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Brian Turner's stuff is real good. Re: On War, if you want to sound smart in your IR class (or with your fellow officers if you're one of those), just read Book I. It's the one everyone quotes from that has "continuation of politics by other means" and "fog, friction, and chance." I will say that it is worth reading in its entirety.....but that it has diminishing returns as you go on. Books I-III are probably required reading if you plan on seriously reading it (as opposed to just getting a few pull quotes to impress that 20 year old in your International Relations 201 class), the remaining Books are more of that "using historical examples to make a point," which requires a fair bit of transposition since he's using direct tactical situations from the early 1800s to make his point. Not the most direct analogy to modern warfare. If you do read it, get the Howard/Paret translation (or if you can find it, the Matthijs Jolles translation), the Rapoport one is hopelessly flawed. Seriously, it's terrible and completely misses the point (it was composed in the '60s, and Rapoport was trying to make a point about how bad the "neo-Clausewitzian" Kissinger was...I don't even know what the gently caress) Also On Killing is underpinned basically by bullshit, as the studies by SLA Marshall showing US soldiers in WWII weren't firing their weapons were........not historically accurate (by that I mean they were more or less made up). Grossman's response when this was pointed out was basically "well none of his critics are published anymore, he's still revered in the Army, and I'm on the Commandant's Reading List and getting all sorts of speaking engagements, so suck it." Also Grossman has a hard on for saying that violence in our culture (specifically video games, more specifically first person shooters) is directly influencing kids to kill, to the point where he's in the pearl clutching camp of arguing that Doom was directly responsible for Columbine. I think it would be an understatement to call that line of thought problematic. On Killing is still worth reading, but go into it with eyes open and I wouldn't recommend his other stuff. Couple others, these are non-fiction The Village Bing West (Vietnam) This is arguably the definitive account of the Combined Action Platoons in Vietnam. The tl;dr is this was what we tried (briefly and incompletely) in Vietnam along the lines of COPs and local partnering before we said gently caress it and went full blown search and destroy. Fifteen Marines, a bunch of ill-equipped but (mostly) determined villagers, and the fight to keep their hamlet free from the VC. The book has been on the Commandant's Reading List for a long time, largely for its supposed counter-insurgency lessons. You'll notice that the operational approach pursued (local partnering + COP like strongholds) hasn't really worked out well in our current wars either because who knew, good tactics and operational art without a valid overarching grand strategy is pissing in the wind. Anyway, I'm not recommending it based on the COIN piece, I'm recommending it because I don't think there's been a book that has better captured the personal and often agonizing nature of that kind of way of fighting a war. The Marines suffer a 50% casualty rate...I won't spoil the end but I imagine you can guess how it turns out. When Thunder Rolled and Palace Cobra Ed Rasimus (Vietnam, Air War over North Vietnam) Ed Rasimus was a fighter pilot who did two tours in Vietnam, both flying over the North during heavy US airstrikes. His first one, When Thunder Rolled, is about him flying Thuds (big-rear end F-105s) during Rolling Thunder. More than any other book I've read, this book encapsulates the pointlessness of Vietnam at a higher level. Obviously all the books about infantry slogging through the jungle have a strong component of that, but for most of them it's a bigger leap between that and the overall strategic failure in the war. Rasimus makes that link much clearer....he has the means, himself, to destroy the SAM sites, AAA emplacements, and airfields that are responsible for shooting down his friends and killing them or consigning them to years of captivity, but he can't do anything about it in a lot of instances because it's against "the rules." And he and his buddies continue to fly North every day so they can blow up a "truck park" (jungle canopy likely without anything underneath it.) There's other books on the same subject that also make this point (Thud Ridge comes to mind), but none of them write as well as Rasimus. It's probably the single best account of flying a Thud in combat (really one of the best accounts of air combat, period), and Rasimus also gets into the dichotomy of the air war in Vietnam (or really most air wars in history)...launching out of a base in Thailand, flying north, risking his life in rather high-intensity aerial combat for 30 minutes, and then returning to a base where there's booze in the air-conditioned o-club and there's plenty of whorehouses just outside the gate. Palace Cobra is his book about his second tour, flying F-4s during Linebacker. Lots of the same stuff as When Thunder Rolled, with the added twist of being in an aerial campaign where the gloves are finally (mostly) off....but everyone knows the war is lost anyway, which is almost more depressing than the first one. However, they know they're bombing in part to get the POWs home. Those two together lend a certain heroic pathos to the whole thing. If you like When Thunder Rolled, pick up Palace Cobra, it's a short read and just as good. Also I mentioned Thud Ridge... Thud Ridge Jack Broughton (Vietnam, Air War over North Vietnam) Like I said, it's not written quite as well as either of Ed's books. However, there's a reason for that...the author was extremely pissed off while writing it. He was a Thud Vice Wing Commander during Rolling Thunder, couple of his pilots strafed a AAA emplacement that was firing on them, arguably in violation of the published ROE due to its proximity to a Soviet cargo ship. In order to prevent his pilots from being court-martialed for the ROE violation, he destroyed the gun camera footage. He admitted to the "crime" to avoid his guys going down for it, so he was convicted of destruction of government property, which was subsequently over-turned. However, by then he'd been relieved and banished to a do-nothing job in the Pentagon. He used that time to write Thud Ridge, which was subsequently published when he retired in 1968. So like I said, he was extremely pissed off while writing it, and it shows...which isn't necessarily a bad thing. Here's a quick write-up for Matterhorn (fiction) Matterhorn Karl Marlantes (Vietnam) If I had to sum up Matterhorn, I'd say it's the best book about Vietnam. Period. Fiction or non-fiction. Sebastian Junger called it "one of the most profound and devastating novels ever to come out of Vietnam—or any war." Marine Company builds a firebase, defends it, abandons it, and then has to retake it. But the strict story isn't the point....all the characters will probably be familiar to anyone in here, probably more than you would originally think. The writing is evocative in the best/worst ways...this was a 30 year labor of love for Marlantes, and it shows through on every page. He was a Yale graduate, Rhodes Scholar, Marine officer, and was awarded the Navy Cross, Bronze Star, two Purple Hearts, and a whole bunch of other poo poo. The book reflects that pedigree. And I'd just like to say that the US Air Force in TYOOL 2016 is arguably closer to making Catch-22 a reality than it has been at any time in its history (including the USAAC/USAAF) e: haven't read it yet, but might want to add Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk for consideration. Basically a satirical take-down of the support are troops phenomenon iyaayas01 fucked around with this message at 06:33 on Aug 17, 2016 |
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Aug 17, 2016 06:23
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| # ¿ May 17, 2024 19:17 |
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