The civil war that tore Spain apart between 1936 & 1939 & attracted liberals & socialists from across the world to support the cause against Franco was one of the most hard-fought & bitterest conflicts of the 20th century: a war of atrocities & political genocide & a military testing ground before WWII for the Russians Italians & Germans whose Condor Legion so notoriously destroyed Guernica. Antony Beevor's account narrates the origins of the Civil War & its violent & dramatic course from the coup d'etat in July 1936 through the savage fighting of the next three years which ended in catastrophic defeat for the Republicans in 1939. & he succeeds especially well in unravelling the complex political & regional forces that played such an important part in the origins & history of the war. ...

On December 17 2010 a Tunisian man set himself on fire after the police seized the vegetable cart by which he earned his living. This single act by an unknown figure sent a wave of revolt through the Arab world. It led to the overthrow of governments in Tunisia & Egypt civil war in Libya prolonged unrest in Syria & Bahrain & massive public protests across the region. In this deeply informed & accessible book Lin Noueihed & Alex Warren draw on years of experience in the Middle East & North Africa to explain how the events of the Arab Spring spread so widely & with such staggering speed. What suddenly drove ordinary Arab people to rise up against their long-entrenched rulers? Noueihed & Warren contend that although the exact causes were different in each country an explosive mix was common to all: widening economic inequalities pervasive corruption lack of political freedom & access to independent TV news social media & mobile phones. The authors explore these economic political & media developments consider the impact of Western responses to the uprisings & discuss the possibilities for a free democratic Arab world in the future. ...

The Falklands War was one of the strangest in British history -- 28 000 men sent to fight for a tiny relic of empire 8 000 miles from home. At the time many Britons saw it as a tragic absurdity but the British victory confirmed the quality of British arms & boosted the political fortunes of the Conservative government. But it left a chequered aftermath; it was of no wider significance for British interests & taught no lessons. It has since been overshadowed by the two Gulf Wars however its political ramifications cannot be overestimated. Max Hastings & Simon Jenkins account of the conflict is a modern classic of war reportage & the definitive book on the war. Republished as part of the Pan Military Classics series The Battle for the Falklands is a vivid chronicle of a call to arms & a thoughtful & informed analysis of an astonishing chapter in the history of our times. Skilfully woven with Simon Jenkins sharp political passages are Max Hastings wonderful dispatches Sunday Times ...

Updated with a new postscript by Amy Chua & a letter from her eldest daughter Sophia Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother is a story about a mother two daughters & two dogs. It was supposed to be a story of how Chinese parents are better at raising kids than Western ones. But instead it's about a bitter clash of cultures a fleeting taste of glory & how you can be humbled by a thirteen-year-old. Witty entertaining & provocative this is a unique & important book that will transform your perspective of parenting forever. ...

The casualties of war arent only on the battlefield... Coming back from war is never easy as Sergeant Dave Henleys platoon discovers all too quickly when they return from fighting in Afghanistan. Life at home is very different than on the battlefield
- for everyone. When they are summoned back to Helmand to protect the US team assigned to destroy the opium crop it is almost a relief to the soldiers if not to their wives girlfriends & families who are turned inside out once more by their mens sudden departure. For all concerned danger lurks around every corner
- for Daves team who must learn new skills to survive & their loved ones in England whose lives can be destroyed by equally deadly weapons
- a harsh look a misunderstanding an ugly rumour. Like War Torn" " Battle Lines" is at once a gritty close-to-the-action thriller & an involving story of the stresses & strains which families & relationships suffer when separated by thousands of miles & a wealth of experience. This is everyday life made brilliantly real by Andy Mc Nab whose continued involvement with the men & women of the British Army gives this extraordinary novel its authenticity its toughness & its heart. This is real life brought brilliantly alive by Andy Mc Nab whose continued involvement with the men & women of the British Army gives this extraordinary novel its authenticity its toughness & its heart."


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Coming back from war is never easy as Sergeant Dave Henley's platoon discovers all too quickly when they return from fighting in Afghanistan. Life at home is very different than on the battlefield
- for everyone. When they are summoned back to Helmand to protect the US team assigned to destroy the opium crop it is almost a relief to the soldiers if not to their wives girlfriends & families who are turned inside out once more by their men's sudden departure. For all concerned danger lurks around every corner
- for Dave's team who must learn new skills to survive & their loved ones in England whose lives can be destroyed by equally deadly weapons
- a harsh look a misunderstanding an ugly rumour. Like War Torn" " Battle Lines" is at once a gritty close-to-the-action thriller & an involving story of the stresses & strains which families & relationships suffer when separated by thousands of miles & a wealth of experience. This is everyday life made brilliantly real by Andy Mc Nab whose continued involvement with the men & women of the British Army gives this extraordinary novel its authenticity its toughness & its heart."


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Battle Lines Ypres the first volume in Pen & Swords new series of walking cycling & driving guides to the Western Front is the essential companion for every visitor to the Ypres Salient & the battlefields of Belgium. Many of the most famous
- & most memorable
- Great War sites are featured here. Expert guides Jon Cooksey & Jerry Murland take visitors over a series of routes that can be walked or biked or driven explaining the fighting that occurred in each place in vivid detail. They describe what happened where it happened & why & who was involved & point out the sights that remain there for the visitor to see. Their accounts give a fascinating insight into the landscape of the front line & the acts of war that took place there a century ago.

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A fresh perspective on the famous battle in which the victors threatened the very existence of the Ulster plantation but ironically brought about the fall of their own Assembly of the Catholic Supreme Council. On Friday 5th June 1646 near the village of Benburb Owen Roe ONeill leader of the Confederate native Irish Ulster army brought about his greatest military triumph in Ireland by putting to rout the combined Scottish/ British force of Robert Monro. This was no ordinary battle as the combatants came from Scotland England Wales & Ireland with the mixed interests of the imprisoned King Charles I his rebellious English parliament the Scottish covenanters the old English the Vatican the Ulster plantation & the native Irish. In this fresh new perspective the battle itself has been re-examined & broken down into tactical phases to understand the experiences the men had to endure & the reasons why the battle turned out the way it did. The rival forces themselves are investigated with full orders of battle the troops of horse & regiments of foot that participated in the campaign & the different types of soldiers that made up these units. ...

When turmoil strikes world monetary & financial markets leaders invariably call for 'a new Bretton Woods' to prevent catastrophic economic disorder & defuse political conflict. The name of the remote New Hampshire town where representatives of forty-four nations gathered in July 1944 in the midst of the century's second great war has become shorthand for enlightened globalization. The actual story surrounding the historic Bretton Woods accords however is full of startling drama intrigue & rivalry which are vividly brought to life in Benn Steil's epic account. Upending the conventional wisdom that Bretton Woods was the product of an amiable Anglo-American collaboration Steil shows that it was in reality part of a much more ambitious geopolitical agenda hatched within President Franklin D. Roosevelt's Treasury & aimed at eliminating Britain as an economic & political rival. At the heart of the drama were the antipodal characters of John Maynard Keynes the renowned & revolutionary British economist & Harry Dexter White the dogged self-made American technocrat. Bringing to bear new & striking archival evidence Steil offers the most compelling portrait yet of the complex & controversial figure of White
- the architect of the dollar's privileged place in the Bretton Woods monetary system who also very privately admired Soviet economic planning & engaged in clandestine communications with Soviet intelligence officials & agents over many years. A remarkably deft work of storytelling that reveals how the blueprint for the postwar economic order was actually drawn The Battle of Bretton Woods" is destined to become a classic of economic & political history."
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Its 1939 & Harry Woods is a Spitfire pilot in the RAF. When his friend Lenny loses his leg in a dogfight with the Luftwaffe Harry is determined to fight on. That is until his plane is hit & he finds himself tumbling through the air high above the English Channel. ...