FROM the celebrated military historian, author of Lincoln and His Generals—whose most recent work, the brilliantly acclaimed Huey Long, won both the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award—a masterful history that traces the American involvement in war through nearly two centuries, from the French and Indian War, the Revolution, and the War of 1812 through the First World War.

The History of American Wars is a provocative, wide-ranging account of the American military experience, whose focus extends beyond the military to the political, social, and economic aspects of war. Interweaving vivid battle accounts with sharp and incisive portraits of military and civilian leaders, T. Harry Williams explains the causes of each war, the development of a command system, the growing civilian supremacy in military matters, the extent of internal opposition, the progress in new weaponry and military thought, and the financing of various conflicts. His narrative offers a brilliant synthesis of detail and interpretation—and characterizes with remarkable clarity and acumen each war and its social and political implications.

The Revolutionary War. Williams depicts the initial confusion of purpose—attributing it to the absence of a central government—and the Continental Congress's dual responsibility of acting as a government and conducting a war.

The War of 1812. Until Vietnam, the nation's most unpopular war. Williams discusses why there was talk of secession among the New England states at the Federalist Party convention, and shows why, with national pride deepened at its end, the war was more of a success than has traditionally been thought.

The Mexican War. Characterizing it as America's first successful offensive war, in which strategic objectives were established before hostilities were joined, Williams describes the divergent styles and achievements of "Old Rough and Ready" (Zachary Taylor) and "Old Fuss and Feathers" (Winfield Scott).

The Civil War. A war of unlimited objectives, the South fighting for something concrete, a way of life; the North, for an abstract principle. Williams movingly evokes its heroic and tragic qualities, and assesses its incalculable impact, past and present, on the national consciousness.

The Spanish-American War. America's debut on the stage of world politics. A tragicomic episode—an army clad in wool for tropical operations, with more deaths from disease than in battle—that enabled America to acquire its first real external possessions. Williams documents how Congress took the initiative in formulating foreign policy.

World War I. Williams traces America's emergence from a century of isolationism to participation in Europe's Great War, and analyzes the impasse of trench warfare, which prolonged a struggle that began with cavalry as an important factor and concluded with the use of startling new weapons—the submarine and the airplane.

In a series of "interludes," Williams describes military activities between wars: skirmishes with Indians and pirates, the peacetime responsibilities of the services, and the problems created by a continuing lack of national strategy.

The History of American Wars is an authoritative record of the significance of war in the history of the United States, a final testament to the comprehensive vision of one of this century's most esteemed historical scholars.