Gods of War: History's Greatest Military Rivals

Hannibal vs. Scipio. Grant vs. Lee. Rommel vs. Patton. The greatest battles, commanders, and rivalries of all time come to life in this engrossing guide to the geniuses of military history.
 
“A compelling study of military leadership.”—James M. McPherson, Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Battle Cry of Freedom
 
Any meeting of genius may create sparks, but when military geniuses meet, their confrontations play out upon a vast panorama of states or civilizations at war, wielding the full destructive power of a mighty nation’s armies. Gods of War is the first single-volume, in-depth examination of the most celebrated military rivalries of all time, and of the rare, world-changing battles in which these great commanders in history matched themselves against true equals.
 
From Caesar and Pompey deciding the fate of the Roman Republic, to Grant and Lee battling for a year during the American Civil War, to Rommel and Montgomery and Patton meeting in battle after battle as Hitler strove for European domination, these match-ups and their corresponding strategies are among the most memorable in history.
 
A thrilling look into both the generals’ lives and their hardest-fought battles, Gods of War is also a thought-provoking analysis of the qualities that make a strong commander and a deep exploration of the historical context in which the contestants were required to wage war, all told with rousing narrative flair. And in a time when technology has made the potential costs of war even greater, it is a masterful look at how military strategy has evolved and what it will take for leaders to guide their nations to peace in the future.

James Lacey is the author most recently of The Washington War: FDR’s Inner Circle and the Politics of Power That Won World War II and The First Clash: The Miraculous Greek Victory at Marathon and Its Impact on Western Civilization, as well as co-author with Williamson Murray of Moment of Battle: The Twenty Clashes That Changed the World. He is a widely published defense analyst who has written extensively on the war in Iraq and the global war on terrorism. He served more than a dozen years on active duty as an infantry officer. Lacey traveled with the 101st Airborne Division during the Iraq invasion as an embedded journalist for Time magazine, and his work has also appeared in National Review, Foreign Affairs, the Journal of Military History, and many other publications. He currently teaches at the Marine Corps War College and lives in Virginia.
 
Williamson Murray is the author of a wide selection of articles and books, including, with Allan Millett, the acclaimed A War to Be Won: Fighting the Second World War. He is professor emeritus of history at Ohio State, served for five years as an officer in the United States Air Force, and has taught at the Air War College and the United States Military Academy. He has also served as a Secretary of the Navy Fellow at the Naval War College, the Centennial Visiting Professor at the London School of Economics, the Matthew C. Horner Professor of Military Theory at the Marine Corps University, the Charles Lindbergh Chair at the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum, the Harold K. Johnson Professor of Military History at the Army War College, and the Distinguished Visiting Professor of Naval Heritage and History at the U.S. Naval Academy at Annapolis. He is presently a defense analyst at the Potomac Institute for Policy Studies and teaches at the Naval War College.