The object of this book is to introduce readers to a whole range of
military history which has all the drama, dangers, horrors and
excitement that we associate with Stalingrad or the Somme. Battles
are acute moments of history whenever and wherever they have been
fought. Through them we can understand how warfare and world
history have evolved. Choosing just one hundred battles from
recorded human history is a challenge. Not just because it is
necessary to cover almost 6,000 years of history, but because men
have fought each other almost continuously for millennia. Anyone
who knows anything about the history of war may be disappointed at
what has had to be left out. However, each of the 100 memorable
battles described shows both how the nature of armed combat has
changed over human history, and also how, despite changes in
technology, organisation or ideas, many things have remained the
same. It is an old adage that you can win a battle but lose a war.
The battles featured here almost always resulted in victory for one
side or another, but the victor did not necessarily win the war.
Some battles are decisive in that broader historical sense, others
are not. The further back in time, the more likely it is that an
enemy could be finished off in one blow. The wars of the modern
age, between major states, have involved repeated battles until one
side was battered into submission. Some of the great generals of
the recent past - Napoleon, Robert E Lee, Erich von Manstein - have
been on the losing side but are remembered nonetheless for their
generalship. Some on the winning side have all but disappeared from
the history books or from public memory. Equally, in many battles,
the issue is not victory or defeat, but what the battle can tell us
about the history of warfare itself. New weapons, new tactics, new
ways of organising armed forces can have a sudden impact on the
outcome of a battle. But so too can leadership, or the effects of a
clever deception, or raw courage. That is why the book has been
divided up into clear themes which apply equally to the battles of
the ancient world as they do to the battles of today. As Professor
Richard Overy laments: "Battle is not a game to plug into a
computer but a piece of living history, messy, bloody and real.
That, at least, has not changed in 6,000 years."
General
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