Книги

Of the many battlefields on which U.S. troops and intelligence operatives fought in Afghanistan, one remote corner of the country stands as a microcosm of the American campaign: the Pech and its tributary valleys in Kunar and Nuristan. The area's rugged, steep terrain and thick forests made it a natural hiding spot for local insurgents and international terrorists alike, and it came to represent both the valor and futility of America's two-decade-long Afghan war.

Drawing on reporting trips, hundreds of interviews, and documentary research, Wesley Morgan reveals the history of the war in this iconic region, captures the culture and reality of the conflict through both American and Afghan eyes, and reports on the snowballing missteps--some kept secret from even the troops fighting there--that doomed the American mission. The Hardest Place is the story of one of the twenty-first century's most unforgiving battlefields and a portrait of the American military that fought there.

Of the many battlefields on which U.S. troops and intelligence operatives fought in Afghanistan, one remote corner of the country stands as a microcosm of the American campaign:…

Sometimes it takes years for a combat vet to understand what war did to him when he was nineteen. With the perception and reflection of a man on the cusp of retirement from a career teaching high school kids, Marty McClure recalls the relentless intensity of prolonged combat as a teenaged Marine machine gunner facing booby traps and battles in a war with few boundaries. Family and friends know Marty as a kind, peaceful man. They aren't aware that when he was young, he plumbed the depths of terror, hatred, and despair with no assurance he'd ever surface again.

Now he needs to reveal what happened in Vietnam and how, with the help of Patti, his wife, Corrie Corrigan, a disabled vet, and Doc Matheson, a corpsman turned trauma surgeon, he works to become a good husband, father, and teacher while he fights to bury the war. Only if he accepts help from his wife and his friends will he find real peace.

Sometimes it takes years for a combat vet to understand what war did to him when he was nineteen. With the perception and reflection of a man on the cusp of retirement from a…

Ночью 26 апреля 1986 года реактор № 4 Чернобыльской атомной электростанции взорвался, положив начало одной из самых страшных ядерных катастроф в истории. Основываясь на более чем десятилетней работе, записях сотен бесед, на личной переписке, неизданных воспоминаниях и недавно рассекреченных архивных документах, журналист Адам Хиггинботам написал бередящее душу и захватывающее произведение, в котором мы видим чернобыльскую катастрофу глазами ее первых свидетелей. Результатом стал мастерски сделанный документальный триллер, исчерпывающий отчет о событии, изменившем историю, – куда более сложный, человечный и пугающий, чем миф о Чернобыле, к которому мы привыкли.

«Чернобыль: История катастрофы» – неизгладимая картина одного из величайших несчастий ХХ века и одновременно документ человеческой стойкости и изобретательности, свидетельство тяжелых уроков, усвоенных человечеством, пытающимся подчинить природу своей воле, – уроков, которые перед лицом наступающих изменений климата и других угроз современности выглядят не просто важными, а жизненно необходимыми.

Ночью 26 апреля 1986 года реактор № 4 Чернобыльской атомной электростанции взорвался, положив начало одной из самых страшных ядерных катастроф в истории. Основываясь на более чем…

A Pentagon defense expert and former U.S. Army Ranger explores what it would mean to give machines authority over the ultimate decision of life or death.

What happens when a Predator drone has as much autonomy as a Google car? Or when a weapon that can hunt its own targets is hacked? Although it sounds like science fiction, the technology already exists to create weapons that can attack targets without human input. Paul Scharre, a leading expert in emerging weapons technologies, draws on deep research and firsthand experience to explore how these next-generation weapons are changing warfare.

Scharre’s far-ranging investigation examines the emergence of autonomous weapons, the movement to ban them, and the legal and ethical issues surrounding their use. He spotlights artificial intelligence in military technology, spanning decades of innovation from German noise-seeking Wren torpedoes in World War II―antecedents of today’s homing missiles―to autonomous cyber weapons, submarine-hunting robot ships, and robot tank armies. Through interviews with defense experts, ethicists, psychologists, and activists, Scharre surveys what challenges might face "centaur warfighters" on future battlefields, which will combine human and machine cognition. We’ve made tremendous technological progress in the past few decades, but we have also glimpsed the terrifying mishaps that can result from complex automated systems―such as when advanced F-22 fighter jets experienced a computer meltdown the first time they flew over the International Date Line.

At least thirty countries already have defensive autonomous weapons that operate under human supervision. Around the globe, militaries are racing to build robotic weapons with increasing autonomy. The ethical questions within this book grow more pressing each day. To what extent should such technologies be advanced? And if responsible democracies ban them, would that stop rogue regimes from taking advantage? At the forefront of a game-changing debate, Army of None engages military history, global policy, and cutting-edge science to argue that we must embrace technology where it can make war more precise and humane, but without surrendering human judgment. When the choice is life or death, there is no replacement for the human heart.

A Pentagon defense expert and former U.S. Army Ranger explores what it would mean to give machines authority over the ultimate decision of life or death.

What happens when a…

The final year of the Civil War witnessed a profound transformation in the practice of modern warfare, a shift that produced unprecedented consequences for the soldiers fighting on the front lines. In The Army of the Potomac in the Overland and Petersburg Campaigns, Steven E. Sodergren examines the transition to trench warfare, the lengthy campaigns of attrition that resulted, and how these seemingly grim new realities affected the mindset and morale of Union soldiers.

The 1864 Overland Campaign created tremendous physical and emotional suffering for the men of the Army of the Potomac as they faced a remarkable increase in the level and frequency of combat. By the end of this critical series of battles, surviving Union soldiers began to express considerable doubt in their cause and their leaders, as evidenced by widespread demoralization and the rising number of men deserting and disobeying orders. Yet, while the Petersburg campaign that followed further exposed the Army of the Potomac to the horrors of trench warfare, it proved both physically and psychologically regenerative. Comprehending that the extensive fortification network surrounding them benefitted their survival, soldiers quickly adjusted to life in the trenches despite the harsh conditions. The army's static position allowed the Union logistical structure to supply the front lines with much-needed resources like food and mail--even a few luxuries. The elevated morale that resulted, combined with the reelection of Abraham Lincoln in November 1864 and the increasing number of deserters from the Confederate lines, only confirmed the growing belief among the soldiers in the trenches that Union victory was inevitable. Taken together, these aspects of the Petersburg experience mitigated the negative effects of trench warfare and allowed men to adapt more easily to their new world of combat.

Sodergren explores the many factors that enabled the Army of the Potomac to endure the brutal physical conditions of trench warfare and emerge with a renewed sense of purpose as fighting resumed on the open battlefield in 1865. Drawing from soldiers' letters and diaries, official military correspondence, and court-martial records, he paints a vivid picture of the daily lives of Union soldiers as they witnessed the beginnings of a profound shift in the way the world imagined and waged large-scale warfare.

The final year of the Civil War witnessed a profound transformation in the practice of modern warfare, a shift that produced unprecedented consequences for the soldiers fighting…

“Vivid…Barron has given us a rich and detailed history.” —The New York Times Book Review

“Ambitious...a deep history and a thoughtful inquiry into how the constitutional system of checks and balances has functioned when it comes to waging war and making peace.” —The Washington Post

A timely account of a raging debate: The history of the ongoing struggle between the presidents and Congress over who has the power to declare and wage war.

The Constitution states that it is Congress that declares war, but it is the presidents who have more often taken us to war and decided how to wage it. In Waging War, David J. Barron opens with an account of George Washington and the Continental Congress over Washington’s plan to burn New York City before the British invasion. Congress ordered him not to, and he obeyed. Barron takes us through all the wars that followed: 1812, the Mexican War, the Civil War, the Spanish-American war, World Wars One and Two, Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, and now, most spectacularly, the War on Terror. Congress has criticized George W. Bush for being too aggressive and Barack Obama for not being aggressive enough, but it avoids a vote on the matter. By recounting how our presidents have declared and waged wars, Barron shows that these executives have had to get their way without openly defying Congress.

Waging War shows us our country’s revered and colorful presidents at their most trying times—Washington, Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin Roosevelt, Truman, Eisenhower, John F. Kennedy, Johnson, both Bushes, and Obama. Their wars have made heroes of some and victims of others, but most have proved adept at getting their way over reluctant or hostile Congresses. The next president will face this challenge immediately—and the Constitution and its fragile system of checks and balances will once again be at the forefront of the national debate.

“Vivid…Barron has given us a rich and detailed history.” —The New York Times Book Review

“Ambitious...a deep history and a thoughtful inquiry into how the constitutional system…

From nuclear proliferation to Jihadi terrorism, the partition of India continues to cast a long shadow even today. Nobody expected the liberation of India and the birth of Pakistan to be so bloody. But in 1946, a full year before Independence, a terrible cycle of riots began, starting with Calcutta and going on to engulf many parts of the country. As the British rushed to leave, thousands of Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs were brutally killed in communal violence. Midnight’s Furies vividly recreates that tragic period through personal stories and eyewitness accounts and recounts the complex relationships between Nehru, Patel, Jinnah and Mountbatten. It shows how Partition, which has created such a wide gulf between two countries whose people have so much in common, has given birth to global terrorism and dangerous nuclear proliferation today.

From nuclear proliferation to Jihadi terrorism, the partition of India continues to cast a long shadow even today. Nobody expected the liberation of India and the birth of…

Alvin C. York (1887--1964) -- devout Christian, conscientious objector, and reluctant hero of World War I -- is one of America's most famous and celebrated soldiers. Known to generations through Gary Cooper's Academy Award-winning portrayal in the 1941 film Sergeant York, York is credited with the capture of 132 German soldiers on October 8, 1918, in the Meuse-Argonne region of France -- a deed for which he was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor.

At war's end, the media glorified York's bravery but some members of the German military and a soldier from his own unit cast aspersions on his wartime heroics. Historians continue to debate whether York has received more recognition than he deserves. A fierce disagreement about the location of the battle in the Argonne forest has further complicated the soldier's legacy.

In Alvin York, Douglas V. Mastriano sorts fact from myth in the first full-length biography of York in decades. He meticulously examines York's youth in the hills of east Tennessee, his service in the Great War, and his return to a quiet civilian life dedicated to charity. By reviewing artifacts recovered from the battlefield using military terrain analysis, forensic study, and research in both German and American archives, Mastriano reconstructs the events of October 8 and corroborates the recorded accounts. On the eve of the WWI centennial, Alvin York promises to be a major contribution to twentieth-century military history.

Alvin C. York (1887--1964) -- devout Christian, conscientious objector, and reluctant hero of World War I -- is one of America's most famous and celebrated soldiers. Known to…

Blood of Tyrants reveals the surprising details of our Founding Fathers’ approach to government and this history’s impact on today. Delving into forgotten—and often lurid—facts of the Revolutionary War, Logan Beirne focuses on the nation’s first commander in chief, George Washington, as he shaped the very meaning of the United States Constitution in the heat of battle.Key episodes of the Revolution illustrate how the Founders dealt with thorny wartime issues: How do we protect citizens’ rights when the nation is struggling to defend itself? Who decides war strategy? When should we use military tribunals instead of civilian trials? Should we inflict harsh treatment on enemy captives if it means saving American lives? Beirne finds evidence in previously unexplored documents such as General Washington’s letters debating the use of torture, an eyewitness account of the military tribunal that executed a British prisoner, Founders’ letters warning against government debt, and communications pointing to a power struggle between Washington and the Continental Congress.Vivid stories from the Revolution set the stage for Washington’s pivotal role in the drafting of the Constitution. The Founders saw the first American commander in chief as the template for all future presidents: a leader who would fiercely defend Americans’ rights and liberties against all forms of aggression.Pulling the reader directly into dramatic scenes from history, Blood of Tyrants fills a void in our understanding of the presidency and our ingenious Founders’ pragmatic approach to issues we still face today.

Blood of Tyrants reveals the surprising details of our Founding Fathers’ approach to government and this history’s impact on today. Delving into forgotten—and often lurid—facts of…

In the spring of 1972, North Vietnam invaded South Vietnam in what became known as the Easter Offensive. Almost all of the American forces had already withdrawn from Vietnam except for a small group of American advisers to the South Vietnamese armed forces. The 23rd ARVN Infantry Division and its American advisers were sent to defend the provincial capital of Kontum in the Central Highlands. They were surrounded and attacked by three enemy divisions with heavy artillery and tanks but, with the help of air power, managed to successfully defend Kontum and prevent South Vietnam from being cut in half and defeated. Although much has been written about the Vietnam War, little of it addresses either the Easter Offensive or the Battle of Kontum. In Kontum: The Battle to Save South Vietnam, Thomas P. McKenna fills this gap, offering the only in-depth account available of this violent engagement. McKenna, a U.S. infantry lieutenant colonel assigned as a military adviser to the 23rd Division, participated in the battle of Kontum and combines his personal experiences with years of interviews and research from primary sources to describe the events leading up to the invasion and the battle itself. Kontum sheds new light on the actions of U.S. advisers in combat during the Vietnam War. McKenna's book is not only an essential historical resource for America's most controversial war but a personal story of valor and survival.

In the spring of 1972, North Vietnam invaded South Vietnam in what became known as the Easter Offensive. Almost all of the American forces had already withdrawn from Vietnam…

The first Afghanistan memoir ever to be written by a Marine Harrier pilot, A Nightmare’s Prayer portrays the realities of war in the twenty-first century, taking a unique and powerful perspective on combat in Afghanistan as told by a former enlisted man turned officer. Lt. Col. Michael "Zak" Franzak was an AV-8B Marine Corps Harrier pilot who served as executive officer of VMA-513, "The Flying Nightmares," while deployed in Afghanistan from 2002 to 2003. The squadron was the first to base Harriers in Bagram in support of Operation Enduring Freedom. But what should have been a standard six-month deployment soon turned to a yearlong ordeal as the Iraq conflict intensified. And in what appeared to be a forgotten war half a world away from home, Franzak and his colleagues struggled to stay motivated and do their job providing air cover to soldiers patrolling the inhospitable terrain.I wasn’t in a foxhole. I was above it. I was safe and comfortable in my sheltered cocoon 20,000 feet over the Hindu Kush. But I prayed. I prayed when I heard the muted cries of men who at last understood their fate.Franzak’s personal narrative captures the day-by-day details of his deployment, from family good-byes on departure day to the squadron’s return home. He explains the role the Harrier played over the Afghanistan battlefields and chronicles the life of an attack pilot—from the challenges of nighttime, weather, and the austere mountain environment to the frustrations of working under higher command whose micromanagement often exacerbated difficulties. In vivid and poignant passages, he delivers the full impact of enemy ambushes, the violence of combat, and the heartbreaking aftermath.
And as the Iraq War unfolded, Franzak became embroiled in another battle: one within himself. Plagued with doubts and wrestling with his ego and his belief in God, he discovered in himself a man he loathed. But the hardest test of his lifetime and career was still to come—one that would change him forever.

A stunning true account of service and sacrifice that takes the reader from the harrowing dangers of the cockpit to the secret, interior spiritual struggle facing a man trained for combat, A Nightmare’s Prayer brings to life a Marine’s public and personal trials set against "the fine talcum brown soot of Afghanistan that permeated everything—even one’s soul."

The first Afghanistan memoir ever to be written by a Marine Harrier pilot, A Nightmare’s Prayer portrays the realities of war in the twenty-first century, taking a unique and…

Matterhorn is a marvel--a living, breathing book with Lieutenant Waino Mellas and the men of Bravo Company at its raw and battered heart. Karl Marlantes doesn't introduce you to Vietnam in his brilliant war epic--he unceremoniously drops you into the jungle, disoriented and dripping with leeches, with only the newbie lieutenant as your guide. Mellas is a bundle of anxiety and ambition, a college kid who never imagined being part of a "war that none of his friends thought was worth fighting," who realized too late that "because of his desire to look good coming home from a war, he might never come home at all." A highly decorated Vietnam veteran himself, Marlantes brings the horrors and heroism of war to life with the finesse of a seasoned writer, exposing not just the things they carry, but the fears they bury, the friends they lose, and the men they follow. Matterhorn is as much about the development of Mellas from boy to man, from the kind of man you fight beside to the man you fight for, as it is about the war itself. Through his untrained eyes, readers gain a new perspective on the ravages of war, the politics and bureaucracy of the military, and the peculiar beauty of brotherhood.

Matterhorn is a marvel--a living, breathing book with Lieutenant Waino Mellas and the men of Bravo Company at its raw and battered heart. Karl Marlantes doesn't introduce you to…

A Medal of Honor recipient looks back at his own service—and ahead to America’s future.

Jack Jacobs was acting as an advisor to the South Vietnamese when he and his men came under devastating attack. Severely wounded, 1st Lt. Jacobs took command and withdrew the unit, returning again and again to the site of the attack to rescue more men, saving the lives of a U.S. advisor and thirteen Allied soldiers. Col. Jacobs received the nation’s highest military award, the Medal of Honor.

Here, with candor, humor, and quiet modesty, Col. Jack Jacobs tells his stirring story of heroism, honor, and the personal code by which he has lived his life, and expounds with blunt honesty and insight his views on our contemporary world, and the nature and necessity of sacrifice.

If Not Now, When? is a compelling account of a unique life at both war and peace, and the all-too-often unexamined role of the citizenry in the service and defense of the Republic.

A Medal of Honor recipient looks back at his own service—and ahead to America’s future.

Jack Jacobs was acting as an advisor to the South Vietnamese when he and his men came…

From the front lines of the battle against Islamic fundamentalism, a searing, unforgettable book that captures the human essence of the greatest conflict of our time.

Through the eyes of Dexter Filkins, the prizewinning New York Times correspondent whose work was hailed by David Halberstam as “reporting of the highest quality imaginable,” we witness the remarkable chain of events that began with the rise of the Taliban in the 1990s, continued with the attacks of 9/11, and moved on to the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Filkins’s narrative moves across a vast and various landscape of amazing characters and astonishing scenes: deserts, mountains, and streets of carnage; a public amputation performed by Taliban; children frolicking in minefields; skies streaked white by the contrails of B-52s; a night’s sleep in the rubble of Ground Zero.

We embark on a foot patrol through the shadowy streets of Ramadi, venture into a torture chamber run by Saddam Hussein. We go into the homes of suicide bombers and into street-to-street fighting with a battalion of marines. We meet Iraqi insurgents, an American captain who loses a quarter of his men in eight days, and a young soldier from Georgia on a rooftop at midnight reminiscing about his girlfriend back home. A car bomb explodes, bullets fly, and a mother cradles her blinded son.

Like no other book, The Forever War allows us a visceral understanding of today’s battlefields and of the experiences of the people on the ground, warriors and innocents alike. It is a brilliant, fearless work, not just about America’s wars after 9/11, but ultimately about the nature of war itself.

From the front lines of the battle against Islamic fundamentalism, a searing, unforgettable book that captures the human essence of the greatest conflict of our time.

Through…

Июль 2005 года. Спецоперация морских котиков в Афганистане. Задание не из легких — ликвидировать лидера талибов Ахмада Шаха. На слежку за ним было потрачено около месяца, но настоящая работа предстояла именно в открытом бою. Все шло по плану, пока отряд не наткнулся на отряд пастухов. Гражданских решили не убивать, но именно это и погубило пехотинцев.

"Уцелевший" — реальная история Маркуса Латтрелла, единственного выжившего в этой кровавой бойне. Тяжело раненный, с парализованными ногами и кровоточащими руками Латтрелл чудом спасся. На родине его считают героем, но сам он считает по-другому — в своей книге Маркус подробно описывает ход операции, попутно размышляя о самом смысле войны. Станет ли мир лучше, если уничтожить каждого талиба, несмотря ни на что? "Цель оправдывает средства" — действительно ли этот принцип работает на поле боя? Латтрелл нашел ответы на эти вопросы.

Июль 2005 года. Спецоперация морских котиков в Афганистане. Задание не из легких — ликвидировать лидера талибов Ахмада Шаха. На слежку за ним было потрачено около месяца, но…

Lieutenant Colonel R. Alan King and his 422nd Civil Affairs Battalion became operations central after the collapse of the Iraqi army and the beginning of the occupation of Iraq in March 2003. While under his command, these civil affairs and psychological operations soldiers were not content to stay in secure offices inside the green zone. Instead, they knew that to do their job they had to get out and make "house calls," and in the process the 422nd became the most highly decorated civil affairs unit in the history of the U.S. Army, with twenty-one individual awards for valor and five purple hearts.

King was particularly well-suited for the new kind of war being waged in Iraq. Armed with his rifle, a Palm Pilot that contained an English translation of the Koran, and an informed and nuanced respect for Middle Eastern culture, King and his team captured or arranged the surrender of almost a dozen of the most-wanted villains from Saddam's regime, including several from the famous deck of cards. He became privy to secrets as weighty as those of Iraq's nuclear weapons program and as light as those behind the outlandish press briefings of the infamous Baghdad Bob.

Twice Armed - its title is taken from Plato's maxim We are twice armed if we fight with faith - provides a compelling view of the Iraq war, and the experience from the Iraqi perspective, from one of the war's most decorated officers. The regional expertise that helped King negotiate with clerics and sheikhs also informs his provocative opinions about what it will take to win the battle for the hearts and minds of Iraq, an ancient, mystifying, and deeply religious culture. King has been compared to the legendary T. E. Lawrence, with the press dubbing him “Alan of Arabia,” and this book sheds light on a new and necessary component of modern warfare, one that goes far beyond artillery and armor, and instead tells King's story of cultural interaction and respect that yielded results in his area at the beginning of the war. A trenchant and necessary look at how the winning of the hearts and minds of people in Iraq is as crucial to success as the winning of tactical military goals.

Lieutenant Colonel R. Alan King and his 422nd Civil Affairs Battalion became operations central after the collapse of the Iraqi army and the beginning of the occupation of Iraq in…

The fierce, bloody battles of Bataan and Corregidor in the Philippines are legendary in the annals of World War II. Those who survived faced the horrors of life as prisoners of
the Japanese.In Conduct Under Fire, John A. Glusman chronicles these events through the eyes of his father, Murray, and three fellow navy doctors captured on Corregidor in May 1942. Here are the dramatic stories of the fall of Bataan, the siege of "the Rock," and the daily struggles to tend the sick, wounded, and dying during some of the heaviest bombardments of World War II. Here also is the desperate war doctors and corpsmen waged against disease and starvation amid an enemy that viewed surrender as a disgrace. To survive, the POWs functioned as a family. But the ties that bind couldn't protect them from a ruthless counteroffensive waged by American submarines or from the B-29 raids that burned Japan's major cities to the ground. Based on extensive interviews with American, British, Australian, and Japanese veterans, as well as diaries, letters, and war crimes testimony, this is a harrowing account of a brutal clash of cultures, of a race war that escalated into total war.

Like Flags of Our Fathers and Ghost Soldiers, Conduct Under Fire is a story of bravery on the battlefield and ingenuity behind barbed wire, one that reveals the long shadow the war cast on the lives of those who fought it.

The fierce, bloody battles of Bataan and Corregidor in the Philippines are legendary in the annals of World War II. Those who survived faced the horrors of life as prisoners of…

How "a handful of bastards and outlaws fighting under a piece of striped bunting" humbled the omnipotent British Navy.

Before the ink was dry on the U.S. Constitution, the establishment of a permanent military had become the most divisive issue facing the new government. Would a standing army be the thin end of dictatorship? Would a navy protect American commerce against the Mediterranean pirates, or drain the treasury and provoke hostilities with the great powers? The foundersparticularly Jefferson, Madison, and Adamsdebated these questions fiercely and switched sides more than once. How much of a navy would suffice? Britain alone had hundreds of powerful warships.

From the decision to build six heavy frigates, through the cliffhanger campaign against Tripoli, to the war that shook the world in 1812, Ian W. Toll tells this grand tale with the political insight of Founding Brothers and a narrative flair worthy of Patrick O'Brian. According to Henry Adams, the 1812 encounter between USS Constitution and HMS Guerriere "raised the United States in one half hour to the rank of a first class power in the world." 16 pages of illustrations; 8 pages of color.

How "a handful of bastards and outlaws fighting under a piece of striped bunting" humbled the omnipotent British Navy.

Before the ink was dry on the U.S. Constitution, the…

Once revered as one of the finest officers in the U.S. Navy, Rear Admiral Samuel Francis Du Pont is now, when remembered at all, criticized for resisting technological advancement and for half-heartedly leading the disastrous all-ironclad Union naval attack on Charleston. Although his reputation appeared unshakable after he won the first major Union victory of the Civil War in South Carolina, the failed attack on Charleston brought his career to an abrupt end. Relieved of his command, he was also maligned in the press. In Lincoln's Tragic Admiral: The Life of Samuel Francis Du Pont, Kevin J. Weddle challenges this reduction of Du Pont's legacy, combining new and known sources to uncover a thoroughly modern, though flawed, Du Pont.

Despite the fact that Du Pont's name has become intertwined with the ironclad due to the catastrophic battle that brought shame on both the man and the machine, Weddle reveals that the admiral was the victim of a double irony: although Du Pont championed technological innovation, he outspokenly opposed the use of the new ironclads to attack Charleston. Only when his objections were overridden did his use of these modern vessels bring his career to a tragic end. Weddle exposes this historical misunderstanding, while also pinpointing Du Pont's crucial role in the development of United States naval strategy, his work in modernizing the navy between the Mexican War and the Civil War, and his push for the navy's technological transition from wood to iron.

In his examination of key documents from Du Pont's life and career, Weddle unveils the life-long partnership that Du Pont shared with his wife and confidante, Sophie, who served as an immediate counsel to many of his decisions, while also tackling larger historical questions such as civil-military relations, attitudes toward slavery, innovations in military strategy and organization, and the introduction of new military technology in wartime. Both enlightening and moving, Lincoln's Tragic Admiral will appeal to scholars interested in American, technological, and military history, as well as the general reader interested in the Civil War.

Once revered as one of the finest officers in the U.S. Navy, Rear Admiral Samuel Francis Du Pont is now, when remembered at all, criticized for resisting technological advancement…

Major General Sid Shachnow is more than a highly decorated Vietnam War veteran with two Silver and three Bronze Stars with V for Valor. He survived a crucible far crueler than the jungles of Vietnam: Nazi-occupied Eastern Europe, spending three years in the notorious Kovno concentration camp as a child. At age ten, with nothing but rags on his back, he was finally able to flee that hellhole. Most of those he left behind died.

After returning to his home in Lithuania, now occupied by the Soviets, and finding it unbearable, Shachnow and his family decided to head west, often on foot, across Europe to the U.S. zone in Germany, where they found refuge. To earn a living in the grim aftermath of war, he smuggled black market contraband for American GIs. His next journey was to America, where he worked his way through school and enlisted in the U.S. Army, volunteering for U.S. Special Forces, where he served for thirty-two years. His primary goal was to save others from the indignities he had endured and the deadly fate he so narrowly escaped.

From Vietnam to the Middle East to the Berlin Wall, Sydney Shachnow served in Special Operations. He grew as Special Forces grew, receiving both a master's and a doctoral degree. He traveled the world, rising to major general, responsible for American Special Forces everywhere, but the lessons of Kovno stayed with him wherever he turned, wherever he soldiered.

Hope and Honor is a powerful and dramatic memoir that shows how the will to live---so painfully refined in the fires of that long-ago death camp---was forged, at last, into truth of soul and wisdom of the heart.

Major General Sid Shachnow is more than a highly decorated Vietnam War veteran with two Silver and three Bronze Stars with V for Valor. He survived a crucible far crueler than the…

Franklin Roosevelt and Winston Churchill were the greatest leaders of "the Greatest Generation." In Franklin and Winston, Jon Meacham explores the fascinating relationship between the two men who piloted the free world to victory in World War II. It was a crucial friendship, and a unique one--a president and a prime minister spending enormous amounts of time together (113 days during the war) and exchanging nearly two thousand messages. Amid cocktails, cigarettes, and cigars, they met, often secretly, in places as far-flung as Washington, Hyde Park, Casablanca, and Teheran, talking to each other of war, politics, the burden of command, their health, their wives, and their children.

Born in the nineteenth century and molders of the twentieth and twenty-first, Roosevelt and Churchill had much in common. Sons of the elite, students of history, politicians of the first rank, they savored power. In their own time both men were underestimated, dismissed as arrogant, and faced skeptics and haters in their own nations--yet both magnificently rose to the central challenges of the twentieth century. Theirs was a kind of love story, with an emotional Churchill courting an elusive Roosevelt. The British prime minister, who rallied his nation in its darkest hour, standing alone against Adolf Hitler, was always somewhat insecure about his place in FDR's affections--which was the way Roosevelt wanted it. A man of secrets, FDR liked to keep people off balance, including his wife, Eleanor, his White House aides--and Winston Churchill.

Confronting tyranny and terror, Roosevelt and Churchill built a victorious alliance amid cataclysmic events and occasionally conflicting interests. Franklin and Winston is also the story of their marriages and their families, two clans caught up in the most sweeping global conflict in history.

Meacham's new sources--including unpublished letters of FDR's great secret love, Lucy Mercer Rutherfurd, the papers of Pamela Churchill Harriman, and interviews with the few surviving people who were in FDR and Churchill's joint company--shed fresh light on the characters of both men as he engagingly chronicles the hours in which they decided the course of the struggle.

Hitler brought them together; later in the war, they drifted apart, but even in the autumn of their alliance, the pull of affection was always there. Charting the personal drama behind the discussions of strategy and statecraft, Meacham has written the definitive account of the most remarkable friendship of the modern age.

Franklin Roosevelt and Winston Churchill were the greatest leaders of "the Greatest Generation." In Franklin and Winston, Jon Meacham explores the fascinating relationship between…

With unprecedented access and previously unreported detail, here is a first hand account of the 22-day march to Baghdad that takes you behind the scenes and to the front line...
No one reporting on the war in Iraq had the unique battlefield clearance afforded the authors of this dramatic eyewitness account. Unlike embedded journalists confined to a single unit, West and Smith acquired a captured yellow SUV and joined with whatever unit was leading the assault every day of the fight. The result is a report of what really happened from the heart of the action unlike anything you'll read anywhere else.
"While we will move swiftly and aggressively against those who resist, we will treat all others with decency, demonstrating chivalry and soldierly compassion for people who have endured a lifetime under Saddam's oppression."--Major General J.N. Mattis, 1st Marine Division, Commanding
Here is the story that can be told only by those who actually witnessed the action of the famed 1st Marine Division's march on Baghdad, from the shaky beginning of U.S. operations in southern Iraq to the capture of U.S. prisoners, the misreported "fierce Iraqi resistance," and the aggressive assaults that led to a quick and decisive victory.
With over a half century of military and combat experience between them, bestselling author F. J. "Bing" West and Major General Ray L. Smith, USMC (Ret.), combine expert military analysis with dramatic battlefield reporting. They bring the reader on a march that ended in victory--but was shadowed by second-guessing, unexpected reversals, and the threat of catastrophe. With access to three-star generals in the command centers and to privates in the field, the authors reveal how the strategic plan played out in battle, showing what went well and what failed, and detailing power struggles for military and political control never reported. The result is destined to become the definitive account of ground warfare in Iraq.

With unprecedented access and previously unreported detail, here is a first hand account of the 22-day march to Baghdad that takes you behind the scenes and to the front line...…

Compelled by the known fallacies in the Associated Press expose of the alleged American slaughter of South Korean refugees, Major Bateman presents an alternate explanation of the events through the perspective of the soldiers and their commanders. The 1948-50 South Korean civil war and the broader state of U.S. military policy surrounding it are both assessed in the light of force readiness and the impact it had on the No Gun RI incident. This is a careful, measured investigation based on official sources and eyewitness testimony. He debunks the AP allusion to a widespread massacre of civilians by U.S. forces and shows how veterans who allegedly witnessed this event and influenced others were not even present. Told concisely with extensively documented research of previously overlooked and unavailable sources, this is a valuable historical reconstruction based on fact rather than the jaundiced view of the media.

Compelled by the known fallacies in the Associated Press expose of the alleged American slaughter of South Korean refugees, Major Bateman presents an alternate explanation of the…

On the murderous road to racial purity Hitler encountered unexpected detours, largely due to his own crazed views and inconsistent policies regarding Jewish identity. After centuries of Jewish assimilation and intermarriage in German society, he discovered that eliminating Jews from the rest of the population was more difficult than he'd anticipated. As Bryan Rigg shows in this provocative new study, nowhere was that heinous process more fraught with contradiction and confusion than in the German military.

Contrary to conventional views, Rigg reveals that a startlingly large number of German military men were classified by the Nazis as Jews or partial-Jews (Mischlinge), in the wake of racial laws first enacted in the mid-1930s. Rigg demonstrates that the actual number was much higher than previously thought-perhaps as many as 150,000 men, including decorated veterans and high-ranking officers, even generals and admirals.

As Rigg fully documents for the first time, a great many of these men did not even consider themselves Jewish and had embraced the military as a way of life and as devoted patriots eager to serve a revived German nation. In turn, they had been embraced by the Wehrmacht, which prior to Hitler had given little thought to the race of these men but which was now forced to look deeply into the ancestry of its soldiers.

The process of investigation and removal, however, was marred by a highly inconsistent application of Nazi law. Numerous exemptions were made in order to allow a soldier to stay within the ranks or to spare a soldier's parent, spouse, or other relative from incarceration or far worse. (Hitler's own signature can be found on many of these exemption orders.) But as the war dragged on, Nazi politics came to trump military logic, even in the face of the Wehrmacht's growing manpower needs, closing legal loopholes and making it virtually impossible for these soldiers to escape the fate of millions of other victims of the Third Reich.

Based on a deep and wide-ranging research in archival and secondary sources, as well as extensive interviews with more than four hundred Mischlinge and their relatives, Rigg's study breaks truly new ground in a crowded field and shows from yet another angle the extremely flawed, dishonest, demeaning, and tragic essence of Hitler's rule.

On the murderous road to racial purity Hitler encountered unexpected detours, largely due to his own crazed views and inconsistent policies regarding Jewish identity. After…