Ian Passingham is a defence analyst and military historian. He is an authority on the history of the First World War and the battlefields of the Western Front. He has a special interest in the German armed forces between 1871 and the present day and has carried out detailed research on the German Army in both World Wars. His previous books include Pillars of Fire: The Battle of Messines Ridge, June 1917 and All the Kaiser's Men: The Life and Death of the German Army on the Western Front, 1914-1918.