From sieges to street fighting and peacekeeping to coups de main, cities have always been key terrain in warfare. Although strategists have warned against urban operations for millennia because they are so costly, difficult, and fraught with risk, armies and generals have nevertheless been forced to attack and defend cities, and victory has required that they do it well. In this masterful study of urban warfare, DiMarco explains what it takes to seize and hold a city literally block by block and provides lessons for today?s tacticians that they neglect at their own peril.

U.S. Army Chief of Staff's Professional reading list, 2017. Includes maps of: German Summer Offensive, 1942; 6th Army Attack into Stalingrad, September-November 1942; Soviet Counteroffensive, November 1942; Battle for Aachen, October 1944; Inchon Landings, September 1950; Capture of Seoul, September 1950; PAVN Capture of Hue, January 1968; Battle for Southern Hue, January-February 1968; Battle for Northern Hue, January-February 1968; Major Events in Algiers, 1956-1957; Deployment and Actions of the 10th Para Division, Algiers, 1957; British Army Deployment and Major Events, Northern Ireland, 1969-2007; Initial Russian Attack into Grozny, December 1994; Operation Defensive Shield, March-April 2002; IDF Attacks Nablus, April 2002; IDF Attacks Jenin, April 2002; Al-Anbar Province, Iraq, 2006; Deployment of 1st BCT in Ramadi, Iraq, 2006-2007.

Urban warfare, past and future -- An operational debacle : Stalingrad, 1942 -- American urban warfare : Aachen, 1944 -- Urban warfare from the sea : Inchon and Seoul, 1950 -- Complex urban warfare : the battle for Hue, 1968 -- War in the Casbah : the Battle of Algiers, 1956-57 -- The long urban war : Operation Banner, 1969-2007 -- Urban death trap : the Russian Army in Grozny, 1995 -- Invading the urban sanctuary : Operation Defensive Shield and the battle for Jenin, 2002 -- Systemic urban warfare : "ready first" in Ramadi, 2006-07.