Talent serial modder Ben Heck has designed a ruggedized portable Playstation 3 for recreational use by US forces stationed in Afghanistan. The modded PS3 is protected from the elements by a Pelican Storm casing that allows soldiers to carry the unit around like a large toolbox. As expected, the battle-ready, yet tricked-out portable PS3 also features some sweet specs for downtime and extended R&R. This ...

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The diplomatic drift towards war: AD 1890-1914 In the years leading to World War I there are five major powers within Europe - Austria-Hungary, Germany, Russia, France and Britain. The cast list is unchanged since the early 18th century (except that Prussia is now Germany), and the players are well used to the game of diplomacy in which alliances formed for defensive purposes turn into aggressive partnershi ...

Preliminary skirmishes Fighting between primitive tribes consists either of raids on rival settlements (where surprise is important, and disorder inevitable) or of structured and even ritualistic clashes. In either case the struggle is made up of a large number of one-to-one encounters. This does not fit the pattern or what is normally called a battle. The story of warfare is usually taken as beginning with ...

Spain's distant cousins: AD 1690s During the 1690s all Europe awaits the death, thought likely to be imminent, of Charles II, the king of Spain. He is childless and has no cousins in the immediate Spanish Habsburg line. The question of the day is who will inherit the vast Spanish domains. The two most powerful European rulers, Louis XIV of France and the Austrian emperor Leopold I, can make almost equal cla ...

Alliances against France: AD 1686-1697 The military adventures of Louis XIV prompt other European powers to form alliances against expansionist France. The first is the League of Augsburg, put together in 1686 by the Austrian emperor Leopold I. He brings into it his Habsburg cousins in Spain and various states of the Holy Roman empire. This league has no specific purpose (other than to give Leopold a sense ...

Charles VI and the Pragmatic Sanction: AD 1720 The great issue dominating Austria in the years after the War of the Spanish Succession is again a problem of succession - this time relating to the remaining Habsburg territories, ruled from Vienna. The emperor Charles VI has a son, born in 1716, but the child dies before the year is out. A daughter, Maria Theresa, is born in 1717. Another daughter, Maria Anna ...

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German colony: AD 1884-1914 The first German connection with Togo is the arrival of missionaries in 1847 to work among the largest tribal group in the region, the Ewe. German traders soon follow, establishing a base at Anécho on the coast. When Bismarck decides to put together an off-the-peg German empire in Africa, Togo is one of the three places which he selects on the west coast. His representative, Gust ...

Timur and the Chagatai Turks: 14th century AD The regions north and south of the Hindu Kush, approximating to modern Uzbekistan and Afghanistan, form an indeterminate part of the empire of Genghis Khan. They are inherited by descendants of his son Chagatai, but the district is fought over by many rival cousins. Here, more than anywhere in the Mongol empire, the Turkish influence is all-pervasive. By the end ...