What Are You Currently Reading? 2010

[MikeF]

Yes, throw some from Jefferson on how the enemy of all enemies to a Republic are the Bankers!

Was that Jefferson? Sounds like Andrew Jackson.

[slapout9]

Was that Jefferson? Sounds like Andrew Jackson.

Jefferson it could be argued started it,but Jackson came on strong later and Lincoln actually beat them with the debt free/interest free Greenbacks of the Civil War.

I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around [the banks] will deprive the people of all property until their children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered. The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people, to whom it properly belongs.

Thomas Jefferson
3rd president of US (1743 - 1826)

[Steve Blair]

Just finished Matterhorn, which deserves all the accolades currently being heaped on it. What stood out for me was the quality of the writing, the recognizable culture of the Marine Corps, and the remarkable compassion of the author for almost every character in the story.

It's almost 600 pages and I finished it in two nights last week. Now rereading it. Yeah, it's that good.

Of interest, the author's Navy Cross citation. The author pretty much outlines how he earned this in the book, but doesn't mention the award.

Matterhorn is good, but to me it pales when compared to The 13th Valley.

[huskerguy7]

I just completed "In the Graveyard of Empires" by Seth Jones.

I was very impressed. Usually, I am very hesitant when I pick up a book talking about a current war because I'm afraid of trashy journalism. Before I read the book, I had no idea who Seth Jones was, but now I know.

The book provides a great history of Afghanistan up to 2008. I am sure that many here are already knowledgeable on this, but for those that aren't, then it's a good read. My only complaint: some of his research is dated. For example, his assertions on the Afghan National Army come from interviews that are from 2006. The ANA in 2010 is much different from the ANA in 2006. I give him credit though for writing about a current conflict.

Since I was so impressed with his writing, I picked up "The Rise of European Security Cooperation" by Seth Jones. I am currently 50 pages in, but am also very impressed. It is an academic read, but it's thought provoking.

[Tukhachevskii]

I'm currently re-reading a bunch of books for a master's dissertation / PhD proposal on Islamist military culture and their "way of war". Relying quite heavily on Insurgents, Terrorists and Militias: Warriors of Contemporary Combat (by Richard Shultz and Andrea Dew, my review available here), Military Orientalism: Eastern War Through Western Eyes (by Patrick Porter) and Waging Wars without Warriors? Changing Culture of Military Conflict (by Christopher Coker).

Don't forget Patrica Crone's, Slaves on Horses: The Evolution of the Islamic Polity

[davidbfpo]

I have just finished reading the fully revised English edition of The Baader-Meinhof Complex by Stefan Aust (Pub. 2008), which also became a film.

The Baader-Meinhof gang in West Germany started in 1970 and ended in 1998. At one time the gang had six members engaged in a campaign of terrorism and was described as "the war of six against sixty million". The early gang was captured in 1972, a prolonged trial started in 1975 and ended in 1977 when three died in custody - after the famous GSG-9 (and SAS) hostage rescue at Mogadishu.

A really good book covering radicalisation, the state response (much still shrouded in secrecy), international links and the impact on Germany.

UK Amazon:http://www.amazon.co.uk/Baader-Meinh.../dp/1847920454

USA Amazon, with good reviews:http://www.amazon.com/Baader-Meinhof...0086711&sr=1-1

[Backwards Observer]

Reading Isaac Asimov's, Foundation. Mentioned recently by jmm99. Fascinating.

Foundation (amazon link)

[JMA]

Not a current read but from 35 years ago in the mid to late '70s.

The first book that was well circulated (and read by certainly the junior ranks) was Devil's Guard by George Robert Elford set in the First Indochina War in the time of the French Foreign Legion involvement. Good read as I remember.

That led me through a reference to the Jungle is Neutral - Spencer Chapman which I remembered when I cam across a copy of Jungle Soldier: The True Story of Freddy Spencer Chapman the other day in a book shop.

I studied Chapman's book as a young officer and found it highly informative and helpful for what I was doing at the time.

Another book I studied was Robert Taber's War of the Flea I studied this book too and found it massively educational.

(Mike: I thought you said you had this book still? If so please check page 93 to see what he writes about the massive production of police forces and asks the question "How would the police themselves be secure where even military patrols were not?". This applies to the latest best plan of OEF to secure Afghanistan.)

I loved reading and rereading TE Lawrence's 7 Pillars of Wisdom not for any other reason that I marveled over his ability to remain a free thinker when under those circumstances one would have expected his focus to become narrower and narrower on what he was doing.

Just wondering if these books are still being read?

[Bob's World]

Hard to believe this was written 111 years ago regarding the US operation to build an empire with the Philippines and not just last week:

"Take up the White Man's burden--
Send forth the best ye breed--
Go bind your sons to exile
To serve your captives' need;
To wait in heavy harness,
On fluttered folk and wild--
Your new-caught, sullen peoples,
Half-devil and half-child.

Take up the White Man's burden--
In patience to abide,
To veil the threat of terror
And check the show of pride;
By open speech and simple,
An hundred times made plain
To seek another's profit,
And work another's gain.

Take up the White Man's burden--
The savage wars of peace--
Fill full the mouth of Famine
And bid the sickness cease;
And when your goal is nearest
The end for others sought,
Watch sloth and heathen Folly
Bring all your hopes to nought.

Take up the White Man's burden--
No tawdry rule of kings,
But toil of serf and sweeper--
The tale of common things.
The ports ye shall not enter,
The roads ye shall not tread,
Go mark them with your living,
And mark them with your dead.

Take up the White Man's burden--
And reap his old reward:
The blame of those ye better,
The hate of those ye guard--
The cry of hosts ye humour
(Ah, slowly!) toward the light:--
"Why brought he us from bondage,
Our loved Egyptian night?"

Take up the White Man's burden--
Ye dare not stoop to less--
Nor call too loud on Freedom
To cloke your weariness;
By all ye cry or whisper,
By all ye leave or do,
The silent, sullen peoples
Shall weigh your gods and you.

Take up the White Man's burden--
Have done with childish days--
The lightly proferred laurel,
The easy, ungrudged praise.
Comes now, to search your manhood
Through all the thankless years
Cold, edged with dear-bought wisdom,
The judgment of your peers!"

[jmm99]

First to Backwards Observer ...

The Foundation series of seven:

1. Prelude to Foundation
2. Forward the Foundation
3. Foundation
4. Foundation and Empire
5. Second Foundation
6. Foundation's Edge
7. Foundation and Earth

boils down to the four earlier books (bolded) as must reads.

I still go back and read favorite chapters - e.g., In Foundation, Part II, The Encyclopedists, Lord Dorwin's methodology for finding the "twuth" of the "Owigin Question" (ch 4), and analysing the real content of Lord Dorwin's diplomatic documents (ch 5). Both chapters are here.

Of course, neither Lord Dorwin's methodology nor content applies to any posts at SWC.

----------------------------
Well JMA, I have to confess to some common reading interests.

I did miss your Mr. Chapman and his jungle; but was (and still am) a devotee to a number of hunters and gatherers of the written word - e.g., from oldest to newest, Jim Corbett (and his man-eater books), Ernest Hemingway (a part-time Northern Michigander when young), Robert Ruark and Peter Capstick. Robert Thompson (in the preface to Defeating Communist Insurgency) recommended Corbett's man-eater books as must reads; and I still think of terrs as man-eaters - except the animal variety have an excuse (they lack a soul and hence are "innocent").

I've also managed Lawrence (a bit tedious at times), but my image is from the movie - obviously not produced and directed by Wilf.

Elford is a good read - even though it is somewhat fictional (perhaps more so as to the characters than for some of the events) - see these two posts re: materials on the first Indochina War (1945-1954), Google up the links to and Hey Marc.

Yup, Taber's Flea page 93 says exactly that: ""How would the police themselves be secure where even military patrols were not?"

The context, which we both will agree is all-important, was the national police program in Vietnam in the late 1950s and early 1960s. The advisors to that program were the Michigan State group led by Wesley Fischel (later unjustly persecuted by Ramparts and others). Their model was the Michigan State Police - a very good domestic police unit then and now; but not a paramilitary, gendarmerie type unit trained and equipped to fight irregulars; and led by Os and NCOs competent in that field.

Now, what you would do is tell me how to bring my cops up to RLI standards.

Cheers

Mike

[Backwards Observer]

First to Backwards Observer ...

The Foundation series of seven:

1. Prelude to Foundation
2. Forward the Foundation
3. Foundation
4. Foundation and Empire
5. Second Foundation
6. Foundation's Edge
7. Foundation and Earth

boils down to the four earlier books (bolded) as must reads.

Much appweciated.

[baboon6]

I'm reading at the moment:

Most Secret War: British Scientific Intelligence 1939-45 by Dr R V Jones

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Most-Secret-.../dp/185326699X

Coastal Forces at War: The Royal Navy's Little Ships in the Narrow Seas 1939-45 by David Jefferson

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Coastal-Forc...0743049&sr=1-1

Recently read:

Military Intelligence Blunders by Colonel John Hughes-Wilson

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Military-Int...0743470&sr=1-3

The Grand Scuttle: The Sinking of the German Fleet at Scapa Flow in 1919 by Dan van der Wat.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Grand-Scuttl...0743653&sr=1-1

[MikeF]

A friend of mine gave me this book as a gift. Sorting through it now.

Walking with the Wind- A Memoir of the Movement by John Lewis with Michael D'orso

While many of his current politics are questionable, John Lewis's participation in the civil rights movement is extraordinary.

John Lewis is an authentic American hero, a modest man from the most humble of beginnings who left a rural Alabama cotton farm 40 years ago and strode into the forefront of the civil rights movement. One of the young people who brought the teachings of Ghandi and King to the lunch counters of Nashville in 1960, Lewis suffered taunts and threats, beatings and arrests. He spoke at the historic 1963 March on Washington and became chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee. The nation, tuned to the nightly news, watched in horror as state troopers clubbed him viciously, fracturing his skull as he led a march in Selma, Alabama, in 1965. Today, he's the only member of Congress who can be proud of having been carried off to jail more than 40 times. With the help of a collaborator, journalist Michael D'Orso, this remarkable man has written a truly remarkable book. Walking with the Wind is a deeply moving personal memoir that skillfully balances the intimate and touching recollections of the deeply thoughtful Lewis with the intense national drama that was the civil rights movement.

[M-A Lagrange]

Orson Scott Card:
The Ender Quartet: Ender's Game/ Speaker for the Dead/ Xenocide/ Children of the Mind.

And the pathfinder cycle also.
All Scott Card in fact.

[JMA]

Well JMA, I have to confess to some common reading interests.

I did miss your Mr. Chapman and his jungle; but was (and still am) a devotee to a number of hunters and gatherers of the written word - e.g., from oldest to newest, Jim Corbett (and his man-eater books), Ernest Hemingway (a part-time Northern Michigander when young), Robert Ruark and Peter Capstick. Robert Thompson (in the preface to Defeating Communist Insurgency) recommended Corbett's man-eater books as must reads; and I still think of terrs as man-eaters - except the animal variety have an excuse (they lack a soul and hence are "innocent").

I've also managed Lawrence (a bit tedious at times), but my image is from the movie - obviously not produced and directed by Wilf.

Elford is a good read - even though it is somewhat fictional (perhaps more so as to the characters than for some of the events) - see these two posts re: materials on the first Indochina War (1945-1954), Google up the links to and Hey Marc.

[snip]

Cheers

Mike

You got to read Spencer Chapman's "The Jungle is Neutral". Its a lot about the type of mindset you want to look for in soldiers. Self reliance and resourcefulness. Marvelous man. Among the best the British have had to offer.

Just remembered another good book from back then.

The War of the Running Dogs: Malaya 1948-1960

Certainly educational.

Then a book I remember well but can't find much on Google other than it is out of print and was published in 1958. Ian Henderson's The Hunt for Kamathi at the time of Mau Mau. Maybe it was republished later as Man Hunt in Kenya.

[jmm99]

On a macro-level, the Malayan Emergency illustrates a decent interplay between the police (esp. Special Branch; for which, it and its networks, Wilf has lust in his heart ) and military. All the standard books apply; but a freebie from Rand is Riley Sunderland's 1964 5-part monograph series:

Antiguerrilla Intelligence in Malaya, 1948-1960 - 1964

Army Operations in Malaya, 1947-1960 - 1964

Organizing Counterinsurgency in Malaya, 1947-1960 - 1964

Resettlement and Food Control in Malaya - 1964

Winning the Hearts and Minds of the People: Malaya, 1948-1960 - 1964

The two keys are bolded.

The difficult question which flowed through Malaya and Vietnam - and touches us today - is how to organize small units (roughly platoon-size) that would handle local governance, justice and police matters, intelligence; as well as being "paramilitary enough" to avoid being defeated in detail. Defeat in detail was, of course, MACV's concern.

One informal solution can be found in Bing West, The Village, dealing with Marine CAP in one village complex. Focus has tended to be on the Marine squads that made up one side of CAP, and sometimes on the Vietnamese Puffs (PFs)that provided the hamlet defenders. But, what is not often mentioned is that the Vietnamese police had its contingent in the village complex, as well as a local governance component. The Marines supplied the backbone and muscle to allow Vietnamese "civil affairs" to function and survive.

A more formal solution was the GVN Revolutionary (sometime "Rural") Development Team, which on paper called for about a double platoon (60 personnel, divided between infantry fighters, intelligence and local governance). That program never got off the ground. It and many of the other GVN paramilitary police and related "pacification" programs are covered well in another freebie: Tran Dinh Tho, Pacification (1977; one of the Indochina Monographs), who was a key player in the programs, and who gives the South Vietnamese slant on the project. Two SWC threads, CORDS / Phoenix: Counterinsurgency Lessons from Vietnam for the Future, and CIA Vietnam Histories, also have a number of links.

That brings us to the most effective (per capita) organization dealing with Pacification and the neutralization (kill, capture, convert) of VCI (Viet Cong Infrastructure), the Provincial Reconnaissance Units (PRUs), which combined infantry and close quarters combat skills with suburb intelligence collection and analysis. If one tossed in a local governance component, the PRUs would pretty much cover the type of paramilitary police unit needed to provide the local effort. See Mark Moyar, Phoenix and the Birds of Prey (a rational discussion of what the PRUs were and were not).

I'm too old and decrepit to unlearn about police; and, JMA, you are too old and decrepit to learn about police. So, hopefully, this post will be useful to some younger guy or gal.

I quit analysing Astan ANA and ANP some months ago - and I'll stick with that quit.

Regards (and quit ass-u-me-ing - )

Mike

[William F. Owen]

(esp. Special Branch; for which, it and its networks, Wilf has lust in his heart )

Dunno why? I'm a big believer in Networks, as long as they are not elevated to something they are not - which is what NEW-COIN has tried to do. People fail to distinguish between command structures and networks. Networks are forms of communication. A network can only enable a command. It cannot make the decision or make the plan.

[Backwards Observer]

Mayhap be interesting perchance or somesuch.

Online participatory novel masterminded by Neal Stephenson (Snowcrash, Cryptonomicon).

The Mongol takeover of Europe is almost complete. The hordes commanded by the sons of Genghis Khan have swept out of their immense grassy plains and ravaged Russia, Poland, and Hungary... and now seem poised to sweep west to Paris and south to Rome. King and pope and peasant alike face a bleak future—until a small band of warriors, inheritors of a millennium-old secret tradition, set out to probe the enemy.
...
We are presenting The Mongoliad first as an online serial novel for a few reasons. One is that it lets us share an intimacy with readers that isn't possible when the books come out every three or so years, all at once, in doorstop format. When something gets you excited or bores you, we want to know. Another reason is that we are energized by the possibilities for creating parts of this novel not only as words, but as illustrations, graphic novels, maps, and eventually games and movies.
...
The Subutai Corporation is named after Genghis Khan's strategic commander, a man who rarely lost a battle and who eventually grew so obese that horses could not carry him. And you know a Mongol has to be somebody pretty special if he can't ride a horse and still gets treated with respect. So that's our guy.

The Mongoliad

[Van]

Donald Kagan's Peloponessian War. Easily the best treatment of the subject around, striking a balance between readability and thoroughness. The small wars aspects of the Peloponessian War are frequently ignored, but effected both sides and had (arguably) an effect on the duration and outcome of the war.

And nugging my way through a small stack of Drs Paul and Elders' critical thinking and education books.

[Jedburgh]

Donald Kagan's Peloponessian War. Easily the best treatment of the subject around....

What?! Better than Thucydides? I think not.