This is a novel about some of the very best. Some led. Some followed. Some died. Meet Sergeant David Grady, Sarah Boyce, Major John Colven, Lieutenant Le Be Son...in the great Vietnam war novel, CHARLIE MIKE.

    In this collection of more than 200 letters, they share their first impressions of the rigors of life in the bush, their longing for home and family, their emotions over the conduct of the war, and their ache at the loss of a friend in battle. Poignant in their rare honesty, the letters from Vietnam are "riveting,... extraordinary by [their] very ordinariness... for the most part, neither deep nor philosophical, only very, very human" (Los Angeles Times). Revealing the complex emotions and daily realities of fighting in the war, these close accounts offer a powerful, uniquely personal portrait of the many faces of Vietnam's veterans.

    . .the World War II flying ace who shot down a Messerschmitt jet with a prop-driven P-51 Mustang . . .the hero who defined a certain quality that all hotshot fly-boys of the postwar era aimed to achieve: the right stuff.Now Chuck Yeager tells his whole incredible life story with the same "wide-open, full throttle" approach that has marked his astonishing career.  What it was really like enaging in do-or-die dogfights over Nazi Europe.  How after being shot over occupied France, Yeager somehow managed to escape.  The amazing behind-the-scenes story of smashing the sound barrier despite cracked ribs from a riding accident days before.The entire story is here, in Yeager's own words, and in wondeful insights from his wife and those friends and colleagues who have known him best.  It is the personal and public story of a man who settled for nothing less than excellence, a one-of-a-kind portrait of a true American hero.

    But as he was the highest-ranking person in the entire district, his life there was far more complex than anyone could have imagined.This is Donovan's gripping account of combat missions and night ambushes in the swamps and jungles of the Delta; his heartrending tale of personal involvement with the culture and families in his charge; his humane introspection on his awesome responsibility as both warrior and king; and his stark reflections on the changes he saw in himself and his country upon his return to the United States."Donovan's memoir . . . provides valuable documentation on a relatively obscure part of the American military effort--it describes how the war really worked on the front line of 'Vietnamization, ' the training of local militia. His reflections on his own use of power raise serious and important questions about the American expierence in Vietnam."--The New York Times Book Review

    In War, noted military historian Gwynne Dyer ranges from the tumbling walls of Jericho to the modern advent of total war in which no one is exempt from the horrors of armed conflict. He shows how the martial instinct has evolved over the human generations and among our close primate relations, such as the chimpanzee. Dyer squarely confronts the reality of war, and the threat of nuclear weapons, but does not despair that war is our eternal legacy. He likes and respects soldiers, even while he knows their job is to kill; he understands the physics and the psychology of battles, but he is no war junkie. Dyer surveys the fiery battlefields of human history, never losing sight of the people caught up in war. He actually believes there is hope that war can be abolished, that human beings are more than just our genes. War is an award-winning book that explores the human past to imagine a different future.

    platoon taking part in the 'strategic hamlet' program. . . . Rather than present a potpourri of combat yarns. . . McDonough has focused a seasoned storyteller's eye on the details, people, and incidents that best communicate a visceral feel of command under fire. . . . For the author's honesty and literary craftsmanship, Platoon Leader seems destined to be read for a long time by second lieutenants trying to prepare for the future, veterans trying to remember the past, and civilians trying to understand what the profession of arms is all about."-Army Times

    combatant types, as well as plans, profiles, and numerous detailed photographs.

    Full discussions of fighter aircraft and weapons systems performance are provided along with an explanation of radar intercept tactics and an analysis of the elements involved in the performance of fighter missions.

    The first book by a top-ranking American navy officer to answer these questions: : Why did the Japanese attack Pearl Harbor? How did they inflict so much damage? What went wrong in our system?

    Its purpose is to defeat the enemy by disrupting the opponent's ability to react, rather than by physical destruction of forces. This book develops and explains the theory of maneuver warfare and offers specific tactical, operational, and organizational recommendations for improving ground combat forces. The authors translate concepts—too often vaguely stated by manuever warfare advocates—into concrete doctrine. Although the book uses the Marine Corps as a model, the concepts, tactics, and doctrine discussed apply to any ground combat force.

    The Blues, as they were called, were perpetually understrength and considered to be acceptable losses in hopeless situations—but their amazingly successful record proved otherwise.A firsthand account of mortal combat with the Ninth Cavalry, Flashing Saber is the remarkable story of the brave men who served in the First Air Cavalry Division's reconnaissance squadron. Included is an account of an air-ground raid that overran a regimental command post and killed more high-ranking enemy officers than any similar engagement of the war. The story begins when a teenager, an Eagle Scout and West Point Prep School student, goes to Vietnam in 1965. Motivated by patriotism and the desire to see combat firsthand, Brennan volunteers for front line duty and spends years as an artillery forward observer and infantryman. Promoted to sergeant and then to lieutenant, Brennan participates in hundreds of assault landings.An expansion and careful reworking of his previous work, Brennan's War, published in 1985, and in the vein of classic memoirs by Johnnie Clark and Frederick Downs, Flashing Saberis a harrowing firsthand account of life and death in war, one filled with breathtaking details about a renowned unit.

    William F. Halsey was one of the leading American personalities of World War II. His reputation as a no-holds-barred fighter and his tough-guy expression earned him the nickname Bull, yet he was also known for showing genuine compassion toward his men and inspiring them to great feats in the Pacific. Originally disclaiming the praise heaped on him, Halsey eventually came to believe in the swashbuckling legend that surrounded him, and his conduct became increasingly controversial.Naval historian E. B. Potter, who established his reputation with an award-winning biography of Chester W. Nimitz, gets behind the stereotype of this national hero and describes Halsey at his best and worst, including his controversial actions at Leyte Gulf. To write this book Potter had full access to Halsey's family and to the admiral's private papers and provides detail of Halsey's youth and career before the war. First published in 1985, it remains the definitive study.

    It was 1982, fourteen years after I had last set foot in Vietnam, and thirteen years after I returned to The World. I had a family and a career. I'd never written more than an occasional letter to the editor in my life. My twisted insides had spawned ulcers. The nightmares were more frequent. I needed to get Vietnam out into the open, but I couldn't talk about it. Not after all those years. Thus begins John Ketwig's powerful memoir of the Vietnam War. Now, over 15 years after its initial publication, Sourcebooks is proud to bring ...and a hard rain fell back into print in a newly updated edition, with a new introduction by the author and eight pages of never-before-published photographs. From the country roads of upstate New York to the jungles of Vietnam, and finally to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C., ...and a hard rain fell is a gripping and visceral account of one young man's struggle to make sense of his place in a world gone mad.

    Book by Doughty, Robert A.

    

    

    That brutal experience prompted him to write a searing, critically acclaimed novel about the surreal experiences of the battle to wrest control of Vietnam’s ancient Imperial capital from regiments of fanatical North Vietnamese Army soldiers. Now he’s taken a long second look at that fight and revised his original work into an even more powerful narrative of one of the Vietnam War’s most brutal battles. The story is told through the eyes of a veteran Marine Corps Combat Correspondent with the observational skills and off-beat attitude to relate what he sees from the close-quarter, house-to-house meat-grinder of the southside to the epic assault on the enemy-infested walls of the city’s medieval Citadel in a voice that reflects the Code of the Grunt: Just do it—or die trying. There it is.

    Describes the activities of famous spies, Resistance movements, and saboteurs and discusses how they helped turn the tide of the Second World War.

    Terrorists drove a truck loaded with 12,000 pounds of explosives into the atrium of a building housing the 24th Marine Amphibious Unit. The explosives were detonated, razing the four-story steel and concrete building, killing 241 Americans, and injuring many more. Shortly thereafter, the U.S. pulled its forces out of Beruit. Within months of the attack, author Eric Hammel was granted an historic opportunity to interview survivors of the bombing and those who came to their rescue. This book is their story and captures the Marines' mission in Lebanon, including largely unreported battles fought in and around Beirut. Using recollections from the nearly 200 people interviewed, the book recounts in vivid detail the terrorist attack on unit headquarters, and how the survivors came out alive.

    In this detailed life of Old Fritz, Christopher Duffy, who has written widely on the army of Frederick and on the armies of his adversaries, Austria and Russia, has produced a definitive account of his military genius. "

    

    March with them as their stories are played out against the progress of WWII in London, Italy, Paris and the Pacific! International Best Seller in hardback. Sold to CBS for mini-series.

    This two-volumes-in-one collection of 1,200 rare black-and-white photographs, gathered through the joint efforts of the National Historical Society and the Civil War Times, covers the leaders and the common soldiers, the compact of comradeship, the ideologies of the governments at war, the aspirations of the people who supported them and the devastation wreaked on the nation.

    The attraction--compelling, magical, overwhelming--was definitely mutual.The first woman in a male-dominated field, Chris had enough to handle without beginning a love affair. But the powerful feelings between them were irresistible, and with Dan she could soar to such ecstatic heights ....

    

    (the forerunner of the C.I.A.) during World War II. Colonel Sage's first assignment was to organize behind-the-lines operations against Erwin Rommel in North Africa. After being captured and brutally interrogated, he was sent to the P.O.W. camp Stalag Luft III in Sagan, Germany. As an O.S.S. officer, Sage would have been executed had his identity been known. But at the time he was captured, Sage jettisoned his O.S.S. hardware and claimed he was a shot-down flier. His true identity was never discovered by his Nazi captors. While a prisoner of war, Sage conducted classes in silent killing with a hand-picked group of Americans. He also worked for fifteen months on the huge, three-tunnel project known in book and movie as "The Great Escape" and was in charge of hiding over 200,000 pounds of golden sand from the German "ferrets." Sage is a vivid, personal account of O.S.S. training under "Wild Bill" Donovan and of the subversive activities conducted in North Africa. It recalls the Nazi interrogations and treatment of Allied prisoners, the vicious reprisals reserved for those prisoners who tried to escape and the extraordinary resourcefulness of the men inside the camps. It is the testimony of a unique individual with the faith, courage, and indomitable will to serve his country and pursue the cause of freedom.

    Speaking virtually no English and at an unexpected ebb in his professional fortunes, Steuben nevertheless brought a depth of military training and grasp of command techniques sorely needed by the bedraggled, ragtag army. With his lofty military reputation, forceful bearing, and colorful personality, the Prussian commander had an immediate galvanizing effect on the disorganized insurgents. He soon became one of Washington's most valued officers — an essential figure in the success of the American War of Independence. Commissioned to mold the troops into an efficient fighting force, Steuben formed a model drill company of one hundred men, transformed it into a precision unit copied throughout the ranks, and captured the imagination of the entire army. His record of drill instructions, written in brief installments, grew into the Regulations for the Order and Discipline of the Troops of the United States. Commonly known as the army's "blue book," this basic manual of military training and procedures remained the official U.S. military guide until 1812.  This inexpensive facsimile reproduces the extremely rare 1794 edition of Steuben's drill manual, published in Boston by I. Thomas and E. T. Andrews. It describes in detail the arms and accoutrements of officers and soldiers, formation and exercise of a company, instruction of recruits, formation and marching of columns, disposition and firing of fieldpieces, laying out of a camp, inspection, treatment of the sick, reviews of parade, and other essentials. The volume is further enhanced by reproductions of the eight copperplates from the 1794 edition and an Appendix (the United States Militia Act of 1792).

    II.

    Finally, the family that had ruled and owned the country was gone. It took its money, which was much of the money the country had. The dictator left. The generals left. The colonels. They fled by helicopter and airplane, by car and on foot. By the nineteenth they were, almost all of them, gone. But the soldiers remained. And in San Juan del Sur, on the Pacific coast of Nicaragua, the rebel Commander Zero, Eden Pastora, was facing the best of the dictator's remaining soldiers: Bravo, Montenegro, "the Rattlesnakes," "the Wild Geese," "the Black and White." Eventually the guardias fled too - some of them, including a tough, murderous sergeant from "the Rattlesnakes" (called Suicida by his men), making their way to El Salvador, from where, as the Contras, they waged sporadic war against the Nicaraguan leftist forces.Christopher Dickey was the first American newspaperman to go into the mountains of Nicaragua with the Contras and come out alive, and his account of the "secret" war that is being waged against the Sandinista government reads like the best fiction. Yet it is as factual as tomorrow's headlines.

    The book comes from the private collection of Military Historian and former MP Rupert Allason. He has also written many books on Military History and Espionage under the pen name Nigel West. There is also a name stamp on one of the front pages showing the name of Mr Allason, embossed on the page. There is also the name of another former owner written on one of the first few pages. The book has been very well looked after, pages and spine nice and tight and one of the best kept copies I have ever seen.

    The first submarine sinking of the war was by a Type VII boat, and some of the most dramatic events of the first year of the war involved a Type VII - the sinking of HMS Courageous by U29 in the Atlantic in September 1939 and the sinking of HMS Royal Oak by U47 in Scapa Flow a few weeks later. The 'Anatomy of the Ship' series aims to provide the finest documentation of individual ships and ship types ever published. What makes the series unique is a complete set of superbly executed line drawings, both the conventional type of plan as well as explanatory views, with fully descriptive keys. These are supported by technical details and a record of the ship's service history.

    In two world wars it was the northern base which sheltered shops of the Royal Navy and Allied fleets from both storm and enemy attack, with sometimes well over a hundred vessels lying at anchor. Massive defense guns, searchlights, booms and minefields were built up between 1914 and 1918, and then demolished, only to be built up again twenty-five years later when the harbor's security was again threatened. This time there was the additional danger from the sky, and an antiaircraft 'umbrella' of over eighty guns was deployed to ward off the Luftwaffe bombers.In This Great Harbour Scapa Flow, W.S Hewison tells how this was achieved as the anchorage known by mariners since the time of the Vikings and perhaps even before them, with its key position athwart the northern sea routes came into the ken of the Admiralty's strategic thinking.The Grand Fleet sailed from Scapa in 1916 to do battle at Jutland. Five days later, Lord Kitchener, went to his death from here in the cruiser Hampshire, sunk by mines off Orkney's west coast. There was tragedy again in 1939 when the German submarine U47 slipped through the incomplete defense to sink the battleship Royal Oak at her moorings with the loss of 800 men. And between the wars the world's greatest feat of salvage the raising of the scuttled German fleet was carried out in its waters.

    It was a Japanese victory-but it spelled the end for Japan in the war at sea. In Carrier Strike, critically acclaimed military historian Eric Hammel gives a blow-by-blow, edge-of-your-seat account of this crucial naval battle-a turning point in the bitter Guadalcanal Campaign. Drawing on American and Japanese battle reports and the recollections of aviators and seamen who were there, Hammel recreates World War II's fourth - and last - carrier versus carrier battle, the battle of the Santa Cruz Islands in October 1942. Written in the heart-stopping style that Hammel's readers have come to expect, Carrier Strike offers the only up-to-date, up-close, in-depth look at the battle that cost Japan any hope of winning the war in the Pacific.

    Drawing on his interviews with hundreds of veterans of Korea, Knox masterfully weaves personal stories with military records to create a vivid, day-by-day chronicle of the war s first savage months of fighting. Index; photographs and maps."

    It reveals the humiliation of basic training, the attitude to fear, the drive for sex and loot, the elixir of comradeship.