Book picks similar to
Hornets over Kuwait by Jay A. Stout


aviation
history
military-non-fiction
military

Firebirds


Chuck Carlock - 1995
    Little did he know that he would see some of the war's most intense action, including the Tet offensives. Carlock portrays countless dangers, from an elusive enemy and treacherous terrain to blinding weather, faulty equipment, and friendly fire. He rides the pendulum between fear and fearlessness during his many brushes with death. Along with the danger and tension, Carlock tells us about the camaraderie and humor shared by men who lived on the edge. Carlock's stories will sometimes shock you, sometimes bring a smile to your face, and sometimes make you angry. Learn about "secret" missions into a neutral country. Discover how the Walker spy ring cost American lives. Most of all, find out what it was like for a twenty-one-year-old farm boy to find himself suddenly immersed in vicious daily combat, making decisions that determined the fate of hundreds of lives.

The Guts to Try: The Untold Story of the Iran Hostage Rescue Mission by the On-Scene Desert Commander


James H. Kyle - 1990
    Kyle was involved in every stage of the Iran hostage rescue operation. As Desert-1 Commander, he alone bore responsibility for the courageous mission. Now Colonel Kyle spares no one, including himself, in this riveting account that takes readers from the initial brainstorming sessions and training camps to the desert rehearsals, the forward staging areas in Egypt and Oman, and finally to the desert refueling site, where he decided to abort.Colonel Kyle provides honest answers to tough questions: Why were the pilots caught totally off guard by the weather? How did the CIA contribute to the mission’s breakdown? And could such a failure happen again? The Guts to Try is a thrilling true-life adventure story–exploring America’s ability to react quickly, forcefully, and effectively to acts of terrorism.From the Paperback edition.

Run Through the Jungle: Real Adventures in Vietnam with the 173rd Airborne Brigade


Larry J. Musson - 2015
    Share the experiences of fighting men under punishing conditions, extreme temperatures, and intense monsoon rains as they search for the enemy in the rugged mountains and teeming lowlands. Relive all the terror, humor, and sadness of one man’s tour of duty with real-life action in spectacular stunning detail.

The Last Attack: Sixth SS Panzer Army and the defense of Hungary and Austria in 1945


William Alan Webb - 2016
    Following defeat in the Ardennes Offensive, Adolf Hitler and the German leadership faced the question of how best to use what little offensive firepower remained to them, as represented by the Sixth SS Panzer Army. Hitler’s obsession with protecting the last source of natural oil available to the Reich compelled this decision, one made against the strong opposition of his military advisers. The resulting offensive, code-named Operation Spring Awakening, was a disaster for Nazi Germany, but a boon for postwar Europe. Heavily outnumbered and lacking supplies, especially fuel, the Sixth SS Panzer Army nevertheless delayed the Red Army long enough for American and British forces to occupy much of western and southern Austria. There is, therefore, a strong likelihood the presence in Austria of Sixth SS Panzer Army saved that country from being overrun completely by the Red Army, and possibly being included in the Warsaw Pact as a Soviet satellite. Impeccably footnoted for peer review, the author hopes this will wet the reader's appetite for more detailed histories on the subject.

Devil's Own Luck: Pegasus Bridge to the Baltic 1944-45


Denis Edwards - 1999
    He brilliantly conveys what it was like to be facing death, day after day, night after night, with never a bed to sleep in nor a hot meal to go home to. This is warfare in the raw ' brutal, yet humorous, immensely tragic, but sadly, all true.

Palace Cobra: A Fighter Pilot in the Vietnam Air War


Ed Rasimus - 2006
    Two years later, he volunteered to go for a second tour of duty. Determined not to die in a losing cause, and relentlessly searching for that next adrenaline rush, Rasimus and the other F-4 Phantom pilots continued the ferocious air war in the North--dodging SAMs and gunning for MiGs--and routinely cheated death.When America finally got serious about ending the war, Rasimus and the other pilots put it all on the line, pounding Hanoi with everything they had, and flying above POW camps to let the troops know they were not alone. Gripping, earnest, and unforgettable, Rasimus's combat memoir is, in the end, a heartfelt tribute to those who never made it back.

The Vietnam War: A Very Brief History


Mark Black - 2012
    For many, it defined a generation.The Very Brief History series is intended to give the reader a short, concise account of the most important events in world history. Each book provides the reader with the essential facts concerning a particular event or person; no distractions, just the essential facts, allowing the reader to master the subject in the shortest time possible. With The Very Brief History series, anyone can become a history expert!

A Field of Innocence


Jack Estes - 1987
    He was a kid, eighteen years old. Married, broke, flunking out of college-and about to become a father. The Marines seemed like a good way out. He figured the Nam couldn't be any worse than home. He was wrong.Publishers Weekly says "Chilling...It tells how a youngster from Portland, Oregon matured in the crucible of combat...The reader is given a sense of what it's like to fight an unseen enemy who might appear anytime, anywhere and start shooting from ambush." Karl Marlantes, New York Times best selling author of "Matterhorn" calls "A Field of Innocence", "Powerful ...and riveting."Tim O'Brien, New York Times best selling author of "The Things They Carried" says, "With its raw realism and heartbreaking honesty...one of the finest Vietnam memoirs."Kirkus Review says A Field of Innocence is "Exciting and Impressive."

Afghan Heat: SAS Operations in Afghanistan


Steve Stone - 2013
    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.'

Operation Broken Reed: Truman's Secret North Korean Spy Mission That Averted World War III


Arthur L. Boyd - 2007
    So valuable were the mission's findings about the North Korean-Soviet-Chinese alliance that it is no stretch to say they prevented World War III. Only one man — sworn to secrecy for a half-century—survived Operation Broken Reed. Arthur Boyd recalls his role as cryptographer on a team of Army Rangers, Navy Frogmen, Air Force officers, and CIA operatives that posed as the captured crew of a B-29 bomber in January 1952. Given cover names and cyanide capsules in case of discovery, the men were transported by Chinese Nationalists wearing Communist uniforms across North Korea, where undercover allies delivered information about troop strengths, weaponry, and intention. Fraught with danger, the mission came apart on its last day when the Americans came under fire from Chinese forces wise to the operation. The members of Broken Reed supplied Truman with proof of massive Chinese and Soviet buildups and a heavy Soviet bomber group in Manchuria, fully loaded with atomic weapons. With the potential destruction of the world outlined in front of him, Truman chose not to escalate the Korean War, saving millions of lives.

War For the Hell of It: A Fighter Pilot's View of Vietnam


Ed Cobleigh - 2005
    With well-crafted prose that puts you into the Phantom's cockpit, Cobleigh vividly recounts the unexplainable loss of his wingman, the useless missions he flew, the need to trust his reflexes, eyesight, and aggressiveness, and his survival instincts in the heat of combat. He discusses the deaths of his squadron mates and the contradictions of a dirty, semi-secret war fought from beautiful, exotic Thailand. This is an unprecedented look into the state of mind of a pilot as he experiences everything from the carnage of a crash to the joy of flying through a star-studded night sky, from the illogical political agendas of Washington to his own dangerous addiction to risk. Cobleigh gives a stirring and emotional description of one man's journey into airborne hell and back, recounting the pleasures and the pain. the wins and the losses. and ultimately, the return.

Albert Einstein: The Life of a Genius


Jack Steinberg - 2015
    Students around the world are taught about his theories and equations with E=mc2 undoubtedly being the most famous.However, there was more to this man than simply being a genius or the original prototype of the mad professor. Instead, this was a man that was dedicated to not only his profession, but also the concept of pacifism, something that most people are unaware of.Albert Einstein went from a late developing child to running away from school to almost failing university and instead turned himself into one of the greatest minds that the world has ever seen. This is his story, a story of how a child taught himself calculus and geometry and was then not afraid to challenge concepts of how the world worked that had been unchanged for centuries. This was a man who stood up for what he believed in even when the world appeared to be against him.The story of Albert Einstein is about more than just mathematical equations. The story is about a man who beat the odds and became world famous in the unlikely world of physics and the universe.

Tragedy At Honda (Annotated)


Charles A. Lockwood - 2018
    Navy destroyers ran into Honda's fog-wrapped reefs.*Includes annotations.*Includes original photographs from the Honda Disaster.

Why Marines Fight


James Brady - 2007
    They have fought from the Revolutionary War to Afghanistan and Iraq, in famous battles become bone and sinew of American lore. But why do Marines fight? Why fight so well? Why run toward the guns? Now comes a thrilling new book, pounding and magnificent in scope, by the author some Marines consider the unofficial “poet laureate” of their Corps.James Brady interviews combat Marines from wars ranging from World War II to Afghanistan, their replies in their own individual voices unique and powerful, an authentically American story of a country at war, as seen through the eyes of its warriors.  Culling his own correspondence and comradeship with hundreds of fellow Marines, Brady compiles a story---lyrical and historical---of the motivations and emotions behind this compelling question. Included are the accounts of Senator James Webb and his lance corporal son, Jim; New York City police commissioner Ray Kelly; Yankee second baseman (and Marine fighter pilot) Jerry Coleman, and of teachers, firemen, authors, cops, Harvard football players, and just plain grunts, as well as the unforgettable story of Jack Rowe, who lost an eye and other parts and now grows avocados and chases rattlesnakes. Their stories poignantly and profoundly illustrate the lives and legacies of battlefront Marines. Why Marines Fight is a ruthlessly candid book about professional killers not ashamed to recall their doubts as well as exult in their savagely triumphant battle cries.  A book of weight and heft that Marines, and Americans everywhere, will want to read, and may find impossible to forget. Praise for James Brady The Scariest Place in the World“[A] graceful, even elegant, and always eloquent tribute to men at arms in a war that, in a way, never ended.”---Kirkus Reviews“James Brady has done it again.  A riveting and illuminating insight into a dark corner of the world.”---Tim Russert, NBC’s Meet the Press The Coldest War“His story reads like a novel, but it is war reporting at its best---a graphic depiction, in all its horrors, of the war we’ve almost forgotten.”---Walter Cronkite“A marvelous memoir. A sensitive and superbly written narrative that eventually explodes off the pages like a grenade in the gut . . .taut, tight, and telling.”---Dan Rather The Marine“In The Marine, James Brady again gives us a novel in which history is a leading character, sharing the stage in this case with a man as surely born to be a gallant warrior as any knight in sixth-century Camelot.”---Kurt Vonnegut  The Marines of Autumn“Mr. Brady knows war, the smell and the feel of it.”---The New York Times

What Now, Lieutenant?


Robert Babcock - 2011
    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.