What If Essays

Historians and inquisitive laymen alike love to ponder the dramatic what-ifs of history. In these never-before-published essays, some of the keenest minds of our time ask the big, tantalizing questions: Where might we be if history had not unfolded the way it did? Why, how, and when was our fortune made real? The answers are surprising, sometimes frightening, and always entertaining. This provocative collection of essays features today's foremost historians speculating on these "what ifs", providing a fascinating new prospective on history's most pivotal events. The essays include: The Peace of 1914: The World War that Wasn't by Robert Cowley; How Hitler Could Have Won the War: The Drive for the Middle East by John Keegan; Our Midway Disaster: Japan Springs a Trap, June 4, 1942 by Theodore F. Cook; D-Day Fails: Atomic Alternatives in Europe by Stephen E. Ambrose; Funeral in Berlin: The Cold War Turns Hot by David Clay Large; China Without Tears: If Chiang Hadn't Gambled in 1946 by Arthur Waldron. In addition to the essays are fascinating "sidebars" provided by such authors as James Chace, Ted Morgan, and others that illuminate in brief other world-changing episodes.

There is no surer way to feel the danger or the good fortune of our collective past than to contemplate those moments when the world's future hung in the balance. Our brightest historians speculate on some of these intriguing crossroads and the ways in which our lives might have been changed for the better -- or the worse. These unabridged essays range across the full span of history. Geoffrey Parker describes ramifications that might have included a divided Reformation movement, a strengthened Catholic leadership, and no European settlements in the Americas. And Caleb Carr argues that we could have been spared the horrific last six months of World War II in Europe if Eisenhower had seized his chance to destroy the Nazis in the fall of 1944.This all-star list of award-winning and bestselling authors includes Lance Morrow, Andrew Roberts, Cecelia Holland, Theodore F. Cook and others.

Historians and inquisitive laymen alike love to ponder the dramatic what-ifs of history. In these never-before-published essays, some of the keenest minds of our time ask the big, tantalizing questions: Where might we be if history had not unfolded the way it did? Why, how, and when was our fortune made real? The answers are surprising, sometimes frightening, and always entertaining. This provocative collection of essays features today's foremost historians speculating on these "what ifs", providing a fascinating new perspective on history's most pivotal events. The essays include: Infectious Alternatives: The Plague that Saved Jerusalem by William H. McNeil; No Glory That Was Greece: The Persians Win at Salamis by Victor Davis Hanson; Conquest Denied: Alexander the Great's Premature Death by Josiah Ober; Furor Teutonicus: The Teutoburg by Lewis Lapham; The Dark Ages Made Lighter: The Consequences of Two Defeats by Barry S. Strauss; The Death that Saved Europe: The Mongols Turn Back by Cecilia Holland; If Only It Had Not Been Such a Wet Summer by Theodore K. Rabb; The Immolation of Hernn Corts by Ross Hassig.