1st July 1916 saw a campaign that devastated the lives of thousands of young men serving under the British Empire. It was a day chosen to begin what had been called `The Big Push', a desperate attempt to overwhelm the German Front Line and bring an end to a two year long stalemate on the Western Front. The Battle of the Somme has become tightly woven into the memory of the British nation and stands as a testimony to the conflict which took so many lives. This authoritative guide gives a factual account of the events leading up to the Somme battle, the battle itself, the politics of the day as well as the experiences of the young men who answered the call to join Kitchener's Army. With dramatic photographs, maps and diagrams this guide is an informative and sensitive account of the conflict.

THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER 'His masterpiece' Antony Beevor, Spectator 'A masterful performance' Sunday Times 'By far the best book on the Vietnam War' Gerald Degroot, The Times, Book of the Year Vietnam became the Western world's most divisive modern conflict, precipitating a battlefield humiliation for France in 1954, then a vastly greater one for the United States in 1975. Max Hastings has spent the past three years interviewing scores of participants on both sides, as well as researching a multitude of American and Vietnamese documents and memoirs, to create an epic narrative of an epic struggle. He portrays the set pieces of Dienbienphu, the Tet offensive, the air blitz of North Vietnam, and less familiar battles such as the bloodbath at Daido, where a US Marine battalion was almost wiped out, together with extraordinary recollections of Ho Chi Minh's warriors. Here are the vivid realities of strife amid jungle and paddies that killed 2 million people. Many writers treat the war as a US tragedy, yet Hastings sees it as overwhelmingly that of the Vietnamese people, of whom forty died for every American. US blunders and atrocities were matched by those committed by their enemies. While all the world has seen the image of a screaming, naked girl seared by napalm, it forgets countless eviscerations, beheadings and murders carried out by the communists. The people of both former Vietnams paid a bitter price for the Northerners' victory in privation and oppression. Here is testimony from Vietcong guerrillas, Southern paratroopers, Saigon bargirls and Hanoi students alongside that of infantrymen from South Dakota, Marines from North Carolina, Huey pilots from Arkansas. No past volume has blended a political and military narrative of the entire conflict with heart-stopping personal experiences, in the fashion that Max Hastings' readers know so well. The author suggests that neither side deserved to win this struggle with so many lessons for the 21st century about the misuse of military might to confront intractable political and cultural challenges. He marshals testimony from warlords and peasants, statesmen and soldiers, to create an extraordinary record.

The Vietnam War - a conflict defined by an ever-evolving mixture of conventional and guerrilla warfare and mass politics - has often been called a ""war without fronts."" In fact, Vietnam had a multitude of fronts, as insurgents and counterinsurgents wrestled for control throughout 44 provinces, 250 districts, and more than 11,000 hamlets. In The Control War, Martin G. Clemis focuses on South Vietnam, where a highly complex politico-military struggle fragmented the battlefield along countless divergent points of conflict as both sides sought spatial and political hegemony. Complicating the conventional view that the Vietnam War was about winning ""hearts and minds,"" Clemis argues that both sides were more interested in asserting control over the people - and resources - of the countryside. As in other revolutionary civil conflicts, the key to winning political power in South Vietnam was to control the physical world of territory, population, and resources, as well as the ideational world of political organization and long-term legitimacy. Despite their countervailing purposes, both insurgency and pacification provided the means to exert this control. Proponents of each approach pursued the same goals, relying on a blend of military force, political violence, and socioeconomic policy to achieve them. Revealing the unique spatiality of the Vietnam War, The Control War analyzes the ways that both sides of the conflict conceptualized and used geography and the environment to serve strategic, tactical, and political ends. Clemis shows us that the operational environment of Vietnam, both natural and human-made, was far more than a backdrop to two decades of war.

Today, Alan Turing is a well-recognised name, but it was not always so. Until the last few years of the 20th century hardly anyone had heard of him or his achievements. All that changed when the British government permitted the story of Bletchley Park during the Second World War to emerge.We learnt that Alan Turing had had a pivotal role in breaking the Enigma cipher, used by German forces.This was so significant that it helped to shorten the length of the war. Alan Turing was an extraordinary man who crammed into a life of only 42 years other careers besides secret codebreaker: he was also a mathematician, computer scientist and biologist. For example, with Tommy Flowers he built the first computer. A man ahead of his time, many of his theories and calculations are still relevant today. In this guide to a truly remarkable life, recent research by Alan Turing's nephew, Dermot, has unearthed a fresh perspective and made entirely accessible this story to the modern reader.

Since 1982, the renowned Civil War historian James I. "Bud" Robertson's "Civil War Sites in Virginia: A Tour Guide" has enlightened and informed Civil War enthusiasts and scholars alike. The book expertly explores the commonwealth's Civil War sites for those hoping to gain greater insight and understanding of the conflict. But in the years since the book's original publication, accessibility to many sites and the interpretive material available have improved dramatically. In addition, new historical markers have been erected, and new historically significant sites have been developed, while other sites have been lost to modern development or other encroachments. The historian Brian Steel Wills offers here a revised and updated edition that retains the core of the original guide, with its rich and insightful prose, but that takes these major changes into account, introducing especially the benefits of expanded interpretation and of improved accessibility. The guide incorporates new information on the lives of a broad spectrum of soldiers and citizens while revisiting scenes associated with the era's most famous personalities. New maps and a list of specialized tour suggestions assist in planning visits to sites, while three dozen illustrations, from nineteenth-century drawings to modern photographs, bring the war and its impact on the Old Dominion vividly to life. With the sesquicentennial remembrances of the American Civil War heightening interest and spurring improvements, there may be no better time to learn about and visit these important and moving sites than now.

Gedurende die Grensoorlog het die Spesiale Magte se 4 Verkenningsregiment tientalle klandestiene seewaartse operasies saam met die SA Vloot uitgevoer. Van Cabinda in Angola tot Dar es Salaam in Tanzanië het hulle strategiese teikens soos oliedepots, vervoerinfrastruktuur en selfs Russiese skepe aangeval. Die bestaan van 4 Recce is grootliks geheim gehou, ook in die SAW.

Ystervuis uit die see beskryf 50 operasies deur 4 Recce, ander Spesmagte-eenhede en die SA Vloot. Daaronder tel Operasie Kerslig (1981), waartydens ’n operateur dood en ander beseer is in ’n aanval op ’n olieraffinadery in Luanda, en Operasie Argon (1985) toe kaptein Wynand du Toit in Angola gevange geneem is.

Die skrywers, wat self aan etlike van die operasies deelgeneem het, het ook toegang gekry tot uiters geheime dokumente wat intussen gedeklassifiseer is. Hul dramatiese vertellings wys hoe veelsydig en doeltreffend hierdie elite-eenheid was.

Die omvattende boek is ’n moet vir enigeen met ’n belangstelling in die Spesmagte. Dit neem jou na die hart van die aksie, die adrenalien en vrees van seewaartse operasies.

The Second World War was the most widespread conflict in human history. Involving over 100 million people from more than thirty nations, it completely reshaped the world as we know it and led to the birth of the modern era. It gave rise to world leaders both iconic and infamous, instigated the break-up of empires and set the stage for the Cold War between the United States of America and the Soviet Union, which would last for over forty years. In Britain, the war helped to solidify a national identity that lasts to this day, leading to the creation of the welfare state and highlighting the merits of an orderly queuing system. Clive Pearson takes us on a quick march across the battlegrounds of the world's deadliest conflict, at home and abroad. Witness the war's defining moments and international aftermath, and discover a few lesser-known facts you may never have heard of along the way.

Written by experienced examiners and teachers and tailored to the new Edexcel specification. An active, engaging approach that brings History alive in the classroom! Exam tips, activities and sources in every chapter give students the confidence to tackle typical exam questions. Carefully written material ensures the right level of support at AS or A2. Our unique Exam Zone sections provide students with a motivating way to prepare for their exams.

The image is indelible: densely packed lines of slow-moving Redcoats picked off by American sharpshooters. Now Matthew H. Spring reveals how British infantry in the American Revolutionary War really fought.

This groundbreaking book offers a new analysis of the British Army during the "American rebellion" at both operational and tactical levels. Presenting fresh insights into the speed of British tactical movements, Spring discloses how the system for training the army prior to 1775 was overhauled and adapted to the peculiar conditions confronting it in North America.

First scrutinizing such operational problems as logistics, manpower shortages, and poor intelligence, Spring then focuses on battlefield tactics to examine how troops marched to the battlefield, deployed, advanced, and fought. In particular, he documents the use of turning movements, the loosening of formations, and a reliance on bayonet-oriented shock tactics, and he also highlights the army's ability to tailor its tactical methods to local conditions.

Written with flair and a wealth of details that will engage scholars and history enthusiasts alike, "With Zeal and with Bayonets Only "offers a thorough reinterpretation of how the British Army's North American campaign progressed and invites serious reassessment of most of its battles.

In this compelling evaluation of Cold War popular culture, Pulp Vietnam explores how men's adventure magazines helped shape the attitudes of young, working-class Americans, the same men who fought and served in the long and bitter war in Vietnam. The 'macho pulps' - boasting titles like Man's Conquest, Battle Cry, and Adventure Life - portrayed men courageously defeating their enemies in battle, while women were reduced to sexual objects, either trivialized as erotic trophies or depicted as sexualized villains using their bodies to prey on unsuspecting, innocent men. The result was the crafting and dissemination of a particular version of martial masculinity that helped establish GIs' expectations and perceptions of war in Vietnam. By examining the role that popular culture can play in normalizing wartime sexual violence and challenging readers to consider how American society should move beyond pulp conceptions of 'normal' male behavior, Daddis convincingly argues that how we construct popular tales of masculinity matters in both peace and war.

"I have decided to prepare for, and if necessary to carry out, an invasion against England."--Adolph Hitler, July 16, 1940
Operation Sealion was the codename for the Nazi invasion of Britain that Hitler ordered his generals to plan after France fell in June 1940. Although the plan ultimately never came to fruition, a few sets of the Germans' detailed strategy documents are housed in the rare book rooms of libraries across Europe. But now the Bodleian Library has made documents from their set available for all to peruse in this unprecedented collection of the invasion planning materials.
The planned operation would have involved landing 160,000 German soldiers along a forty-mile stretch of coast in southeast England. Packets of reconnaissance materials were put together for the invading forces, and the most intriguing parts are now reproduced here. Each soldier was to be given maps and geographical descriptions of the British Isles that broke down the country by regions, aerial photographs pinpointing strategic targets, an extensive listing of British roads and rivers, strategic plans for launching attacks on each region, an English dictionary and phrase book, and even a brief description of Britain's social composition.
Augmenting the fascinating documents is an informative introduction that sets the materials in their historical and political context. A must-have for every military history buff, "German Invasion Plans for the British Isles, 1940" is a remarkable revelation of the inner workings of Hitler's most famous unrealized military campaign.

In Dwarstrekkers, dwepers en dokters vertel Kay de Villiers van 'n hele aantal mense wat die verskrikkings en vermaaklikhede van die Boere-oorlog aan eie lyf ervaar het. So is daar die romantiese Russiese dokter wat eers met haar eggenoot rusie maak en dan vermom as man haar lewe waag om hom op die slagvelde van Suid-Afrika te gaan soek. Daar is die onstuitbare mediese student Tewie Wessels wat hom as 'n Engelse adellike voordoen om uit Engeland, waar hy medies studeer, na Suid-Afrika te kom. Daar is die dapper tienermeisie Susie Blignaut wat deur dinamietslagdoppies vermink word. Daar is die Franse kolonel en die flambojante graaf Sternberg, daar is die onkeerbare Mary Kingsley, daar is Robert Montague Poore die soldaat sesse slaan, en soveel ander. Prof. De Villiers slaag uitstekend daarin om die lewens van merkwaardige, minder bekende enkelinge binne die groter geskiedenis van die Anglo-Boereoorlog te plaas.

One of the most effective units to fight on either side of the Civil War, the Texas Brigade of the Army of Northern Virginia served under Robert E. Lee from the Seven Days Battles in 1862 to the surrender at Appomattox in 1865. In Hood's Texas Brigade, Susannah J. Ural presents a nontraditional unit history that traces the experiences of these soldiers and their families to gauge the war's effect on them and to understand their role in the white South's struggle for independence. According to Ural, several factors contributed to the Texas Brigade's extraordinary success: the unit's strong self-identity as Confederates; the mutual respect among the junior officers and their men; a constant desire to maintain their reputation not just as Texans but as the top soldiers in Robert E. Lee's army; and the fact that their families matched the men's determination to fight and win. Using the letters, diaries, memoirs, newspaper accounts, official reports, and military records of nearly 600 brigade members, Ural argues that the average Texas Brigade volunteer possessed an unusually strong devotion to southern independence: whereas most Texans and Arkansans fought in the West or Trans- Mississippi West, members of the Texas Brigade volunteered for a unit that moved them over a thousand miles from home, believing that they would exert the greatest influence on the war's outcome by fighting near the Confederate capital in Richmond. These volunteers also took pride in their place in, or connections to, the slave-holding class that they hoped would secure their financial futures. While Confederate ranks declined from desertion and fractured morale in the last years of the war, this belief in a better life, albeit one built through slave labor, kept the Texas Brigade more intact than other units. Hood's Texas Brigade challenges key historical arguments about soldier motivation, volunteerism and desertion, home-front morale, and veterans' postwar adjustment. It provides an intimate picture of one of the war's most effective brigades and sheds new light on the rationales that kept Confederate soldiers fighting throughout the most deadly conflict in U.S. history.

* Accessible, engaging and packed with activities to build the skills required * Focused to the latest specification and OCR's support materials * Unique Exam Cafe gives students a motivating way to prepare thoroughly for their exams.

From bestselling and prize-winning author Paddy Ashdown, a revelatory new history of German opposition to Hitler. `Ashdown has a great gift for narrative history. He unearths little known stories and places them in context with great dexterity. His new book throws fresh and important light on a crucial topic.' JONATHAN DIMBLEBY In his last days, Adolf Hitler raged in his bunker that he had been betrayed by his own people, defeated from the inside. In part, he was right. By 1945, his armies were being crushed on all fronts, his regime collapsing with many fleeing retribution for their crimes. Yet, even before the war started, there were Germans very high in Hitler's command committed to bringing about his death and defeat. Paddy Ashdown tells, for the first time, the story of those at the very top of Hitler's Germany who tried first to prevent the Second World War and then to deny Hitler victory. Based on newly released files, the repeated attempts of the plotters to warn the Allies about Hitler's plans are revealed. What is revealed is that the anti-Hitler bomb plots, which have received so much attention are, in fact only a small part of a much wider story; one in which those at the highest levels of the German state used every means possible - conspiracy, assassination, espionage - to ensure that, for the sake of the long-term reputation of their country and the survival of liberal and democratic values, Hitler could not be allowed to win the war. It is a matter of record that the European Union we have today and the nature and central position of Germany within it, is, in very large measure, the future envisaged by the plotters and for which they gave their lives.

For the first time, Richard S. Grayson tells the story of the Dubliners who served in the British military and in republican forces during the First World War and the Irish Revolution as a series of interconnected 'Great Wars'. He charts the full scope of Dubliners' military service, far beyond the well-known Dublin 'Pals', with as many as 35,000 serving and over 6,500 dead, from the Irish Sea to the Middle East and beyond. Linking two conflicts usually narrated as separate stories, he shows how Irish nationalist support for Britain going to war in 1914 can only be understood in the context of the political fight for Home Rule and why so many Dubliners were hostile to the Easter Rising. He examines Dublin loyalism and how the War of Independence and the Civil War would be shaped by the militarisation of Irish society and the earlier experiences of veterans of the British army.

The Mysteries of Haditha is a war story unlike any other. This riveting and hilarious memoir of M. C. Armstrong's journey into the Iraq War as an embedded journalist pulls no punches and lifts the veil on the lies we tell each other-and the ones we tell ourselves. This is a story about both the strong women in Armstrong's life and his road to true manhood. Armstrong's family was nearly ripped at the seams as he struggled to secure his embed with Navy SEALs in the Al Anbar Province in 2008. Armstrong's searingly honest narrative about his relationship with his father, his fiance, and his friend in the SEAL team takes the reader on a nosedive ride from a historically black college in the American South straight into Baghdad, the burn pits, and the desert beyond the mysterious Haditha dam. Honest and vulnerable, tender but fearless, The Mysteries of Haditha is an incredible coming-of-age story and a unique glimpse into the world of the war on terror.

In 1944 the British War Office distributed a handbook to British soldiers informing them what to expect and how to behave in a newly-liberated France. Containing candid descriptions of this war-ravaged society (widespread malnourishment, rampant tuberculosis) as well as useful phrases and a pronunciation guide (Bonjewer, commont-allay-voo), it was an indispensable guide to everyday life. This small, unassuming publication had a deeper purpose: to bring together two allies who did not enjoy ideal relations in 1944. The book attempts to reconcile differences by stressing a shared history and the common aim - defeating Hitler. It also tried to dispel misapprehensions: 'There is a fairly widespread belief among people in Britain that the French are a particularly gay, frivolous people with no morals and few convictions.' Often unintentionally hilarious in its expression of these false impressions, the book is also a guide for avoiding social embarrassment: 'If you should happen to imagine that the first pretty French girl who smiles at you intends to dance the can-can or take you to bed, you will risk stirring up a lot of trouble for yourself - and for our relations with the French.' Many of its observations still ring true today. For example, 'The French are more polite than most of us. Remember to call them "Monsieur, Madame, Mademoiselle," not just "Oy!"' Others remind us of how we recently we have adopted French customs: 'Don't drink yourself silly. If you get the chance to drink wine, learn to "'take it".' Anyone with an interest in Britain, France or World War II will find this an irresistible insight into British attitudes towards the French and an interesting, timeless commentary on Anglo-French relations.

"Don't be too ready to listen to stories told by attractive women. They may be acting under orders." This was only one of the many warnings given to the 30,000 British troops preparing to land in the enemy territory of Nazi Germany nine-and-a-half months after D-Day. The newest addition to the Bodleian Library's bestselling series of wartime pamphlets, "Instructions for British Servicemen in Germany, 1944" opens an intriguing window into the politics and military stratagems that brought about the end of World War II.
The pamphlet is both a succinct survey of German politics, culture, and history and a work of British propaganda. Not only does the pamphlet cover general cultural topics such as food and drink, currency, and social customs, but it also explains the effect of years of the war on Germans and their attitudes toward the British. The book admonishes, "The Germans are not good at controlling their feelings. They have a streak of hysteria. You will find that Germans may often fly into a passion if some little thing goes wrong." The mix of humor and crude stereotypes--"If you have to give orders to German civilians, give them in a firm, military manner. The German civilian is used to it and expects it"--in the text make this pamphlet a stark reminder of the wartime fears and hopes of the British.
By turns a manual on psychological warfare, a travel guide, and a historical survey, "Instructions for British Servicemen in Germany, 1944" offers incomparable insights into how the British, and by extension the Allied forces, viewed their fiercest enemy on the eve of its defeat.

Originally published in 1967, William H. Leckie's "The Buffalo Soldiers" was the first book of its kind to recognize the importance of African American units in the conquest of the West. Decades later, with sales of more than 75,000 copies, "The Buffalo Soldiers" has become a classic. Now, in a newly revised edition, the authors have expanded the original research to explore more deeply the lives of buffalo soldiers in the Ninth and Tenth Cavalry Regiments.

Written in accessible prose that includes a synthesis of recent scholarship, this edition delves further into the life of an African American soldier in the nineteenth century. It also explores the experiences of soldiers' families at frontier posts. In a new epilogue, the authors summarize developments in the lives of buffalo soldiers after the Indian Wars and discuss contemporary efforts to memorialize them in film, art, and architecture.

The Battle of the Little Bighorn has long held an eminent position among the chronicles of the mythic West. None of the men who rode with Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer to his ""Last Stand"" survived to tell the tale, but this stunning photography book provides a view of the battlefield as it must have existed in 1876.To create Where Custer Fell, authors James S. Brust, Brian C. Pohanka, and Sandy Barnard searched for elusive documents and photographs, made countless trips to the battlefield, and scrutinized all available sources. Each chapter begins with a concise, lively description of an episode in the battle. The narratives are graphically illustrated by historical photos, which are presented alongside modern photos of the same location on the battlefield. The book also features detailed maps and photographs of battle participants and the early photographers who attempted to tell their story.

The horrifying true story of one of the first eight men to enter Auschwitz Growing up in New York, Marilyn Shimon often visited her uncle in California. She saw his scars, gaped at his 31321 tattoo, and listened to his horrific stories of surviving the Holocaust. However, she could not relate to the suffering he endured or understand the significance of his accounts - until now. In this grisly memoir, Marilyn resurrects Murray Scheinberg's stories of six hellish years in Nazi concentration camps during World War II. The Polish Jew was one of the first eight men to enter Auschwitz, as a political prisoner in 1940, and one of the last to escape Dachau. Shockingly frank and truly harrowing, this is a gripping first-hand account of the horror and degradation of the camps, from the first day to the very last. 'It is both an uplifting tale and a sorry one about human nature in the face of evil.' Abraham H. Foxman, National Director Emeritus, Anti-Defamation League

In the tradition of Ezra J. Warner's magisterial Generals in Gray, military historian Dan C. Fullerton supplies an indispensable reference work on Confederate forces over the entire course of the Civil War. Armies in Gray details the development and organization of the southern armies, their evolution over the course of the conflict, their command structure, and their geographic assignment and placement. Developed through a decade-long analysis of an array of primary-source materials, Armies in Gray provides an entirely new understanding of the operations and strategies of the Civil War by examining how the Confederate War Department and field commanders used their fighting forces. Unlike typical battle histories, which analyze the events of a single action at a single point in time or offer only a brief overview of the fighting forces' overall organization, Armies in Gray focuses on the structure of the Confederate ranks as a whole. Fullerton's meticulous examination of the Confederate Army allows readers to assess how well military leaders utilized their troops to achieve their tactical goals as they waged battles against the armies of the North. Divided into three-month quarters over the duration of the war, this reference guide details the origins of all Confederate brigades, divisions, corps, districts, and departments. It also reports on ordered changes to these units, providing details on the evolution of Confederate forces and on how commanders deployed them through the entirety of the war. By looking at the organization of the Confederate armies in each quarter, readers can gain a clearer picture of the forces available to southern military leaders as they developed their plans at every stage of the Civil War. Armies in Gray fills a void in Civil War studies, providing an accurate picture of the development of the Confederate armies, how commanders wielded them, and ultimately, how they were defeated by the Union Army as the nation's bloodiest conflict drew to a close.