The Battle 100: The Stories Behind History's Most Influential Battles - Softcover

Lanning, Michael

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1402202636 ISBN 13: 9781402202636

Publisher: Sourcebooks, 2005

Synopsis

A single day in the heat of armed conflict can shape the future of the world. Throughout history, individual battles have inspired the birth of nations, the devastation of cultures and the triumph of revolutions. Yet while some battles rise up as the cornerstones of history, others fade in our cultural memory, forgotten as minor skirmishes. Why is this so? What makes a battle "important"?
Celebrated veteran and military expert Michael Lee Lanning offers a provocative response with The Battle 100: The Stories Behind History's Most Influential Battles. Lanning ranks history's 100 greatest battles according to their influence, both immediate and long-term. Thought-provoking and controversial, Lanning's rankings take us to the heart of the battles and reveal their true greatness.

About this title

About the Author

Lt. Col. Michael Lee Lanning retired from the U.S. Army after more than twenty years of service. He is a decorated veteran of the Vietnam War, where he served as an infantry platoon leader and company commander. Lanning has written fourteen books on military history, including The Military 100: A Ranking of the Most Influential Military Leaders of All Time. He lives in Phoenix, Arizona.

From Publishers Weekly

This handy browser's reference from retired Army officer and decorated Vietnam veteran Lanning offers brief accounts of the author's choice of the 100 most influential battles in history. The selections are wide-ranging: the first three are household words-Yorktown, Hastings and Stalingrad-while the last three are Tel-el-Kebir, which established the British protectorate over Egypt in 1882, Vyborg, the White victory over the Reds in 1918 that ensured the independence of Finland, and Little Big Horn, whose major importance is the amount of controversy it has generated since 1876. The author has impartially included wars of colonial conquest (Cajamarca, which gave Pizarro and Spain rule over the Inca Empire) and colonial liberation (Carabobo, which freed Venezuela, and Dien Bien Phu). He also offers useful perspectives on naval battles (Actium, Trafalgar, Tsushima, Lepanto and Midway, to name a few). Each article features a clearly written if brief narrative, including analyses of what is known about the tactics and weapons, and an excellent map. Some of them also have flaws, such as the article on Tsushima-not all the Russian ships were old-and the political attack on Walter Cronkite in the article on the Tet Offensive. This work is very similar to Lanning's The Military 100, a volume in the same format on the most influential commanders, but unusual and even witty insights also abound, such as the comment that the Battle of Kadesh was the first example of a general's publicity machine (in this case, Ramses II of Egypt) turning a drawn battle into a victory. The wide range keeps depth of each article limited, but these are useful introductions to many battles that are not household words.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Sourcebooks
• Publication date: 2005
• ISBN 10: 1402202636
• ISBN 13: 9781402202636
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 368