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When a planetary government faces threats from guerrillas, insurgents or terrorists, the men they hire are Hammer's Slammers—known throughout the galaxy for their cold, ruthless ferocity, their ability to defeat overwhelming forces, and their willingness to go up against impossible odds.

Table of contents:

• Intro: Mercenaries and Military Virtue by Jerry Pournelle
• But Loyal to His Own
• The Butcher's Bill
• Under the Hammer
• Cultural Conflict
• Caught in the Crossfire (Caught in the Crossfire)
• Hangman
• Standing Down
• Interludes: Supertanks, The Church of the Lord's Universe, Powerguns, Backdrop to Chaos, The Bonding Authority, and Table of Organization and Equipment, Hammer's Regiment (The Tank Lords, as Appendix) The Baen (1987) edition adds The Tank Lords

The hottest science fiction mercenaries of the decade are back, so why count the cost? The other guy is going to pay for it! Hammer's Slammers must win a two-front war while maintaining the civilian power structure against hordes of religious fanatics.

Colonel Alois Hammer, Luke Broglie, Tess Kuykendall, and Slick Des Grieux, cogs in a killing machine, find themselves at the center of a potential bloodbath.

With a veteran's eye for the harsh and gritty details of war, David Drake depicts a futuristic analog of tank combat in his Hammer's Slammers fiction. The Slammers are neither cartoon heroes nor propaganda villains; rather they are competent professionals engaged in a deadly business. The inevitable conflicts between policy, necessity, and human nature make Drake's Slammers fiction instantly identifiable and utterly compelling.

This is the first of a three volume set presenting for the first time the entire genre-defining Slammers series in a uniform trade paperback set, with new introductions by major SF figures and new afterwords. Each volume will also include a Slammers story not collected in previous Slammer's books.

Table of Contents:

• The Complete Hammer's Slammers Volume 1 - interior artwork by John Treadaway
• 1 - Introduction (The Complete Hammer's Slammers Volume 1) - (2005) - essay by Gene Wolfe
• 5 - Foreword: Becoming a Professional Writer by Way of Southeast Asia - (1998) - essay (variant of Becoming a Professional Writer by Way of Southeast Asia)
• 9 - Under the Hammer - (1974) - short story
• 25 - Supertanks - (1979) - essay
• 29 - The Butcher's Bill - (1974) - novelette
• 45 - The Church of the Lord's Universe - (1979) - essay
• 47 - But Loyal to His Own - (1975) - novelette
• 67 - Powerguns - (1979) - essay
• 71 - Caught in the Crossfire - (1978) - short story
• 83 - Backdrop to Chaos - (1979) - essay
• 87 - Cultural Conflict - (1979) - short story
• 101 - The Bonding Authority - (1979) - essay
• 105 - Hangman - (1979) - novella
• 147 - Table of Organization and Equipment, Hammer's Regiment - (1979) - essay
• 149 - Standing Down - (1979) - novelette
• 163 - Code-Name Feirefitz - (1984) - novelette
• 189 - The Interrogation Team - (1985) - short story
• 201 - The Tank Lords - (1986) - novella
• 237 - Liberty Port - (1987) - novella
• 289 - Night March - (1997) - novelette
• 305 - The Immovable Object - (1998) - novelette
• 337 - The Irresistible Force - (1998) - novella
• 373 - A Death in Peacetime - (2005) - novelette
• 391 - Afterword: Accidentally and by the Back Door (The Complete Hammer's Slammers Volume 1) - essay