Adrian Smith is Emeritus Professor of Modern History at the University of Southampton, UK, and the author of Mountbatten Apprentice War Lord and Mountbatten, Cold War and Empire, 1945-79.

Was he a far-sighted war hero, or an ambitious networker promoted well above his natural talent? Admired as a modernising chief of staff, a timely decoloniser, and a genuine player on the world stage, Mountbatten nevertheless continues to attract fierce criticism. In this timely new biography, Adrian Smith offers a fresh and convincing perspective, depicting Mountbatten as a quintessentially modern, highly professional figure within the Royal Navy, and at Combined Operations and SE Asia Command, a hands-on officer who enthusiastically embraced new technology; someone who, although an aristocrat, was by instinct a progressive, innovative in his approach to man management. Smith brings Mountbatten to life, acknowledging the essential qualities as well as the obvious weaknesses. Beneath the rich, vain, often ruthless, embodiment of power and privilege could be found a very human, even vulnerable, character - the complex personality of a pivotal figure in the history of twentieth-century Britain and her empire.

Preface
Part One Dickie Mountbatten, consul, courtier, charmer and chancer
1.Introduction
2.Lord Louis Mountbatten - royal parvenue?
Part Two Mountbatten at war, 1914-1939
3. The First World War and the 1920s
4. Fast-tracking in 1930s
Part Three Mountbatten at war, Flotilla Captain 1939-41
5. HMS 'Kelly', 1939-1940
6. HMS 'Kelly' 1941
Part Four Mountbatten at war, Chief of Combined Operations 1941-43
7. From Adviser to Chief of Combined Operations 1941-2
8. The Dieppe Raid, 19 August 1942
9. Dieppe - the aftermath, the inquest and the debate
10. 'The steel hand from sea' - Combined Operations at its zenith
Conclusion