The episode begins with the presidential election of 1864 that sets Abraham Lincoln against his old commanding general, George McClellan. The stakes are nothing less than the survival of the Union itself: with Grant and Sherman stalled at Petersburg and Atlanta, opinion in the North has turned strongly against the war. But 11th-hour victories at Mobile Bay, Atlanta, and the Shenandoah Valley tilt the election to Lincoln and the Confederacy's last...

When The Civil War, originally premiered in September 1990, the response was phenomenal and the series became a national viewing event. The film interweaves thousands of photographs and paintings with the words of those who lived through the war that shattered a union and shaped a nation: politicians, generals, common soldiers, slaves and free slaves, the famous and the forgotten, male and female.

The episode begins with William Tecumseh Sherman's brilliant march to the sea, which brings the war to the heart of Georgia and the Carolinas and spells the end of the Confederacy. In March, following Lincoln's second inauguration, first Petersburg and then Richmond finally fall to Grant's army. Lee's tattered Army of Northern Virginia flees westward towards a tiny crossroads town called Appomattox Court House. There the dramatic and deeply moving...

Episode six begins with a biographical comparison of Ulysses S. Grant and Robert E. Lee and then chronicles the extraordinary series of battles that pitted the two generals against each other from the wilderness to Petersburg in Virginia. In 30 days, the two armies lose more men than both sides have lost in three years of war. With Grant and Lee finally deadlocked at Petersburg, we visit the ghastly hospitals north and south and follow General Sherman's...

This extraordinary final episode of The Civil War begins in the bittersweet aftermath of Lee's surrender and then goes on to narrate the horrendous events of five days later when, on April 14, Lincoln is assassinated. After chronicling Lincoln's poignant funeral, the series recounts the final days of the war, the capture of John Wilkes Booth and the fates of the Civil War's major protagonists. The episode then considers the consequences and meaning...

"In this penetrating history of the Defense Department's most secret, most powerful, and most controversial military science R & D agency, Annie Jacobsen draws on inside sources, exclusive interviews, private documents, and declassified memos to paint a picture of "the Pentagon's brain" from its Cold War inception in 1958 to the present. This is the essential book on DARPA--a compelling narrative about the clandestine intersection of science and the...

Sun Tzu's legendary victory manual, Art of War, was written 2,400 years ago, yet is still considered by many as the ultimate how-to guide for winning at war. "Weaves together the epic story of Sun Tzu himself, and relives a war in which his tactics posthumously saved a city from defeat, a victory at war that paved the way toward the unification of China. ... An emotional, epic and ultimately visual understanding of Sun Tzu's lessons, telling the story...

"When we think about the future of war, the military and Washington and most everyone gets it backwards. We think in terms of buying single military systems, such as fighter jets or aircraft carriers. And when we think about modernizing those systems, we think about buying better versions of the same things. But what really matters is not the single system but "the battle network"--the collection of sensors and shooters that enables a military to...

A graphic adaptation of the Gettysburg Address explains the events of the War, drawing on first-hand accounts from soldiers, slaves, and key figures and providing an understanding of the speech that marked America's new path.

"War is no longer waged only by national militaries. We are seeing a shift to a new anarchy where might makes right, but with new tools: private intelligence outfits, rent-an-army soldiers, and cyber mercenaries for hire. These groups profit from chaos and uncertainty, while accountability, transparency, and peace seem harder than ever to achieve"--