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LRRP (Provisional) 2nd Bde 4th Infantry Division Vietnam 1966-67 by Frank Camper
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Pathfinder: First In, Last Out
Richard R. Burns - 2002
Within just one month, during a holiday called Tet, the Communists would launch the largest single attack of the war--and he would be right in the thick of it. . . .In Vietnam, Richard Burns operated in live-or-die situations, risking his life so that other men could keep theirs. As a Pathfinder--all too often alone in the middle of a hot LZ--he guided in helicopters disembarking troops, directed medevacs to retrieve the wounded, and organized extractions. As well as parachuting into areas and supervising the clearing of landing zones, Pathfinders acted as air-traffic controllers, keeping call signs, frequencies, and aircraft locations in their heads as they orchestrated takeoffs and landings, often under heavy enemy fire.From Bien Hoa to Song Be to the deadly A Shau Valley, Burns recounts the battles that won him the Silver Star, Bronze Star, Purple Heart, and numerous other decorations. This is the first and only book by a Pathfinder in Vietnam . . . or anywhere else.From the Paperback edition.
Pucker Factor 10: Memoir of a U.S. Army Helicopter Pilot in Vietnam
James Joyce - 2003
He flew both Huey "slicks" and Huey "gunships": the former on defense as he flew troops into battle, and the latter on offense as he took the battle to the enemy. Through this book, the author relives his experiences flying and fighting, with special attention given to the pilots' day-to-day lives - such as the prankish smoke bombing of Disneyland, the nickname for a United States Army-sponsored compound for prostitution. Some of the pilots Joyce served with survived the war and went on to have careers with commercial airlines, and many were killed.
Firefly: A Skyraider's Story About America's Secret War Over Laos
Richard E. Diller - 2013
Control stick hard left into a sharp left turn and let the nose drop quickly but smoothly to 40° down. Down. My heart is pumping hard. I'm in a sharp dive. I have to do it right and fast. Line up the target in the sight. It's getting bigger as I get closer to the ground. Airspeed is increasing! Quick! Right there! Pickle at 8,000 feet, only 2,000 feet from roll-in altitude. Not much time. NOW! Pull out! Pull hard, but don't over G! All the remaining ordnance is trying to pull the airplane toward the ground. Smoothly pull to four Gs. Watch the artificial horizon. It's the only visual reference I can count on. Pull! Get the nose up! Don't go below 7,000 feet because rocks can be anywhere below seven. There's level. Bring it on up. Twenty-five degrees nose high. I have plenty of speed, so keep the nose up. Here comes 8,000 feet. Then 9,000. I can let the nose down a little now and look around to see if anyone is shooting. It is 1969 and Dick Diller is on his way to flying warplanes in the Vietnam conflict. He is commissioned to fly A-1 Skyraiders in sometimes harrowing nighttime missions over Laos-surviving not only the danger of the missions he flew, but also the bureaucracy of the air force, from fitness testing to additional duties assigned, to attacking impossible-to-find targets in the dead of night-with minimal fuel supplies. At once entertaining and riveting, as well as thought-provoking, Firefly is the story of one man's journey in a world at war, and a day-to-day description of the fighting force that was flying A-1 Skyraiders in combat. Firefly contains actual transcriptions of dialogue of pilots locating a target and making a strike in northern Laos.
War Paint
Bill Goshen - 2001
Their base was Lai Khe, within hailing distance of the Vietcong central headquarters, a mile inside Cambodia, with its vast stockpiles of weapons and thousands of transient VC and NVA soldiers.Recondo-qualified Bill Goshen was there, and has written the first account of these battle-hardened soldiers. As the eyes and ears of the Big Red One, the 1st Infantry, these hunter/killer teams of only six men instered deep inside enemy territory had to survive by their wits, or suffer the deadly consequences. Goshen himself barely escaped with his life in a virtual suicide mission that destroyed half his team.His gripping narrative recaptures the raw courage and sacrifice of American soldiers fighting a savage war of survival: men of all colors, from all walks of life, warriors bonded by triumph and tragedy, by life and death. They served proudly in Vietnam, and their stories need to be told.From the Paperback edition.
Eye of the Tiger: Memoir of a United States Marine, Third Force Recon Company, Vietnam
John Edmund Delezen - 2003
John Edmund Delezen felt a kinship with the people he was instructed to kill in Vietnam; they were all at the mercy of the land. His memoir begins when he enlisted in the Marine Corps and was sent to Vietnam in March of 1967. He volunteered for the Third Force Recon Company, whose job it was to locate and infiltrate enemy lines undetected and map their locations and learn details of their status. The duty was often painful both physically and mentally. He was stricken with malaria in November of 1967, wounded by a grenade in February of 1968 and hit by a bullet later that summer. He remained in Vietnam until December, 1968. Delezen writes of Vietnam as a man humbled by a mysterious country and horrified by acts of brutality. The land was his enemy as much as the Vietnamese soldiers. He vividly describes the three-canopy jungle with birds and monkeys overhead that could be heard but not seen, venomous snakes hiding in trees and relentless bugs that fed on men. He recalls stumbling onto a pit of rotting Vietnamese bodies left behind by American forces, and days when fierce hunger made a bag of plasma seem like an enticing meal. He writes of his fallen comrades and the images of war that still pervade his dreams. This book contains many photographs of American Marines and Vietnam as well as three maps.
You Don't Lose 'Til You Quit Trying: Lessons on Adversity and Victory from a Vietnam Veteran and Medal of Honor Recipient
Sammy Lee Davis - 2016
On November 18th, 1967, Private First Class Davis’s artillery unit was hit by a massive enemy offensive. At twenty-one years old, he resolved to face the onslaught and prepared to die. Soon he would have a perforated kidney, crushed ribs, a broken vertebra, his flesh ripped by beehive darts, a bullet in his thigh, and burns all over his body. Ignoring his injuries, he manned a two-ton Howitzer by himself, crossed a canal under heavy fire to rescue three wounded American soldiers, and kept fighting until the enemy retreated. His heroism that day earned him a Congressional Medal of Honor—the ceremony footage of which ended up being used in the movie Forrest Gump. You Don’t Lose ’Til You Quit Trying chronicles how his childhood in the American Heartland prepared him for the worst night of his life—and how that night set off a lifetime battling against debilitating injuries, the effects of Agent Orange and an America that was turning on its veterans. But he also battled for his fellow veterans, speaking on their behalf for forty years to help heal the wounds and memorialize the brotherhood that war could forge. Here, readers will learn of Sammy Davis’s extraordinary life—the courage, the pain, and the triumph.
Midway: The Battle That Made the Modern World
Richard Freeman - 2012
It was fought at a place thousands of miles from land, by hundreds of planes over distances of hundreds of miles. It saw four massive Japanese aircraft carriers pitted against three similarly huge American carriers in a battle for domination of the Pacific. The battle is the story of the young Japanese empire seeking to challenge the established industrial power of America. Japan had smashed America at Pearl Harbour, shaken her at Coral Sea. Now she was ready to risk all in one mighty attempt to drive the United States Navy from the Pacific Ocean. Japan’s admirals put to sea confident that they could take the Americans by surprise, take the Midway atoll and destroy the American carriers. American espionage ensured that Admiral Nimitz had full knowledge of the planned attack, so turning a Japanese trap into an American ambush. The battle that followed raged over three days, full of set backs and disaster for each side. But Admirals Yamamoto and Nagumo had over-reached themselves and suffered the greatest naval defeat in history. America entered Midway on the defensive, still a hesitant participant in the war. She left the battle as the world’s first super power. Richard Freeman graduated in mathematics before following a career in distance education. He now writes on naval history. His other books include 'The Great Edwardian Naval Feud'. Endeavour Press is the UK's leading publisher of digital books.
Semper Cool: One Marine's Fond Memories of Vietnam
Barry Fixler - 2010
Marine Corps seeking adventure and his father's approval and finds both, plus more danger than he ever could have imagined. With its vivid imagery, Semper Cool thrusts readers into a grunt's-eye view of the blood, guts, tears and laughter of war, as told by a Marine who returned home a man and a patriot. Be prepared to laugh and cry and ultimately thank God for the men and women willing to risk their lives for the freedoms that so many Americans enjoy.
Mongoose Bravo: Vietnam: A Time of Reflection Over Events So Long Ago
Timothy McCullough - 2019
I would guess that I’ve been at it for more than twenty years. It started as a result of wanting to let the mother of a fallen soldier know what happened to her son, as well as where his death took place. She and I had been in contact over the years, during which she asked quite a few questions; so, I began writing it all down. I may have been better served if I had pushed my memories of Vietnam off into the ditch alongside the road traveled and driven on without looking back. In the long run, I believe it has been therapeutic. Therefore, worth the time I put into writing it all down. We lived, and fought as a unit, covering each other’s backs. Most came home to tell their own stories, many didn’t.
Mad Dog: The Legend and Truth of Jerry Shriver
Henry Brown - 2015
Then along came the Vietnam War. It seemed he fulfilled his destiny there, becoming someone Radio Hanoi dubbed "the mad dog." This is what is known about his exploits in-country.
Zelda Fitzgerald: The Biography
University Press Biographies - 2017
The chafing restrictions of a typical upbringing in upper-class, small town Alabama simply did not apply to Zelda, who was described as an unusual child and permitted to roam the streets with little supervision. Zelda refused to blossom into a typical 'Southern belle' on anyone's terms but her own and while still in high school enjoyed the status of a local celebrity for her shocking behavior. Everybody in town knew the name Zelda Sayre. Queen of the Montgomery social scene, Zelda had a different beau ready and willing to show her a good time for every day of the week. Before meeting F. Scott Fitzgerald, Zelda's life was a constant pursuit of pleasure. With little thought for the future and no responsibilities to speak of, Zelda committed herself fully to the mantra that accompanied her photo in her high school graduation book: "Why should all life be work, when we all can borrow. Let's think only of today, and not worry about tomorrow." But for now Zelda was still in rehearsal for her real life to begin, a life she was sure would be absolutely extraordinary. Zelda Sayre married F. Scott Fitzgerald on the 3rd of April 1920 and left sleepy Montgomery behind in order to dive headfirst into the shimmering, glamourous life of a New York socialite. With the publication of Scott's first novel, This Side of Paradise, Zelda found herself thrust into the limelight as the very epitome of the Flapper lifestyle. Concerned chiefly with fashion, wild parties and flouting social expectations, Zelda and Scott became icons of the Jazz Age, the personification of beauty and success. What Zelda and Scott shared was a romantic sense of self-importance that assured them that their life of carefree leisure and excess was the only life really worth living. Deeply in love, the Fitzgeralds were like to sides of the same coin, each reflecting the very best and worst of each other. While the world fell in love with the image of the Fitzgeralds they saw on the cover of magazines, behind the scenes the Fitzgerald's marriage could not withstand the tension of their creative arrangement. Zelda was Scott's muse and he mercilessly mined the events of their life for material for his books. Scott claimed Zelda's memories, things she said, experiences she had and even passages from her diary as his possessions and used them to form the basis of his fictional works. Zelda had a child but the domestic sphere offered no comfort or purpose for her. The Flapper lifestyle was not simply a phase she lived through, it formed the very basis of her character and once the parties grew dull, the Fitzgeralds' drinking became destructive and Zelda's beauty began to fade, the world held little allure for her. Zelda sought reprieve in work and tried to build a career as a ballet dancer. When that didn't work out she turned to writing but was forbidden by Scott from using her own life as material. Convinced that she would never leave her mark on the world as deeply or expressively as Scott had, Zelda retreated into herself and withdrew from the people she knew in happier times. The later years of Zelda's life were marred by her detachment from reality as, diagnosed with schizophrenia, Zelda spent the last eighteen years of her life living in and out of psychiatric hospitals. As Scott's life unraveled due to alcohol abuse, Zelda looked back on the years they had spent together, young and wild and beautiful, as the best of her life. She may have been right but she was wrong about one thing, Zelda did leave her mark on the world and it was a deep and expressive mark that no one could have left but her. Zelda Fitzgerald: The Biography
On The Ground: The Secret War in Vietnam
John Stryker Meyer - 2007
SOG's chain of command for missions and after-action reports extended to the White House and the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Small Green Beret-lead teams ran missions into Laos, Cambodia, and North Vietnam without assistance from conventional artillery, tank or infantry units. Once on the ground, their sole support was provided by Air Force Tactical Air and helicopter units, U.S. Army and Marine helicopter aviation personnel and aircrews, and from the South Vietnam Air Force's 219th Special Operations Squadron, code named Kingbees. In Laos, the communists dedicated 50,000 troops to the Ho Chi Minh Trail, including highly trained sappers from the 305th Sapper Battalion, its sole mission: attack SOG teams.
Mekong Mud Dogs: Story of: Sgt. Ed Eaton
Ed Eaton - 2014
and Sniper with the River Raiders of the Mekong. His stories include the one which garnered him a recommendation for the Medal of Honor.
Countryman's Lot: Tales from the Dales
Max Hardcastle - 1991
One day, they'll sell their cramped city-centre antiques shop and the overflowing upstairs flat and relocate to the beautiful Yorkshire Dales. When a smallholding in a remote Dales village comes on the market, it seems like the answer to their prayers.
Silver Dolphins: The Emblem of the Enlisted Submariner
Richard Hansher - 2015
The author doesn't pull any punches describing the good, the bad, the funny and the just plain ridiculous of the Submarine Service. Besides a wealth of information about what it's like to serve on a submarine, you'll meet real life characters like Tongue, Snake and Button Butt John. Did submarines make them rude, crude, and crazy. Or does the Submarine Service act as a magnet for every nut in the Navy? One thing is sure, after two months underwater, and with their back pay in their back pocket, Sub Sailors are as wild as cowboys after a cattle drive. Bar the doors and hide your daughters. Every reader owes it to themselves to use Amazons "Look In" feature to take a peek inside this unique and entertaining book.