by RNS | Aug 16, 2021 | Beating Tsundoku
Stephen Manning, Britain at War with the Asante Nation 1823-1900 (Pen& Sword, 2021)
They called it the White Man’s Grave; that part of West Africa that we now call Ghana but was the Asante Empire in the nineteenth century. The British and Asante people fought for control of this land intermittently from before Queen Victoria was crowned to almost the end of her reign. Indeed, one of the Queen’s most famous generals, Garnet Wolseley, fought a campaign so audacious and brilliant that it ranks with any of the century’s great colonial expeditions. Yet, the Zulus and the Mahdists are commonly known Victorian foes, while the Asante have been pushed into the background. Stephen Manning is here to fix that misperception.
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Manning begins with the rise of the Asante Nation and its early contacts with European traders, mostly dealing in slaves. He describes the Asante army, one which was formed only of infantry and well organised and supplied. They also used muskets, long danes, which, though often ineffective physically, could induce psychological terror in the twilight battlefields of the deep forest. It was perhaps inevitable that this army would clash with the British merchants along the Gold Coast among the Fante people. That happened in 1824 as a result of the usual British hubris in colonial matters, underestimating their enemy and advancing into a massacre. They recovered their position after nearly two years of fighting and an uneasy peace was restored. That lasted until the 1860s when relations broke down but with only limited conflict.
In, 1872, the Dutch sold their holdings on the Gold Coast to the British, leaving them the sole Europeans in the area. In December that year, the Asante attacked, again catching the British unprepared. With that, Manning brings us to Wolseley’s expedition of 1873-1874. Wolseley was a meticulous planner and he had British public opinion in his side, but most of all, he had the Snider Rifle, which would do great damage. Minor morale boosting operations occupied the British, although they gained valuable information about fighting in such a hostile environment. Wolseley then advanced, bringing the Asante to battle at Amoaful, which was a hard fought win for the British. He pressed on to the Asante capital, took it, then returned to the coast and Britain as a hero. As for the Asante, Manning notes that their tribal confederation fell apart and fell into civil war in the 1880s.
The British sat back, but then took renewed interest with the Scramble for Africa. That led to the ‘bloodless’ invasion of 1896 and the seizure of the Asante capital, this time for good. One serious rebellion followed in 1900, resulting in a protracted siege of the British in the Asante capital and a timely relief mission. Manning concludes with the note that the Asante believed their revolt a success because the British never located the seat of Asante power, the Golden Stool that the Asante revered.
Manning’s detailed account of the fighting for control over the Asante is Victorian military history at its best. His narrative portrays vividly the complexity of warfare in this environmentally treacherous region of West Africa, and Manning captures the spirit of the Victorian officers and soldiers perfectly. He also pointedly brings the native allies of the British into his account. Manning also tells the story from the Asante perspective, creating a more balanced account than older texts on the conflict. Anyone interested in Victorian warfare and how the Empire was formed in far-flung corners of the earth will thoroughly enjoy this book.
by RNS | Aug 13, 2021 | Beating Tsundoku
Gareth C Sampson, Rome & Parthia: Empires at War (Pen & Sword, 2020)
In this military history, Gareth Sampson narrates the story of the Romans and Parthians squeezing the Hellenistic world from west and east until they clashed in what we now call appropriately the Middle East. It is a complex tale with many players, but Sampson’s deft narrative teases out the strands, providing a fascinating insight into an often overlooked period of intense warfare and all the drama that goes with that.
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Sampson sets the foundation by bringing the rising new powers of Rome and Parthia down to 50 BCE. It is a story of expansion and civil wars on both sides, but also the almost inevitable wearing down of the Hellenistic powers until Rome and Parthia stood toe to toe and fought it out. The Romans lost at Carrhae in 53 BCE, but the war ended in stalemate, though Parthia held the balance of power, for now.
Internal divisions abated ambition on both sides until 40 BCE when Parthia successfully invaded Roman Syria. This is where the Roman general Ventidius enters the picture as the man who led the Roman recovery. He won a series of battles in one season and recaptured Syria. The Parthians counterattacked, but Ventidius defeated them at Gindarus in 38 BCE using a stratagem lauded by Sampson. For his troubles, Ventidius was sent home, a victim of Roman politics. Meanwhile, Parthia all but collapsed. But then it was Rome’s turn to follow suit.
Sampson sticks to his eastern theatre while Republican Rome went into a tailspin. The Romans, under Antonius, consolidated their hold in the Middle East, then went after the Parthians in 36 BCE. The invasion was a disaster and the Romans found themselves outnumbered and isolated; they had to retreat. It was a retreat to rival the worst in history with the Parthians harassing the Romans all the way. But the stalemate between Parthia and Rome continued through to 30 BCE while Antonius consolidated his position and planned to create his own eastern power base. The rising force of Octavianus had other ideas and defeated Antonius who committed suicide. Parthia pounced, taking the vital Roman client kingdoms of Medea and Armenia. But now Rome was united again under Octavianus and presented a very different foe.
Parthia again fell into civil war. But Octavianus arranged a truce, although he watched on as an ally attacked Parthia and lost. Octavianus, now Augustus, had other wars to fight in the east, most notably against Arabia and Galatia. By 20 BCE, the Roman and Parthian Empires were again in stalemate, and that is where Sampson leaves his story with a summary of the settlement between the two powers. Two appendices round out Sampson’s book: lists of kings and sources
Sampson tells an engaging and balanced story of two major powers slugging it out and the minor powers caught between them; all of which takes place in the chaotic collapse of the Roman Republic and various Parthian civil wars. The narrative is slanted to the Romans because of the lack of sources on the Parthian side, but Sampson winkles out what he can and makes educated guesses where he hits blank spaces. He also incorporates many of the sources into the narrative. My only quibble was on Sampson’s habit of repeating what those sources have just told us. Nevertheless, this is a first rate military history of an often confusing theatre of war.
by RNS | Aug 9, 2021 | Beating Tsundoku
Mark Magreehan, Britain’s Airborne Forces of WWII (Frontline, 2020)
The Paras hold an iconic place in the pantheon of British army regiments. Indeed, it is difficult to imagine allied victory in World War II without them. But, as Mark Magreehan points out, they began their war as an experiment, only achieving their elevated status through hard work and sacrifice. Magreehan follows their development in this fascinating and lavishly illustrated book.
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Magreehan’s numerous small chapters cover the evolution of the Paras and their battle highlights. They were formed in June 1940 as a small and poorly equipped unit, and first saw action in Italy in February 1941. That was a failure, but their next operation at Bruneval the following year was successful. The Paras, having proved their worth, expanded until they formed two divisions by the end of the war. Along the way, they fought in North Africa, Sicily, Italy, Greece, and France where they took part in the D-Day landings. The Paras arguably found their most glorious moment in the defeat at Arnhem in September 1944, though that was not the end of their active service. They took part in the Battle of the Bulge in January 1945 and the crossing of the Rhine two months later. They finished the war in mopping up operations in Norway and the Far East.
The text in Britain’s Airborne Forces of WWII conforms to standard histories of the Paras, but Magreehan tells the story well enough. It is the wonderful collection of photographs accompanying the text that makes this book stand out. Some of them are familiar, but many are not. Magreehan is also adept at highlighting developments in equipment and weaponry through his descriptions of the photographs. In doing so, he also underscores how the Paras rose from being an experiment to an essential component of the British war effort. His inclusion of Polish and Canadian Paras is an important contribution to the history of this force, lest we forget. Anyone with an interest in the Paras will enjoy this book, and modellers and wargamers will be particularly rewarded by adding this to their collection.
by RNS | Aug 1, 2021 | Beating Tsundoku
Andrew Rawson, Balkan Struggles (Pen & Sword, 2020)
The Balkans. Just to say it is to conjure up images of war and devastation with an impact well beyond its borders, as unfair as that might be to the people living there. But the warlike nature of the region in the twentieth century is the focus of Andrew Rawson’s book, and he has a lot of it to narrate in under 200 pages.
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There is a sense of Groundhog Day about the structure of Balkan Struggles. Rawson opens with the war before the War, beginning in October 1912 with wars of independence against the Ottoman Empire. Then came Sarajevo in June 1914 and the world conflagration that followed. With the Great War behind them, you might think a long bout of peace was called for, but not in the Balkans. The Greeks, Albanians, and the Turks all fought wars in the region, and a communist uprising seized Bulgaria, and we’re still in the 1920s. Bulgaria became a right-wing state soon after the new decade started, then a dictatorship, but the major developments were taking place elsewhere on the road to World War II.
Fascist Italy attacked Greece in October 1940, and Nazi Germany invaded Yugoslavia in April 1941; the Balkans was now a significant theatre in that war. Rawson points out that occupation brought its own headaches as the partisan war developed; a multi-faceted campaign that the author does a good job of clarifying. The results of that and changing allegiances in Bulgaria and Romania caused chaos, which ended with post-war communist government across the region and a fascist junta in Greece. Rawson also devotes space to the collaborators in the Balkans and the horrors of the Holocaust, both of which would cast long post-war shadows.
Stalin’s death proved a turning point in the Balkans, according to Rawson. Soviet control over the region faltered and died over the ensuing decades, and the post-war consensus failed with the death of Yugoslavia’s President Tito in 1980. The ethnic tensions released from that loosening of control erupted in internecine warfare through the 1990s, forcing UN and NATO intervention. Peace was restored but at a terrible price. Perhaps fittingly, Rawson leaves the story there without a conclusion to bring the strands together; despite a century of war, several wounds remain open and the future for the region is uncertain.
Rawson’s narrative of the Balkan struggles is a reminder of how far Europe has come in the twentieth century, but also how far it still has to go to guarantee peace and prosperity along its volatile south-eastern flank. The structure of Rawson’s book with its subtitled state by state approach, reflects the fractured political and ethnic landscape that is the Balkans, though it also makes for a disjointed story. Nevertheless, Rawson includes enough detail to produce a satisfying if depressing account of a century of turmoil. Readers of modern European history and warfare will appreciate this survey.
by RNS | Jul 31, 2021 | Beating Tsundoku
Dmitry Ryabushkin & Harold Orenstein, The Sino-Soviet Border War of 1969 v1 (Helion, 2021)
The thought of two nuclear armed superpowers coming to blows is the stuff of nightmares. When it happens over something as paltry as who owns a small island in the middle of a river, the mind boggles. But that is exactly what happened between China and the Soviet Union in 1969. Dmitry Ryabushkin and Harold Orenstein bring us a story shrouded in mystery and propaganda in a magazine-style book from Helion’s excellent Asia@War series.
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Border tensions between China and Russia has deep roots, extending back to the 17th Century when there began a long series of treaties between them. These were discussions over extensive borders, but the fighting that broke out in 1969 centred around a small Island in the middle of the Ussuri River. The authors set that against the wider disagreements between the two communist powers, beginning in the 1950s after Stalin’s death. In the 1960s, the otherwise peaceful coexistence along the border changed to State inspired antagonism; scuffles and brawling followed, and a shooting war was not far behind.
The war began with a Chinese ambush on Damansky Island on 2 March 1969. The authors describe this action in some detail, aided by some remarkable photographs of the event. The Chinese withdrew from the engagement after a few hours, leaving about 20 dead on the battlefield and 31 dead Soviets. The authors add a quite unnecessary section showing photographs of some of the dead Soviets along with descriptions of how they died. The authors include this, they argue, to demonstrate Chinese barbarity driven by their propaganda. The rest of this volume is mostly dedicated to establishing exactly what happened and who was to blame. They follow that with a discussion on the western view of what happened before giving their own thoughts on why this incident occurred. They broaden their inquiry to the geopolitical aspects of the war and the greater clash between Moscow and Peking. While much of that concludes this volume, it also sets the stage for Volume 2 and the much bigger battle sparked by the Damansky Island incident.
The authors had an almost impossible task of seeking the truth from two secretive, totalitarian regimes. That they produced as much as they have is noteworthy, though it is evident that they lean heavily towards the Soviet view of events and sometimes tip into what feels like propaganda. That was hardly avoidable, however, when the Chinese evidence is almost entirely missing. The story of the ambush at Damansky Island is told with admirable clarity, and the maps and illustrations of soldiers and vehicles helps with that. This book will appeal to those interested in modern skirmish warfare and geopolitical issues in the late twentieth century.
