Liberty or Death: Latin American Conflicts, 1900-70, Hardcover

A highly illustrated study of the wars of Central and South America from 1900 through to 1970, featuring many rare and never-before-seen images.

Fully illustrated with a wealth of rare photographs, this fascinating story sheds light on seven decades of a continent in conflict that is rarely covered in English.

From the Banana Wars of the early 20th century through to the Football War of 1969, South and Central America has been a hotbed of revolutions, rebellions and conflicts as diverse as they are numerous. Some were small-scale affairs involving the poorly armed forces of Central American armies with rifles, machetes and a few aged machine guns. Others were full-scale conflicts involving sophisticated armies equipped with tanks, artillery and aircraft, and hundreds of thousands of troops. These wars often went largely unreported in the West, which was preoccupied with its own problems in fighting two world wars and dealing with Cold War tensions.

Philip Jowett was born in Leeds in 1961, and has been interested in military history for as long as he can remember. His first Osprey book was the ground-breaking Men-at-Arms 306: Chinese Civil War Armies 1911-49; he has since published the three-part sequence The Italian Army 1940-45 (Men-at-Arms 340, 349 and 353). He is married and lives in Lincolnshire, UK.