John Laffin - Böcker

For too long, Dr John Laffin maintains, the military reputation of British Generals in World War I has not been examined critically enough, and he asks how those responsible for catastrophic defeats were able to retain their commands. Haig, whose army suffered 60,000 casualties on the first day of the Battle of the Somme in 1916, was still in command after five months more fighting and another 400,000 casualties. By the war's end the numbers of dead ran into millions - doggedly brave British Empire soldiers who, Laffin believes, were killed, wounded or broken by commanders who were vain, egocentric and incompetent. But the generals, who blamed the dead and junior in rank, cannot be excused on the grounds that there was "nothing else that they could do". Even now, more than 75 years after that "Great War for Civilization", this book raises questions that are uncomfortable. Laffin draws on the memories and writings of those who took part and quotes the judgements of other military historians to provide analysis of just what went wrong in the generals' leader, and how it resulted in such appalling and tragic losses - and concludes that they were not merely incompetent but uncaring.

For too long, believes John Laffin, the image of the German soldier has been distorted by the atrocities of the Nazis. In Jackboot, the author gives the ordinary German soldier his due, tracing his background and influences from the time of Frederick the Great to the end of World War II.

Tommy Atkins is the English soldier, who joking broke the cavalry of France at Minden, who singing marched with the Great Duke to the Danube, who grumbling shattered Napoleon's dreams at Waterloo, who sweating in his red coat tramped back and forth across Indis, who kept his six-rounds-to-the-minute at Mons, and who died in the mud at Passchendaele, the sands of the Western Desert, and the jungles of Burma. If his name has been eclipsed by his more illustrious commanders - Cromwell, Marlborough, Moore, Wolfe, Wellington, Allenby, Slim - they at least will accord him his rightful place beside them. They knew his worth.Tommy Atkins is his story - the story of this most versatile, most adaptable, most un-military soldier.

The Australians have had a brief military history, by world standards.Yet, they have taken part in nine wars and, British troops apart, they have fought in more countries than the soldiers of any other nation. Friend and foe alike have assessed them as men-at-arms perhaps equalled but never surpassed. This absorbing text by John Laffin examines the history, uniforms and organisation of these colourful and courageous troops, from the Diggers of the First World War to their role in Vietnam.

The modern wars of the Middle East began in 1947, when the Syrians, Egyptians, Jordanians and Lebanese were unofficially at war with the Jewish settlers of Palestine.On the 15 May, the day after Israel was declared a sovereign state, the Arab invasion began. Between then and 1973 five wars occurred: those of 1948; the Sinai War; the Six-Day War; the 1968–1970 War of Attrition and the 1973 October War.This book examines the organization, training and equipment of the key Arab armies during these conflicts and the variety of uniforms are illustrated by a number of contemporary photographs and full colour artwork.