Libros

Even before the spectacular success of its X-1 rocket-powered aircraft in breaking the "sound barrier," the adventurous Bell Aircraft Corporation was already pushing ahead with a parallel project to build a second aircraft capable of far higher speeds. The X-2 (or Model 52) explored the equally (...)

Adopted from the Celts in the 1st century BC, the spatha, a lethal and formidable chopping blade, became the primary sword of the Roman soldier in the Later Empire. Over the following centuries, the blade, its scabbard, and its system of carriage underwent a series of developments, until by the 3rd (...)

The history of the US Navy's gunboats, their roles in building a worldwide American naval presence and in combat, from the Yangtze era through to World War II.For more than half a century, American gunboats were the ships often responsible for policing small crises and provided deterrence and (...)

During World War II, Imperial Japan was the world's most militarized society, with a host of uniformed organizations supporting the war effort in East Asia and the Pacific and ultimately tasked with defending the Home Islands. Featuring full-color artwork, this book reveals the organization and (...)

Gaius Julius Caesar remains the most famous Roman general of all time. Although he never bore the title, historians since Suetonius have judged him to be, in practice, the very first 'emperor' - after all, no other name in history has been synonymous with a title of imperial rule. Caesar was a (...)

This title explores and illustrates the armies of France, and six countries allied against Louis XIV, in a wide-ranging Continental conflict that ushered in more than a century of European warfare.Formed in 1689, the 'Grand Alliance' or League of Augsburg was a military coalition of the Holy Roman (...)

In 1935 the USAAC wanted to build a potential intercontinental bomber, a 'Guardian of the Hemisphere,' and granted Donald Douglas a contract to build the world's largest bomber. The groundwork for the intercontinental bomber had been laid in the previous two decades by the courageous military and (...)

During the Korean War and the Vietnam War, US Navy Special Warfare units played a variety of vital combat roles amid two of the deadliest conflicts of the Cold War. In Korea, underwater demolition teams (UDTs) surveyed beaches for amphibious operations, cleared sea mines from harbors, conducted (...)

This study explains how the armies of North and South Vietnam, newly equipped with the most modern Soviet and US tanks and weaponry, fought the decisive armored battles of the Easter Offensive.Wearied by years of fighting against Viet Cong guerillas and North Vietnamese regulars, the United States (...)

A beautifully illustrated history of the iconic ocean-going gunboats of British 'gunboat diplomacy', the hundreds of little warships that for 50 years demonstrated the power of the Royal Navy worldwide, and which maintained and enforced the rule of the British Empire at its peak.In recent years the (...)