The collected adventures of John Bullard, officer of the Patrol, from Lieutenant to Admiral. The creation of Malcolm Jameson, the Bullard stories may have been the first military science fiction series. This collection is the most complete ever published. In addition to all the Bullard stories, it includes two bonus essays by Jameson on the tactics and strategy of war in space.
Anthony Boucher praised Bullard as "the most successfully drawn series character in modern science fiction." P. Schuyler Miller wrote that Jameson drew on his own naval experience to give the stories "a warm atmosphere of reality."
Includes:
- Admiral's Inspection - Newly arrived Lieutenant Bullard unexpectedly finds himself in command of the cruiser Pollux when all senior officers are casualties of an inspection. He quickly demonstrates the qualities that will make him the hero of the Patrol.
- White Mutiny - You don't have to start a fight and shoot your officers to mutiny - and the officers don't have to beat men to drive them to mutiny! A rule book skipper in a prize-winning ship is dynamite enough for that.
- Blockade Runner - A good technician can make unlikely things turn into highly effective weapons, and weapons don't always have to kill to be effective.
- Devil's Powder - The drug was getting aboard somehow - and making the men do peculiar things. Somehow, they had to stop its smuggling -
- Slacker's Paradise - Or it seemed that way till the commander of a space rowboat found a gigantic enemy battleship that was determined to surrender to him!
- Bullard Reflects - Captain Bullard had a team nicely trained in a harmless sport - but it turned out he had a team well-trained in the dangerous sport of outlaw-busting.
- Pig Trap - Captain Bullard recounts how he caught a vacuum hog on Pluto.
- Brimstone Bill - Bill was a crook, a hell-fire-damnation specialist in the art of collecting cash. A marvelous orator - with gadgets. But Captain Bullard had a good use for a bad actor!
- Orders - Acting Admiral Bullard is stuck in a desk job and isn't too happy about it, but he still manages to get a bad guy using secret orders.
- The Bureaucrat - Bullard was a Grand Admiral now, and the red tape of high position bound him - they thought!- so tight he couldn't do a friend a favor. But what's a knowledge of high strategy for but to outmaneuver trouble?
- Space War Tactics - Jameson brings out some important details about war in space - not the least of which is that a space battle fleet gets one shot at the enemy in months of maneuvering!
- Space War Strategy - Jameson examines the composition and deployment of space fleets in interplanetary war.
