,500 tanks and self-propelled guns, attacked across huge distances and deserts, marshes, and mountains to smash Japan's million-strong Kwantung Army in a matter of days. Japanese forces were short of training and equipment, but nevertheless fought fiercely, inflicting 32,000 casualties on the Soviets. Red Army operations were characterized by surprise, speed, and deep penetrations by tank-heavy forces born of the brutal lessons they had learned during years fighting the Wehrmacht. Lessons from the campaign directly shaped Soviet Cold War force structure and planning for mechanized operations against the West. Illustrated with contemporary artwork and rare photos from one of the best collections of Soviet military photos in the West, this fascinating book explains exactly how the last blitzkrieg of World War II was planned, fought, and won, and how it influenced the Red Army's plans for tank warfare against NATO in Europe.