Few phases of history were as heavy with implications for the world at large than the turbulent years through which China moved from the overthrow of the last imperial dynasty in 1911, through anarchy, civil war and invasion, to the final triumph of the Communists in 1949 xxx, yet few periods are as little known by the wider world, and so little understood. Professor Dreyer's impressive account of China at war is both an important contribution to this new series of studies of modern wars in their full political, social and ideological contexts, and also a valuable introduction to the birth of the future superpower.