Exploring the enduring taboo around allowing women to fight in wars, and what causes us to break it

Why do women fight in wars? The short answer is simply that women, like men, fight because they must. The longer answer is inevitably more complex.

Why Women Fight is a look into what drives women to take up arms, examining these reasons through the lives of individuals on the front lines. Busting the myth that female soldiers are a manifestation of modernity, it begins with Semiramis, a former milkmaid attributed with expanding the Babylonian empire, and concludes with Tatyana, a former shop assistant who went on to command a Ukrainian battalion of a thousand men.

Incorporating extraordinary interviews with resistance fighters, illegal paramilitaries, conscripts and regular volunteers, Victoria Preston explores some of the reasons why throughout history women have joined the fray.