Leuthen (1757) is one of the best-known battles of the Seven Years'' War, the most consequential conflict in continental Europe between the Thirty Years'' War and the wars of Revolutionary and then Napoleonic France. It was a victory against the odds, over a vastly superior Austrian enemy who held the initiative in the war. Leuthen confirmed the reputation of Frederick II (''the Great'') of Prussia as one of history''s greatest military commanders. His victory rested on superior drill and firepower, intelligent use of the terrain, and his perfecting of the ''oblique battle order''. But faulty intelligence and flawed decision-making on the Austrian side were no less important, as T.G. Otte shows in this reappraisal of events.Leuthen was of profound significance for the war and for the future course of European history. Frederick''s victory reversed the military dynamic of the current conflict. It kept Prussia in the war, preserved the existence of the Prussian state, and laid the founda
