The Forgotten Intervention: Operation Intrados, the Musandam Peninsula, and the End of the British Empire in the Gulf

Dr Geraint Hughes Fifty-two years ago the Arabian Gulf was experiencing its own End of Empire. Britain was withdrawing its garrisons from the region, and was preparing Bahrain, Qatar, and the Trucial States (now the United Arab Emirates) for independence by December 1971. Behind this backdrop Headquarters British Forces Gulf (BFG) planned and executed what… Read More The Forgotten Intervention: Operation Intrados, the Musandam Peninsula, and the End of the British Empire in the Gulf

February 8, 2023February 8, 2023 defenceresearchLeave a comment

Historical Reflections On The ‘Grey Zone’

Geraint Hughes Following Anna Karenina’s suicide in Tolstoy’s eponymous novel, her lover Count Vronsky enlists to fight for the Serbs against the Turks. Vronsky’s decision reflected the contemporary reality of Russian volunteers taking up arms against the Ottoman Empire during the Balkan crises that preceded the Russo-Turkish War of 1877-1878, and it provides a reminder… Read More Historical Reflections On The ‘Grey Zone’

May 19, 2020May 18, 2020 defenceresearchLeave a comment

In Pursuit of Prokhorovka

To see in the New Year, Defence-in-Depth is re-publishing its three most-viewed posts of 2019. At No. 1, Ben Wheatley’s new research on the visual record of the Battle of Prokhorovka. BEN WHEATLEY Ben Wheatley is a Honorary Research Fellow in the School of History, University of East Anglia and a former Teaching Fellow at… Read More In Pursuit of Prokhorovka

January 10, 2020January 3, 2020 defenceresearch6 Comments

The Furlough Mutiny and the Struggle for Cassino in the Second World War

To see in the New Year, Defence-in-Depth is re-publishing its three most-viewed posts of 2019. At No. 3, Jonathan Fennell’s account of the furlough mutiny in New Zealand and its impact on the war in the Mediterranean in 1944. JONATHAN FENNELL Jonathan Fennell is author of Fighting the People’s War: The British and Commonwealth Armies… Read More The Furlough Mutiny and the Struggle for Cassino in the Second World War

January 8, 2020January 3, 2020 defenceresearchLeave a comment

Jan Smuts and the Anglo-American World Order

DR JOHN MITCHAM John is Assistant Professor of History at Duquesne University. He is an historian of the British Empire, with a particular focus on settler colonialism in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. His book, Race and Imperial Defence in the British World 1870-1914 (Cambridge University Press, 2016), examined the cultural links between Britain and… Read More Jan Smuts and the Anglo-American World Order

January 25, 2019January 23, 2019 defenceresearch1 Comment

Civil Resettlement Units – a lesson from the past

DR CLARE MAKEPEACE Clare is an historian, writer, lecturer and consultant in the cultural history of the First and Second World Wars. Her debut book Captives of War. British Prisoners of War in Europe in the Second World War was published in 2017, and she holds the position of Honorary Research Fellow at Birkbeck, University of London. You can… Read More Civil Resettlement Units – a lesson from the past

December 14, 2018December 12, 2018 defenceresearchLeave a comment

Prophets of Nuclear Land Combat

DR SIMON MOODY The British Army was remarkably quick in getting to grips with the conceptual challenges posed by the arrival of nuclear weapons, with a rich body of theoretical literature emerging in service journals during the 1950s. The basic tactical problem identified was that mass would suffer most on a nuclear battlefield – nuclear… Read More Prophets of Nuclear Land Combat

November 26, 2018November 24, 2018 defenceresearchLeave a comment

Infernal Machines: the Royal Navy and the asymmetric challenge of mine warfare

DR RICHARD DUNLEY Richard Dunley is a Lecturer in History at UNSW, Canberra and has recently published Britain and the Mine, 1900-1915: Strategy, Culture and International Law with Palgrave Macmillan. Why do military organisations develop and adopt some technologies with ease, whilst others face deep institutional opposition? This is a hugely important question in an… Read More Infernal Machines: the Royal Navy and the asymmetric challenge of mine warfare

August 24, 2018August 22, 2018 defenceresearch2 Comments

An Open Secret: British Open Source Intelligence during the Second World War

DR BEN WHEATLEY Ben Wheatley is a Honorary Research Fellow in the School of History, University of East Anglia and a former Teaching Fellow at the Defence Studies Department, King’s College London. His 2017 book, British Intelligence and Hitler’s Empire in the Soviet Union, 1941-1945 published by Bloomsbury Academic will be available in paperback from August 2018. You… Read More An Open Secret: British Open Source Intelligence during the Second World War

August 8, 2018August 7, 2018 defenceresearch2 Comments

SWWRG Conference Report – 2018 The Peoples’ War? The Second World War in Socio-Political Perspective

DR ALEX WILSON Editorial Note: On 14-15 June 2018, the Second World War Research Group held its annual conference on the theme of ‘The Peoples’ War? The Second World War in Socio-Political Perspective.’ Over the coming weeks, we will be posting short blog articles written by some of the conference’s presenters. In this first post,… Read More SWWRG Conference Report – 2018 The Peoples’ War? The Second World War in Socio-Political Perspective

July 27, 2018September 7, 2018 defenceresearchLeave a comment

Defence-In-Depth

Research from the Defence Studies Department, King's College London

Tag: Military History