One of the leading voices on national-security issues in the US Congress demonstrates how words have been sharp and powerful weapons of victory in this compilation of great military speeches that helped turn the tide of history. Congressman Israel has included speeches that have motivated and mobilized, challenged and comforted. Some were blurted in the heat of combat, others carefully written in places far removed from the brutality of the battlefield, but all will inspire readers with th...

Until now, there has been no study of the significant errors that Napoleon made himself which, though apparently trivial at the time, proved to be major factors in his downfall. Digby Smith tracks his rise to power, his stewardship of France from 180415, and his exile. He highlights his military mistakes, such as his unwillingness to appoint an effective overall supremo in the Iberian Peninsula, and the decision to invade Russia while the Spanish situation was spiralling out of control.

In June 1812 500,000 men of Napoleon's army invaded Russia. Six months later barely 20,000 returned. The disastrous advance to Moscow and the subsequent retreat irreparably damaged Napoleon's military power and prestige and resulted one of the most celebrated catastrophes of in all military history. Digby Smith's new account of the grim events of 1812 is based on the diaries and letters of soldiers who survived, many of which have not been published in English before. They describe the dea...

Richard Digby Smith, legendary Island Records engineer, takes listeners deep into the studio during the golden era of rock and reggae. From Bob Marley to Eric Clapton, Led Zeppelin to Free, his memoir captures the raw magic of music creation from inside the control room.This is not just another celebrity name-dropper. It’s an insider's journey through decades of musical evolution, analog machines, world-famous stud...

In this authoritative and beautifully illustrated new account of Napoleon's greatest victory and the campaign that preceded it, Ian Castle sheds new light on the actions of the commanders and questions the assumptions—and explores the myths—that have shaped our understanding of the event ever since. His account follows every twist and turn of a war that was fought out across central Europe two centuries ago. In particular he reconstructs the course of the action in every sector of the Aust...

From the author of Talavera, an extensive history of the Battle of Waterloo from the losing side's point of view.The story of the Battle of Waterloo—of the ultimate defeat of Napoleon and the French, the triumph of Wellington, Blücher, and their allied armies—is most often told from the viewpoint of the victors, not the vanquished. Even after 200 years of intensive research and the publication of hundreds of books and articles on the battle, the French pers...

Popular and scholarly history presents a one-dimensional image of Napoleon as an inveterate instigator of war who repeatedly sought large-scale military conquests. General Franceschi and Ben Weider dismantle this false conclusion in The Wars Against Napoleon a brilliantly written and researched study that turns our understanding of the French emperor on its head.Avoiding the simplistic clichés and rudimentary caricatures many historians use when discussing Napoleon Franceschi and Weider ar...

A grand sweeping military history of the “pike and shot” era, with a particular emphasis on the Thirty Years’ War in Europe (1618–1648). Originally published in two volumes, the first covers the life of Gustavus Adolphus, King of Sweden, and known as “The Lion of the North” by his many opponents. Born into an era of constant warfare, he became king at 17, transformed the Army of Sweden into the first truly modern military machine, and led it in person for twenty years until his untimely de...

Napoleon Bonaparte is renowned as one of the great military commanders in history, and the central figure in so many of the events of the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic wars.Throughout the first decade of the 19th century he won battle after battle by wielding the Grande Armée decisively against the other powers of Europe – Prussia, Austria and Russia. Yet his fortunes changed in 1812 when the invasion of Russia wrecked his forces, and Napoleon suffered his fi...

Ever since 1821, when he died at age fifty-one on the forlorn and windswept island of St. Helena, Napoleon Bonaparte has been remembered as either demi-god or devil incarnate. In The Rise of Napoleon Bonaparte, the first volume of a two-volume cradle-to-grave biography, Robert Asprey instead treats him as a human being. Asprey tells this fascinating, tragic tale in lush narrative detail. The Rise of Napoleon Bonaparte is an exciting, reckless thrill ride as Asprey charts Napoleon'...

A stirring biography of the fiery marshal who led Napoleon's forces—from his swift rise to fame to his tragic fall from grace and death by firing squad.A.H. Atteridge's biography of Michel Ney, Napoleon's most famous marshal, is a classic work of its kind. He describes Ney's meteoric career in vivid detail, from his enlistment as a hussar in the army of Louis XVI, his rapid promotion through the ranks of the revolutionary armies and his long service under Napoleon. ...

Includes over 200 maps, plans, diagrams and uniform printsLt.-Col. Theodore Ayrault Dodge was a soldier of long and bloody experience, having served with the Union Army of the Potomac during the American Civil War losing one of his legs during the battle of Gettysburg. After the end of the war he settled down in retirement to write, he produced a number of excellent works on the recently ended Civil War and his magnum opus "A History of the Art of War", tracing the advances, changes...