In time for the bicentennial in 2015, a veteran historian brings the campaign and battle, its armies and their commanders, to fresh and vivid life in his brilliant new military history of one of the key battles in world history. Wellington remarked that Waterloo was "a damned nice thing," meaning uncertain or finely balanced. He was right. For his part, Napoleon reckoned "the English are bad troops and this affair is nothing more that eating breakfast."...