Cuban soldiers pose with Soviet-backed Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola soldiers near Cuito Cuanavale. The struggle between pro-Western and pro-Soviet military factions in Angola was a major front in the Cold War, resulting in the participation of 40,000 Cuban troops.
Military Heritage

January 2014

Volume 15, No. 4

COVER: Edward, Prince of Wales, famous as “the Black Prince,”defeated a superior French force at the Battle of Poitiers, in part by his skillful use of troops armed with the longbow.

Image © Philip Mould Ltd., London / The Bridgeman Library

Carthaginian general Hannibal Barca enters an Italian village following a victory over the Romans in a contemporary painting by Peter Connolly. Hannibal invaded the Italian peninsula in 218 bc to keep the war away from Carthage and put the burden of sustaining the fight on his enemy’s lands.

January 2014

Military Heritage

Hannibal’s Cunning Ambush

By Chuck Lyons

When still a young boy, Hannibal once came upon his father, the Carthaginian general Hamilcar Barca, who at the time was preparing to go to Iberia where Carthage was campaigning to expand its power. Read more

A 19th-century print of the Battle of Fort Pillow conveys the Union sentiment that the Confederate capture of the small redoubt was a massacre. The affair remains one of the most contentious incidents in America’s history.

January 2014

Military Heritage

A Deplorable Affair

By John Walker

As dawn broke on April 12, 1864, the Union garrison manning Fort Pillow, a small redoubt on a cliff overlooking the Mississippi River in West Tennessee, found itself surrounded by 1,500 Confederate cavalrymen led by Maj. Read more

January 2014

Military Heritage

Storm Of Arrows

By William E. Welsh

For nearly half a millennium the crossbow and longbow served as the predominant missile weapons for field armies in Western Europe. Read more

Soldiers with the pro-Western Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA) on patrol during the Bush War. A communist push into southeastern Angola in 1897 triggered a major ground response from South Africa.

January 2014

Military Heritage

Bloody Clash On The Lomba

By William Stroock

With its pro-Western ally in southern Angola facing destruction by an all-out communist offensive in 1987, Apartheid South African President P.W. Read more

British Rear Admiral Edward Hawke’s flagship Royal George engages French Rear Admiral Comte de Conflans’ flagship Soleil Royal in the storm-tossed waters of Quiberon Bay. Even though the British lacked detailed knowledge of the bay, Hawke pursued Conflans into the hazard-filled waters in a quest to smash his opponent’s fleet.

January 2014

Military Heritage

‘Tis To Glory We Steer

By David A. Norris

Brimming with gale force winds, uncharted reefs, and a force of 21 enemy ships of the line, the bay seemed to be a deathtrap for the flagship Royal George. Read more

January 2014

Military Heritage, Editorial

Principles of Fabian Strategy

“I am sick of Fabian systems in all quarters,” said American patriot John Adams of General George Washington’s strategy against superior British forces during the American Revolution. Read more

The statue of famed samurai warrior Kusunoki Masashige at the Imperial Palace in Tokyo pays homage to his legacy as the embodiment of samurai loyalty.

January 2014

Military Heritage, Soldiers

Samurai Kusunoki Masashige

By Charles Hilbert

Fourteenth-century Japan was ruled by an emperor who traced his descent back to the sun goddess Amateratsu. However, the emperor took his orders from the retired or cloistered emperor (usually the father of the emperor), who in turn took his orders from the Sei-I Tai Shogun, who took his orders from the kampaku, or regent. Read more

The commander of a Japan- ese fighter squadron took it upon himself to attack the Seventh Amphibious Force at the start of the Battle of Biak. Submarine Chaser 699 suffered heavy damage in the attack. Painting by Don Greer.

January 2014

Military Heritage, Weapons

Submarine Chaser 699 (SC-699)

By Brad Hall

The crew of Submarine Chaser 699 (SC-699) watched with dread as the Japanese fighter aircraft slammed into the ocean, cartwheeled off the ocean’s surface, and spun toward its deck. Read more

Nixon at work in the Oval Office. Pentagon leaders made sure that if they received unusual military orders from the president they would be evaluated properly.

January 2014

Military Heritage, Intelligence

The Secret World of Richard Nixon

By Blaine Taylor

In the spring of 1974—at the height of the political Watergate crisis in Washington, D.C.—Joseph Laitin, a spokesman at the Office of Management and Budget whose office was in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, next door to the White House, was on his way over to the west wing of the White House to meet with Treasury Secretary George Schultz. Read more

January 2014

Military Heritage, Books

The Battle of Shanghai

By Christopher Miskimon

The 1930s was a decade full of World War II’s antecedents. Fighting broke out at various points around the globe during this decade, and many consider the period to be a training ground for 1939-1945. Read more

January 2014

Military Heritage, Games

Winter 2014 Military Games

By Joseph Luster

One of the best things about the Sniper Elite series is the painstaking detail put into its head-bursting money shots. Read more