By the middle of the second century BCE, after nearly one hundred years of warfare, Rome had exerted its control over the entire Mediterranean world, forcing the other great powers of the region—Carthage, Macedonia, Egypt, and the Seleucid empire—to submit militarily and financially. But how, despite its relative poverty and its frequent numerical disadvantage in decisive battles, did Rome prevail? Michael J. Taylor explains this surprising outcome by examining the role that manpower and finances played.

Throughout the war on the Eastern Front, there were two consistent trends. The Red Army battled to learn how to fight and win, while involved in a struggle for its very survival. But by 1944 it had a leadership that was able to wield it with lethal effect and with far more effective equipment than before. By contrast, the Wehrmacht had commenced a slow process of decline after the invasion of the Soviet Union. Hitler became increasingly unwilling to delegate decision-making to commanders in the field, which had been crucial to earlier success.

The Baltic's time has come. It is not only critical to Europe's security and increasingly a centre of political and military power in its own right; it is a reservoir of ideas and experiences that could shape the continent's future. This books explores the history, their culture, their peculiarities and national dilemmas of all nine Baltic countries. At its core is a search for fresh answers to Europe's problems, at a point where the continent's previously dominant powers appear tired and divided.

A survey of Chinese naval operational history, Li's book focuses on the major battles and important engagements of Chinese naval operations from 1949-2009. His findings elucidate the origin of and changes of the People's Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) by examining its adaptation, modernization, and setbacks in the past sixty years.

We are entering a new era of global cataclysm in which the world faces a deadly mix of war, climate change, great power rivalry, rapid technological advancement, the end of both monarchy and empire, and countless other dangers. In Waste Land, Robert D. Kaplan, geopolitical expert and author of more than twenty books on world affairs, incisively explains how we got here and where we are going.

The 13 chapters of The Art of War, each devoted to one aspect of warfare, were compiled by the high-ranking Chinese military general, strategist, and philosopher Sun-Tzu. In spite of its battlefield specificity, The Art of War has found new life in the modern age, with leaders in fields as wide and far-reaching as world politics, human psychology, and corporate strategy finding valuable insight in its timeworn words.

The Mongol army led by Genghis Khan subjugated more lands and people in 25 years than the Romans did in 400. In nearly every country the Mongols conquered, they brought an unprecedented rise in cultural communication, expanded trade, and a blossoming of civilization.

Experience a bold take on this classic autobiography as it’s performed by Oscar-nominated Laurence Fishburne. In this searing classic autobiography, originally published in 1965, Malcolm X, the Muslim leader, firebrand, and Black empowerment activist, tells the extraordinary story of his life and the growth of the Human Rights movement. His fascinating perspective on the lies and limitations of the American dream and the inherent racism in a society that denies its non-White citizens the opportunity to dream, gives extraordinary insight into the most urgent issues of our own time.

Lyndon Baines Johnson was a man of great ambition and enormous greed, both of which, in 1963, would threaten to destroy him. In the end, President Johnson would use power from his personal connections in Texas and from the underworld and from the government to escape an untimely end in politics and to seize even greater power. President Johnson, the thirty-sixth president of the United States, was the driving force behind a conspiracy to murder President John F. Kennedy on November 22, 1963. In The Man Who Killed Kennedy, you will find out how and why he did it. Political consultant, strategist, and Libertarian Roger Stone has gathered documents and used his firsthand knowledge to construct the ultimate tome to prove that LBJ was not only involved in JFK's assassination, but was in fact the mastermind. With 2013 being the fiftieth anniversary of JFK's assassination, this is the perfect time for The Man Who Killed Kennedy to be available to readers. The research and information in this book is unprecedented, and as Roger Stone lived through it, he's the perfect person to bring it to everyone's attention.

Do you know how many wives Zeus had? Or how the famous Trojan War was caused by one beautiful lady? Or how Thor got his hammer? Give your imagination a real treat. This Mega Mythology Collection of eight audiobooks is for you....

It takes a special type of person to serve in a nation’s navy, especially on long voyages that separate men and women from their loved ones, and no service is both loved and hated as that aboard submarines, for very few people ever serve on them on a whim. For one thing, the psychological impact of being trapped for long periods underwater in tight, cramped quarters is more than many people can stand.

Crescent Dawn features some of the legendary figures of the era – from Mehmet the Conqueror, and Suleiman the Magnificent on the Ottoman side, to Charles V and Vasco de Gama on the other – and some of the most exotic locales on Earth – from the sumptuous palaces of Constantinople to the bloody battlefields of the Balkans to the awe-inspiring mountains of Ethiopia. This is a colorful history that brings the great battles of the age to life and clearly shows how the western struggle against the Ottomans constituted the first truly world war.

Born in Germany in 1922, Colin Anson's (Claus Ascher) childhood was marked by the trials of Nazism. His father was arrested by the Gestapo in 1937 and transported to Dachau, where he died shortly after. Colin, aged just seventeen, escaped to Britain in the Kindertransport. As soon as he was old enough, Colin volunteered in the Pioneer Corps. Then, in 1942, he was recruited for the elite commando unit X-Troop. Colin took part in the invasions of Sicily and Italy in 1943, where he sustained a near-fatal injury. But just months later, he returned to duty.

By the middle of the second century BCE, after nearly one hundred years of warfare, Rome had exerted its control over the entire Mediterranean world, forcing the other great powers of the region—Carthage, Macedonia, Egypt, and the Seleucid empire—to submit militarily and financially. But how, despite its relative poverty and its frequent numerical disadvantage in decisive battles, did Rome prevail? Michael J. Taylor explains this surprising outcome by examining the role that manpower and finances played.

Between the ninth and fourteenth centuries, Arab explorers journeyed widely and frequently into the far north, crossing territories that now include Russia, Uzbekistan, and Kazakhstan. Ibn Fadlan's chronicles of his travels are one of the most important documents from the period, and this illuminating new translation offers insight into the world of the Arab geographers and the medieval lands of the far north. Based on an expedition to the upper Volga River in 922 AD,

At the heart of the Middle East, with its regional conflicts and proxy wars, is a 1400-year-old schism between Sunni and Shia. To understand this divide and its modern resonances, we need to revisit its origins—which go back to the death of the Prophet Muhammad in 632; the accidental coup that set aside the claims of his son Ali; and the slaughter of Ali's own son Husayn at Karbala. These events, known to every Muslim, have created a slender fault line in the Middle East.

A Genocide Foretold confronts the stark realities of life under siege in Gaza and the heroic effort ordinary Palestinians are waging to resist and survive. Weaving together personal stories, historical context, and unflinching journalism, Chris Hedges provides an intimate portrait of systemic oppression, occupation, and violence.

How do social movements arise, wield power, and decline? Renowned scholar Linda Gordon investigates these questions in a groundbreaking work, narrating the stories of many of America's most influential twentieth-century social movements. Beginning with the turn-of-the-century settlement house movement, Gordon then scrutinizes the 1920s Ku Klux Klan and its successors, the violent American fascist groups of the 1930s.

The enduring image of World War I is of men stuck in muddy trenches, and of vast armies deadlocked in a fight neither could win. It was a war of barbed wire, poison gas, and horrific losses as officers led their troops on mass charges across No Man’s Land and into a hail of bullets. While these impressions are all too true, they hide the fact that trench warfare was dynamic and constantly evolving throughout the war as all armies struggled to find a way to break through the opposing lines.

When America retreated from Kabul amid chaos in 2021, Lieutenant General Sami Sadat, the last commander of the army of the Afghan republic, was still fighting to the end. In this firsthand account, he reveals how his troops were starved of ammunition for two years before the final pullout, while America was glad-handing the Taliban.

Eran A. Zelnik offers a cultural history of early America that shows how humor among white men served to define and construct not only whiteness and masculinity but also American political culture and democracy more generally. Zelnik traces the emerging bonds of affinity that white male settlers in North America cultivated through their shared, transformative experience of mirth. This humor—a category that includes not only jokes but also play, riot, revelry, and mimicry—shaped the democratic and anti-elitist sensibilities of Americans.

The acclaimed author of the “stirring, definitive, and engrossing” (NPR) The Woman’s Hour returns with the story of four activists whose audacious plan to restore voting rights to Black Americans laid the groundwork for the Civil Rights Movement.

An unusually sharp look at the way in which the U.S. press and experts have dealt with the crisis in the Middle East and Iran.

Award-winning El Paso-native journalist Richard Parker offers a radical work of history that re-centers the American story around El Paso, Texas, gateway between north and south, center of indigenous power and resistance, locus of European colonization of North America, centuries-long hub of immigration, and underappreciated modern blueprint for a changing United States.

On March 22, 2023, the Swedish Academy organized a conference on threats to democracy and freedom of expression featuring a slate of distinguished speakers including Arundhati Roy, Timothy Snyder, and Sofi Oksanen. Oksanen’s address—entitled “Putin's War on Women”— would go on to spark such interest that the acclaimed Finnish writer felt compelled to return to it as the basis for a larger, more in-depth look at Putin’s threat to women. The result is Same River, Twice, a devastating book-length essay that incisively builds on the themes and arguments first presented in her powerful speech.