Audio Extract: The Secret War: Spies, Codes and Guerrillas 1939–1945
‘As gripping as any spy thriller, Hastings’s achievement is especially impressive, for he has produced the best single volume yet written on the subject’ Sunday Times Read More
News
Audio Extract: Catastrophe: Europe Goes to War 1914
The Amazon History Book of the Year 2013 is a magisterial chronicle of the calamity that befell Europe in 1914 as the continent shifted from the glamour of the Edwardian era to the tragedy of total war. Read More
The English love a buffoon but the Boris Johnson joke went tragically wrong
A few months ago on the London Underground, a middle-aged stranger who found himself my neighbour demanded: “Excuse me asking, but you will know if anybody does — is Boris Johnson going to resign?” Read More
Don’t let’s delude ourselves over the special relationship
The only certainty about President Donald Trump’s visit next week is that it will unloose a fresh torrent of clichés about the “special relationship” between Britain and the United States. The man himself, if he feels benign, may toss us a bone by according it lip service. Read More
We need to tell the truth about defence
Defence secretary Gavin Williamson is said to be threatening the prime minister with a mutiny, perhaps even with a vote against the autumn budget, unless his department is given £20 billion towards filling its cash chasm. Read More
Splendid Isolation. Max reviews ‘Dunkirk’ and ‘Alone’.
Dunkirk written and directed by Christopher Nolan
Alone by Michael Korda Read More
What’s New About the War?
Ardennes 1944: The Battle of the Bulge by Antony Beevor, Viking
Eisenhower’s Guerrillas by Benjamin F.Jones, OUP Read More
Imagining the Unimaginable. Max reviews ‘On War and Writing’
On War And Writing by Samuel Hynes (Chicago) Read More
Always Take Notes Podcast
In this episode, Simon speaks to Max Hastings, the best-selling military historian and erstwhile foreign correspondent and newspaper editor. Read More
A Message to My Readers
Well, everybody: Vietnam is done, finished, over. Now, I am just crossing my fingers that when you all get to see it in the autumn, you find the story as fascinating as I do. Read More
Max reviews ‘The Last Battle: Endgame on the Western Front, 1918’ by Peter Hart
The Last Battle: Endgame on the Western Front, 1918 by Peter Hart (Profile) Read More
Vietnam An Epic Tragedy: 1945-1975
NEW BOOK COMING SEPTEMBER 2018
Vietnam became the Western world’s most divisive conflict since the Second World War, first creating a humiliation for France in 1954, then a vastly greater one for the United States in 1975. Read More