What Are You Currently Reading? 2010

[Tukhachevskii]

Recently read...


David Bellavia (with John Bruning), House to House: An Epic of Urabn Warfare

Mark N. Woodruff, Unheralded Victory: Who won the Vietnam War?

&

Robin Moore, Task Force Dagger: The Hunt for Bin Laden

[Wargames Mark]

Eastern Approaches, by Fitzroy MacLean

Complexity: A Guided Tour, by Melanie Mitchell

[davidbfpo]

Wargames Mark,

Eastern Approaches, by Fitzroy MacLean

Excellent book, the authors tour descriptions through Stalinist USSR are really amazing and the chapter on the conflicts in Yugoslavia i.e. Bosnia is an excellent primer on why the communities fought.

[Spud]

Did a couple over leave (in between struggling through some old Wilber Smith's ... that guy could do with a good editor):

Finally finished The Men Who Persevered (Australian Army Training Team in Vietnam) by Bruce Davies and Gary McKay and The Tiger Man of Vietnam by Frank Walker. Preferred Barry Pettersen's telling of his own story in Tiger Men than the effort by Walker.

Horse Soldiers by Doug Stanton ... good read about the events surrounding the capture of John Walker Lindh in Afghanistan.

Just getting started on Orson Scott Card's Empire ... it was the inspiration for a great XBox Live Arcade game Shadow Complex last year and after finishing off COD Modern Warfare 2 last night there's also a little bit in that. Gotta love a good military conspiracy.

[Spud]

Recently read...


Robin Moore, Task Force Dagger: The Hunt for Bin Laden

Burn it ... Burn it with fire

[Tukhachevskii]

Burn it ... Burn it with fire

I, too, have come to the same conclusion. There was much in it that was factual nonsense whilst the rest of it appeaered to be pure fantasy. Don't get me wrong, much of it does reek of virsimilitude but of a strained variety. Still, it was interesting nonetheless.

Just finished reading Sniper One, by Sgt Dan Mills. Scorching stuff!!

[reed11b]

Blink by Malcom Gladwell
Not a COIN book per se, but extremely relevant to much of what we discuss here and I recommend the book highly.
Reed

[Bob's World]

FM 31-23 Stability Operations - U.S. Army Doctrine. December 1967

CSM Tommy Smith handed me a copy as I was heading out the door for Afghanistan, and just got around to cracking it open today. An excellent manual all about dealing with insurgency. Term not found in the glossary? "Counterinsurgency."

Thanks Sergeant Major, I approve and share your endorsement of this "lost" bit of doctrine.

[Jedburgh]

FM 31-23 Stability Operations - U.S. Army Doctrine. December 1967

CSM Tommy Smith handed me a copy as I was heading out the door for Afghanistan, and just got around to cracking it open today. An excellent manual all about dealing with insurgency. Term not found in the glossary? "Counterinsurgency."

Thanks Sergeant Major, I approve and share your endorsement of this "lost" bit of doctrine.

FYI - there's a thread on the board from '07 that is mostly links to digital copies of vintage COIN and stability doctrine

[sandman]

Just finished ARABIAN ASSIGNMENT written by David Smiley commander of the British involvement in the Middle East during the 60’s. Of particular interest was his work in Yemen. I had forgotten that the U.S. favored the Egyptian invasion while the British supported the Saudi backing of the Emir’s guerrillas. Smiley’s constant struggles with the various tribes’ he tried to unite, helps to provide a window into politics in that country today. Also slogged through Tom Chamales’ fictional account of his life as a captain leading the Kachin Rangers while serving with the OSS in Burma, NEVER SO FEW. Very wordy at times (like cutting through elephant grass with a penknife) but loved the ending.