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From the #1 New York Times bestselling coauthor of No Easy Day comes a thrilling World War II story of… the American airborne soldiers who captured a Japanese-held island fortress&“Rock Force is a beautifully told story of war: the friendships, the courage and despair, and the terror... One of the most exciting books ever written about the Pacific War.&”—Mitch Weiss, New York Times bestselling coauthor of Countdown 1945In late December 1941, General Douglas MacArthur, caught off guard by the Japanese invasion of the Philippines, is forced to retreat to Corregidor, a jagged, rocky island fortress at the mouth of Manila Bay. Months later, under orders from the president, the general is whisked away in the dark of night, leaving his troops to their fate. It is a bitter pill for a fiercely proud warrior who has always protected his men. He famously declares "I shall return," but the humiliation of Corregidor haunts him, even earning him the derisive nickname "Dugout Doug."In early 1945, MacArthur returns to the Philippines, his eyes firmly fixed on Corregidor. To take back the island, he calls on the 503rd Parachute Infantry Regiment, a highly trained veteran airborne unit. Their mission is to jump onto the island—hemmed in by sheer cliffs, pockmarked by bomb craters, bristling with deadly spiky broken tree trunks—and wrest it from some 6,700 Japanese defenders who await, fully armed and ready to fight to the death. Drawn from firsthand accounts and personal interviews with the battle's surviving veterans, acclaimed war correspondent and bestselling author Kevin Maurer delves into this extraordinary tale, uncovering astonishing accounts of bravery and heroism during an epic, yet largely forgotten, clash of the Pacific War. Here is an intimate story of uncommon soldiers showing uncommon courage and winning, through blood and sacrifice, the redemption of General MacArthur.
Supported in large part by evidence released after the collapse of the Soviet Union, this book follows the career of… the Red Army from its birth in 1918 as the designated vanguard of world revolution to its affiliation in 1941 with 'the citadel of capitalism', the United States. Effectiveness of leadership and military doctrine are particular conce
As counter-profileration is expected to become the central element in the new national security policy of the US, such actions… will constitute a central element of every major international conflict in the first decades of the 21st century. One of the most important geostrategic phenomena of the past decade has been the extraordinary diffusion of w
This book uses cross-cultural analysis across Eurasia and Afro-Asia to trace the roots of contemporary border disputes and insurgencies in… South Asia. It discusses the way frontiers of British India, and consequently the modern states of India and Pakistan, were drafted through negotiations backed up by organized violence, showing how this conce
A historical investigation of children’s memory of the Holocaust in Greece illustrates that age, generation and geographical background shaped postwar… Jewish identities. The examination of children’s narratives deposited in the era of digital archives enables an understanding of the age-specific construction of the memory of genocide, which shakes established assumptions about the memory of the Holocaust. In the context of a global Holocaust memory established through testimony archives, the present research constructs a genealogy of the testimonial culture in Greece by framing the rich source of written and oral testimonies in the political discourses and public memory of the aftermath of the Second World War. The testimonies of former hidden children and child survivors of concentration camps illuminate the questions that haunted postwar attempts to reconstruct communities, related to the specific evolution of genocide in Greece and to the rising anti-Semitism of postwar Greece. As an oral history of child survivors of the Holocaust, the book will be of interest to researchers in the fields of the history of childhood, Jewish studies, memory studies and Holocaust and genocide studies.
Western counterinsurgency doctrine proposes that cultural intelligence is an important requirement for those forces operating amidst the unfamiliar socio-political structures… often found in distant conflict zones. Yet while the determination to understand the intricate nature of alien societies may appear a rational undertaking in such circumstances, Christian Tripodi argues that these endeavours rarely help deliver success. The frictions of war and the complex human, cultural and political 'terrain' of the operating environment render such efforts highly problematic. In their attempts to generate and instrumentalize local knowledge for the purpose of exerting influence and control, western military actors are drawn into the unwelcome realm of counterinsurgency as a form of political warfare. Their operating environment now becomes a space charged with phenomena that they rarely comprehend, rarely even see and which they struggle to exert any meaningful control over. All in pursuit of a victory that might literally mean nothing.
Sun Tzu's The Art of War is an acknowledged masterpiece--for the general reader. Yet the deeper truths of strategy and… mind manipulation have been, until now, known only to true scholars dedicated to deciphering illegible scrolls and mastering the nuances of lost languages. Now, Dr. Haha Lung has at last gathered and fully translated these teachings from the shadows of history--the truly dangerous wisdom of the lesser-known masters--and presents them here for those daring, perhaps unwisely, to attain a higher level of dominance. You'll discover: The 12 Cuts: Voritomo's Art of War The War Scroll of Spartacus Musashi's 6 Ways to be VictoriousThe 99 Truths: Hannibal's Black Art of War And much moreBE ADVISED: For academic study ONLY; publisher assumes NO responsibility for content use/misuse. Dr. Haha Lung is the author of more than a dozen books on martial arts, including Ultimate Mind Control, Mind Penetration, Mind Fist, The Nine Halls of Death, Assassin!, Mind Manipulation, Knights of Darkness, and Mind Control: The Ancient Art of Psychological Warfare.
A Main Selection of the Military Book Club and a Featured Alternate of the History Book Club In the last… days of World War II, a new and baffling weapon terrorized the United States Navy in the Pacific. To the sailors who learned to fear them, the body-crashing warriors of Japan were known as "suiciders"; among the Japanese, they were named for a divine wind that once saved the home islands from invasion: kamikaze. Told from the perspective of the men who endured this horrifying tactic, At War with the Wind is the first book to recount in nail-biting detail what it was like to experience an attack by Japanese kamikazes. David Sears, acclaimed author of The Last Epic Naval Battle, draws on personal interviews and unprecedented research to create a narrative of war that is stunning in its vivid re-creations. Born of desperation in the face of overwhelming material superiority, suicide attacks--by aircraft, submarines, small boats, and even manned rocket-boosted gliders--were capable of inflicting catastrophic damage, testing the resolve of officers and sailors as never before. Sears's gripping account focuses on the vessels whose crews experienced the full range of the kamikaze nightmare. From carrier USS St. Lo, the first U.S. Navy vessel sunk by an orchestrated kamikaze attack, to USS Henrico, a transport ship that survived the landings at Normandy only to be sent to the Pacific and struck by suicide planes off Okinawa, and USS Mannert L. Abele, the only vessel sunk by a rocket-boosted piloted glider during the war, these unforgettable stories reveal, as never before, one of the most horrifying and misunderstood chapters of World War II. This is the candid story of a war within a war--a relentless series of furious and violent engagements pitting men determined to die against men determined to live. Its echoes resonate hauntingly at a time of global conflict, when suicide as a weapon remains a perplexing and terrifying reality. November 1, 1945--Leyte Gulf The destroyer Killen (DD-593) was besieged, shooting down four planes, but taking a bomb hit from a fifth. Pharmacist mate Ray Cloud, watching from the fantail, saw the plane--a sleek twin-engine Frances fighter-bomber--swoop in low across the port side. As its pilot released his bomb, Cloud said to himself, "He dropped it too soon," and then watched as the plane roared by--pursued and chewed up by fire from Killen's 40- and 20-mm guns. The bomb hit the water, skipped once and then penetrated Killen's port side hull forward, exploding between the #2 and #3 magazines. The blast tore a gaping hole in Killen's side and water poured in. By the time Donice Copeland, eighteen, a radar petty officer, emerged on deck from the radar shack, the ship's bow was practically submerged and the ship itself was nearly dead in the water. Practically all the casualties were awash below decks. Two unwounded sailors, trapped below in the ship's emergency generator room, soon drowned. The final tally of dead eventually climbed to fifteen. The experts praise At War With The Wind "A work of power and passion . . . The finest account of the American reaction to the furious suicide raids that attempted to turn the course of the War in the Pacific." --Donald L. Miller, author of D-Days in the Pacific "A real stunner . . . A superb narrative of life, death, and incredible heroism." --Jim Hartz, former host of "Today" "Thorough and vivid . . . A timely, absorbing book." --John C. McManus, author of Alamo in the Ardennes "Gripping naval combat writing . . . Sears pulls no punches in this powerful account of the sheer terror that was kamikaze warfare." --M. G. Sheftall, author of Blossoms in the Wind "Mesmerizing . . . With history like this, who needs fiction? Simply thrilling." --Kenneth Sewell, author of Red Star Rogue "Powerful . . . David Sears salutes American heroism in the bleakest days of the war." --H. Paul Jeffers, author of Command of Honor "Gripping . . . Sears puts readers
From bestselling and award-winning war reporter Damien Lewis and for fans of Erik Larsen&’s The Splendid and Vile and Alex… Kershaw&’s The Forgotten 500 comes a thrilling account of one of the most daring raids of WWII…the true story of the race to stop Hitler from developing a top-secret weapon that would change the course of history. "One of the most readable World War 2 history books I have read in years&” —We Are the Mighty In the winter of 1941, as Britain faced defeat on all fronts, an RAF reconnaissance pilot photographed an alien-looking object on the French coast near Le Havre. The mysterious device—a &“Wurzburg Dish&”—appeared to be a new form of radar technology: ultra-compact, highly precise, and pointed directly across the English Channel. Britain&’s experts found it hard to believe the Germans had mastered such groundbreaking technology. But one young technician thought it not only possible, he convinced Winston Churchill that the dish posed a unique and deadly threat to Allied forces, one that required desperate measures—and drastic action . . . Capturing the radar on film had been an amazing coup. Stealing it away from under the noses of the Nazis would be remarkable. So was launched Operation Biting, a mission like no other. An extraordinary &“snatch-and-grab&” raid on Germany&’s secret radar installation, it offered Churchill&’s elite airborne force, the Special Air Service, a rare opportunity to redeem themselves after a previous failed mission—and to shift the tides of war forever. Led by the legendary Major John Frost, these brave paratroopers would risk all in a daring airborne assault, with only a small stretch of beach menaced by enemy guns as their exit point. With the help of a volunteer radar technician who knew how to dismantle the dish, as well as the courageous men and women of the French Resistance, they succeeded against all odds in their act of brazen robbery. Some would die. Others would be captured. All fought with resolute bravery . . . This is the story of that fateful night of February 27, 1942. A brilliantly told, thrillingly tense account of Churchill&’s raiders in their finest hour, this is World War II history at its heart-stopping best. &“This highly informative book almost reads like a genuine techno-thriller."—New York Journal of Books &“A little-known behind-the-lines spectacular led by two heroic British officers.&”—Kirkus Reviews &“Anyone who wants to learn more about the origins of the British Special Forces should read this book. It intertwines historical research and eyewitness testimony to tell the untold story of heroism, courage, and ingenuity.&”—Military Press &“Lewis presents a richly detailed and nail-biting tale.&” —Library Journal
Perfect for fans of Erik Larsen&’s The Splendid and Vile and Alex Kershaw&’s The Forgotten 500, #1 international bestselling and… award-winning war reporter Damien Lewis&’ latest book details the thrilling account of one of the most daring raids of WWII—the untold story of the heroic hellraisers who stormed a Nazi fortress and helped turn the tide of the war. Bracingly tense, brilliantly researched, and truly unforgettable, Churchill&’s Hellraisers is a must-have for every World War II library. It is the winter of 1944. Allied forces have succeeded in liberating most of Axis-occupied Italy—with one crucial exception: the Nazi headquarters north of the Gothic Line. Heavily guarded and surrounded by rugged terrain, the mountain fortress is nearly impenetrable. But British Prime Minister Winston Churchill is determined to drive a dagger into the &“soft underbelly of Europe.&” The Allied&’s plan: drop two paratroopers into the mountains—and take the fortress by storm . . . The two brave men knew the risks involved, so they recruited an equally fearless team: Italian resistance fighters, escaped POWs, downed US airmen, even a bagpipe-playing Scotsman known as &“The Mad Piper.&” Some had little military training, but all were willing to fight to the death to defeat the Nazi enemy. Ultimately, the mission that began in broad daylight, in the enemy&’s line of fire, would end one of the darkest chapters in history—through the courage and conviction of the unsung heroes who dared the impossible . . . &“One of the most dangerous and effective attacks ever undertaken by this Regiment against the enemy.&” —Lt Col Robert Walker‐Brown, MBE DSO, senior SAS commander &“Action-packed…Battleground history buffs will be entertained.&” —Publishers Weekly &“A little-known behind-the-lines spectacular led by two heroic British officers. Successful niche military history for a popular audience.&” —Kirkus Reviews
As the U.S. Army's Chief of Staff through World War II, George Catlett Marshall (1880-1959) organized the military mobilization of… unprecedented numbers of Americans and decisively shaped the Allied strategy that defeated first Nazi Germany, then Imperial Japan. As President Truman's Secretary of State, and later as his Secretary of Defense during the Korean War, Marshall the statesman created the European Recovery Act (known as the Marshall Plan), made possible the Berlin Airlift, and was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. This masterful biography brings the reader face to face with a genuine American hero.
The year 2001 marks the centenary of the Royal Navy's submarine service. In the aftermath of the 2016 celebrations of… the Battle of Jutland centenary, it is worth considering how the First World War at sea changed. This volume opens with an examination of the background to the Board of Admiralty's decision in 1900 to buy submarines, bringing to light documents that go a long way toward dispelling the myth that Britain's pre-1914 naval leaders were opposed to the development of the submarine as a major weapon. Indeed, the documents show that senior naval officers and influential civilians in Whitehall believed that the advent of the submarine would revolutionize naval warfare in a way that would bolster the Royal Navy's position as the world's predominant naval power. This edited selection of documents illustrates not only the Admiralty's thinking on the employment of the submarine between 1900 and 1918, it also charts the technical development of British submarines, and explains issues such as why the pioneer submariners came to regard themselves as an élite group within the Royal Navy - and were allowed to become the 'silent service'.
During the French Revolutionary War the Channel Fleet played the crucial role of defending Britain from invasion, protecting Britain’s incoming… and outgoing trade through the Channel and Western Approaches, and preventing the French Brest fleet from setting forth on raids and expeditions. Presenting documents revealing the evolution of this role during the war, this book focuses on the blockade of Brest. It shows how the blockade developed and tightened through the increase of Admiralty control of the disposition of the Channel Fleet. It reveals the political conflicts that existed between the Commanders-in-Chief and the Admiralty, the logistical demands that had to be met, and the response of the Admiralty and fleet officers to the Spithead Mutiny. Above all, it reveals the response of the Fleet to the challenges it met from the French in their sequence of break-outs, and from the perennial problem posed by the necessity to preserve the health of seamen. Here, confuting the claims of contemporary medical officers, is evidence that shows how scurvy remained a scourge to the very end of the war.
By the end of the Napoleonic Wars, the seven home dockyards of the British Royal Navy employed a workforce of… nearly 16,000 men and some women. On account of their size, dockyards add much to our understanding of developing social processes as they pioneered systems of recruitment, training and supervision of large-scale workforces. From 1815-1865 the make-up of those workforces changed with metal working skills replacing wood working skills as dockyards fully harnessed the use of steam and made the conversion from constructing ships of timber to those of iron. The impact on industrial relations and on the environment of the yards was enormous. Concentrating on the yard at Chatham, the book examines how the day-to-day running of a major centre of industrial production changed during this period of transition. The Admiralty decision to build at Chatham the Achilles, the first iron ship to be constructed in a royal dockyard, placed that yard at the forefront of technological change. Had Chatham failed to complete the task satisfactorily, the future of the royal dockyards might have been very different.
Following America's entry into World War Two, there was a necessity for the Royal Navy to strengthen co-operation with the… United States Navy. Admiral Sir Andrew Cunningham's brief term as head of the British Admiralty Delegation in Washington was to endear him to the Americans so much so that they proposed him as Allied Naval Commander of the Expeditionary Force which was to invade North Africa in November 1942. In October 1943, Cunningham was summoned to replace the dying Pound as First Sea Lord, a position he held until his retirement from active service in June 1946. In that time he presided over the invasion of Normandy, operations in the Mediterranean, the sinking of the Scharnhorst and Tirpitz, the defeat of the late surge of U-boat activity, the British Pacific Fleet, and the problems of manpower, the futures of the Royal Marines and the Fleer Air Arm, and the conversion of the Royal Navy from its swollen wartime strength to a much-reduced peacetime cadre. Cunningham remained concerned over the future of the country's defence and that of the Royal Navy and he was able to speak in major defence debates in the House of Lords. He died suddenly in 1963 and was buried at sea. Cunningham was one of Britain's great sailors, a worthy successor to Nelson, whom he admired and many of whose qualities he displayed. This second volume of Cunningham's papers covers the period of his life described above. It includes official documents but also many letters to his family and brother-officers that exhibit his feelings, as well as his illuminating diary entries from April 1944 onwards.
Actions against the Spanish Armada and campaigns in the Netherlands left the Queen’s coffers empty. For this reason proposals to… capture the Spanish treasure fleet were given royal support. The treasure fleet homeward bound from the Americas would be intercepted in the Azores. A diversion at Santander to damage the Spanish fleet would prevent protection of the treasure fleet and, more importantly, prevent further actions against England or Ireland. However, the project was diverted further with backers wanting to re-instate Don Antonio as King of Portugal, with ideas of gaining lucrative Portuguese trade rights.At sea a further diversion was taken, with news of shipping at Corunna and the prospect of capturing merchantmen. ‘Profit was already challenging strategy’. This diversion gave their enemies more time to prepare. The failure at Lisbon was partly from a lack of co-ordination between the navy and army but also from the lack of promised support from Don Antonio’s supporters.The decision to sail for the Azores to intercept the Spanish treasure fleet was at last made only for Drake to be driven back to England by a storm. Short of supplies and with sick crews the ships were in no condition to continue with the Queen’s demands so there was no great treasure and the Spanish fleet was still in being. The sale of prizes and their contents failed to cover the cost of the expedition, and so the expedition was considered a financial and strategic failure.
This book examines the effects of the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington of 11 September 2001 on America's… human rights and counter-terrorism policies towards a number of countries in Asia. Five countries have been chosen for examination, divided into two front-lines states (Pakistan and Uzbekistan), two second-front countries (Indonesia and Malaysia), and a third-front country, China. The paper also looks at changes in US domestic legislation and its treatment of prisoners at Guantanamo Bay and elsewhere in order to analyse the extent to which the US promotion of an external human rights policy might also have been compromised by its own legislative changes as a result of the struggle against terrorism. The paper concludes that the attacks on US territory, overall, have constrained America's willingness and capacity to promote an external human rights policy with respect to these five countries. However, some attention - especially at the rhetorical level - to these countries' human rights records has been retained to differing degrees among the five states. This degree of difference is not explained entirely in reference to a country's perceived centrality to the struggle against terrorism. It depends on the extent to which the US executive and legislative branches are united - either singly or in combination - in their disapproval of a state's record, or in their understanding about how best to reach the policy goals that are sought.
The Tenth Cruiser Squadron of the Grand Fleet had the task of patrolling the seas between Scotland and Greenland to… intercept enemy ships trying to escape into the ocean and merchant ships who could be carrying goods destined for Germany. This was a task of great political sensitivity, since almost all the ships intercepted were neutrals, and requiring great physical endurance from ships and men in the violent North Atlantic. The Maritime Blockade of Germany in the Great War is a comprehensive collection of the records of the Northern Patrol. It consists of regular reports of the admirals in command, to which are added other relevant official records, and more informal documents. There are the chatty letters of Captain Vivian and HMS Patia, the appalling experiences of young officers placed in barely seaworthy sailing ships to see that they went into port for examination, the patehtic 'mutiny' by a bored, distressed and underpaid black gang, the diary of Able Seaman Style, demonstrating the tedium of the patrol, and the self-satisfied diary of Dr Shaw. There are also the casualities: ships overwhelmed by storms, sunk by enemy action, torpedoed. The ships of the Patrol were perhaps the most constantly active Royal Navy vessels in the Great War, a barely acknowledged yet vital component in the eventual Allied victory
This collection of high policy documents charts Britain’s difficulties in defending the Empire in a time of ’imperial overstretch’. The… 20th century saw the rise of several great maritime and military powers and the relative decline of British strength, which created major defence problems for the British Empire. Various solutions were attempted, such as ententes with France and Russia, the settling of differences with the USA and an alliance with Japan. These sufficed until after World War I, when the Empire gained several new territorial responsibilities, all to be defended on a declining economic base. The dominions were encouraged to pay for their own navies, although the Admiralty wished to assume control of them. The increasing threat from Japan made Australia, New Zealand and other Asian colonies nervous and the promised ’main fleet to Singapore’ became less and less likely as the 1930s wore on.
Since the mid-1990s, US and European attitudes, strategies and policies towards the Middle East have diverged. In the Middle East… peace process, Europeans have grown frustrated with the lack of progress and with Washington’s near-monopoly on diplomatic action, and have begun to demand a greater role. On Iraq, the US insists on strong military and economic containment of Saddam Hussein, while some Europeans have started to press for a more rapid reintegration of Iraq into the international community and are reluctant to use or threaten force. The issue of how to deal with Iran has been most divisive of all, with the US and Europe deeply divided over whether they should contain, or engage, Tehran. Transatlantic tensions over the Middle East are damaging for three main reasons. They reduce the effectiveness of allied policies; undermine NATO’s cohesion when its future is no longer guaranteed by a common threat; and threaten to spill over into the economic domain. This paper examines the reasons for these potentially damaging differences, assesses the prospects for improving transatlantic cooperation in the region and suggests approaches that may help to bring this about. Its main policy conclusions are:On the Arab–Israeli conflict, as long as the peace process is moving forward, or has reasonable prospects of doing so, the US is probably right that Europe’s formal involvement in direct peace talks would not be helpful, particularly if such a role aimed to promote policies different from those of the US. If the peace process stalls completely, however, it will be difficult for Washington to justify opposing a more active European role. On Iraq, the US-led policy of containment is correct, and economic sanctions should remain in place until Baghdad complies fully with UN Security Council disarmament resolutions. However, in exchange for Europe’s agreement to contribute to Iraq’s military containment, the US, like Europe, should abide by the letter and spirit of these resolutions, even if this means agreeing to lift restrictions on oil exports if Iraq complies in full. Failing to do so could undermine global support for the integrity of the UN system, ultimately leaving the US, and perhaps the UK, isolated in maintaining a policy that might not be sustainable in the long term. On Iran, a transatlantic compromise would need to include an agreement by the US not to impose sanctions against European companies doing business with Iran, as long as Europe offered unstinting support in combating terrorism and helping to contain the development of weapons of mass destruction. The US should also seek agreement with the European Union on which Iranian actions would justify sanctions or other punitive measures.The paper concludes by examining institutional changes that might help to promote transatlantic cooperation on the Middle East.