An account of the Chinese Civil War re-examining the strategy, tactics, and leadership of both sides

The Greatest Tumult: The Chinese Civil War 1936-49

History

Hooton, E.R.

World

Potomac Books Inc.

Supermarine Spitfire Mk.I-XVI in R.A.F., S.A.A.F., R.A.A.F., R.N.Z.A.F., R.C.A.F. and Foreign Service (Aircam Aviation)

Osprey_Publishing

In the late 1930s the Soviet Union experienced a brutal Ezhovshchina – or Purge – which swept through all levels of its society with millions arrested and tens of thousands shot for reasons lacking any form of ethics or justification. As historian, E.R. Hooton describes in this absorbing and revealing history, the Soviet armed forces did not escape the bloody tidal wave which swept away the majority of their most experienced and gifted officers. One of the driving forces for the Red Army Purges was a bitter dispute between the conservatives and radicals who sought a form of warfare based on deep-roaming mechanized forces. But the conservatives’ ensuing bitterness was due to the fact that the radicals were unable to make the mechanized forces viable operationally and this failure would prove to be the major factor in driving the radicals to the execution chambers. Yet as the leadership of the Soviet forces was cut to pieces, the Red Army was deployed in operations at the extremities of Stalin’s empire. Despite showing ominous signs of weakness, in every case it triumphed. The Japanese had been defeated on the Korean border at Lake Khasan in 1938 and a year later suffered a major defeat on the Mongolian border at the River Khalkin (Khalkin Gol) in an offensive directed by the future Marshal Zhukov. These guns had barely ceased fire when there was a major invasion of eastern Poland following the Ribbentrop Pact. On the back of that, the Baltic States were compelled to allow the Russians to base forces in their borders. But as the Purges eased and Moscow became overconfident, the massive Red Army became enmeshed in the disastrous Winter War with Finland of 1939-1940 which saw its military prestige shattered and its invasion not only stopped, but dealt a series of major defeats. Victory of a kind, when it came, was pyrrhic. In the aftermath, the Red Army hurriedly sought to modernize and to expand in order to meet the growing threat from Nazi Germany. It invaded Romania’s eastern province of Bessarabia in June 1940 to provoke ‘Barbarossa’. Yet the Purges and the Purge mentality continued to wreak slaughter and fear from 1939 to 1941, culminating in a mini massacre of Soviet generals even as Hitler’s armies approached Moscow. Following detailed research, the author provides a vivid and important insight into the operations conducted by the Red Army from 1937 to 1941 and makes some surprising conclusions about the impact of the Purges.

Stalin's Claws: From the Purges to the Winter War: Red Army Operations Before Barbarossa 1937-1941

Military

Tattered Flag

The air war over the Steppes was more than a brutal clash in which might alone triumphed. It was a conflict that saw tactical and technological innovation as the Soviet air force faced off against Herman Göring's Luftwaffe. As Germany and the Soviet Union battled for victory on the Eastern Front, they had to overcome significant strategic and industrial problems, while fighting against the extreme weather conditions of the East. These factors, combined with the huge array of aircraft used on the Eastern Front, create one of the most compelling conflicts of the war.
 Told primarily from the strategic and command perspective, this account offers a detailed analysis of this oft-overlooked air war, tracing the clashes between Germany and the Soviet Union over the course of World War II. Historical photographs complement the examination as author E. R. Hooton explores these epic aerial battles between the Third Reich and the Soviet Union.

War over the Steppes: The air campaigns on the Eastern Front 1941–45 (General Aviation)

Spain in Arms is a military history of the Spanish Civil War. It examines how the Spanish Civil War developed on the battlefield through the prism of eight campaigns between 1937-1939 and shows how many accounts of military operations during this conflict are based upon half-truths and propaganda. The book is based upon nearly 60 years of extensive research into the Spanish Civil War, augmented by information from specialized German, Italian and Russian works. The Italian campaign against the Basques on the Northern Front in 1937 was one of the most spectacular Nationalist successes of the Civil War, with 60,000 prisoners taken. This is also the first book to quote secret data about Italian air operations intercepted by the British. The figures intercepted by the British show the Italians flew 1,215 sorties and dropped 231 tons of bombs during the campaign, whilst also suffering the heaviest losses. It also demonstrates how the Nationalists won not simply by benefitting from a cornucopia of modern arms from the Fascist powers but by using its limited resources to maximum effect. Spain in Arms reveals the Nationalist battlefield superiority in terms of training and overall command, and the Republic's corresponding weaknesses in the same fields. The Republican Brunete and Belchite offensives of 1937 are described in detail, from the weapons they carried and the tactics they employed to the dynamic Nationalist response and reaction of the generals. This book also explores how the extent of foreign intervention on both sides has been greatly exaggerated throughout history and provides the first accurate information on this military intervention, using British and French archives to produce a radically different but more accurate account of the battles and the factors and men who shaped them. Hooton finally gives the historical context and operational implications of the battlefield events to provide a link between the First and Second World Wars. Table of Contents Prologue Chapter 1: Madrid Front February-March 1937 Chapter 2: The New Armies and weapons Chapter 3: Northern Front April-October 1937 Chapter 4: Republican offensives July-October 1937 Chapter 5: The Nationalist Advance November 1937-October 1938 Chapter 6: The Last Battles; July 1938-February 1939

Spain in Arms: A Military History of the Spanish Civil War 1936-1939

Europe

Casemate

Franco's Pirates: Naval Aspects of the Spanish Civil War 1936–39

The fuse to the First World War was lit in the Balkans where simmering hatreds exploded into violence. Like a string of firecrackers, these hatreds had been fueled by attacks on the Turkish Ottoman Empire in the previous few years. From 1911-1912, Italy seized Libya. In 1912, the Balkan states united to drive Turkey out of Europe in the First Balkans War, and in the following year in the Second Balkans War, turned on each other in a division of the spoils which allowed Turkey to retain a foothold in Europe. This was a war of land campaigns, sea battles and amphibious operations in which the new military technology was first used. Submarine and aircraft attacked ships, aircraft made reconnaissance flights and bombed troops while even electronic warfare was used. It also saw mirror images of the events in the First World War; Bulgarians driven from Salonika where an Allied army would later be contained and Turkish troops held back in the Dardanelles, their guns driving off a naval task force. These now forgotten wars were the overture to the First World War and yet they have overtones a century later. The First World War saw echoes of these campaigns in Salonika and especially in the Dardanelles, while the ethnic tensions would erupt into further bloodshed after the Cold War ended as Yugoslavia collapsed during the 1990s.

Prelude to the First World War: The Balkan Wars 1912-1913

Fonthill Media

The Iran-Iraq War was one of the bloodiest and longest conventional conflicts of the twentieth century - and one that, accidentally, created the current nightmare of Islamic fundamentalist terrorism. There have been many books on the conflict, but Helion's Iran-Iraq War mini-series was the first detailed military history using materials from both sides, as well as materials obtained from US intelligence circles and British Governmental archives. It provided a unique insight into a war which began through miscalculation and rapidly escalated into the longest conventional conflict in the post-Second World War era.Combining the four @War volumes previously published on this topic, The Iran-Iraq War: The Greatest Land War of the Late Twentieth Century details the origins of the conflict and how Saddam Hussein decided to invade; how the hamstrung Iraqi Army was able to conquer only a narrow strip of territory of Iran's southern province of Khuzestan; the constantly growing Iranian counteroffensives that first recovered Khuzestan before invading Iraq and nearly breaking the back of its armed forces; the warfare between Iran and Iraq on the Central and Northern Fronts, and final Iraqi victories that forced Iran into accepting a UN-mediated cease-fire.This special edition features an extensive quantity of new material that does not appear in the individual volumes, including detailed appendices providing the organizational structure of the protagonists' armies and their equipment holdings. It is lavishly illustrated with color photographs as well as color artworks of the vehicles, aircraft and soldiers involved, a number of which have been specially commissioned for this edition.The Iran-Iraq War: The Greatest Land War of the late Twentieth Century is the most detailed military history of this conflict available, and a unique, single-point source of reference on this topic.

The Iran-Iraq War: The Greatest Land War of the Late Twentieth Century (MiddleEast@War Series Special)

Cooper, Tom

MacKenzie, Bob

Nadimi, Farzin

Middle East

Helion and Company

This book details the period of the Arab-Israeli conflict between the June 1967 and October 1973 wars, referred to as the War of Attrition.\nThe Arab-Israeli conflict persisted through two wars and ongoing border tensions. However, the Six-Day War of June 1967 was a cataclysm. Israel emerged victorious in a war with neighboring Arab states and in possession of occupied territory. The Arabs were furious at this outcome and determined to regain their lands and dignity by again making war with Israel. Added to the mix was a resurgent Palestinian liberation movement. Renewed fighting began within weeks. It became a period of sustained combat, casualties, fiscal outlay, and diplomacy on the world stage unlike anything experienced previously. All involved militaries remained very active over these years with more consistent mobilization, intensive training, and action than ever before. Each side deepened their dependence on superpower arms supply. The geopolitical stakes rose and Israel found itself fighting the Soviets indirectly on the borders and terrorist internationally. Adversary forces grew in size, adopted more complex weapons, and trained in new tactics, all in the tumult of combat of escalating intensity. The danger of this sparking another general war with potential superpower involvement was high. This period is collectively referred to as the War of Attrition.\nThe named War of Attrition on the Suez Canal was began on March 8, 1969, and ended with a ceasefire 17 months later. However, there was combat on all fronts before and after. Palestinian irregulars operating from Jordan brought Israeli counter-insurgency operations in the West Bank and Jordan. Israeli special operations and bombing inside Jordan sought to compel that government to reign in the guerrillas and this greatly threatened the economy. The Palestinian elements challenged the Jordanian government itself and a civil war erupted that saw a dramatic decline in the power of the irregulars. Moving their principal base of operations to Lebanon saw the same cycle began evolving there. Syria struggled to regain strength to take on Israel again. They eventually began periodic operations against Israeli forces on the Golan Heights as retribution and to build strength for the next war many saw as inevitable.\nThe air forces of especially Israel and Egypt, then Syria, became especially active, grew in size and capabilities. They employed some of the most advanced weapons the USA and the USSR arrayed in their Cold War confrontation. The extent of the air war grew to extensive air defenses and long-range bombing plus deep photo reconnaissance.\nIt was an extraordinary time of confrontation, irregular warfare, rising terrorism, and national struggles seldom seen before or since. It became the world’s most violent, costly, and dangerous conflict after that in Southeast Asia. At the center of it, Israel found herself engaged on all sides and isolated as never before. The struggle altered the geopolitical landscape and set the stage for the October 1973 war.\nVolume 1 of this series covers the immediate aftermath of the Six-Day War as forces were reconstituted, strategies formulated and combat began anew on the new borders. The air forces and associated weapons that would play a significant role in the coming years are detailed.

The Arab-Israeli War of Attrition, 1967-1973: Volume 1: Six-Day War Aftermath, Renewed Combat, Air Forces (Middle East@War)

Norton, Bill

Charts the downfall of the Luftwaffe, from all-conquering force to defeat, to a straggling unit bereft of pilots, ground crew, quality aircraft or fuel. Its loss in the Battle of Britain, its reversals elsewhere, its failure to halt the Allied advances and inability to bring jet aircraft on stream are all covered.

Eagle in Flames: The Fall of the Luftwaffe

Arms & Armour

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