The impact of World War II opened the door for weak and impoverished nations to develop military means of defeating modern armies. In China, Korea, Vietnam, Palestine, Cuba, Ireland, Africa, and the former Soviet Union, where battles still rage today-indeed, all over the globe-impassioned revolutions, marked by irregular warfare, guerilla insurgency, and terrorism, turned nations upside down in the name of liberation. Vividly illustrated and packed with punch, this dynamic account of endemic violence, epic character, and astonishingly resourceful commanders and combatants probes the nation in arms as a product of the Western presence, and of communism, religion, and tribal or familial loyalties. A chronology and biographies of crucial figures clarifies the lines leading backward to the prewar era.