History's Greatest Wars

History's Greatest Wars PDF

Author: Joseph Cummins

Publisher: Quarto Publishing Group USA

Published: 2011-05-01

Total Pages: 305

ISBN-13: 1610580559

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A centuries-spanning study of twenty-five pivotal wars that shaped world history, from the Greco-Persian War to the Soviet-Afghan War. Driving and dispersing peoples across the globe, giving birth to and destroying great empires, transforming cultures, and determining systems of government, warfare, as much as anything else, has fashioned our world. History’s Greatest Wars: The Epic Conflicts that Shaped Our Modern World highlights pivotal victories that changed nations, even entire continents, forever, and charts the astonishingly rapid evolution of warfare. It delineates defining moments in the development of political philosophies, as well as the scientific innovations that yielded the machine gun, the tank, and the atom bomb. From the Greco-Persian Wars that began in 500 BCE, to the Vietnam War and beyond, it vividly renders the key victories that turned the tide of war, and recounts the heroism of armies and individuals. Yet it does not shy away from showing the acts of savagery that characterize much warfare: the slaughters and massacres. History’s Greatest Wars covers twenty-five of the most important and “thunderous” wars, wars that shook the world and took part in forming the nations that, today, we call home. The best and worst of humanity is on display here, in a collection that will act as a perfect primer for novices while offering seasoned history readers new perspectives on many famous and some not-so-well-known conflicts. Sweeping in its scope, yet intimate in its insights into the motivations of politicians, strategists, commanders, and soldiers, this is a collection that will enhance your understanding of the modern world and your own place in it.

History Wars

History Wars PDF

Author: Tom Engelhardt

Publisher: Holt Paperbacks

Published: 1996-08-15

Total Pages: 306

ISBN-13: 1429936770

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From the "taming of the West" to the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima, the portrayal of the past has become a battleground at the heart of American politics. What kind of history Americans should read, see, or fund is no longer merely a matter of professional interest to teachers, historians, and museum curators. Everywhere now, history is increasingly being held hostage, but to what end and why? In History Wars, eight prominent historians consider the angry swirl of emotions that now surrounds public memory. Included are trenchant essays by Paul Boyer, John W. Dower, Tom Engelhardt, Richard H. Kohn, Edward Linenthal, Micahel S. Sherry, Marilyn B. Young, and Mike Wallace.

A History of the Great War, 1914–1918

A History of the Great War, 1914–1918 PDF

Author: C.R.M.F. Cruttwell

Publisher: Chicago Review Press

Published: 2019-09-03

Total Pages: 688

ISBN-13: 0897336607

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This vivid, detailed history of World War I presents the general reader with an accurate and readable account of the campaigns and battles, along with brilliant portraits of the leaders and generals of all countries involved. Scrupulously fair, praising and blaming friend and enemy as circumstances demand, this has become established as the classic account of the first world-wide war.

Wars That Changed History

Wars That Changed History PDF

Author: Spencer C. Tucker

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA

Published: 2015-09-22

Total Pages: 660

ISBN-13:

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A thorough study of significant wars throughout history and their influence on world affairs-from the Egyptian Pharaoh Thutmore III's Campaigns during 479–459 BCE through the Iraq War of 2003–2011. For hundreds of years, wars have played a determining role in history and have decided the rise and fall of civilizations. Many believe that understanding the causes and consequences of warfare may move humankind towards world peace. This selection of the 50 most consequential wars, compiled by award-winning military historian Spencer C. Tucker, presents each conflict in chronological order and discusses its causes, its course, and its significance in world history. Through thoughtful essays and supporting visual evidence, this reference work examines the types of weapons systems employed and their effects in the field; the roles played by individual leaders such as Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, Abraham Lincoln, and Adolf Hitler; and the impact of geography and economics on the battlefield. The work includes fascinating information about warfare, addressing subjects such as how transportation and logistics changed the face of war over time, what invention marked the ascendancy of infantry over cavalry, why World War I remains the most important war in the 20th century, and which war killed nearly half of the population of Germany. Each essay includes the latest interpretations of strategy, agendas, and consequences of the featured event.

History's Greatest War

History's Greatest War PDF

Author: S. J. Duncan-Clark

Publisher:

Published: 2015-07-06

Total Pages: 420

ISBN-13: 9781330831021

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Excerpt from History's Greatest War: A Pictorial Narrative This volume attempts to encompass the causes of the great conflict, the chief happenings of military and political importance during the bloodiest four years of the world history, and their results and their effects upon the nations involved. An earnest endeavor has been made to take the reader through the most important phases. The limitation of this work to one volume makes the giving of exhaustive details of every incident, every battle, every siege, every advance or retreat, an impossibility. But in this very limitation lies the book's greatest value. To please a tactician, chapters might be devoted to the battles along the Marne, the Somme, the Yser, or to the struggle before Verdun or to the Russian campaigns. But for the reader who seeks a straightforward, circumstantial narrative of the great war, without its chief events being clouded and obscured by a multiplicity of subsidiary details, this book has been written. Devotion of time to research has been given that its facts may be accurate. It contains no statements based on rumors, no accounts taken from unauthoritative sources. The United States undoubtedly was the great determining factor in the overthrow and crushing of junkerism, and for that reason this volume should be of the greatest interest to Americans. Two million sons of America were in France. Their concentration and transportation was the greatest military feat in history. America's active share in the war, though it covered only a little over a year and a half, is the nation's most glorious achievement. With this in mind, painstaking effort has been made to do the fullest justice to recounting the events of the last eighteen months of the crusade to crush autocracy and militarism. Entertaining visualization of the war is best attained through photographs. For this reason this book has been profusely illustrated and the hundreds of scenes photographed during the four years of campaigning on all the great fronts, in themselves tell the narrative in a convincing manner. These pictures were taken by the most skilled men attached to the fighting forces. Many of them are the official output of the bureau of public information in Washington. Others were taken by men who risked death for a "close-up." The events of the war have been brought down to the present day. No vital episode of the struggle has been overlooked. The narrative is complete from the demolition of Liege to the signing of the terms of the armistice and the abdication of the German Kaiser. It is hoped that it will do full justice to the sacrifice, courage, steadfastness in the face of apparent defeat, of the tireless fighting men of Great Britain, France, Italy, Belgium, Serbia and the United States. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

The Origin and Prevention of Major Wars

The Origin and Prevention of Major Wars PDF

Author: Robert Gilpin

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 1989-02-24

Total Pages: 364

ISBN-13: 9780521379557

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This analysis of the origins of major wars, since the development of the modern state system in Europe centuries ago, also considers the problems involved in preventing a contemporary nuclear war.

Why We Fought

Why We Fought PDF

Author: Peter C. Rollins

Publisher: University Press of Kentucky

Published: 2008-07-25

Total Pages: 877

ISBN-13: 0813138744

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A “wide-ranging and sophisticated anthology” comparing theaters of war to wars in the movie theater (Dennis Showalter, author of Patton and Rommel). Why We Fought makes a powerful case that film can be as valuable a tool as primary documents for improving our understanding of the causes and consequences of war. A comprehensive look at war films, from depictions of the American Revolution to portrayals of September 11 and its aftermath, this volume contrasts recognized history and historical fiction with the versions appearing on the big screen. The text considers a selection of the pivotal war films of all time, including All Quiet on the Western Front, Sands of Iwo Jima, Apocalypse Now, Platoon, and Saving Private Ryan—revealing how film depictions of the country’s wars have shaped our values, politics, and culture, and offering a unique lens through which to view American history. Named as a Choice Outstanding Academic Title

The Allure of Battle

The Allure of Battle PDF

Author: Cathal Nolan

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2017-01-02

Total Pages: 320

ISBN-13: 0199874654

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History has tended to measure war's winners and losers in terms of its major engagements, battles in which the result was so clear-cut that they could be considered "decisive." Cannae, Konigsberg, Austerlitz, Midway, Agincourt-all resonate in the literature of war and in our imaginations as tide-turning. But these legendary battles may or may not have determined the final outcome of the wars in which they were fought. Nor has the "genius" of the so-called Great Captains - from Alexander the Great to Frederick the Great and Napoleon - play a major role. Wars are decided in other ways. Cathal J. Nolan's The Allure of Battle systematically and engrossingly examines the great battles, tracing what he calls "short-war thinking," the hope that victory might be swift and wars brief. As he proves persuasively, however, such has almost never been the case. Even the major engagements have mainly contributed to victory or defeat by accelerating the erosion of the other side's defences. Massive conflicts, the so-called "people's wars," beginning with Napoleon and continuing until 1945, have consisted of and been determined by prolonged stalemate and attrition, industrial wars in which the determining factor has been not military but matériel. Nolan's masterful book places battles squarely and mercilessly within the context of the wider conflict in which they took place. In the process it help corrects a distorted view of battle's role in war, replacing popular images of the "battles of annihilation" with somber appreciation of the commitments and human sacrifices made throughout centuries of war particularly among the Great Powers. Accessible, provocative, exhaustive, and illuminating, The Allure of Battle will spark fresh debate about the history and conduct of warfare.