Anybody got suggestions for milhist books on gunpowder period pre-WWI conflicts that are NOT about the American revolution, the American Civil War, the war of 1812, or English-French focused Napoleonic period? Stuff like the pike and shot period or the Italian wars.
War and Peace.
>>8167484
That's a novel. I'm looking more for stuff like Gibbon's Decline and Fall of Rome or Robert Massie's Castles of Steel.
>>8167544
Decline and Fall is outdated, and is only read as a grand series of novels.
Also War and Peace is absolutely a historical text. Tolstoy was the first Russian writer to fully understand the invasion if 1812.
milhist? for a moment i thought you were posting from your phone and you had mis-typed "nihilist".
huh. fifty-two times around the sun and this is the first time i've heard that abbreviation. mildsurp.
>>8167397
This, shelby foote's narrate history of the Civil War, Citizens by Schama, and Churchill's biography of Marlborough are exactly what you are looking for.
>>8168236
>nihilist
Italian combat memoirs from WWI will make you into one.
>We had made a solid trench, with rocks and big clods of earth. The men could walk up and down its entire length without being seen. The lookouts observed and shot through loopholes, under cover. The general looked through the loophole, but he wasn’t satisfied. He had a pile of rocks made at the foot of the parapet and climbed upon them, his eyes behind binoculars. Standing straight up, he was uncovered from his chest to his head.
>“General”, I said, “the Austrians have some excellent snipers and it’s dangerous to expose yourself like that.”
>The general didn’t answer me. Two rifle shots rang out from the enemy line. The bullets whistled past the general. He remained impassive. Two more shots followed the first two, and one of them grazed the trench. Only then, composed and unhurried, did he come down. I looked at him up close. His face displayed arrogant indifference, but his eyes were spinning. They looked like the wheels of a race car.
>“If you’re not afraid”, he said, turning to the corporal, “do what your general just did.”
>“Yes, sir”, the corporal replied. And leaning his rifle against the trench wall, he climbed up. Instinctively I grabbed him by the arm and made him come down. “The Austrians have been alerted now, and they certainly won’t miss on the next shot.”
>With a chilling glance, the general reminded me of the difference of rank that separated me from him. I let go of the corporal and didn’t say another word. “But there’s nothing to it”, said the corporal, and he climbed back up. As soon as he looked out he was greeted by a barrage of fire. The corporal remained unhurt. Impassive, his arms on the parapet, his chest exposed to enemy fire, he kept his eyes to the front.
>“Bravo!” cried the general. “You can get down now.”
>A single shot came from the enemy trench. The corporal fell backward and landed on top of us. The bullet had hit him in the top of the chest, under the collarbone, in one side and out the other. Blood was coming out of his mouth. The general bent over him. The soldiers looked at him, hate in their eyes.
>“He’s a hero”, the general said.
