The Russo-Japanese War in Manchuria was the first 20th century conflict fought between the regular armies of major powers, employing the most modern means - machine guns, trench warfare, minefields and telephone communications; and the battle of Mukden in March 1905 was the largest clash of armies in world history up to that date. Events were followed by many foreign observers; but the events of 1914 in Western Europe suggest that not all of them drew the correct conclusions. For the first time in the West the armies of this distant but important war are described and illustrated in detail, with rare photos and the superbly atmospheric paintings of Russia's leading military illustrator.

The main instrument with which the Bolsheviks imposed communism on Russia was the Red Army. Traditionally the origins of this army were among the factory workers who laid down their tools and took up arms as a way of expressing their grievances. Already formed by the time of the revolutions of 1905 and February 1917, these militant workers organised themselves into parliamentary detachments known as the krasnogvardeytsi, or 'Red Guards'. In this first of two volumes [see Men-at-Arms 305: White Armies] focusing on the Russian Civil War (1917-1923), Mikhail Khvostov examines the Red Army's organisation, weaponry, uniforms and insignia.

The partisan war in the Soviet Union from 1941 to 1944 has been the subject of considerable political manipulation in the decades following 1945. In great part this was due to the need to project the image of a country united behind Joseph Stalin and the Communist regime when the truth was much more complex than that. The opening weeks of Operation Barbarossa had exposed the lack of unity in the Soviet Empire as nationalist and anti-Communist groups emerged in the western provinces such as Belo Russia, Galicia, Bukovina, Ukraine and the Baltic states of Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia. Consequently it was vital for the survival of the Soviet Union that such groups were countered in situ and that the authority of Moscow was maintained in what were known as the Occupied Territories. During the summer of 1941 plans, dormant since the 1930s, for the conduct of partisan warfare behind the lines of an invading force were resurrected. The plans were intended to make life for the invaders as problematic as possible by acts of sabotage, but most important of all to maintain the physical presence of Soviet authority.

Imperial Russia's massive, if finally fatal contribution to the Allied war effort of 1914-17 involved huge numbers of men and some of the greatest battles of the war. The defeat at Tannenburg in 1914, and Brusilov's successful 1916 offensive against the Austro-Hungarians, were major events which had far-reaching effects on the Western fronts; and the attempts to keep the war effort going after the fall of the Tsar greatly influenced the course of the Bolshevik Revolution. This volume provides illustrated detail on the range of varied and colourful uniforms worn by the troops who played central roles in these events, many of which appear exotic to western eyes.