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A good portion of the book was him bitching about things. The unit he was attached to needed ammo and supplies. They couldn't get it for a long time. Suddenly they got all of the order air lifted to them including everything that was backlogged. Then they got attacked and had to blow up most of it to make sure the enemy didn't get it. Or him talking about asking for naval artillery and watching a hill disappear due to how much came in.
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Sep 13, 2016 16:46
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Smiling Jack posted:The Corner by David Simon I'm working through The Corner now and it is really good. I would highly recommend it if you're into crime or drugs at all. It's truly amazing and thorough in scope. It's also the basis for the wire. seriously check it out!
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Sep 22, 2016 04:04
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EVA BRAUN BLOWJOBS posted:I've been reading Shake Hands With the Devil on your guys' suggestion. I've gotten through the first 6 parts so chronologically I'm at New Year's Day 1994. I'm understanding now how Dallaire was screwed operationally before any of it kicked off- didn't have enough of anything to work with really. I'm not even at the gory parts of the book yet and I'm cringing at the disparity in quality of life between troops from rich/poor nations and the lack of basic logistics like rations. i've just started reading it and i know already it's gonna be a loving brutal read christ the girl who was helping him write it committed suicide over it for god's sake
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Sep 22, 2016 05:56
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There's a troll in the CanPol megathread who likes to poo poo on Dallaire for having PTSD.I fall for the bait more than I should because what he went through should be a test for military colleges. In that situation as a commanding officer, do you; 1) Intervene, and watch every man and woman under your command, as well as every man, woman and child you were ordered to protect murdered in the most horrific possible fashion before dying yourself? or, 2) Don't intervene, and watch some of the men under your command, as well as every man, woman and child you were ordered to protect murdered in the most horrific possible fashion? There is no right answer. Both are poo poo. The situation was poo poo.
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Sep 22, 2016 16:37
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3) You immediately contact any and all press you can find and whistleblow the poo poo out of everything, and tank your career in the process That's probably the best case scenario, but the end result was the same. After Mogadishu, American intervention in Africa was finished for at least a half century and no one else in 1994 had the capability or will to intervene, certainly not the UN
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Sep 22, 2016 17:02
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VikingSkull posted:3) You immediately contact any and all press you can find and whistleblow the poo poo out of everything, and tank your career in the process According to the book he let in any reporter or photographer brave enough. People just didn't care. Writers were on point with that line in Hotel Rwanda (paraphrased): "You're dirt Paul. We think you're dirt. The West. You're not even a n****r...you're African."
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Sep 22, 2016 17:24
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The people not caring thing was the main issue, really. I know I remember that time on the news, right in the wheelhouse of when my dad and I would watch Peter Jennings every night. The main poo poo was always the war in Bosnia back then. When I look at how bad the Bosnian War was, and how it was the benchmark of conflict in post WWII Europe, I can't help but contrast it with Syria today and I kinda have to laugh. Who knew you could turbocharge that style of conflict?
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Sep 22, 2016 17:31
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VikingSkull posted:The people not caring thing was the main issue, really. Ding ding ding. That's Dallaire's realization about the UN. Bosnia was more important than Rwanda and thus got all the equipment, and the US was still too risk averse from Somalia to commit much of anything beyond some beat up stripped down vehicles and a tiny Marine QRF stationed in a different country.
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Sep 22, 2016 17:36
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To be fair to the UN (I know, I know), the ramifications of the Bosnian War still influence current affairs today, and Rwanda is much more localized of a thing. Certainly there's ripples among the conflicts in Africa today, but you don't have Putin pointing at Rwanda like he does the Balkans.
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Sep 22, 2016 17:39
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VikingSkull posted:To be fair to the UN (I know, I know), the ramifications of the Bosnian War still influence current affairs today, and Rwanda is much more localized of a thing. Certainly there's ripples among the conflicts in Africa today, but you don't have Putin pointing at Rwanda like he does the Balkans. Rwandan genocide led directly into the Congo wars that drew in half of Africa and left millions dead.
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Sep 22, 2016 18:12
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P-Mack posted:Rwandan genocide led directly into the Congo wars that drew in half of Africa and left millions dead. Yeah but no one cares about Africa, including Africans
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Sep 22, 2016 18:19
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P-Mack posted:Rwandan genocide led directly into the Congo wars that drew in half of Africa and left millions dead. .... and sadly it barely affected the rest of the world. The Balkans almost brought the US and Russia to the point of armed conflict then, and it has clouded Russia's relationship with NATO ever since. Far, far more influencing on a geopolitical scale and it's not even close.
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Sep 22, 2016 18:29
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MA-Horus posted:There's a troll in the CanPol megathread who likes to poo poo on Dallaire for having PTSD.I fall for the bait more than I should because what he went through should be a test for military colleges. That's Dallaire's problem, and I say this as someone who has met and talked with him many times and respect him enormously, he believed he had a choice. In reality, his hands were tied, and there was nothing he could do. He would have been sacked as soon as he cabled back to Ottawa and New York any intent to use force in Rwanda. The man even knew where the weapon stockpiles were and was denied permission to seize them. Meanwhile, in Bosnia... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lPnnhi3RszM One measly mech battalion against 3 Croat brigades and we dug in and saved hundreds, thousands, of lives. If the Belgian Paras hadn't been pulled out, maybe we could have stopped the worst of it as well. So yeah, 1 all the way. I'm taking all you fuckers with me. Barrakketh fucked around with this message at 13:45 on Oct 2, 2016 |
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Sep 23, 2016 00:29
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Barrakketh posted:The man even knew where the weapon stockpiles were and was denied permission to seize them. I just got up to this part of the book. gently caress 
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Sep 30, 2016 01:20
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Has anyone read The Centurions by Jean Larteguy and Xan Fielding? Is it any good and how well does it stack up against other Vietnam war literature.
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Oct 5, 2016 11:47
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Stultus Maximus posted:Last Stand of the Tin Can Sailors Yo I'm most of the way through this and it's a fantastic loving read.
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Dec 8, 2016 08:52
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I finally got around to finishing Shake Hands With The Devil. gently caress this book and gently caress the UN and gently caress this gay earth. "Human beings with no rights, no security, no future, no hope and no means to survive are a desperate group who will do desperate things to take what they believe they need and deserve." Man hits the loving nail on the head on just about every point he makes. Poor broken dude 
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Mar 13, 2017 02:28
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The Company They Keep is a great book that came out in 98, written by an anthropologist who was rescued by an ODA (and later married one of them). https://www.amazon.com/Company-they...mpany+they+keep The book is a quick read and has some cool insight into the dynamics of SF, their struggle with Big Army (prior to 9/11) and various related topics.
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Mar 14, 2017 04:42
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I just finished Leviathan Wakes which is the first book that the SyFy series The Expanse is based on. The first book covers all of season 1 and most if not all of season 2 of the show. It explores the time between humanity conquering the solar system and humanity conquering the stars. It has some of the world building of game of thrones and the military culture of battlestar galactic. It's half noir detective mystery and half space western like firefly. It's a fun easy read that tries to be realistic with things like gravity and physics without devoting pages to explain the mechanics of a fusion engine.
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Mar 14, 2017 23:31
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The Coldest Winter: America and the Korean War David Halberstam "a masterful narrative of the political decisions & miscalculations on both sides. He charts the disastrous path that led to the massive entry of Chinese forces near the Yalu River & that caught Douglas MacArthur & his soldiers by surprise. He provides vivid & nuanced portraits of all the major figures-Eisenhower, Truman, Acheson, Kim, & Mao, & Generals MacArthur, Almond & Ridgway. At the same time, he provides us with his trademark highly evocative narrative journalism, chronicling the crucial battles with reportage of the highest order. As ever, he was concerned with the extraordinary courage" In short this book is a detailed account of the politics, misconceptions and mistakes that not only led to the Korean War but contributed to some of our worst stumbles during the conflict itself. Long but a good read.
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Mar 16, 2017 19:06
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Here's an awesome list of 99 titles from War, Literature, and the Arts journal. Many of them have already been mentioned, but it's deffo worth checking out: http://wlajournal.com/blog/?p=848
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Mar 17, 2017 18:00
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Was annoyed that there's no Kindle version of Zinky Boys, but got it anyway. I can definitely vouch for it being quite good--despite being extremely depressing I've been reading it for about 5 hours straight. Someday I need to get around to A Dirty War/A Small Corner of Hell for more Russia waging ill-advised wars against Muslims in mountainous areas sadreads.
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Apr 2, 2017 00:07
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D-Day Through German Eyes. 2 books in the series, if you have kindle unlimited you can read them for free. These are a series of interviews from German soldiers who were at the D-Day landings and survived. The interviews were taken 10 years after the war was over. A few really interesting things in them such as the Goliath remote controlled anti-tank bomb.  another interesting thing was the fuel-air explosive rockets they made called the TyphoonB. Here is a few pages of that interview.      Edit : also there are several accounts of the interviewees getting shot at with phosphorus rockets from planes and the effects they had. ded fucked around with this message at 03:48 on Apr 9, 2017 |
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Apr 9, 2017 03:44
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"Let's move on." drat. I've never heard of that system or anything like it from that era.
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Apr 9, 2017 04:42
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"Let's move on" And Duzzy Funlop wonders why I hate the loving Krauts.
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Apr 9, 2017 04:46
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LtCol J. Krusinski posted:"Let's move on" How do you feel about the italians? Seems you got a hateboner for the whole axis
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Apr 9, 2017 07:12
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The eastern front was insane in WW2. The Germans slaughtered whole villages under the guise of anti-partisan warfare. I studied it a bit in school and there were so many after action reports from German units where they encountered "partisan" villages or camps and then killed dozens of "partisans" in glorious combat with zero German casualties and maybe a couple old rifles captured. Ben Shepherd's War in the Wild East and Marching into Darkness by Waitman Beorn are excellent books on the subject.
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Apr 9, 2017 16:43
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Two Finger posted:How do you feel about the italians? Seems you got a hateboner for the whole axis Shim's hateboner for the Germans is pretty understandable and well deserved.
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Apr 9, 2017 16:52
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Two Finger posted:How do you feel about the italians? Seems you got a hateboner for the whole axis I hate the guido's no doubt, and even the Irish for staying neutral but I really hate the Krauts. The nips are also on my poo poo list, and I believe we should have let LeMay finish off Japanese society from the sky.
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Apr 10, 2017 00:26
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Yes, Ireland (which was still rather pissed off at the UK having just fought a war for independence to something like a draw) with it's army of about 10,000 (admittedly) poorly-trained soldiers, it's navy of two PT boats, and air force of two biplanes surely would've done something besides bring Ireland to its knees through embargo. 
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Apr 10, 2017 02:07
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gently caress the Micks.
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Apr 10, 2017 02:12
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FWIW, a ton of Irish went and joined the British army because gently caress Nazis.
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Apr 10, 2017 02:21
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And god bless their potato loving hearts, but still- gently caress Ireland.
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Apr 10, 2017 02:31
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Let's not forget the Eamon De Valera and his visit to the German Embassy in Dublin to offer his condolences on the death of Hitler. I'm most definitely can see the Irish side in most things but that was just hosed up.
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Apr 10, 2017 22:26
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I forgot about that, didn't he say he only did it out of protocol or some poo poo? Either way, hosed up on his part.
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Apr 10, 2017 22:28
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Handsome Ralph posted:I forgot about that, didn't he say he only did it out of protocol or some poo poo? I think their overriding sentiment was 'gently caress the English'.
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Apr 10, 2017 22:51
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anatoliy pltkrvkay posted:Was annoyed that there's no Kindle version of Zinky Boys, but got it anyway. I do all my reading on my tablet and the fact that there are still tons of books that don't have a kindle version bugs the hell out of me.
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Apr 15, 2017 09:43
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I'm about a quarter of the way through Legacy of Ashes, just past the Bay of Pigs. I'm getting the feeling that the book needs to be taken with a grain of salt due to what feels like an overly unflattering tone. Despite this it's amazing reading about how loving retarded Dulles and his gang were in the first 15 years of the agency's existence. The way the book poses it, the CIA completely failed to fulfill its primary task of intelligence gathering and focused entirely on bungled special operations.
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Apr 21, 2017 17:36
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tastefully arranged labia posted:The way the book poses it, the CIA completely failed to fulfill its primary task of intelligence gathering and focused entirely on bungled special operations. Wait till you get to the Vietnam era part of the book, remember Forrestal and Nightengale? Weiner does list every source he used in the back and it's all publicly available FOIA stuff mostly. He gets a bit angry at the very end but I don't disagree with his analysis of "maybe we shouldn't let these guys set foreign policy by default when there's a foreign policy vacuum".
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Apr 22, 2017 00:01
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The Last True Story I'll Ever Tell - by John Crawford. Kind of a memoir, maybe kind of fiction? Pretty good book written by a Florida National Guard infantryman who was in Iraq for OIF I. Is SWATJester still around? He was in the dude that wrote it's unit. The one star reviews are funny on Amazon because some honest folk don't like to think ARE TROOPS talk with so much vulgarity. The War I Always Wanted - by Brandon Friedman - another early OIF/OEF memoir that I enjoyed quite a bit, probably because as an infantry PL, a book written by an infantry PL was pretty easy to relate to, especially written by a guy that wasn't aggressively HOOAH at all.
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May 25, 2017 02:33
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