"The history of warfare cannot be fully understood without considering the technology of killing. In Firepower, acclaimed historian Paul Lockhart tells the story of military technology from the Renaissance to the dawn of the atomic era -- five-hundred-year-long "age of firepower" during which the evolution of weaponry transformed the conduct of warfare in the West. Weapons technology had always influenced warfare. But the introduction of gunpowder...

"In November 1983, Soviet nuclear forces went on high alert. After months nervously watching increasingly assertive NATO military posturing, Soviet intelligence agencies in Western Europe received flash telegrams reporting alarming activity on U.S. bases. In response, the Soviets began planning for a countdown to a nuclear first strike by NATO on Eastern Europe. And then Able Archer 83, a vast NATO war game exercise that modeled a Soviet attack on...

Winston Churchill called him World War II's "organizer of victory." Harry Truman said he was "the greatest military man that this country ever produced." Today, in our era of failed leadership, few lives are more worthy of renewed examination than Marshall and his fifty years of loyal service to the defense of his nation and its values. Even as a young officer he was heralded as a genius, a reputation that grew when in WWI he planned and executed...

"In this fully revised edition of Finding Your Father's War, Jonathan Gawne has written an easily accessible handbook for anyone seeking greater knowledge of their relative's experience during World War II. Jonathan explains and shares techniques he uses to research archives, libraries, veteran associations, and myriad other sources of information to track down wartime careers. Detailed appendices also give a wealth of useful information including...

"A skeptical appraisal of U.S. military intervention in the Philippines, Vietnam, and Iraq, highlighting a common pattern of poor intelligence gathering, nationalistic hubris, and political pressures, which led to these unsuccessful foreign adventures"-- "This eye-opening book takes a unique approach to the history of U.S. foreign policy by examining three unrelated conflicts, all of which ended tragically and resulted in the deaths of millions on...

"An award-winning military journalist tells the amazing stories of twenty-two soldiers who've won the Medal of Honor, the nation's highest military award. In the Company of Heroes will feature in-depth narrative profiles of the twenty-three post-9/11 Medal of Honor awardees who served in Afghanistan and Iraq. This book will focus on the stories of these extraordinary people, expressed in their own voices through one-on-one interviews, and in the case...

"The United States has been fighting wars constantly since invading Afghanistan in 2001. This nonstop warfare is far less exceptional than it might seem: the US has been at war or has invaded other countries almost every year since independence. In The United States of War, David Vine traces this pattern of bloody, near-permanent conflict from Columbus's 1494 arrival in Guantanamo Bay through the 250-year expansion of a global US empire. Drawing on...

Required reading for West Point and Marine Corps cadets, Once An Eagle is the story of one special man, a soldier named Sam Damon, and his adversary over a lifetime, fellow officer Courtney Massengale. Damon is a professional who puts duty, honor, and the men he commands above self-interest. Massengale, however, brilliantly advances by making the right connections behind the lines and in Washington's corridors of power. Beginning in the French countryside...

Provides eye-witness accounts from commanders to intelligence officers, army doctors to ordinary soldiers, that contradict the official stories and figures. This book gives an insight into the plight of ordinary soldiers doing nightmarish jobs, and the real nature of the fighting in Iraq.

"An honest reckoning with the war on terror, masculinity, and the violence of American hegemony abroad, at home, and on the psyche, from a veteran whose convictions came undone. When Lyle Jeremy Rubin first arrived at Marine Officer Candidates School, he was convinced that the "war on terror" was necessary to national security. He also subscribed to a strict code of manhood that military service conjured and perpetuated. Then he began to train and...