Book: The Complete Guide to Combat City

Unmarked on maps and largely unnoticed by urban design, architecture and planning communities, Combat Cities have quietly spread throughout the world.
The Complete Guide to Combat City is an architectural and cultural handbook of these simulated towns, exclusively developed by the military to train for war. 17 existing, fully functioning urban combat centres in the US, Europe and the Middle East have been reconstructed from existing video footage, satellite images, military photographs and army suppliers’ brochures. The guide evaluates the power of simulation and interrogates whether fake cities can resist or even surpass the comparison with their mirror image. It analyses their features, be they fictional or real, and presents them with commentary, illustrations and classifications. It combines different urban portraits to create a comprehensive catalogue and architectural database of contemporary mock-cities.