' The current trend in general writing on World War I emphasizes its global aspect. At the same time an increasing number of specialised monographs address theatres long overlooked and participants long forgotten- France's Malagasy soldiers, the British West Indies Regiment- yet somehow the pieces never quite fit. The looming presence of the Western Front continues to dominate and define- until this anthology. The essays within cover a comprehensive and dazzling spectrum, from the Belgian Congo to Upper Silesia, and from th Four Communes of Senegal to America's Caribbean 'empire without portfolio'. Some focus on the social/cultural interaction of colonisers and colonised. Others deal with non-European ambitions- not only Japan's but those of Indian nationalists as well. What makes the discrete chapters fit together is their high individual quality- scholarship and presentation are uniformly excellent- and the author's success in presenting case studies and niche studies in a genuinely global context. The result is a major contribution to concretising the global nature of a war still narrowly understood, and to demonstrating that the war's causes and aims were as universal as its operational aspects.' Dennis Showalter, Professor of History at Colorado College.
