A full ten years before downed American U2 pilot Francis Gary Powers was exchanged in 1962 on the Glienicke Bridge in Berlin for Rudolf Abel, a Soviet spy captured by the US, the espionage Cold War was already well under way. In 1952 Soviet intelligence had an agent under development codenamed ZEMLIAK, who had access to the highest levels of Government in Australia. Through this access the Soviets fully expected ZEMLIAK to betray highly secret US and British intelligence.Through a ...

Filled with fresh interpretations and information, puncturing old myths and challenging new ones, Battle Cry of Freedom will unquestionably become the standard one-volume history of the Civil War. James McPherson's fast-paced narrative fully integrates the political, social, and military events that crowded the two decades from the outbreak of one war in Mexico to the ending of another at Appomattox. Packed with drama and analytical insight, the book vividly recounts the momentous...

D-Day, June 6, 1944: it was the biggest amphibious operation in history. German Field Marshal Rommel, declared, "the enemy must be annihilated before he reaches our main battlefield," the Allied Forces undertook a massive invasion of the German-occupied coast of Normandy, France. First, there was the aerial onslaught by British and American airborne divisions, then the landing of the American, British, and Canadian seaborne troops. Over 150,000 Allied troops took the fight to the enemy, th...

Men from Hampshire have for generations fought in the ranks of the Royal Hampshire Regiment, or its predecessors.All 160 Battle Honours of the regiment are featured in this book, including Blenheim, Minden, Barrosa, Kabul, Paardeburg, Mons, The Somme, Mesopotamia, Ypres, Passchendaele, Dunkirk, North Africa, Sicily, D-Day and Rhine Crossing.

Too often historical writing on the Russian War of 1854-56 focuses narrowly on the land campaign fought in the Crimean peninsula in the Black Sea. The wider war waged at sea by the British and French navies against the Russians is ignored. The allied navies aimed to strike at Russian interests anywhere in the world where naval force could be brought to bear, and as a result campaigns were waged in the Baltic, the Black Sea, the White Sea, on the Russian Pacific coast and in the Sea of Azof...

The Battle of Waterloo took place in Belgium on 18 June 1815. The French Armee du Nord, led by Napoleon Bonaparte, was pitted against an Allied army, comprising British, Belgians, Dutch and Germans, under the command of the Duke of Wellington and Prince Willem of Orange, combined with a Prussian army led by Gebhard von Blucher. This Digest examines the battle, and the lead up to the event, through different lens. We all know from our school days, that Napoleon lost the battle, but with the...

Five classics of military strategy in one volume, spanning from ancient empires to the early nineteenth century.This collection compiles the writings of some of the world's most renowned generals and strategists, offering both a journey through more than two millennia of military history and a grounding in the timeless principles of waging war. Included are:The Art of War by Sun TzuThe Military Institutions of the Romans by Vegetius...

The Fighting First tells the untold story of the 1st Infantry Division's part in the D-Day invasion of France at Normandy. Using a variety of primary sources, official records, interviews, and unpublished memoirs by the veterans themselves, author Flint Whitlock has crafted a riveting, gut-wrenching, personal story of courage under fire. Operation Overlord - the Allied invasion of Normandy on 6 June 1944 - was arguably the most important battle of World War II, and Omaha Beach was...

This book concentrates on the dramatic experiences of Napoleon's Army of the Orient in Egypt and the Holy Land. The fighting of the Mamelukes and Turks are covered in depth, detailing desert combat, siege warfare, cavalry skirmishes and the suppression of uprisings. It examines the French treatment of prisoners as well as the fate of captured Frenchmen, and describes caring for the wounded, outbreaks of bubonic plague, and the terrible retreat from Acre in 1799, in accounts by the men who ...

As leader of the Irish Republican Brotherhood and then the Irish Republican Army (IRA), Michael Collins developed a bold, new strategy to use against the British administration of Ireland in the early twentieth century. His goal was to attack its well-established system of spies and informers, wear down British forces with a sustained guerrilla campaign, and force a political settlement that would lead to a free Irish Republic.Michael Collins and the Anglo-Irish War reveal...

Why did the Suez War ever come to pass? Why did Eden, against public opinion and without sufficient military capability, decide to invade Egypt? When Gamal Abdel Nasser decided to nationalize the Suez Canal, Britain and France reacted dramatically, beginning a chain of events that ultimately led to war. But why did Nasser nationalize the canal in the first place? And what part did the United States of America play in sparking the conflict that resulted in war? Paul Johnson skilfully and cl...

In August of 1939 a nine year old boy, his younger brother, and his mother sailed to Yugoslavia for a purported vacation that would end up lasting six years. Before they reached Yugoslavia, World War II started. They continued on their journey. The American Consulate advised them to return to the United States, but the boy's mother decided to stay in Yugoslavia. That decision both saved them and nearly killed them several times. The boy's name was Anthony Farcich. Ahead lay a series of eve...