This book is the best sort of military history, combining the big strategic picture with what the struggle meant on the ground.
Rob Johnson is the Director of the Changing Character of War (CCW) research programme at Oxford University (www.history.ox.ac.uk/ccw). The CCW Programme brings together academics, policy makers and armed forces in the study of war, pursuing a variety of research themes including the future character of war; war and the state in a connected world; unconventional warfare; strategy and war, and the moral-legal dimensions of war. Rob's primary interests are in strategy and the history of war, particularly in Asia and the Middle East, and he has examined the problems of strategic decision-making in a variety of contexts and publications.