By Force of Arms

The Austrian Army in the Seven Years War

by

Christopher Duffy

 From as far back as I can remember, I have always been extremely interested in the history of Austria and Austria-Hungary. As far as history books go, Helion & Company publish some of the best military history books on the market. So, wanting to review this book was a complete no-brainer for me.

 This is the second volume in the series by Mr. Duffy (who unfortunately passed away in 2022). The first volume, 'Instrument of War', covered the political and national goals of Austria in the Seven Years War. This volume covers the actual battles and warfare of that war. So, for the first time really, we get to see the war from the Austrian viewpoint instead of the Prussian. Most books that have been written about the European theater of war, this being the first real world war, follow the career of Frederick the Great through it. The lack of a well written and all-encompassing book on the Austrian involvement was decried as early as 1881 per the author.

 One of the best things about this book is you get to see the entire history of the war. A lot of books talk in depth about the first years of the war from 1756-1760, but only pay lip service to the war from 1760-1763. The book shows you both the victories and defeats of the Austrian Army throughout the war (yes, Frederick the Great did lose a good number of battles). However, not only that, but it also shows the reasons behind the successes and failures of the Army.

 The author switches easily from discussing the war on a strategic level to the tactics during its battles. One thing the book has which is absolutely essential in military histories is a great abundance of maps. The maps are also incredibly clear and well-drawn. You can follow the course of all the battles and the war easily with them. The book also includes black and white photos of some of the areas of the battlefields as they look today. It also comes with portraits of some of the main players in the history of the war.

 This is a fine work that has been needed for quite a while. For those of us who are interested in the Austrian side of things in the war, it is a veritable gold mine. This book should be on the shelf of any person who is interested in military history and specifically the Seven Years War. Thank you, Casemate Publishers, for allowing me to review this very fine book. 

Robert

Book: By Force of Arms: The Austrian Army in the Seven Years War Volume 2

Author: Christopher Duffy

Publisher: Helion & Company

Distributor: Casemate Publishers

 STARGRAVE: THE LAST PROSPECTOR

from

OSPREY GAMES

Stargrave transports the fantasy RPG Frostgrave lock stock and barrel to a science fiction setting.  Behind it all are Joseph McCullough, the prolific writer and creator of these two worlds and many other novels too and the publisher's Osprey Games.

Though RPGs are very much the outer rim  of my gaming world, how could I resist the kind opportunity given to me by Osprey Games to preview this latest expansion to the Stargrave canon, especially when I discovered that it's due to be released on 28th April - my birthday!

In case any of you are totally unfamiliar with its origins, I'm going to start with the briefest of outlines .  This core was presented in a substantial hardback book that gives you all the background, rules, stats and scenarios etc. Thematic art work and photos of diaramas taken from games adorn and enliven the text.  We're dealing with a small unit, miniatures skirmish game set in a typical devastated and blighted galaxy.  The rather long subtitle to the core game says it all- Science Fiction Wargames in The Blasted Galaxy.

There is a substantial gallery of miniatures that have been sculpted purely for this game, but it really is one game where you can bring virtually any existing figures, terrain and buildings you possess to your gaming table.  

Your first task is to create a team made up of a captain, first mate and assorted crew then follow through the scenarios.  Like most RPGs, the wealth of written material provides an excellent resource to create your own scenarios.

A free supplement introduced solo play, while the first published expansion, Stargrave: Quarantine 37 , landed your crew slap bang into a deserted research station where you can compete through the scenarios against other crews in two mini-campaigns or take on a solo mini-campaign.

The Last Prospector, the second supplement similarly presents a range of new elements and a new region of the galaxy to explore.  The presentation is a glossy softback book of 86 pages. The introduction had me hooked at once.  Though only two pages long, in it Joseph McCullough gives us a clear, succinct explanation of his intentions and inspirations.  Three things leapt out at me.  

Foremost was his desire to explore the connection between the genres of science-fiction and the western.  This is a pairing very familiar to me as were his seminal references to Star Wars and especially Firefly, the sadly curtailed Josh Wheedon series and the film Outland which, as he notes, has often been compared to High Noon.  Firefly in particular struck me as a particularly important influence on the geography and geopolitics of The Last Prospector.

The region in question, the Honoreb System, has become a backwater of the galaxy, though still a mineral-rich asteroid belt.  Among its locations that will feature in the scenarios are Penthalia Station, a once vibrant and important hub, now largely decaying and derelict; Honera, a steamy jungle planet with originally three enclosed bases and Saint Mollia [or "Molly" for short] a vast titanic though abandoned ore carrier.

Next to seize my attention was his desire to depart from the linear progression of so many, many RPGs.  Instead the Campaign provides a ten scenario arc of which only the opening and final episodes are fixed.  The other eight can be played in any order.  The suggestion is that the game players take turns choosing a scenario usually based on what each thinks will be most immediately advantageous and suited to the qualities, powers and abilities of their crew.  My own instant reaction was, at some future date, to offer up this order to the random gods of the dice world! 

The third detail that I was highly enthusiastic about is summed up in the following extract"...instead of a focused narrative , this campaign is based around a mystery and a location ... to solve the mystery, the crews must travel all over the system , searching for clues."  Great idea was my immediate reaction - a game with not just sci-fi, not just westerns, but a whole touch of Sherlock Holmes: Consulting Detective too.  Sadly this was my one disappointment.  The disappearance of the old friend, the eponymous Last Prospector and his rumoured "big score" are simply what Alfred Hitchcock would have called the McGuffin.  In other words they are the motivating trigger for the game's plot that sends your crews hither and thither across the Honereb System.

Just one of the many pieces of artwork that enliven the text

At this point, I think  one other sentence from the introduction is important to quote: "I leave it up to the players to fit my work into their own imaginative framework."  As Joseph McCullough stresses in his introduction, it's entirely up to the gamer whether you stick closely to his detailed descriptive script or not.  This is very important comment for the whole creation of your table-top, as you'll see in the next section where I explore some of the scenarios.  The fact that all bar the grand finale of the game is designed to be played on a 3'x3' table is a big plus for the gamer with limited space. However, the setup for many of the scenarios could task the physical terrain resources of the average gamer.

The fixed opening Scenario of the Campaign screams its influence from the classic western mythos in its title: The Barfight!  The setup specifies the classic bar down one edge of the gaming table and various other familiar accoutrements such as tables and chairs.  However, later scenarios grow more taxing in their requirements, such as a cavern floor with an upper level shelf running all around the edge of the scene.  This is where the comment about using your own "imaginative framework" applies - in other words "do the best with what you've got".   I've got to say that the suggestion of using 3" strips of paper didn't appeal.  So, substantial quantities of packaging from a recent home purchase, plus extensive Stanley knife work, are going to be pressed into service. 

The transformation begins!

Similarly, broken bits of polystyrene are in the process of being transformed into rocky outcrops that may serve both in some of the underground locations and on the planet's surface.

However, the thick jungle of a scenario like The Devil's Punchbowl will stretch my current resources considerably, though it will be one of the cheaper to beef up.  Though behind my nascent rocks lurks one of the rare items that I possess which I need to greatly expand and spend on to furnish my jungle settings.

On the other hand, left-over creations made for my son's long past days of Warhammer 40K and Necromunda, plus my own Deadzone 2 building collection will certainly feature prominently in other scenes, as will many of the figures pressed into service from those games. 

The one above I particularly like and feel it will work both in a jungle setting and also can be adapted to serve as a mine entrance.

Before looking at the typical Scenario outline, it's important to explain a narrative feature that I strongly like.  This region of the galaxy is split between six factions each with their own ideals, culture and needs.  Each player's crew will be affected by their shifting "standing" with each faction that will be affected by how they perform in each Scenario.  Outcomes will be positive or negative and, not surprisingly, will bring rewards or disadvantages that feed into other Scenarios.*[see below]   This adds a lot of colour to the story and game play - a definite winner for me, as it also sits well with the "western" influence, making me think of the factions successfully played off by Clint Eastwood in A Fistful of Dollars!

Each Scenario is presented in a well organised pattern:-

A brief narrative introduction to set the storyline scene.

Crew - these details usually introduce specific factors that may change the constituents of your crew, introduce limitations, exceptions, additional equipment or even additional units.

Set-Up - outlines the terrain/physical details to create the scene, the placing of loot tokens and the positioning of figures.

Special Rules - fairly self-explanatory!

Faction Advantage - changes in each player's crew standing with the factions in the game and the benefits and disadvantages resulting [*see above]

Outcome - what may generally be summed up as victory conditions, in that this section tells you what you'll gain or lose by certain actions.

Loot and Experience - usually this results in players rolling on the core game book's tables for these two factors plus special ones just for this supplement.

The typical start to a Scenario's organisation

As you'd expect with any supplement, there are new additions to all elements of the game.  They start with new backgrounds and powers for the two most important characters in each player's crew, your captain and first mate.  There are new soldier types , ship upgrades and advanced technology, a series of new attributes and in the section labelled Bestiary there are ten new creatures that you'll encounter through these Scenarios.  I'm not quite sure that a Foreman or Miner would be too happy finding themselves in a chapter entitled Bestiary or be lumped among "creatures"!

One of my favourite figure illustrations

All in all this is a very attractive and well produced addition to the Stargrave canon.  There's plenty to read and its well illustrated with many exemplary photos and artwork.  The Scenarios cover a good range of situations culminating in a lengthier three-part finale and as the author observes, there are plenty of hooks and dangling storylines in the narrative to chase down by creating your own scenarios.  

With the Western influence in mind, I can already envisage a captain and first mate with five other crew members finding themselves called upon to defend a rag-tag group of isolated and down-trodden settlers from the brutal oppression of the nastiest elements of one of the system's six factions.  My captain might just be called Chris!

So, look out for Stargrave; the Last Prospector and its publication date on 28th April!

 

 

 

KAIS: A True Story of a Daring Rescue in the Swamps of New Guinea, Summer 1944 is a fascinating account of the crash of a B-25 bomber into the jungles of New Guine. It details both the efforts to find and rescue the crew immediately after, and the search to find and recover the aircraft 75 years later. The book takes its name from the Kais river, which both the rescue and research teams traveled on to reach the crash site. The author, Bas Kreuger, is a Dutch researcher who focuses on the history of the Dutch in the East Indies.

KAIS opens with a summarized account of the war in the Pacific on and around New Guinea. This was interesting in and of itself, as this fighting is not often discussed or depicted in media. New Guinea is an extremely harsh island covered in swamps, jungles, and rivers, with virtually no infrastructure across vast swathes of the landscape. This made merely existing on the island difficult for both the Japanese and Allied soldiers, never mind finding each other and fighting. As the war went on and the Allies gained the upper hand, it was decided that it would be easier to isolate and starve out most of the Japanese strongholds on the island, rather than destroying them directly. Most of the fighting then became about air superiority, and attacks against each side's airfields. If the Allies could control the skies, they could then easily destroy any Japanese cargo ships trying to resupply the soldiers in the brutal jungles and swamps. 

Enter the 418th Night Fighter Squadron. These men were brought in to crew, you guessed it, night fighters, but due to the realities of war in the far flung reaches of the Pacific, they didn't have any on hand for some time. So instead they found themselves operating a variety of aircraft, including the B-25 bombers being used in an anti-ship role. After an intense attack on some Japanese ships, the crew of the fateful B-25 realize that they aren't going to make it home due to damage sustained to the aircraft. Knowing that they are deep in Japanese controlled waters, they decide to fly inland and look for somewhere to put the plane down. 

After a mostly successful crash landing into a swamp, the crew is then at the mercy of the environment and fate. Fortunately for them, one of their fellow bombers was able to track them down quickly, and so their approximate location is known to the Allies. Unfortunately for them, reaching their location borders on the impossible. Any rescue attempt will have to brave miles river, jungle, and swamp filled with both hazardous wildlife and hostile Japanese soldiers. The rescue team, composed of Dutch, Indonesian, Australian, and American soldiers sets out on an expedition to find and rescue the crew, which ends up taking three weeks. The book details this entire endeavor, including direct combat with Japanese soldiers, meetings with local tribes, and all the misery of camping in the jungle.

I'll leave it to you to read the story of how all of that goes down, but I will say it is quite the adventure and would make an excellent movie. Every soldier and airman involved in the book is detailed as much as possible, with the author having tracked down family members, photographs, and even local Papua's who were connected to the event. His efforts are extremely impressive and reveal so much about this event that would otherwise have been forgotten. 

The latter third or so of the book details his modern day research efforts in pulling together all of this information, and the expedition he went on in 2019 to try and find the actual crash site in the swamp. The area is still as wild and undeveloped as it was at the time, with the expedition facing exactly the same environmental hazards that the rescue team dealt with. Initially, I thought this part of the book wouldn't be as interesting as the actual event, but in the end it was very enjoyable. It opened my eyes to what researchers do and had some shades of a real world Indiana Jones adventure, just with gentlemen a bit more out of their element than Dr. Jones ever was.

This book is a very easy one to recommend. The pages fly by and the story is quite thrilling all the way through. Like I said above, this event would make a great movie, and one could write the whole script simply based on Kreuger's account, as it is extremely detailed and vivid. 

KAIS is available on Amazon Kindle or paperback.

- Joe Beard

A year after the Battle of the Somme the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) were tasked with pushing through Ypres in Belgium and occupying the high ground and ridge-lines to the East. This battle now known as the Battle of Passchendaele or the Third Battle of Ypres is succinctly covered in Andrew Rawson's latest book in the BEF series from Pen & Sword Publishing.

The book starts, just as the battle did, with a series of explosions in mines sunk beneath the Allied trenches and tunnelled underneath German defensive positions. Although the Germans were listening for the tell-tale sounds of boring machinery, they couldn't hear it because the mines were so deep and machinery wasn't involved. The author tells us that humans, literally 'diggers' were quieter and quicker than any machinery of the time.

Initial successes literally became stuck in the mud as the Flanders coast saw unprecedented rainfall throughout August. This left each side not only fighting each other but also the quagmire in which they lived and died.

I was expecting this book to be a bit of a slog (no pun intended) but the way in which the author breaks down each battle with an accompanying map into Divisions and Brigade level really helped my comprehension of what was happening. The author states that his inspiration for this approach came from a book about the American Civil War, 'A Testing of Courage'. I've not read that volume but I think Andrew has achieved his aim of clearly explaining the force disposition, terrain and outcome into a coherent narrative.

I've long known about the terrific amount of ordnance fired by artillery pieces throughout WWI but I've never read an account of how precisely it was integrated into the whole offensive. Not only that but I was surprised at how 'joint' were the separate military outfits. The Royal Flying Corps and Royal Naval Air Service, with the subterranean diggers, with the modern tank, alongside the ubiquitous infantryman all supported with artillery. The level of coordination between all of these services must have been immense and it was achieved primarily by runners and pigeons!

Passchendaele village before and after artillery barrage.

 A common artillery tactic mentioned frequently in the book was the artillery barrage. This served to soften up the German positions but scarily the infantry would hug the line of explosions and walk just behind the explosions in order to capitalise on the defenders turmoil. The numbers of shells fired, given by Mr Rawson are frankly terrifying to comprehend.

I found the prose to be rather terse as the author whips you through one Brigade of a Division then onto another very quickly. The briefest mentions of individual acts of bravery are given scant acknowledgement, with the oft repeated phrase '...for this he received the Victoria Cross'. I appreciated this style as it kept the book flowing along at a very steady clip. If nothing else, the book is a thorough account of the entire Flanders campaign in just over 200 pages.

Bovington Tank Museum diorama of combined arms during WWI

I would have liked more picture inserts as those that the author put in were just enough to whet my appetite. Their clarity was surprising and complemented the text very well.

If you're looking for a good introduction to the battles in and around Ypres then look no further.


Book: The Passchendaele Campaign 1917
Author: Andrew Rawson
Publisher: Pen & Sword Books

This is the second book in Gordon Thorburn's 'Luck of a Lancaster' series. The first follows the fortunes of an single aircraft that managed to return successfully from 107 sorties. This book copies that formula and recounts the sorties of tail number EE136 WS/R 'Spirit of Russia'. Interestingly both aircraft were from No. 9 Sqn, a unit which exists to this day. I have subsequently learnt that of the approximately 7,000 Lancasters built, there were just 36 that survived more than 100 operations.

First things first, I read this book in two sittings. It's not a particularly long book (147 pages) but what there is, is gripping, exciting and it receives, from me, a book-lovers highest recommendation, 'I couldn't put it down'. It is a rare non-fiction book where I find myself reading long into the small hours and wanting to find out how the crew fared on their next sortie.

Pen & Sword Publishing have this book in stock for £15.99. 

I suppose I should say that my review of this subject matter may be more subjective than most. I have served in a very similar professional role to those depicted in this book, albeit their circumstances and risks they were willing, and in some cases eager to take are, for me, beyond comprehension.

The author cites No. 9 Sqn's Operations Record Book (ORB) frequently throughout the text and rarely expands the abbreviations. A typical entry might read:

"Unidentified T/E A/C passed stern of Lancaster

 to port, same height. RG opened fire..."

This isn't a big problem as your brain has been frequently exposed to ORB excerpts that by the second or third chapter it automatically substitutes in the expansion. Just be prepared to read lots of abbreviated excerpts - that's exactly how they were and still are written.

  

Sometimes in reading the text I found myself wondering whether the author was playing a bit loose with the facts as I couldn't square their [the bomber crews] experiences to my own understanding. For example, the book opens with a sequence from a personal diary which states:

"There were ninety of us, flying in a gaggle at about

twenty feet around Lincoln, over the Wash..."

Today, 250 ft is a hard bottom for the UK's Low Flying System and 100 ft on some ranges. This separation is maintained in all aspects, and generally the aircraft fly either in pairs or more often as a single aircraft. To have 'a gaggle' of 90 large aircraft at 20 ft beggars belief. I suppose this claim and other similarly astonishing revelations on nearly every page made this book a page-turner.

I have to take issue with the author when he claims (cites?) aircraft flying at zero feet!!! Now call me pedantic if you will, but that is not possible. The account goes onto say that due to some jostling within this 'zero foot' bomber stream an aircraft had to roll 90 degrees and it's wing was 'almost' touching the water. With a wingspan of approximately 100 ft those Lancaster's must have been flying somewhere greater than 50 ft ... either way it's ludicrously low.

The book made me stop and think for a bit when the author states, when referring to the aircrew:

"...these men who, whenever they flew, had to

obliterate their most basic instinct, that of 

self-preservation, so they could do their work."

Another pause-for-thought moment came for me, when the author equates the damage of German Cities by Bomber Command to British Cities. The civilian death toll must have been horrendous. I would have liked to see some balance, i.e. from German squadron log books or civilian accounts of the bombing raids in which our heroine was present. 

I'm of the opinion that although it was deemed a necessary evil at the time, the carpet bombing of civilian populations should make us more than a little uncomfortable. Unfortunately the book doesn't provide any opinion on the matter. Neither good or bad, it just tells the facts - I suppose that is the safest way talk about a potentially contentious subject.

Hamburg after Bomber Command and US 8th Air Force visited

As we follow the air-frame I realised that the author had almost imbued a sense of personality into EE136 WS/R and I found myself rooting for her as much as I did her crews. Spoiler - she survives for 109 operations before being declared U/S. However when a Bomber Command tour was 30 missions and the average life expectancy for those aircrews was around 15 missions, we can start to appreciate just how fortunate WS/R was.

The are several photo pages wedged into the middle of the book and I was shocked and a little saddened to see faces of predominantly very young men looking back. There are numerous accounts of aircrew whilst on the 20th sortie being shot down and killed, yet still being 19 years. Captains of 20 years old, were not uncommon.

WWII was a very different time and I am always reminded how grateful I should be and in awe of those who served every time I read a book like this. I can recommend this book to everyone, military aviation nut or not and at 147 pages, anyone can finish this book.

The title of this book gives the impression that it covers the escape attempts of captured military personnel during WWI. A more accurate title would be "Airborne shenanigans during WWI", admittedly this is not as eye-catching a title; but what 'escaping' there is, is tucked up nicely in the last few chapters of the book. What you have to read to get to that point is however a fascinating insight into the personal exploits, predominantly of airmen - not soldiers, during the conflict. I enjoyed the entire book and was constantly struck by just how far we've come in 100 years of aviation [military] and in comparison what was considered acceptable then to today. For example during the first 5 days of the Battle of Arras, the author tells us that 75 aircraft were lost and 105 aircrew - a figure unthinkable today and sobering to consider.

When I opened this book my eyes felt assaulted by the walls of text on each page. This may sound like a silly criticism but the typesetting felt very cramped on the page. I'm sure the author is not to blame for this but it did look like someone had taken an un-formatted document file and bound it into a book. This did surprise me as no other book I have from Pen & Sword Publishing (P&S hereafter) has this style of typesetting. The publishing quality of my other P&S books is very high, maybe they had a page limit to fit this work into ...?

Each chapter opens with a short excerpt from a personal journal or what I assume to be official dispatches from the front or other such source. Then the author goes on to give the context and throughout each chapter reveals more of the personal account or event. I found this style of having two voices in a chapter engaging. The chapters finish with a note section, rather than at the end of the book which allows for much quicker lookup of the referenced material.

I am professionally aware of military aviation and have spent countless hours surrounded by pictures of old planes from the Royal Flying Corps and the Royal Naval Air Service. There were more than a few occasions throughout this book which jogged old memories of reading medal citations contained within squadron display cabinets. I was very grateful to the author in fleshing out each account and providing the sources and more of the back story as much as he did. There were still many stories of which I knew nothing and I was surprised at the seemingly, ubiquitous role the formative RAF had in WWI.

The focus of each chapter is a different individual and in its entirety this book comprises a who's who of aviation legends; Immelmann, Handley Page, Richtofen to name a few. One name that stood out to me for all the wrong reasons and which takes the best British military officer's name I've ever heard, was Sqn Cdr Joseph Ruscombe Wadham Smyth-Pigott. It feels slightly cheeky to say that the character of Blackadder's Lord Flashheart came to mind several times through reading this book...

One of the most poignant chapters involves the story of Reggie Marix, who after capturing a German cavalry captain and confiscating his sword, offered the POW his pistol in order to end the suffering of his stricken horse; an honour that Reggie thought the German should still have. The chapter goes on to relate how the confiscated sword found its way back to the German many years later and is quite touching. This example, and several others throughout the book, hark back to the days of chivalry and honour which arguably has disappeared from modern battlefields.

I think this book would be enjoyed by a relatively wide audience, although convincing the wider audience of that would be a challenge. If you're not interested in military history then nothing on the cover suggests that a person that only reads biographies would also enjoy it. The book's focus is on individuals and their personal stories in which they are, to me at least, doing amazing things. It's not a historic retelling of the tactics or strategies of WWI but focuses right down at the lowest, human level. In our time, these gentlemen would be celebrities in their own right and lauded for their courage, tenacity and skill. The reader is free to draw their own conclusions to how the majority of today's 'stars' stack up in comparison.

If you would like to pick up a copy of this title, P&S currently (Aug 2017) have a sale on it. However I will just link to their store page and the RRP of £25.00. I highly recommend this book.

The Siege of Tsingtau

by

Charles Stephenson

First things first, the campaigns of WWI are not very familiar to me. This book covers, what I originally thought, a very obscure battle of the Japanese attack on German Tsingtau in the Pacific (current day Qingdao). Although the name 'World War One' implies a global conflict my naive understanding is limited to the Somme, Verdun, Gallipoli et al. It should be no surprise that the colonial subjects across the Pacific were drawn into the war just as their primary state decreed.

The book starts with several chapters that detail the geo-political environment of all the main belligerents. In these formative chapters there is a large reliance on direct quotes from source material. This leads to some dense sentence construction, of which the author excels throughout the rest of the book, even when source material is not being referenced. 

In the introduction to the book, the author himself states that if you want to get to the actual fighting, i.e. to skip the politics, then skip the first couple of chapters. I might be doing the book an injustice, there are a few skirmishes in the previous chapters, but the actual battle, from my understanding started in Chapter 7, the penultimate chapter of the book.

Again in the introduction, the author states that the book is not aimed at the academic audience. I think he is doing himself a disservice as the book is, to my mind, thoroughly researched and includes 66 pages of notes and bibliography to the 8 chapters, that comprise nearly 40% of the book. Any student of the theatre, at any level, would do well to pick up this book and read this narrative history of the battle.

All that being said, I was continually surprised by this account of an 'obscure' battle. I wasn't aware of the extent of German colonisation in the Pacific, nor the different military's nascent air power capabilities. However what initially piqued my interest with this book was the fact that two infamous WWII allies were, adversaries just 25 years earlier. I personally would have liked to see more analysis of how that came to be, but that is unfair to the author and his work, as that would warrant an entirely different book outside this scope.

The book includes the standard middle glossy insert of photo pages. The scale and size of the equipment shown in these photos somehow seemed incongruous to the text I was reading. This is no criticism of the text rather a new-found admiration and awe of the bravery of soldiers from both sides, with the most rudimentary of equipment, going against massive siege artillery.

I particularly enjoyed the account of SMS Emden's (a German light crusier) exploits in the Indian Ocean against the Entente Powers' shipping. A nugget I will take away from that account is the importance of logistics and command and control (C2) support; often decried as boring and glossed over in many historical war-games, yet it is essential. The German East Asian (naval) Squadron was bereft of a re-supply base and had to split into both the Indian Ocean and round Cape Horn into the Southern Atlantic to find fuel and repairs.

As a precursor to the battle the British and Japanese forces destroyed the radio masts of the German occupiers. This, I imagine, is still employed today as a viable military tactic i.e. denying the enemy C2 channels, but in 1914 the German colony was left with no communication ability to the outside world. From a modern perspective that seems scary and almost impossible to achieve today.

The other aspect, which I found noteworthy, was the effect and experience of aeroplanes in this battle. The author, at some length, explains a few of the aviation firsts that occurred during and in the events preceding this battle. I was very grateful for the detail he included and I would have liked another chapter or so dedicated to the air environment. 

The author loosely follows the exploits of a couple of pilots from both sides as they built, and fixed their aircraft to fly reconnaissance or strike missions. Yes you read that right - 'strike' missions. I was particularly intrigued with a pilot who was given his license, his 'wings' if you will, after 2 days training and how his propeller would disintegrate during flight as the right type of glue wasn't available! I can't imagine flying in a self-destructing aircraft.

Overall this book opened my eyes to the global scale and scope of WWI and I am grateful to have read it. My personal experience and interests include military aviation and the pacific theatre from WWII to today and so this book was interesting to me. I couldn't recommend it to the casual reader unless they have, at the very least, a peripheral interest in the topic. However, if you are in the latter camp then pick it up and you may be as surprised as I was.

The Siege of Tsintau is available from Pen & Sword Books for £20.