War: A History in 100 Battles
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.”
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William Collins
An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers
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London SE1 9GF
First published in Great Britain as A History of War in 100 Battles by William Collins in 2014
This Ebook edition published 2016
Text © Richard Overy 2014
Richard Overy asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work
A catalogue record of this book is available from the British Library
Cover photograph © Getty Images
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.
Source ISBN: 9780007452514
Ebook Edition © September 2016 ISBN: 9780008220761
Version: 2016-09-21
‘One of the great works of historical reference in the English language. If you were allowed only one history book in the whole of your life, The Times Complete History of the World would be hard to beat because it conveys a sense not only of time, but also of place’
Niall Ferguson, Professor of History, Harvard University
‘Magnificent … It is probably the most important book published on the history of the second world war this century’
Guardian
‘Monumental … this is a major contribution to one of the most controversial aspects of the Second World War … hugely impressive’
Literary Review
‘This tremendous book does what the war it describes signally failed to do. With a well-thought-out strategy and precision, it delivers maximum force on its objectives … the result is a masterpiece of the historian’s art’
The Times
‘Excellent … Overy is never less than an erudite and clear-eyed guide whose research is impeccable and whose conclusions appear sensible and convincing even when they run against the established trends’
Financial Times
‘An extraordinary and far-reaching history … Overy’s scope is incredibly broad and well-researched, also highly readable’
Spectator
Contents
Praise for Professor Richard Overy
Introduction: The Truth of Battle
4 Battle of the Milvian Bridge
41 Battle of Solferino–San Martino
42 Battle of Königgrätz (Sadowa)
56 Battle of Kleidion–Strumitsa
62 Battle of the Plains of Abraham
64 Battle of the Little Big Horn
Chapter 5: Courage in the Face of Fire
71 Battle of the Catalaunian Fields (Châlons)
78 First Battle of Manassas (Bull Run)
85 Fourth Battle of Monte Cassino
Choosing just 100 battles from recorded human history is a challenge. Not just because it is necessary to cover a period of almost 6,000 years, but because men have fought each other almost continuously for millennia. Any century of battles has to be arbitrary. Anyone who knows anything about the history of war may be disappointed at what has had to be omitted, but each of the battles described here has something memorable about it. Between them, they tell us something about how the nature of armed combat has changed over time, and also how some things have remained the same, whatever changes in technology, organization or ideas separate one era from another.
