Nations

The Netherlands stays neutral in the Great War, but mobilises more than 200,000 men and takes in a million Belgian refugees. The army guards the borders with rifles from the Artillerie-Inrichtingen.

The interwar years are a time of cutbacks: the 'broken rifle' movement gains influence and the army shrinks. Meanwhile, Rotterdam and its port grow into an economic powerhouse.

In May 1940 the fighting lasts five days. After the bombing of Rotterdam the army capitulates; the government goes to London, the Princess Irene Brigade fights alongside the Allies and the resistance grows in the occupied country.

After 1949 the Netherlands commits fully to NATO. The Royal Netherlands Army stands on the North German Plain with Leopards and YPRs, and TNO Defensie works on radar and sensors.

A professional army with deployments from Bosnia to Uruzgan and Mali. With F-35s, Boxers and the air defence and command frigates of the De Zeven Provinciën class, it is a small but modern armed force.

The German Empire goes to war in 1914 wearing the Pickelhaube. After the first months the Schlieffen Plan stalls and the war disappears into the trenches of Flanders and northern France.

The Weimar Republic has to live with the Treaty of Versailles: an army of no more than 100,000 men, no tanks and no air force. Hyperinflation and crisis undermine the young democracy.

Under the Nazi regime, Germany starts the Second World War in 1939. The war of conquest and annihilation, with the Holocaust as its lowest point, ends in 1945 in total defeat. The game shows this period without the swastika and without glorification.

West Germany rearms within NATO. The Bundeswehr, built on the ideal of the citizen in uniform, stands on the front line of the Cold War, directly facing the Warsaw Pact.

Reunified Germany has a smaller army that is deployed mainly on international missions. Since 2022 it has once again been investing heavily in defence.

In 1914 the British Empire sends a small professional army to France and then raises an army of millions. At the Somme in 1916, the first tank ever, the Mark I, rolls onto the battlefield.

After the war the British lead the way with experiments in mechanisation. The Vickers Medium is the army's standard tank for years.

In 1940 Great Britain stands alone. The Spitfire wins the Battle of Britain and at Bletchley Park codebreakers crack Enigma.

The empire is dismantled and the United Kingdom becomes a nuclear power within NATO. GCHQ takes over intelligence work.

The modern British Army is small and professional, deployed worldwide, with two new aircraft carriers.

In 1914 the French Republic still takes the field in red trousers, soon swapping them for horizon blue. Verdun becomes the symbol of endurance: 'Ils ne passeront pas.' The 75 mm field gun is the backbone of the artillery.

France invests in the Maginot Line, a wall of bunkers meant to protect the country against a new invasion.

After the fall of France in 1940, General de Gaulle calls for resistance from London. Free France and the Résistance fight on until the liberation in 1944.

Under de Gaulle, France builds its own nuclear force and temporarily leaves NATO's military command structure. The Mirage becomes an export success.

Modern France has one of the largest armed forces in Europe, with the Rafale, the aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle and missions in the Sahel.

America enters the war in 1917. The doughboys of the American Expeditionary Forces arrive in France just in time for the final offensives.

The army shrinks, but new weapons are tested at proving grounds such as Aberdeen Proving Ground. American industry becomes the strongest in the world.

After Pearl Harbor, America converts its industry entirely to the war effort: Shermans, B-17s and Willys jeeps roll off the line in unprecedented numbers.

In the Cold War the M60 Patton and the B-52 symbolise the arms race with the Soviet Union. DARPA lays the foundations for stealth, GPS and the internet.

After 1990 the US military is unrivalled, with the M1 Abrams, the F-35, HIMARS and eleven aircraft carriers.

In 1914 the Russian Empire mobilises the largest army in Europe, but it is poorly equipped. Defeats and hunger lead to revolution in 1917.

In the 1920s and '30s the Soviet Union builds up heavy industry through five-year plans. The Red Army still wears the budenovka cap.

The Great Patriotic War costs more than twenty million Soviet citizens their lives. At Stalingrad and Kursk the tide turns and the Red Army pushes on all the way to Berlin.

As a Cold War superpower, the Soviet Union sets the BM-21 Grad, the S-75 and the Kirov cruiser against the West. The GRU is the army's eyes.

After 1991 Russia is a state of its own with a strong air defence system, the Pantsir-S1 and the Iskander. The war against Ukraine from 2022 shows how drones are changing the battlefield.

In 1915 the Kingdom of Italy sides with the Allies. On the Isonzo front, the Alpini fight in mountains where snow lies all year round.

In 1922 Mussolini seizes power. Fascist Italy promises a new Roman empire and invades Ethiopia in 1935.

In the Second World War Italy fights on Germany's side until Mussolini's fall in 1943. After that the country becomes a battlefield between the Allies, the Germans and the partisans.

In 1949 the Italian Republic is one of the founding members of NATO. The Fiat G.91 becomes the alliance's light fighter-bomber.

Modern Italy has a strong navy and air force, with the Eurofighter and the F-35, and takes part in peacekeeping missions in places such as Lebanon.

In 1914 the Empire of Japan sides with the Allies and seizes the German possessions in China and the Pacific.

In the interwar years the army gains ever more power in politics. In 1931 Japan occupies Manchuria.

The war in Asia and the Pacific begins as early as 1937 in China and ends in 1945, after the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, with capitulation.

Japan establishes the Self-Defense Forces. Under the constitution they are intended for defence only, and they work closely with the United States.

The modern Japanese armed forces are among the best equipped in Asia, with the Mitsubishi F-2 and a strong navy.

In the Great War the Jewish Legion, battalions of Jewish volunteers in the British Army, fights against the Ottoman Empire in Palestine in 1918.

Under the British Mandate, the Haganah is founded in 1920, an underground defence organisation for the Jewish villages and kibbutzim. Shai is its intelligence service.

During the Second World War tens of thousands of Jewish volunteers serve in the British Army, including in the Jewish Brigade. After the Holocaust the pressure for a state of their own grows.

With independence in 1948 the Haganah becomes the Israeli army. During the Cold War it fights several wars with neighbouring countries, flying among others the Mirage IIICJ Shahak.

The modern Israeli army is technologically highly advanced, with the F-35I Adir, drones such as the IAI Harop and missile defence. MAFAT leads defence development.

Tribal fighters with old rifles, a Maxim machine gun and the tachanka: a horse-drawn cart with a machine gun on the back. Saboteurs bury dynamite charges.

Irregular fighters with captured weapons, a Ford Model T with a Lewis gun and the first anti-tank rifles.

Partisans with captured bazookas, desert trucks with Vickers machine guns and improvised rocket lorries.

Fighters with AK-47s and RPG-7s, Land Rovers with DShK machine guns, rocket jeeps, bomb makers with roadside bombs and radio-controlled bomb planes.

Pickups with heavy machine guns, RPG-29s, rocket pickups with 20 tubes and home-made FPV drones that dive onto their targets.