Nick Lloyd, "The Western Front: A History of the Great War, 1914-1918" (Liveright, 2021)
The Western Front evokes images of mud-spattered men in waterlogged trenches, shielded from artillery blasts and machine-gun fire by a few feet of dirt. This iconic setting was the most critical arena...
9 Jul 202138min
Cees Heere, "Empire Ascendant: The British World, Race, and the Rise of Japan, 1894-1914" (Oxford UP, 2020)
In 1902, the British government concluded a defensive alliance with Japan, a state that had surprised much of the world with its sudden rise to prominence. For the next two decades, the Anglo-Japanese...
7 Jul 202156min
Susan Eisenhower, "How Ike Led: The Principles Behind Eisenhower's Biggest Decisions" (Thomas Dunne, 2020)
Few people have made decisions as momentous as Eisenhower, nor has one person had to make such a varied range of them. From D-Day to Little Rock, from the Korean War to Cold War crises, from the Red S...
5 Jul 20211h 21min
Margaret MacMillan, "War: How Conflict Shaped Us" (Random House, 2020)
“…and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.” -Isaiah 2:4 The instinct...
28 Jun 202135min
Philip Zelikow, "The Road Less Traveled: The Secret Battle to End the Great War, 1916-1917" (PublicAffairs, 2021)
During a pivotal few months in the middle of the First World War all sides-Germany, Britain, and America-believed the war could be concluded. Peace at the end of 1916 would have saved millions of live...
24 Jun 202135min
Edward G. Longacre, "Unsung Hero of Gettysburg: The Story of Union General David McMurtrie Gregg" (U Nebraska Press, 2021)
Today I talked to Edward G. Longacre about his new book Unsung Hero of Gettysburg: The Story of Union General David McMurtrie Gregg (University of Nebraska Press, 2021). On the 3rd day of the Battle o...
24 Jun 202132min
Sean McMeekin, "Stalin's War: A New History of World War II" (Basic Books, 2021)
World War II endures in the popular imagination as a heroic struggle between good and evil, with villainous Hitler driving its events. But Hitler was not in power when the conflict erupted in Asia—and...
23 Jun 20211h 15min
Bradley Cesario, "New Crusade: The Royal Navy and British Navalism, 1884-1914" (De Gruyter Oldenbourg, 2021)
In the years leading up to the First World War, a loose combination of serving naval officers, journalists, and politicians in Great Britain orchestrated a wave of support for the Royal Navy and an ex...
17 Jun 202146min
