Great Lakes Holocaust is the first in two volumes covering military operations in Zaire - as the Congo was named from 1971 until 1997 - and the Democratic Republic of Congo at the turn of the 21st century. This volume explores the events of the 1980s and 1990s in Rwanda and Uganda, which eventually spilled over the borders into Zaire, resulting in one of the worst tragedies ever to befall an African region. The narrative traces the ascent of crucial Rwandan, Congolese and Ugandan military and political figures, and their connections within influential business and political circles in and outside Africa. It examines the build-up of the Zairian military under the government of dictator Mobutu Sese Seko in the 1960s and 1970s, and provides an in-depth study into reasons for its near-collapse in the early 1990s. The military build-up of Rwanda and Uganda is discussed in detail as is their planning for operations inside Zaire, and the global logistic tail that provided the Rwandan military, particularly, but also most of its opponents, with a capability of not only waging war beyond their borders, but - in the case of Rwanda - of invading and practically conquering a country the size of Western Europe or the USA east of the Mississippi. The book further traces the covert Rwandan military actions inside Zaire, initially run under the guise of an insurgency by one of Zaire's ethnic minorities; how ever-deepening Rwandan operations inside Zaire were practically dictated by concentrations of Hutu refugees; and how the insurgency - led by Laurent-Desire Kabila who was installed by key Rwandan and Ugandan military and political figures - developed into an organization that sought autonomy from the military and political dictates of Rwanda, in turn delivering a direct reason for the Second Congo War which was fought from 1998-2003.

In "Counterstrike", Eric Schmitt and Thom Shanker of "The New York Times" take readers into a previously hidden theater of war, as U.S. ground troops, intelligence operatives, and top executive branch officials have fashioned effective new strategies to fight terrorism, in sharp contrast to the cowboy slogans that once characterized the U.S. government's public posture. They show how these innovative strategies, drawn from classic Cold War deterrence theory, were employed in the dramatic raid in which Osama bin Laden was killed, and in a new afterword the authors point to the on-going challenges and successes facing America in the Middle East, in cyberspace, and at home.

In this story from the frontlines of the undeclared battlefields of the War on Terror, journalist Jeremy Scahill documents the new paradigm of American foreign policy: fought far from any declared battlefield, by units that do not officially exist, in thousands of operations a month that are never publicly acknowledged. From Afghanistan and Pakistan to Yemen, Somalia and beyond, independent journalist Scahill speaks to the CIA agents, mercenaries and elite Special Operations Forces operators who populate the dark side of the many wars Obama's government is fighting. He goes deep into al Qaeda - held territory in Yemen and walks the streets of Mogadishu with CIA-backed warlords. We also meet the survivors of U.S. night raids and drone strikes - including families of U.S. citizens targeted for assassination by their own government - who reveal the human consequences of the dirty wars the United States struggles to keep hidden.

Indian Defence Review (IDR) is India's best-known defense journal. Over the year the journal has attained the "most quoted" status by defense and security analysts worldwide. The journal offers an incisive analysis of defense and politico-security affairs focused on Asia.returncharacterreturncharacterIn addition to defense and security analyses, each issue includes regular feature sections on aerospace trends, naval affairs, and army force developments, including the latest arms transfers and news.returncharacterreturncharacterIndian Defence Review, a quarterly journal, is read by almost all leading policy makers at senior bureaucratic, political and military levels. Time and again, the incisive analyses in the Indian Defence Review have helped form opinions and shape strategic responses on the subcontinent.

The United States has struggled to define its approach to what has been called the information battlefield since the information era began. Yet with the outbreak of the war on terror, the United States has been violently challenged to take a position and react to the militants use of emerging information technology. Ideological demigods operating against the United States now have unprecedented channels by which to disseminate their message to those targets who are uncertain, sympathetic, or actively supportive of their philosophy. From the caves of southeastern Afghanistan to the streets of Baghdad, the message has dominated the thinking of those who perpetrate horrific acts of violence, whether in the name of ideology, ethnic and sectarian partisanship, or religion.This anthology is divided into four sections: geopolitical, strategic, operational, and tactical. The geopolitical perspective covers world politics, diplomacy, and the elements of national power, excluding military force. The strategic view examines where the violence has begun and the military element of power. The operational perspective handles the campaigns to accomplish a specific purpose on the world stage for example, as in the Iraq campaign. The tactical level takes the individual s role into account. Because the nexus of information conflict is most easily seen in the world s contemporary violent confrontations, this anthology reflects the experience and lessons learned by military personnel who have managed these difficult issues. With a foreword by Colonel H. R. McMaster, U.S. Army, the author of "Dereliction of Duty: Johnson, McNamara, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the Lies That Led to Vietnam."

When many Americans hear that the US may go to war against another nation, they tend to believe there's probably a good reason for it or that no viable alternatives exist-or they don't think about it at all. They trust their leaders to represent them and defend their values. They accept their leaders' claims that war is to ensure their safety when others wish to harm them. The parties of war play on Americans' basic values to bring them online. The media reassures them that the reasons for war are altruistic- that Americans wish to spread democracy and allow others to adopt their way of life. But is this the case? With 24 compelling illustrations, maps and graphs, this book is intended to serve as a tool for peace advocacy. Well known peace advocates respond to 19 of the most common illusions held by the American public which weaken their opposition to Washington's wars. "The American way of war offers a nonstop supply of illusions-while imposing horrific realities far away and, ultimately, at home too. This book is intent on dispelling key illusions and coming to terms with human realities. Between the covers of American Wars, the result is a compendium of insights and hard-won knowledge of the sort you' ll rarely find in the daily paper or the evening news. The writers are myth-busters who challenge the conventional lack of wisdom that drags the United States into one war after another and keeps us lethally mired in a warfare state. This collection provides us with an array of vital perspectives, opening up a crucial topic that usually remains shut down- what American wars are doing to humanity, under false pretenses and with calamitous results, around the world and in our own neighborhoods. The future is at stake. This book helps us to understand the perils and opportunities of the present moment. -NORMAN SOLOMON, author of War Made Easy "With the War on Terror threatening to go on for decades, it's critical for Americans to examine the myriad ways our government has tricked us into supporting unjust wars, with catastrophic consequences for all sides. American Wars uncovers a tragic pattern that must be broken. Read it and act." -MEDEA BENJAMIN, Code Pink "This country needs a moral revolution where supporting work for peace and justice is not seen as weakness. The voices heard in this work truly "speak truth to power." This book addresses issues that will empower the reader to more fully appreciate the ethical challenges America faces and to effectively participate in this change. Its accessibility will attract, inform and inspire the next generation of peace activists." -RAY PARRISH, Vietnam Veterans Against the War

From the controversial expert who brought Iran's nuclear program to the attention of the world in 2002 comes a searing expose of the inner workings and plans of Iran's mullahs. With access to dissident groups inside Iran, Alireza Jafarzadeh traces President Ahmadinejad's radical roots and involvement in terror attacks to his impact on Iran's weapons program. He reveals new details on Iran's meddling in Iraq and its broader goals for the future of the Middle East. This is the most authoritative account to date of the looming threat Iran poses to the United States and the Gulf region. Readers will learn for the first time: *President Ahmadinejad's radical past as a feared torturer of political prisoners and his zealous mission to deliver the regime its first nuclear bomb *The chilling trend of the military's increasing control of the nuclear program *How Ahmadinejad was handpicked by Iran's mullahs to help create an Islamic Republic in Iraq *The latest covert actions to bury nuclear facilities in tunnels *The story of the front companies Iran used to buy its nuclear technology undetected *The author's original and insightful policy options to end the Iranian threat

At the end of World War I, the United States Army-despite its recent experience with trenches, machine guns, barbed wire, airplanes, and even tanks-maintained a horse-mounted cavalry from a bygone era. From the end of World War I until well into World War II, senior leaders remained convinced that traditional cavalry units were useful in reconnaissance, and horses retained a leading role. Months into World War II, the true believers in the utility of the horses had their hopes shattered as the last horse cavalry units either dismounted to fight as infantry or traded their oat-eating horses for gasoline-guzzling iron ponies. The horse belonged to the past, and the armored truck was the way of the future. Morton has examined myriad official records, personal papers, doctrine, and professional discourse from an era of intense debate about the future of the U.S. Cavalry. He has captured the emotion of the conflict that ultimately tore the branch apart by examining the views of famous men such as George S. Patton, Jr., Lesley J. McNair, George C. Marshall, and Adna R. Chaf-fee, Jr. More importantly, Morton brings new light to lesser-known figures-John K. Herr, I. D. White, Lucian K. Truscott, Willis D. Crittenberger, Charles L. Scott, and William S. Biddle-who played equally important roles in shaping the future of the U.S. Cavalry and in determining what function it would play during World War II. At the heart of Men on Iron Ponies are the myriad questions about how to equip, train, and organize for a possible future war, all the while having to retain some flexibility to deal with war as it actually happens. Morton goes beyond the explanation of what occurred between the world wars by showing how the debate about the nature of the next war impacted the organization and doctrine that the reformed U.S. Cavalry would employ on the battlefields of North Africa, Italy, the beaches of Normandy, and through the fighting in the Ardennes to the link-up with Soviet forces in the heart of Germany. Leaders then, as now, confronted tough questions. What would the nature of the next war be? What kind of doctrine would lend itself to future battlefields? What kind of organization would best fulfill doctrinal objectives, once established, and what kind of equipment should that organization have? The same challenges face Army leaders today as they contemplate the nature of the next war.

After drilling troops during the American Revolution, Baron Friedrich von Steuben reportedly noted that although one could tell a Prussian what to do and expect him to do it, one had to tell an American why he ought to do something before he would comply. Although such individualistic thinking is part of the democratic genius of American society, it also complicates efforts to train and educate citizen-soldiers.

For more than three decades, the U.S. Army's "Troop Information" program used films, radio programs, pamphlets, and lectures to stir patriotism and spark contempt for the enemy. Christopher S. DeRosa examines soldiers' formal political indoctrination, focusing on the political training of draftees and short-term volunteers from 1940 to 1973.

DeRosa draws on the records of the army and the Department of Defense's information offices, the content of the indoctrination materials themselves, and soldiers' recollections in analyzing the political messages the nation conveyed to its army during three decades of conscription. He examines how the program took root as an army institution, how its technique evolved over time, and how it interacted with the larger American political culture. In so doing, he explores the implications of trying to impose a political consensus on the army of a democracy.

"War," wrote Gen. William T. Sherman, "is cruelty, and you cannot refine it." Throughout history, noncombatants have always been among the victims of war's violence. In this book, nine distinguished historians examine twenty-five hundred years of human conflicts and their varied impacts on civilian society. Each case study examines not only what military forces did to noncombatants in the area of their operations, but why they did it and how they justified their actions. The focus, however, remains firmly on the practical realities of war, not on normative theories or the prescriptions of the "laws of war."

The patterns that emerge from the nine case studies are not simple ones. Some of the same factors and pressures appear again and again, though the balance among them and the ultimate outcome vary greatly. We see how often devastation has served as a tool of coercive diplomacy, but also how logistic considerations have greatly affected the calculus of pillage versus restraint. The importance of precedent, of culture, of ideology or morality, and of morale become clear.

This book addresses crucial issues in an era in which historians have come to appreciate that a full understanding of war must address its victims as well as its victors, and when policymakers are perhaps more concerned than ever with minimizing the impact of war on civilian society.

The Year 1932 was not only the year in which the famous carnival of Rio de Janeiro was organized for the first time, or the giant statue of the Christ the Redeemer was placed on top of the Corcovado mountain ridge: tragically, it was also the year of the last civil war fought in Brazil. On 9 July 1932, about 35,000 men from two Brazilian federal states - Sao Paulo and Mato Grosso do Sul - rose in arms against the dictatorship of Getulio Vargas, demanding the return to constitutionality and democracy. This movement became known as the 'Constitutionalist', while its members became known as the 'Paulistas'. The Brazilian government reacted with brute force: it deployed over 100,000 troops supported by heavy artillery and combat aircraft. The result was the biggest war ever fought in Brazil: the first ever campaign to see strategic aerial bombardment conducted in the Americas; the first aircraft shot down in air combat, and the first to see night bombing operations. Following three months of bitter fighting - which often degenerated into trench warfare - the Paulistas were defeated. Indeed, the end of this conflict brought to the end a period of successive civil wars fought in Brazil since 1889. The Paulista War - the first authoritative account of this conflict ever published in the English language - provides a blow-by-blow account of both aerial and ground combat operations. It is lavishly illustrated with a collection of authentic photographs and exclusive colour profiles, and as such is an indispensable source of reference about this crucial moment in the history of the largest country in South America.

At the dawn of the twentieth century, observers heralded a new era of social progress, seemingly limitless technological advances, and world peace. But within only a few years, the world was perched on the brink of war, revolution, and human misery on an unprecedented scale. Is it possible that today, in the early twenty-first century, we are on the verge of similar, tumultuous times? Blending a detailed knowledge of international security affairs with history, philosophy, psychology, and literature, Th?r?se Delpech vividly reminds us of the signs and warnings that were missed as the "civilized" world failed to prevent both world wars, the Holocaust, Soviet death camps, and Cambodian killing fields that made the twentieth century so deadly. Drawing a parallel between 1905 and 2005, Delpech warns that it could happen again in this current era of increasing international violence and global lawlessness. She looks ahead to imagine various scenarios and regions that could become flashpoints in the future. Winner of the 2005 Prix Femina de l'essai. Praise for the original French edition, L'Ensauvagement "One doesn't know what to admire most in this book: the precision of information, the scope of reference, the originality of the approach..." --Le Nouvel Observateur "From Iranian nuclear ambitions to the Taiwan question, Delpech reviews all the situations which might lead mankind to succumb to the perennial temptation of savagery --a passionate and lucid book." --L'argus de la presse "L'ensauvagement transcends its surface content, articulating great hope that our reason and will might take hold and overcome unreason." --Politique ?trang?re "Combining introspection and prediction, geopolitics and philosophy, Th?r?se Delpech has issued a warning cry." --Politique Internationale

This book deals with a series of military operations that occurred in Portugal in 1762 and 1763, during the Seven Years' War, and which have been largely dismissed by the historiography. They are collectively called the Guerra Fantastica ,'Fantastical War', given the fact that the military units of the countries involved carried out multiple movements while not engaging in any battle. This work begins with an introduction to the phenomenon of war as a whole, to the environment in Europe at the time, and to the military framework of the conflict. It then describes the events that led to the participation of Portugal in the Seven Years' War and the way in which the conflict in Portugal began. It continues with a presentation of the various forces involved. For this purpose, it analyses in detail the weakness of the Portuguese army, the military reinforcements that were obtained from England, and the arrival in Portugal of the Count of Lippe, whom the King of England had recommended to the King of Portugal to be the commander of the forces, given his recognized ability for the task. It proceeds with an account of the events of the war, starting with an analysis of the invasion of the North of Portugal by the Spanish army and its later withdrawal to Spain. It continues with a description of how the Spanish army, once strengthened by French units, again invaded Portuguese territory, and the events that occurred until its second withdrawal. Despite the numerical superiority of the Bourbon army, the difficulties of the terrain, the efficient command of the Count of Lippe, and the manoeuvres of the Anglo-Portuguese army prevented it from reaching victory and forced its return to Spain. The book is an important piece of research, based on archival material. It explores contemporary correspondence between the Court of Spain and the commanders of the force that invaded Portugal, which is available at the Archive of Simancas. It makes use, moreover, of the correspondence between the Secretary of State of Portugal, the Count of Oeiras, and the Count of Lippe, and between the latter and his subordinate commanders, which is extant at the Military Historical Archive of Lisbon. At the same time, this work is reader-friendly, integrating several notes and original documents that help clarify certain of its major points, as well as a list of the units that participated in the military operations.

Like most members of the professional military freemasonry, Slim came to admire "all the soldiers of different races who have fought with me and most of those who have fought against me." Among the most likable of his enemies were the Wazirs of India's Northwest Frontier. In 1920, Slim took part in a retaliatory raid on an obscure village. It was an unusually easy victory over the canny Wazirs, whom the British took by surprise and escaped from with scant loss. Afterwards, in the casual frontier way, the British sent a message to the Wazirs, expressing surprise at the enemy's unusually poor shooting. The Wazirs replied in courtly fashion that their rifles were Short Magazine Lee-Enfields captured in previous fights with the British and that they had failed to sight the guns to accord with a new stock of ammunition. Now, having calculated the adjustment, they would be delighted to demonstrate their bull's-eye accuracy any time the British wanted. "One cannot help feeling," Slim says, "that the fellows who wrote that ought to be on our side." Slim genuinely enjoyed his virtually blood-free skirmishes with such foes as the Turks, the Wazirs and the Italians in 1940 Ethiopia.

Steel My Soldiers' Hearts is the story, from D-Day to the armistice, of a Canadian tank man who fought the campaign in Northwest Europe at the sharp end - told from the fighting man's perspective. The armoured war involved the main battles for which WWII was famous: the Normandy landing; the battles to defend the beachhead; the fighting for Caen and Falaise; the pursuit across France and the Low Countries; the "Market Garden" exercise to capture the Rhine bridges at Arnhem; the Siegfried Line penetration and finally the Rhine crossing before the march deep into Germany. Stewart's personal war also involved the loss of three tanks and many gallant comrades. To accomplish their feats, the author and his colleagues had to "steel their hearts" indeed.
This book contains comments (in separate chapters) which could have been made by officers in their messes, postulated via the author's knowledge of the history of WWII. However, since the author was not an officer during the war, these chapters are pure fancy, and this is why the work is called a novel - not an autobiography. The stories are exactly as Stewart experienced them, and the names are of people, many still alive, that were with the author.

Philip D. Beidler, who served as an armored cavalry platoon leader in Vietnam, sees lees and less of the hard-won perspective of the common soldier in what America has made of that war. Each passing year, he says, dulls out sense of immediacy about Vietnam's costs, opening wider the temptation to make it something more necessary, neatly contained, and justifiable than it should ever become. Here Beidler draws on deeply personal memories to reflect on the war's lingering aftereffects and the shallow, evasive ways we deal with them. Beidler brings back the war he knew in chapters on its vocabulary, music, literature, and film. His catalog of soldier slang reveals how finely a tour of Vietnam could hone one's sense of absurdity. His survey of the war's pop hits looks for meaning in the soundtrack many veterans still hear in their heads. Beidler also explains how "Viet Pulp" literature about snipers, tunnel rats, and other hard-core types has pushed aside masterpieces like Duong Thu Huong's "Novel without a Name. Likewise we learn why the movie "The Deer Hunter doesn't "get it" about Vietnam but why "Platoon or "We Were Soldiers sometimes nearly do. As Beidler takes measure of his own wartime politics and morals, he ponders the divergent careers of such figures as William Calley, the army lieutenant whose name is synonymous with the civilian massacre at My Lai; and an old friend, poet John Balaban, a conscientious objector who performed alternative duty in Vietnam as a schoolteacher and hospital worker. Beidler also looks at Vietnam alongside other conflicts--including the war on international terrorism. He once hoped, he says, that Vietnam had fractured our sense of providential destinyand geopolitical invincibility but now realizes, with dismay, that those myths are still with us. "Americans have always wanted their apocalypses," writes Beidler, "and they have always wanted them now."

This second volume in the two-volume series Rethinking the Russo-Japanese War, 1904-5, comprises nineteen chapters and is largely based on the papers presented at a special conference convened at Nichinan, Kyushu, Japan, in 2005. Importantly, it brings together a set of original essays by Japanese, Korean and Chinese scholars, together with analyses by Russian, US and European specialists, thereby reflecting the multinational mix of contemporary influences forming the international vortex of the war. The contributions are thematically structured into six topics: The Force of Personality, Facets of Neutrality, The Power of Intelligence, Interior Lines, Gender and Race, and Global Repercussions. Above all, through the use of primary sources which could not be readily accessed by contemporaries, the contributors have sought to highlight the setting of the conflict in the development of international politics and strategic thinking in the twentieth century, but at the same time eliciting fresh perspectives on the human experiences and dilemmas which impacted on different individuals and groups during the course of the war.

Edmund Candler was the correspondent of the correspondent of the Daily Mail who accompanied the British expeditionary forces that in 1903. He provides an eyewitness account of Great Britain's first and last military incursion in to the forbidden land on the roof of the world .The British expedition to Tibet in 1903 and 1904, led by Sir Frances seeking to prevent the Russian Empire from interfering in Tibetan affairs and thus gaining a foothold in one of the buffer states surrounding British India.

'Breathtakingly, brutally and hilariously honest. This is the finest book about youth and war I've ever read.' -Clinton McKinzie, bestselling author of Crossing the Line 'The sergeant major, right after he told us at Fleibel's funeral that nobody owed us anything and took back the medals he had given us, he told us, all of us, that it's our duty to tell our Army story. That there was a lot of negative publicity out there circulating about the Army and that each one of us has an Army story within them, and it was our responsibility to have it be told. I'm not sure that this is the story the sergeant major had in mind, but he didn't specify, he just told us to tell our story.' When the 9/11 terrorist attacks took place, Johnny Rico was well into his twenties, with a masters degree and a dead-end job. Inspired by this terrible event, Rico decided to join the Army, not so much out of patriotism as a desire to find purpose in his life. Far from being a star soldier, the author found himself assigned to the worst unit in the army. Rico joined the hunt for the Taliban in Afghanistan. Unconvinced by what he saw around him, yet fully aware that a dangerous enemy was never far away, the author became increasingly cynical about the US Army's role in Afghanistan. The Story I Was Ordered to Write is a compelling tale, written with great honesty and humour. About the Author Johnny Rico graduated from the University of Colorado in 2001. A month after September 11, 2001, he joined the Army under the delayed entry program. He was sent to Afghanistan with C. Company, 2nd Battalion, 5th Infantry, of the 25th Infantry (Light) Division in Hawaii, where he served as an infantryman in three different areas of operation. He was released from active duty in September 2005.

Despite the growing number of publications on the Russo-Japanese War, an abundance of questions and issues related to this topic remain unsolved, or call for a reexamination. This 30-chapter volume, the first in the two-volume project Rethinking the Russo-Japanese War, provides a comprehensive reexamination of the origins of the conflict, the various dimensions of the nineteen-month conflagration, the legacy of the war, and its place in the history of the twentieth century. Such an enterprise is not only timely but unique. It has benefited from a multinational team of thirty-two scholars from twelve nations representing a broad disciplinary background. The majority of them focus on topics never researched before and without exception provide a novel and critical view of the war. This reexamination is, of course, facilitated by a century-long perspective as well as an impressive assortment of primary and secondary sources, many of them unexplored and, in a number of cases, unavailable earlier.

"From Pusan to Panmunjom" is the candid and revealing wartime memoir of the soldier who, at the age of thirty-two, became South Korea's first four-star general. It brings an unprecedented perspective to a cataclysmic war.

In the vast body of material dealing with Custer's ""last stand,"" the journal kept by young Lieutenant James H. Bradley of the Seventh Infantry is at once graphic, incisive, and of first-rate historical importance. It is also little known.It records in detail the major incidents of the march of the Montana Column, under command of Colonel John Gibbon, to participate in the Sioux campaign of 1876. Beginning on March 17, when five companies of the regiment left Fort Shaw, it traces the progress of the column and ends abruptly with the entry for June 26, when Gibbon's command camped on the site of present Crow Agency, Montana, amid abundant indications that Custer's Seventh Cavalry had met with disaster. A letter written by Bradley describing the finding of the bodies on the Custer battlefield on the Little Big Horn is appended to provide a fitting conclusion. Bradley's journal, however, is much more than an account of a military command moving through unsettled country against a primitive foe. The Lieutenant was a gifted writer with definite scientific and historical interests, a man of infinite curiosity, who not only recorded the daily progress but also added ""historical notices of the country traversed."" His description of the grief of the Crow scouts on hearing the first news of the disaster of the Little Big Horn is a classic in the literature of the American West. A rare treat for all readers interested in the Indian wars, the journal was first published in a limited edition in 1896.

The SIPRI Yearbook is as an authoritative and independent source of data and analysis on armaments, disarmament and international security. It provides an overview of developments in international security, weapons and technology, military expenditure, arms production and the arms trade, and armed conflicts and conflict management, along with efforts to control conventional, nuclear, chemical and biological weapons. This 50th edition of the SIPRI Yearbook covers developments during 2018, including - Armed conflicts and conflict management, with an overview of armed conflicts and peace processes as well as a focus on global and regional trends in peace operations - Military expenditure, international arms transfers and developments in arms production, - World nuclear forces, with an overview of each of the nine nuclear-armed states and their nuclear modernization programmes - Nuclear arms control, featuring North Korean-US nuclear diplomacy, developments in the INF Treaty and Russian-US nuclear arms control and disarmament, and implementation of Iran's nuclear deal - Chemical and biological security threats, including the investigation of allegations of chemical weapon use in the Middle East and the attempted assassination in the United Kingdom - Conventional arms control, with a focus on global instruments, including efforts to regulate lethal autonomous weapon systems and explosive weapons in populated areas, and dialogue on international cyber security - Dual-use and arms trade controls, including developments in the Arms Trade Treaty, multilateral arms embargoes and export control regimes, including the challenges of seeking to control transfers of technology as well as annexes listing arms control and disarmament agreements, international security cooperation bodies, and key events in 2018.

Some will be shocked to find out that the United States and Ho Chi Minh, our nemesis for much of the Vietnam War, were once allies. Indeed, during the last year of World War II, American spies in Indochina found themselves working closely with Ho Chi Minh and other anti-colonial factions - compelled by circumstances to fight together against the Japanese. Dixee Bartholomew-Feis reveals how this relationship emerged and operated and how it impacted Vietnam's struggle for independence. The men of General William Donovan's newly-formed Office of Strategic Services closely collaborated with communist groups in both Europe and Asia against the Axis enemies. In Vietnam, this meant that OSS officers worked with Ho Chi Minh and the Viet Minh, whose ultimate aim was to rid the region of all imperialist powers, not just the Japanese. Ho, for his part, did whatever he could to encourage the OSS's negative view of the French, who were desperate to regain their colony. Revealing details not previously known about their covert operations, Bartholomew-Feis chronicles the exploits of these allies as they developed their network of informants, sabotaged the Japanese occupation's infrastructure, conducted guerrilla operations, and searched for downed American fliers and Allied POWs. Although the OSS did not bring Ho Chi Minh to power, Bartholomew-Feis shows that its apparent support for the Viet Minh played a significant symbolic role in helping them fill the power vacuum left in the wake of Japan's surrender. Her study also hints that, had America continued to champion the anti-colonials and their quest for independence, rather than caving in to the French, we might have been spared our long and very lethal war in Vietnam. Based partly on interviews with surviving OSS agents who served in Vietnam, Bartholomew-Feis's engaging narrative and compelling insights speak to the yearnings of an oppressed people - and remind us that history does indeed make strange bedfellows.|Some will be shocked to find out that the United States and Ho Chi Minh, our nemesis for much of the Vietnam War, were once allies. This book reveals how this relationship emerged and operated and how it impacted Vietnam's struggle for independence.