This work analyses the vulnerability of America's land-based missile force to a pre-emptive Soviet strike as an issue in US strategic and political debate. It examines why the issue rose to prominence in the way it did in the 1970s and then fell away as a concern in the 1980s without being solved in the way it had been presented. It details the way in which the issue was exploited for political and strategic purposes which were often at odds with a concern for this vulnerability.

The late Byzantine period was a time characterized by both civil strife and foreign invasion, framed by two cataclysmic events: the fall of Constantinople to the western Europeans in 1204 and again to the Ottoman Turks in 1453. Mark C. Bartusis here opens an extraordinary window on the Byzantine Empire during its last centuries by providing the first comprehensive treatment of the dying empire's military. Although the Byzantine army was highly visible, it was increasingly ineffective in preventing the incursion of western European crusaders into the Aegean, the advance of the Ottoman Turks into Europe, and the slow decline and eventual fall of the thousand-year Byzantine Empire. Using all the available Greek, western European, Slavic, and Turkish sources, Bartusis describes the evolution of the army both as an institution and as an instrument of imperial policy. He considers the army's size, organization, administration, and the varieties of soldiers, and he examines Byzantine feudalism and the army's impact on society and the economy. In its extensive use of soldier companies composed of foreign mercenaries, the Byzantine army had many parallels with those of western Europe; in the final analysis, Bartusis contends, the death of Byzantium was attributable more to a shrinking fiscal base than to any lack of creative military thinking on the part of its leaders.

The cavalry of most classical Greek states was drawn from the cream of society. Their youth, wealth, and aristocratic background was more obvious to their fellow citizens than their military prowess. Using a wide range of written, artistic, and archaeological evidence, this book provides an in-depth account of the position of cavalry in classical warfare and society.

When the Red Army needed to mechanize its cavalry branch in the 1930s, the BT fast tank was its solution. Based on the American Christie high-speed tank, the Red Army began a program to adapt the design to its own needs. Early versions were mechanically unreliable and poorly armed but by the mid-1930s, the BT-5 emerged, armed with an excellent dual-purpose 45mm gun. It saw its combat debut in the Spanish Civil War in 1937 and was later used in the border battles with the Japanese Kwangtung Army in the late 1930s. The final production series, the BT-7, was the most refined version of the family. One of the most common types in Red Army service in the first years of the Second World War, BT tanks saw extensive combat in Poland, Finland, and the opening phases of Operation Barbarossa in 1941 and latterly during the 1945 campaign against the Japanese in Manchuria - this is the story of their design and development history.

Designed to counter the threat of a massed Soviet armored assault, the M50 Ontos showed its merit in the jungles and streets of Vietnam. Ontos grew out of Project Vista, the secret study of possible improvements to NATO defenses. Project Vista identified the need for an inexpensive, heavily armed "something" to thwart waves of Soviet armor. Armed with six powerful recoilless rifles, the diminutive M50 was given the name "Ontos," an Army mistranslation of Greek for "the Thing." Initially, the Army felt that the Allis-Chalmers T165E1 (later standardized as the M50) was the thing to fill the recommendation of Project Vista. Ultimately, and after some controversy, the Army lost interest in the vehicle, but the United States Marine Corps believed in the vehicle, and in 1955 the M50 entered production. While the Corps first used the Ontos in Santo Domingo in 1965, it would rise to fame in Vietnam, where the M50, as well as the modernized M50A1, saw considerable use as antipersonnel weapons and in perimeter defense. On the streets of Hue, Marines made considerable use of the Ontos, blasting open walls and using antipersonnel rounds to create faux smoke screens. Over 270 photos, many in color, chronicle the development, production, combat use, and details of this famed vehicle and the men who used them.

This book explores the mechanical details and military use of the M911 C-HET and M1070/M1070A1 HETS and their associated trailers. These vehicles are tasked with transporting the US Army's heaviest weapons-the M1 Abrams tank and other armored vehicles. In a departure from previous generations of tank transporters, which were designed especially for this task and built at great expense, the vehicles in this volume utilize numerous components from the civil market in order to lower cost and ease maintenance. The Oshkosh M911 C-HET and the M747 trailer typically used with it are first examined, then the newer M1070, M1070 armored cab conversion, M1070A1, and M1070F and the M1000 trailer used with the M1070-series tractors are studied. These heavy haulers are revealed in outstanding detail in this volume, which features both combat and detail photos. Hundreds of color and black-and-white photos put the reader in, on, over, and under these massive machines.

Powered by a massive Ford V-8 engine, the M4A3 Sherman was the standard tank of the US Army during the later stages of WWII, as well as the Korean War. The M4A3 was also supplied to the Marines during WWII, when the Corps faced a shortage of their preferred M4A2. The M4A3 was used by both services during the Korean War and was supplied in large numbers to Allied nations during the post-WWII rebuilding process. This book chronicles the development and use of these vehicles from concept to combat. This work contains several hundred first class images, many of which are in color.

DeVries has focused on an intriguing problem, and his detailed analysis of battles provides an important reassessment of the way in which infantry and dismounted cavalry achieved such striking successes. HISTORY His detailed analysis of battles provides an important reassessment of the way in which infantry and dismounted cavalry achieved such striking successes. HISTORY This remarkable study confirms [DeVries's] emergence as one of themajor scholars of his generation. JOURNAL OF MILITARY HISTORY This study departs from the conventional view of the dominance of cavalry in medieval warfare: its objective is to establish the often decisive importance of infantry. Kelly DeVries employs evidence from first-hand accounts - a major feature of this study - to examine the role of the infantry, and the nature of infantry tactics, in nineteen battles fought in England and Europe between 1302 and 1347, in most of which it was the infantry which secured victory. The battles analysed in detail are: Courtrai Arques Mons-en-Pevele Loudon Hill Kephissos Bannockburn Boroughbridge Cassel Dupplin Moor Halidon Hill Laupen Morlaix Staveren Vottem Crecy Neville's Cross, and the infantry ambushes: Morgarten Auberoche La Roche-Derrien.

At the end of the Great War, the U.S. Army faced the challenge of integrating what it had learned in the failures and ultimate success of its war effort. During the interwar years the army sought to balance readiness and modernization in a period of limited resources and technological advances with profound implications for the conduct of warfare. In After the Trenches, William O. Odom traces the development of combat doctrine between the world wars through an examination of the army's primary doctrine manuals, the Field Service Regulations.

The Field Service Regulations of 1923 successfully assimilated the experiences of the First World War and translated them into viable tactical practice, Odom argues in this unique study. Rapidly developing technologies generated more efficient tools of war and greatly expanded the scale, tempo, and complexity of warfare. Personnel and material shortages led to a decline in the quality of army doctrine evidenced in the 1939 regulations. Examining the development of doctrine and the roles of key personalities such as John Pershing, Hugh Drum, George Lynch, Frank Parker, and Lesley McNair, Odom concludes that the successive revisions of the manual left the army scurrying to modernize its woefully outdated doctrine on the eve of the new war.

This impressively researched study of the doctrine of the interwar army fills a significant gap in our understanding of the development of the U.S. Army during the first half of the twentieth century. It will serve scholars and others interested in military history as the standard reference on the subject. Moreover, many of the challenges and conditions that existed seventy years ago resemble those faced bytoday's army. This study of the army's historical responses to a declining military budget and an ever-changing technology will broaden the perspectives of those who must deal with these important contemporary issues.

In the aftermath of the Winter War, Finland found itself drawing ever closer to Nazi Germany and eventually took part in Operation Barbarossa in 1941. For the Finns this was a chance to right the wrongs of the Winter War, and having reached suitable defensive positions, the army was ordered to halt. Years of uneasy trench warfare followed, known as the Continuation War, during which Finland desperately sought a way out, German dreams of victory were dashed, and the Soviet Union built the strongest army in the world.

In the summer of 1944, the whole might of the Red Army was launched against the Finnish defences on the narrow Karelian Isthmus. Over several weeks of fierce fighting, the Finns managed to halt the Soviet assault. With Stalin forced to divert his armies to the race to Berlin, an armistice agreement was reached, the harsh terms of which forced the Finns to take on their erstwhile German allies in Lapland. Featuring rare photographs and first-hand accounts, this second volume of a two-part study, publishing in paperback for the first time, details the high price Finland had to pay to retain its independence and freedom.

It is an often overlooked fact that the SS Divisions included Cavalrymen, Paratroopers, Mountain and Ski Battalions and these rare photographs illustrate the unique role played by specialist units in action.

Bringing together experts from across the globe to provide a comprehensive introduction to strategic studies, this is the only overview to critically engage with both enduring and contemporary issues that dominate strategy. Throughout the chapters, readers are encouraged to explore key debates and alternative perspectives. A debates feature considers key controversies and presents opposing arguments, helping students to build critical thinking skills and reflect upon a wide range of perspectives. The new edition has been thoroughly updated to incorporate the latest developments in the field of strategic studies. Four new chapters feature in-depth coverage of cyber power and conflict, strategic culture, the evolution of grand strategy in China, and the relationship between military technology and warfare. Digital formats and resources The seventh edition is available for students and institutions to purchase in a variety of formats, and is supported by online resources - The e-book offers a mobile experience and convenient access along with functionality tools, navigation features and links that offer extra learning support: www.oxfordtextbooks.co.uk/ebooks - Online resources for students include: case studies that help to contextualise and deepen understanding of key issues; web links and further reading that provide students with opportunities to deepen their understanding of main topics and explore further areas of research interest; and multiple choice questions that test students' knowledge of the chapters and provide instant feedback. - Online resources for lecturers include: customisable PowerPoint slides to ensure clarity of explanation of key concepts and debates; and a test-bank of questions to reinforce key concepts and test students' understanding.

Literary and historical conventions have long painted the experience of soldiers during World War I as simple victimization. Leonard Smith, however, argues that a complex dialogue of resistance and negotiation existed between French soldiers and their own commanders. In this case study of wartime military culture, Smith analyzes the experience of the French Fifth Infantry Division in both pitched battle and trench warfare. The division established a distinguished fighting record from 1914 to 1916, yet proved in 1917 the most mutinous division in the entire French army, only to regain its elite reputation in 1918. Drawing on sources from ordinary soldiers to well-known commanders such as General Charles Mangin, the author explains how the mutinies of 1917 became an explicit manifestation of an implicit struggle that took place within the French army over the whole course of the war. Smith pays particular attention to the pivotal role of noncommissioned and junior officers, who both exercised command authority and shared the physical perils of men in the lower ranks. He shows that "soldiers," broadly defined, learned to determine rules of how they would and would not fight the war, and imposed these rules on the command structure itself. By altering the parameters of command authority in accordance with their own perceived interests, soldiers and commanders negotiated a behavioral space between mutiny and obedience. Originally published in 1994. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

Allan Wildman presents the first detailed study of the Army's collapse under the strains of war and of the front soldiers' efforts to participate in the Revolution. Originally published in 1980. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

Taking up its position astride the Peking-Mukden [Beijing-Shenyang] railway beginning in January, 1912, the United States Fifteenth Infantry Regiment was engaged in protecting American interests in China. The 1000 man force was especially challenged during the 1920s, those tumultuous years when warlords struggled to gain ascendancy in the Chinese Republic. Although Chiang Kai-shek established a measure of control in China by 1928, the regiment remained in China--partially to counter Japan's increasingly aggressive actions—despite considerable misgivings within and outside of the United States Army as to the feasibility, desirability, and ethical appropriateness of the policy retaining it there. The success of the Japanese in conquering much of eastern China finally compelled Washington to withdraw the regiment on March 2, 1938. This work recounts and assesses some aspects of the involvement and service of the Fifteenth Infantry Regiment during its fateful quarter of a century in the Orient between the World Wars. Also detailed is the Army's service in those years in general. Many insights are provided regarding the self-perceptions of a key generation of U.S. military personnel deployed there.

The First World War in the Middle East swept away five hundred years of Ottoman domination. It ushered in new ideologies and radicalised old ones - from Arab nationalism and revolutionary socialism to impassioned forms of atavistic Islamism. It created heroic icons, like the enigmatic Lawrence of Arabia or the modernizing Ataturk, and destroyed others. And it completely re-drew the map of the region, forging a host of new nation states, including Turkey, Iraq, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, and Saudi Arabia - all of them (with the exception of Turkey) under the 'protection' of the victor powers, Britain and France. For many, the self-serving intervention of these powers in the region between 1914 and 1919 is the major reason for the conflicts that have raged there on and off ever since. Yet many of the most commonly accepted assertions about the First World War in the Middle East are more often stated than they are truly tested. Rob Johnson, military historian and former soldier, now seeks to put this right by examining in detail the strategic and operational course of the war in the Middle East. Johnson argues that, far from being a sideshow to the war in Europe, the Middle Eastern conflict was in fact the centre of gravity in a war for imperial domination and prestige. Moreover, contrary to another persistent myth of the First World War in the Middle East, local leaders and their forces were not simply the puppets of the Great Powers in any straightforward sense. The way in which these local forces embraced, resisted, succumbed to, disrupted, or on occasion overturned the plans of the imperialist powers for their own interests in fact played an important role in shaping the immediate aftermath of the conflict - and in laying the foundations for the troubled Middle East that we know today.

The Deutsche Afrika Korps (best known as simply Afrika Korps) built up a well-deserved reputation as a superb fighting machine. While this was founded on the leadership and tactical genius of its legendary commander Erwin Rommel and the fighting skills of its officers and men, another vital element was its equipment in general and armour in particular. This superbly illustrated Images of War book reveals the full range of German armoured vehicles that saw service in North Africa over the two year period 1941 to mid-1943\. As well as the formidable panzers , such as the Tiger and Panther tanks, there were Sturmartillerie equipments, reconnaissance vehicles, half- tracks, armoured cars, Panzerkampwagens and motor cycles. All had their roles to play. While the Allies triumphed in North Africa ultimately, the combination of German design and engineering with superb generalship and fighting spirit, very nearly changed the course of the Second World War in 1942\. Military historians and equipment enthusiasts will find this a fascinating and authoritative book.

Literary and historical conventions have long painted the experience of soldiers during World War I as simple victimization. Leonard Smith, however, argues that a complex dialogue of resistance and negotiation existed between French soldiers and their own commanders. In this case study of wartime military culture, Smith analyzes the experience of the French Fifth Infantry Division in both pitched battle and trench warfare. The division established a distinguished fighting record from 1914 to 1916, yet proved in 1917 the most mutinous division in the entire French army, only to regain its elite reputation in 1918. Drawing on sources from ordinary soldiers to well-known commanders such as General Charles Mangin, the author explains how the mutinies of 1917 became an explicit manifestation of an implicit struggle that took place within the French army over the whole course of the war.

Smith pays particular attention to the pivotal role of noncommissioned and junior officers, who both exercised command authority and shared the physical perils of men in the lower ranks. He shows that "soldiers," broadly defined, learned to determine rules of how they would and would not fight the war, and imposed these rules on the command structure itself. By altering the parameters of command authority in accordance with their own perceived interests, soldiers and commanders negotiated a behavioral space between mutiny and obedience.

Originally published in 1994.

The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These paperback editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

The first major study of the experiences of the hundreds of thousands of African soldiers who served with the British army during the Second World War. During the Second World War over half-a-million African troops served with the British Army as combatants and non-combatants in campaigns in the Horn of Africa, the Middle East, Italy and Burma - the largest single movement of African men overseas since the slave trade. This account, based mainly on oral evidence and soldiers' letters, tells the story of the African experience of the war. It is a 'history from below' that describes how men were recruited for a war about which most knew very little. Army life exposed them to a range of new and startling experiences: new foods and forms of discipline, uniforms, machines and rifles, notions of industrial time, travel overseas, new languages and cultures, numeracy and literacy. What impact did service in the army have on African men and their families? What new skills did soldiers acquire and to what purposes were they put on their return? What was the social impact of overseas travel, and how did the broad umbrella of army welfare services change soldiers' expectations of civilian life? And what role if any did ex-servicemen play in post-war nationalist politics? In this book African soldiers describe in their own words what it was like to undergo army training, to travel on a vast ocean, to experience battle, and their hopes and disappointments on demobilisation. DAVID KILLINGRAY is Professor Emeritus of History, Goldsmiths, and Senior Research Fellow at the Institute of Commonwealth Studies, University of London.

Women, Armies, and Warfare in Early Modern Europe examines the important roles of women who campaigned with armies from 1500 to 1815. This included those notable female individuals who assumed male identities to serve in the ranks, but far more numerous and essential were the formidable women who, as women, marched in the train of armies. While some worked as full-time or part-time prostitutes, they more generally performed a variety of necessary gendered tasks, including laundering, sewing, cooking, and nursing. Early modern armies were always accompanied by women and regarded them as essential to the well-being of the troops. Lynn argues that, before 1650, women were also fundamental to armies because they were integral to the pillage economy that maintained troops in the field.

A penetrating study of the German army's military campaigns, relations with the Nazi regime, and complicity in Nazi crimes across occupied Europe For decades after 1945, it was generally believed that the German army, professional and morally decent, had largely stood apart from the SS, Gestapo, and other corps of the Nazi machine. Ben Shepherd draws on a wealth of primary sources and recent scholarship to convey a much darker, more complex picture. For the first time, the German army is examined throughout the Second World War, across all combat theaters and occupied regions, and from multiple perspectives: its battle performance, social composition, relationship with the Nazi state, and involvement in war crimes and military occupation. This was a true people's army, drawn from across German society and reflecting that society as it existed under the Nazis. Without the army and its conquests abroad, Shepherd explains, the Nazi regime could not have perpetrated its crimes against Jews, prisoners of war, and civilians in occupied countries. The author examines how the army was complicit in these crimes and why some soldiers, units, and higher commands were more complicit than others. Shepherd also reveals the reasons for the army's early battlefield successes and its mounting defeats up to 1945, the latter due not only to Allied superiority and Hitler's mismanagement as commander-in-chief, but also to the failings-moral, political, economic, strategic, and operational-of the army's own leadership.

"Extraordinary...recreates the Vietnam experience in visceral terms."—Col. Harry G. Sumniers, Jr., editor, Vietnam magazine.

Regarded by many as one of the greatest tanks ever built, the German Panther is probably the finest medium tank of the Second World War. Some 7,000 were made, combining firepower, armour protection and mobility that was unmatched by any other tank of the period. On the Eastern Front it was the primary nemesis of the Russian T-34 tank in the last two years of the war. Ironically, the Panther's genesis lay in the need for the Germans to come up with a new tank design after the T-34 had rendered the Panzer III obsolete almost overnight after Operation Barbarossa in June 1941. The Panther made its combat debut in Russia at the Battle of Kursk in July 1943 and all major German tank development after this point was influenced by the design features of the T-34. Soviet tank crews were not alone in recognising the Panther as a deadly adversary. The Allied armies in Europe encountered it during the Normandy campaign in 1944 and considered the Panther to be the most formidable German armoured fighting vehicle in Europe through to 1945. Such was the effectiveness of the Panther that the French Army used it for a period after the Second World War as it rebuilt its own armoured force.