"The rigorous archival depth and scholarship of the book allows every twist and turn to be detailed down to the hour, and peopled by an array of characters whose self-belief and delusions would make a fictional tale appear absurdly unrealistic...the book provides ingredients essential for understanding the international history of the following forty years, at least." - American Historical Review "This book deserves wider attention that just among historians of the South Pacific or of the American military.... Each colony shows a microcosm of Franco-French disputes, of uncongenial relations between the Allies and of the inevitable confrontation between the French and the "natives" whose lives, in different ways around the imperial globe, changed because of the war. Munholland's excellent study explores these issues, and also provides essential background to the post-war future of the French forced retreat from empire and its difficult engagement with its American ally." - H-Net France ."a clear, authoritative narrative. that is at once wide-ranging and detailed--and welcome." - International History Review KIM MUNHOLLAND received his PhD from Princeton University and, since 1963, has been a member of the history faculty at the University of Minnesota where he has taught Modern European and French History.