Resultados Editorial "Charles River Editors" en Militar

It has been famously pointed out that the Holy Roman Empire was neither holy, nor Roman, but it was also not an empire in the sense people expect when hearing the term. In theory, the emperor was the highest prince in Christendom, and his dominion extended the length and breadth of Western Europe. The empire had been created by the papacy in 801 when Pope Leo III famously crowned the supposedly unwitting Charlemagne in Saint Peter’s Basilica, intending to recreate the Western Roman Empire.

Americans have long been fascinated by the Civil War, marveling at the size of the battles, the leadership of the generals, and the courage of the soldiers. The Civil War was the deadliest conflict in American history, and had the two sides realized it would take four years and inflict over a million casualties, it might not have been fought. Since it did, however, historians and history buffs alike have been studying and analyzing the military and political history of the conflict ever since.

As Union commander George McClellan moved the Army of the Potomac up the Peninsula in early 1862, the Union army still had a nearly 2-1 advantage in manpower, so Army of Northern Virginia commander Joseph E. Johnston continued to gradually pull his troops back to a line of defense nearer Richmond as McClellan advanced. In conjunction, the Union Navy began moving its operations further up the James River, until it could get within seven miles of the Confederate capital before being opposed by a Southern fort.

The Underground Railroad is one of the most taught topics to young schoolchildren, and every American is familiar with the idea of fugitive slaves escaping to Canada and the North with the help of determined abolitionists and even former escaped slaves like Harriet Tubman. The secrecy involved in the Underground Railroad made it one of the most mysterious aspects of the mid-19th century in America, to the extent that claims spread that 100,000 slaves had escaped via the Underground Railroad.

Alfred Thayer Mahan is arguably the most influential military strategist in American history, and one of the world’s most important naval theorists. After a lengthy naval career, Mahan had assignments at the Naval Academy and the Brooklyn Naval Yard. He was invited to lecture at the Naval War College, and it was there that he collected together his notes and wrote a book, The Influence of Naval Power upon History, which somehow became an international best seller in 1890. Mahan went on to write twenty books and hundreds of essays and articles, most related to naval affairs.

In March 1941, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the Lend-Lease Act, which authorized the president to give arms to any nation if it was in America’s national interest. Operation Barbarossa gave the Soviets common cause with the British, and subsequently the Americans, changing the purpose of the Lend-Lease Act. Getting supplies to the Soviets to help them resist the German armies became a strategic imperative, and Iran’s geography of bordering the Persian Gulf to the south and Soviet territory to the north brought Iran to the front and center in the strategic supply effort.

Some historians have called the Seven Years’ War the first true world war, and they make a good point. Ultimately, this globally coordinated war involved five continents and at least 29 states and tribal confederacies, with a casualty toll in the millions and the maps forever altered. As part of the Seven Years’ War, the French and Indian War was the last in a long series of colonial conflicts between the French and British and also changed the map in America. At the end of the war, disputed borders were finally settled, and both empires were left reeling from the costs of war.

When the Battle of Towton took place on Palm Sunday in 1461 near a small village in Yorkshire, it was the largest and bloodiest battle ever fought on English soil. Towton was one of the battles of the Wars of the Roses, a series of civil wars ravaging England from 1455-1487. These marked the longest period England has been in unrest, surpassing the 12th century civil war between King Stephen and Empress Matilda (Maud), which lasted 15 years.

Tens of millions died during World War II as the warring powers raced to create the best fighter planes, tanks, and guns, and eventually that race extended to bombs which carried enough power to destroy civilization itself. While the war raged in Europe and the Pacific, a dream team was working on the Manhattan Project in America, a program kept so secret that Vice President Harry Truman didn’t know about it until he took the presidency after FDR’s death in April 1945. During this time, J. Robert Oppenheimer emerged as an extraordinary scientific mind in the United States.

World War I, also known in its time as the Great War or the War to End all Wars, was an unprecedented conflict in terms of its sheer scale. Before 1914, flying machines were objects of public curiosity. By 1918, all the major belligerents were fielding squadrons of fighting aircraft. Bombs were dropped on Paris in August 1914, and Zeppelins bombed Belgian forces as the Germans advanced on Liège. Zeppelin raids on Britain would continue for nearly four years. These raids and the attempts to stop them would be carried out at the cutting edge of new technology.

While some might think of the war as being a continuation of the feudal tradition of knights and peasants, the Hundred Years’ War revolutionized Western European warfare, and it truly helped to usher in the concept of nationalism on the continent. In England, it is remembered as a period of grandeur and success, even though the English lost the war and huge swathes of territory with it, while the French remember it as a strategic victory that ensured the continued independence of France and the denial of English hegemony.

To most observers, it seemed clear that Japan and Russia were destined to come into conflict in Korea and Manchuria. However, Russia’s vastly larger population, army, and navy seemed to make it inevitable that Japan would lose if the conflict escalated into war. Few could have foreseen that when war came, it would reveal that Russian power was largely an illusion. That would be underscored by one of the war’s most famous events, a bizarre battle that involved a makeshift Russian fleet under the command of an irascible and unstable admiral sailing around the world to meet its fate.

The Dodecanese Campaign was a British attempt to seize islands in the Aegean during the fall and winter of 1943. The campaign brought Anglo-American relations to their lowest point during the war. The Dodecanese Campaign was the tragic outcome of the fundamental differences of opinion and approach between allies who otherwise worked closely and in harmony, and though nobody knew it at the time, it marked one of the last major victories for German forces who had been forced to retreat in every other theater of operations.

Although it ended over 550 years ago, the Hundred Years’ War still looms large in the historical consciousness of England and France, even if the name of the famous war is a misnomer. The war was transformative in many respects, and the impact it had on the geopolitical situation of Europe cannot be overstated. While some might think of the war as being a continuation of the feudal tradition of knights and peasants, the Hundred Years’ War revolutionized Western European warfare, and it truly helped to usher in the concept of nationalism on the continent.

Germany's North African defeat opened up the possibility of taking the war in the West to the European continent for the first time since France's lightning conquest by the Wehrmacht in 1940. The British and Americans debated the merits of landing in France directly in 1943, but they ultimately opted against it. The Soviets railed at the Westerners as “bastards of allies”; but a 1943 “D-Day”-style landing in France might have proven a strategic and logistical impossibility.

The fighting in North Africa during World War II is commonly overlooked, aside from the famous battle at El Alamein that pitted the British under General Bernard Montgomery against the legendary “Desert Fox”, Erwin Rommel. But while the Second Battle of El Alamein would be the pivotal action in North Africa, the conflict in North Africa began all the way back in the summer of 1940 when Italian dictator Benito Mussolini declared Italy’s entrance into the war. From his perspective, the fact that the British and French had their hands full with the Germans created an opportunity.

Americans have long been fascinated by the Civil War, marveling at the size of the battles, the leadership of the generals, and the courage of the soldiers. Given the extent of Irish immigration in the 19th century, it should come as no surprise that the Irish played important roles in the Civil War. The Irish joined for many reasons, including wanting regular wages and enlistment bonus money, defending the Union, and even hoping that veteran Irish soldiers could help free Ireland from British rule.

Despite all the accomplishments, widespread victories, and conquests that the ancient Romans accrued over the centuries, one of their most critical failures was the inability to subjugate Germany. Indeed, historians have singled out this one failure as central to the ultimate downfall of Rome, as the constant wars against the Germanic tribes and the need to defend the frontier on the Rhine helped bring the Roman Empire to its knees. There are elements of truth in such a conclusion, but the reality was far more fluid than is often realized.

Somewhat ironically, the one aspect of the Middle Ages that has been romanticized is medieval warfare. What is generally forgotten is that medieval warfare was constantly adapting to the times as leaders adopted new techniques and technology, and common infantry became increasingly important throughout the period. The changes became most evident at the beginning of the 14th century, when the French army fought rebellious forces from Flanders in the Battle of the Golden Spurs on July 11, 1302.

Soon after dawn on July 1, 1916, British and Commonwealth troops climbed out of damp, muddy trenches in the Somme valley and began to advance across no-man’s land toward German positions. The British commander, Field Marshal Douglas Haig, was certain that this battle would lead to a decisive victory. However, by the time that night fell on that day, 57,000 British troops had become casualties, including more than 19,000 killed, the highest number of British casualties in a single day of combat.