Such is this work by Bob Babcock. What makes this work unique is that it is based upon his wartime writing as it occurred, without the softening of time and the refining of modern memory applied to past experience. In it you will find the thinking of a young officer as he struggles to take in all that he is responsible for while experiencing everything himself for the first time. It is an honest, unvarnished look at Soldiering in 1966-1967 and is as fine an example of the early American experience in Vietnam that one is likely to come across...” The personal account of Bob Babcock’s experiences as a platoon leader and executive officer with Bravo Company, 1st Battalion, 22nd Infantry Regiment, 4th Infantry Division in Vietnam in 1966 and 1967.

    A violent uprising has been instigated all across Tibet as Beijing moves to establish control while the Dalai Lama’s health deteriorates further and questions on the future of the Tibetan leadership are raised. As Beijing pursues the rebels and their benefactors within India, both nations are plunged into a spiraling descent to war. Now each side must navigate their widely different paths to victory as vast armies on both sides wage all-out war in their bid to become the dominant power in Asia… Book Edition: II

    But Waterloo was one peak only in the career of this phenomenal man, and it is the achievement of this major biography that it reveals the subtlety and full variety of Wellington's genius as well as the fascinating complexity of England in his time.He was born Arthur Wesley, third son of the Earl of Mornington, in 1769--the same year as Napoleon. His family, which belonged to the ruling caste of Englishmen in Ireland, was long on the tradition of proud service to the King and chronically short of funds. Neither his childhood nor his years at Eton were happy; but when he went to Anjou at seventeen, to study at France's Royal Academy of Equitation, he came into his own, learned well, and emerged qualified and cosmopolitan.He joined the British Army as an ensign and, for the next few years, rose through the ranks. He courted Kitty Pakenham but her family would not allow his suit--his family was not rich enough-- so he went to India at the age of twenty-seven still a bachelor.It was in India that he made his name. There he became a scholar and a soldier. He returned a Knight of the Bath, a major-general, a hero to his countrymen and acceptable, at last, to the Pakenhams. (He had courted Kitty by post over the twelve intervening years; it was scarcely surprising that the woman he married proved different indeed from the charming girl he had left.)When he was forty, the youngest lieutenant-general in the army, he took command of the allied armies in the Peninsular War. With Napoleon's downfall, abdication and exile to Elba, the hero of Europe began a gay career as ambassador to Paris. All the ladies, from the formidable Madame de Staël to the melting Signora Grassini, vied--often successfully--for his favors. His behavior with them and as a diplomat caused some disquiet, and there was evident relief when he was dispatched to the Congress of Vienna. When word came of Napoleon's escape, Wellington took command once more, and after the spectacular eve-of-battle ball in Brussels, led the British and Dutch-Belgian armies to triumph at Waterloo.Lady Longford's unique biography draws on new material from private papers and Wellington's own uninhibited correspondence. Wellington: The Years of the Sword is a worthy successor to her superb Queen Victoria: Born to Succeed.

    The book follows individual operations where special forces, aircraft, and the latest surveillance technology are fused together - in order to capture key figures or simply take out an enemy stronghold.The books account is both gritty and graphical as it follows the SAS, battling at times against overwhelming odds in a hostile country. Fighting a war hardened enemy with years of experience fighting occupying forces. Even these elite soldiers with advanced weaponry and immense fire support at their disposal are put to the ultimate test of skill and courage fighting in the 'Stan.'

    The Atomic Outhouse, Hot Extractions, Listening Out, and Best Vacation Ever, will have you enthralled. These stories and sixty more like them pull no punches to give you a genuine understanding of a war that was more bizarre than you ever imagined.

    It is a story of food, star-crossed lovers, ancient myths and one boy's rise from outcast to hero.Orphaned when his mother dies of starvation, having been cast out of her village as a witch, John is taken in at the kitchens at Buckland Manor, where he quickly rises from kitchen-boy to Cook, and is known for his uniquely keen palate and natural cooking ability. However, he quickly gets on the wrong side of Lady Lucretia, the aristocratic daughter of the Lord of the Manor. In order to inherit the estate, Lucretia must wed, but her fiance is an arrogant buffoon. When Lucretia takes on a vow of hunger until her father calls off her engagement to her insipid husband-to-be, it falls to John to try to cook her delicious foods that might tempt her to break her fast.Reminiscent of Wolf Hall and Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell, John Saturnall's Feast is a brilliant work and a delight for all the senses.

    

    

    Blessed with impudent wit and saucy beauty, she swiftly rises from the poverty of Covent Garden to become a sensation in the theater. Still in her teens, she catches the eye of King Charles II, and trades the stage for Whitehall Palace and the role of royal mistress. Even though she delights the king, she must learn to negotiate the cutthroat royal court, where ambition and lust for power rule the hearts of all around her. For beneath her charm and light-heartedness, Nell has her own ambition to become no less than the king's favorite.

    Illustrated by the satires of Gillray and Rowlandson and the paintings of Turner and Constable, and combining the familiar voices of Austen, Wordsworth, Scott, and Byron with others lost in the crowd, In These Times delves into the archives to tell the moving story of how people lived and loved and sang and wrote, struggling through hard times and opening new horizons that would change their country for a century.

    Many were just school girls at the outbreak of war; the next six years would change their lives forever. This vivid portrayal of their experiences, sacrifices, and memories is a poignant reminder that without the work of thousands of young women Bletchley Park's extraordinary achievements would not have been possible. By meeting and talking to these fascinating female secret-keepers who are still alive today, Tessa Dunlop captures their extraordinary journeys into an adult world of war, secrecy, love, and loss. Through the voices of the women themselves, this is the story of life at Bletchley Park beyond the celebrated code-breakers; it's the story of the girls behind Britain's ability to consistently outsmart the enemy.

    James II's drive towards Catholicism had alienated the nation and his two staunchly Protestant daughters by his first marriage, Mary and Anne, the "ungrateful daughters," who eventually usurped their father's crown and stole their half-brother's birthright.Seven prominent men sent an invitation to William of Orange--James's nephew and son-in-law--to intervene in English affairs. But Mary and Anne also played a key role. Jealous and resentful of her hated stepmother, Anne had written a series of malicious letters to Mary in Holland, implying that the Queen's pregnancy was a hoax: a Catholic plot to deny Mary her rightful inheritance.Distraught from being betrayed by his own children, James fled the kingdom. And even as the crown descended on her head, Mary knew she had incurred a father's curse. The sisters quarreled to the day of Mary's death at age 32. Anne did nothing to earn her father's forgiveness, and she declared her brother an outlaw with a price on his head.Acclaimed historian Maureen Waller re-creates the late Stuart era in a compelling narrative that highlights the influence of the royal women on one of the most momentous events in English history. Prompted by religious bigotry and the emotions that beset every family relationship, this palace coup changed the face of the monarchy, and signaled the end of a dynasty.

    It is a study of the contribution made, not only by George VI and his redoubtable Queen, but also by the entire royal family during those turbulent years. And of how that contribution strengthened and popularized the monarchy. This is a family saga; an account of the lives, as much private as public, of all the diverse members of what George VI called 'The Firm'. Together with the tireless efforts of the King and Queen, it deals with such aspects as the Duke of Windsor's flirtation with Fascism, the ground-clearing obsessions of Queen Mary, the mysterious death of the Duke of Kent, the activities of the Athlones in Canada and the Gloucesters in Australia, and the imprisonment of the Princess Royal's eldest son, Viscount Lascelles. Occasionally tragic, often amusing, always interesting, it is a richly detailed panorama of the monarchy in one of its finest hours. Theo Aronson has been granted an unprecedented series of audiences with the Queen Mother, Princess Margaret, Princess Alice. Duchess of Gloucester, and the late Princess Alice, Countess of Athlone, as well as interviews with many other members of the royal family and of the royal households. He has been permitted the use of previously unpublished letters, diaries and papers. The result is a colourful study by an author who has been consistently praised for his insight, scholarship and, above all, readability.

    . . . Mr. Nicolson brings to life superbly the horror, devastation, and gore of Trafalgar.”—The EconomistAdam Nicolson takes the great naval battle of Trafalgar, fought between the British and Franco-Spanish fleets in October 1805, and uses it to examine our idea of heroism and the heroic. A story rich with modern resonance, Seize the Fire reveals the economic impact of the battle as a victorious Great Britain emerged as a global commercial empire.Nicolson not only vividly describes describes the brutal realities of battle but enters the hearts and minds of the men who were there. HIs masterful history is a portrait of a moment, a close and passionately engaged depiction of a frame of mind at a turning point in world history.

    It ends in around 1800 when the rough outline of the contemporary North America could be perceived.Dropping the usual Anglocentric description of North America's fate, Taylor brilliantly conveys the far more vivid and startling story of the competing interests--Spanish, French, English, Native, Russian--that over the centuries shaped and reshaped both the continent and its 'suburbs' in the Caribbean and the Pacific. It is one of the greatest of all human stories.