Introduction : command as politics --
Supreme commander : Truman and MacArthur --
The fury of the legions : the French army in Indochina and Algeria --
Keeping control : the Cuban missile crisis --
The very model of insubordination : Ariel Sharon and Israel's wars --
Civil war : the surrender of East Pakistan --
Orders from on high : responses to North Vietnam's 1972 offensive --
Command in theatre : the Falklands campaign --
Dictator as supreme commander : Saddam Hussein --
Command in a fragile state : Guevara, Kabila and the Congo --
Command in a faltering state : the Russian invasion of Chechnya --
Too many cooks : Kosovo in 1999 --
From hybrid conflict to all-out war : Russia fights Ukraine --
The war on terror : the battle of Tora Bora --
A tale of two surges : Iraq 2006-7 --
War among the people : fighting the Taliban and Isis --
Past, present and future of command.
