In contrast to every other book about the conflict Andrew Lambert's ground-breaking study The Crimean War: British Grand Strategy against Russia, 1853-1856 is neither an operational history of the armies in the Crimea, nor a study of the diplomacy of the conflict. The core concern is with grand strategy, the development and implementation of national policy and strategy. The key concepts are strategic, derived from the works of Carl von Clausewitz and Sir Julian Corbett, and the main focus is on naval, not military operations. This original approach rejected the 'Continentalist' orthodoxy that dominated contemporary writing about the history of war, reflecting an era when British security policy was dominated by Inner German Frontier, the British Army of the Rhine and Air Force Germany. Originally published in 1990 the book appeared just as the Cold War ended; the strategic landscape for Britain began shifting away from the continent, and new commitments were emerging that heralded a return to maritime strategy, as adumbrated in the defence policy papers of the 1990s. With a new introduction that contextualises the 1990 text and situates it in the developing historiography of the Crimean War the new edition makes this essential book available to a new generation of scholars.

The Crimean War was a conflict between the Russian Empire and an alliance of the French Empire, British Empire, Ottoman Empire and the Kingdom of Sardinia. The war was part of a long-running contest between the major European powers for influence over territories of the declining Ottoman Empire. Most of the conflict took place on the Crimean Peninsula, but there were smaller campaigns in western Anatolia, the Caucasus, the Baltic Sea, the Pacific Ocean and the White Sea. The Crimean War is known for the logistical and tactical errors during the land campaign on both sides (the naval side saw a successful Allied campaign which eliminated most of the ships of the Russian Navy in the Black Sea). Nonetheless, it is sometimes considered to be one of the first modern wars as it introduced technical changes which affected the future course of warfare, including the first tactical use of railways and the electric telegraph. It is also famous for the work of Florence Nightingale and Mary Seacole, who pioneered modern nursing practices while caring for wounded British soldiers. The war also led to the establishment of the Victoria Cross in 1856 (backdated to 1854), the British Army's first universal award for valor. The Crimean War was one of the first wars to be documented extensively in photographs. News correspondence reaching Britain from the Crimea was the first time the public were kept informed of the day-to-day realities of war. This unique collection of images will prove to be an invaluable resource for historians, students and all those interested in what was one of the most significant periods in British military history. Each picture will tell its own story, and will be fully captioned with historical detail.