Great battles mark history's turning points, occurring where cultures and ideologies clash. While some battles have been won by the superior force, others have been won by a sheer dogged refusal to surrender in the face of overwhelming odds. Superior weaponry has sometimes brought victory, as at Plassey, while the extraordinary generalship of a Napoleon, a Wellington, or a Marlborough has won the day on other occasions.

From the Battle of Marathon in 490 BC, when the vastly-outnumbered Athenian army turned back an invasion of the mighty Persian empire, up to the Vietnamese defeat of the French army at the battle of Dien Bien Phu, the battles in this book demonstrate that fate is not always on the side of the big battalions.