In the rich and varied life stories in Under the Black Umbrella, elderly Koreans recall incidents that illustrate the complexities of Korea during the colonial period. Hildi Kang here reinvigorates a period of Korean history long shrouded in the silence of those who endured under the "black umbrella" of Japanese colonial rule.

Existing descriptions of the colonial period tend to focus on extremes: imperial repression and national resistance, Japanese subjugation and Korean suffering, Korean backwardness and Japanese progress. "Most people", Kang says", have read or heard only the horror stories which, although true, tell only a small segment of colonial life". The varied accounts in Under the Black Umbrella reveal a truth that is both more ambiguous and more human -- the small-scale, mundane realities of life in colonial Korea.

Accessible and attractive narratives, linked by brief historical overviews, provide a large and fully textured view of Korea under Japanese rule. Looking past racial hatred and repression, Kang reveals small acts of resistance carried out by Koreans, as well as gestures of fairness by Japanese colonizers. Impressive for the history it recovers and preserves, Under the Black Umbrella is a candid, human account of a complicated time in a contested place.

The detailed portrait of social change in the North China plain depicts how the world of the Chinese peasant evolved during an era of war and revolution and how it in turn shaped the revolutionary process. The authors spent a decade interviewing villagers and rural officials, exploring archives, and investigating villagers with diverse resources and cultural, traditions, and they vividly describe both the promise and the human tragedy of China’s rural revolution.   Exploring the decades before and after the establishment of the People’s Republic in 1949, they trace the growing economic desperation and cultural disintegration that led to the revolution, the reforms undertaken by the Communist leadership that initially brought economic gains and cultural healing, and the tensions that soon developed between party and peasantry. They show that the Communist antimarket and collectivist strategies which culminated in the imposed collectivization of 1955-56 and the disastrous Great Leap Forward of 1958-60, clashed with cherished peasant cultural norms and economic aspirations. Eventually the party’s attack on peasant values and interests, the authors find, produced a rupture that threatened both developmental and socialist goals and destroyed the democratic potential of the revolution at its best.

An extremely solid history of Indochina in the Viet Minh War era. Essentially a diplomatic history, but one that carefully weaves in developments on the battlefield. Makes use of new knowledge and is a useful corrective to some of the earlier works on the subject by the French. Recommended. Douglas Pike, Indochina Chronology"

In exploring the antiwar movement, tax and foreign economic policies, environmental and health care questions, and the space program, these essays demonstrate how domestic issues were critically affected by the Vietnam War and provide a fuller understanding of Johnson's vital but flawed legacy to the nation.

Operating from a clandestine camp on an island off western North Korea, Army lieutenant Ben Malcom coordinated the intelligence activities of eleven partisan battalions, including the famous White Tigers. With Malcom's experiences as its focus, White Tigers examines all aspects of guerrilla activities in Korea. This exciting memoir makes an important contribution to the history of special operations.

No one knows more about Osama bin Laden than Peter Bergen. In 1997, well before the world suddenly became aware of the world's most sought-after terrorist, Bergen met with him and has followed his activities ever since. In Bergen's own experience, bin Laden 'presented himself as a soft-spoken cleric, rather than as the firebreathing leader of a global terrorist organization.' Today, years after President Bush swore to get him dead or alive and despite haunting the popular imagination since September 11, 2001, bin Laden remains shrouded in mystery and obscured by a barrage of facts, details and myths. With numerous never-before-published interviews, THE OSAMA BIN LADEN I KNOW provides unprecedented insight into bin Laden's life and character drawing on the experiences of his most intimate acquaintances. This timely and important work - the only book of its kind - gives readers their first true, enduring look at the man who has declared the West his greatest enemy.

Now in its third edition, this classic study has been updated for the first time in more than twenty years.
Chaim Herzog, former President of Israel, was involved in every conflict involving Israel and its Arab neighbors from before the 1948 War of Independence. The Arab-Israeli Wars is Herzog's acclaimed history of Israel's fight since 1947 to preserve her existence against repeated attacks. Revised after his death by friend and colleague General Shomo Gazit, this new edition also covers the events of the past twenty years, including the pullout from Lebanon, both "intifadas, the first Gulf War, the Oslo Process, and beyond. Riveting, informative, and comprehensive, this authoritative account tells the story of Israel's struggle to survive but gives a clear picture of the people and politics that continue to shape the destiny of this crucial region.

On the eve of the twentieth century, few places were as exciting as Shanghai.  Once a wildness of swamps, Asia's "Sin City" evolved into a dazzling modern-day Babylon: redolent with the sickly sweet smell of opium; teeming with illicit sex, crime, and poverty; rife with corruption and glamorous wealth.  In this vibrant history, Stella Dong follows the rise and fall of the city's booming international port, gateway to China's heartland.  In intricate, colorful detail, she examines the misdeeds of its criminal underworld, the passions of its citizens decadent appetites, and the revolutionary spirit of its many political refugees.  Best of all, she captures the essence of the city as if it were a person who had lived a fascinating and tumultuous life.

Drafted into the Soviet Army in April 1984 and sent at the age of 19 to serve in Afghanistan as a minesweeper, Vladislav Tamarov turned in secret to the pen and the camera to chronicle his 621 days of war. Photographs depicting the haunted faces of both soldiers and civilians, the country's rugged yet beautiful mountain terrain, and the banality of daily life between missions are interspersed with Tamarov's unsentimental but passionate prose, in which he reveals his growing disorientation and assails his government's folly for engaging in a campaign that has been widely dubbed "the Soviet Vietnam."

First time in paperback, with a new Introduction and final chapter

World affairs expert and intrepid travel journalist Robert D. Kaplan braved the dangers of war-ravaged Afghanistan in the 1980s, living among the mujahidin—the “soldiers of god”—whose unwavering devotion to Islam fueled their mission to oust the formidable Soviet invaders. In Soldiers of God we follow Kaplan’s extraordinary journey and learn how the thwarted Soviet invasion gave rise to the ruthless Taliban and the defining international conflagration of the twenty-first century.

Kaplan returns a decade later and brings to life a lawless frontier. What he reveals is astonishing: teeming refugee camps on the deeply contentious Pakistan-Afghanistan border; a war front that combines primitive fighters with the most technologically advanced weapons known to man; rigorous Islamic indoctrination academies; a land of minefields plagued by drought, fierce tribalism, insurmountable ethnic and religious divisions, an abysmal literacy rate, and legions of war orphans who seek stability in military brotherhood. Traveling alongside Islamic guerrilla fighters, sharing their food, observing their piety in the face of deprivation, and witnessing their determination, Kaplan offers a unique opportunity to increase our understanding of a people and a country that are at the center of world events.

"Spence has broadened our perspectives and given greater depth to our visions of Chinese life."—Lucien W. Pye, China Quarterly.

"The risk of a fatal catastrophe was constant. The NVA was the enemy, but the ultimate opponent was, quite simply, death. . . ."
For assault helicopter crews flying in and around the NVA-infested DMZ, the U.S. pullout from Vietnam in 1970-71 was a desperate time of selfless courage. Now former army warrant officer Tom Marshall of the Phoenix, C Company, 158th Aviation Battalion, 101st Airborne, captures the deadly mountain terrain, the long hours flown under enormous stress, the grim determination of hardened pilots combat-assaulting through walls of antiaircraft fire, the pickups amid exploding mortar shells and hails of AK fire, the nerve-racking string extractions of SOG teams from North Vietnam. . . . And, through it all, the rising tension as helicopter pilots and crews are lost at an accelerating pace.
It is no coincidence that the Phoenix was one of the most highly decorated assault helicopter units in I Corps. For as the American departure accelerated and the enemy added new, more powerful antiaircraft weapons, the helicopter pilots, crew chiefs, and gunners paid the heavy price of withdrawal in blood. For more than 30 Percent of Tom Marshall's 130 helicopter-school classmates, the price of exit was their lives. . . .

What is "Chinese" about China's modern state? This book proposes that the state we see today has developed over the past two centuries largely as a response to internal challenges emerging from the late empire. Well before the Opium War, Chinese confronted such constitutional questions as: How does the scope of political participation affect state power? How is the state to secure a share of society's wealth? In response to the changing demands of the age, this agenda has been expressed in changing language. Yet, because the underlying pattern remains recognizable, the modernization of the state in response to foreign aggression can be studied in longer perspective.

The author offers three concrete studies to illustrate the constitutional agenda in action: how the early nineteenth-century scholar-activist Wei Yuan confronted the relation between broadened political participation and authoritarian state power; how the reformist proposals of the influential scholar Feng Guifen were received by mainstream bureaucrats during the 1898 reform movement; and how fiscal problems of the late empire formed a backdrop to agricultural collectivization in the 1950s. In each case, the author presents the "modern" constitutional solution as only the most recent answer to old Chinese questions. The book concludes by describing the transformation of the constitutional agenda over the course of the modern period.

From the 1910s to the mid-1930s, the flamboyant and gifted spiritualist Deguchi Onisaburo (1871-1948) transformed his mother-in-law's small, rural religious following into a massive movement, eclectic in content and international in scope. Through a potent blend of traditional folk beliefs and practices like divination, exorcism, and millenarianism, an ambitious political agenda, and skillful use of new forms of visual and mass media, he attracted millions to Oomoto, his Shintoist new religion. Despite its condemnation as a heterodox sect by state authorities and the mainstream media, Oomoto quickly became the fastest-growing religion in Japan of the time. In telling the story of Onisaburo and Oomoto, Nancy Stalker not only gives us the first full account in English of the rise of a heterodox movement in imperial Japan, but also provides new perspectives on the importance of "charismatic entrepreneurship" in the success of new religions around the world. She makes the case that these religions often respond to global developments and tensions (imperialism, urbanization, consumerism, the diffusion of mass media) in similar ways. They require entrepreneurial marketing and management skills alongside their spiritual authority if their groups are to survive encroachments by the state and achieve national/international stature. Their drive to realize and extend their religious view of the world ideally stems from a "prophet" rather than "profit" motive, but their activity nevertheless relies on success in the modern capitalist, commercial world. Unlike many studies of Japanese religion during this period, "Prophet Motive" works to dispel the notion that prewar Shinto was monolithically supportive of state initiatives and ideology.

The resistance group Hizbullah ('Party of God') formed in 1982 in response to Israel's 1982 invasion of Lebanon, and were instrumental in eventually forcing Israel to withdraw its troops altogether - thus ending a twenty-two-year-old military occupation. Many armed factions had sprung up in the face of Lebanon's descent into chaos, but few were as organised, disciplined, persistent and civic-minded as Hizbullah. In the 1990s, after many years functioning as both a guerrilla movement targeting the Israeli military on Lebanese soil and as a social-support provider to Lebanese victims of war, Hizbullah moved into mainstream parliamentary politics. Despite US condemnation of Hizbullah as a 'terrorist group', the party has never advocated attacking non-military targets, and was quick to condemn the events of September 11. Today they remain a force to be reckoned with on the Lebanese political scene.

While most people associate Japanese film with modern directors like Akira Kurosawa, Japan's cinema has a rich tradition going back to the silent era. Japan's "pure film movement" of the 1910s is widely held to mark the birth of film theory as we know it and is a touchstone for historians of early cinema. Yet this work has been difficult to access because so few prints have been preserved.

Joanne Bernardi offers the first book-length study of this important era, recovering a body of lost film and establishing its significance in the development of Japanese cinema. Building on a wealth of original-language sources -- much of it translated here for the first time -- she examines how the movement challenged the industry's dependence on pre-existing stage repertories, preference for lecturers over intertitles, and the use of female impersonators.

Bernardi provides in-depth analysis of key scripts -- The Glory of Life, A Father's Tears, Amateur Club, and The Lust of the White Serpent -- and includes translations in an appendix. These films offer case studies for understanding the craft of screenwriting during the silent era and shed light on such issues as genre, authorship and control, and gender representation.

"Writing in Light helps fill important gaps in the history of Japanese silent cinema. By identifying points at which "pure film" discourse merges with changing international trends and attitudes toward film, it offers an important resource for film, literary, and cultural historians.

This is a very important collection because it consists of internal political telegrams which were never intended for international, or even external, examination. These telegrams provide a rare glimpse into the system of administration and the style of leadership of Sultan (King) Abdul Aziz ibn Abdul Rahman ibn Saud, ruler of Nejd-Hedjaz/Saudi Arabia from 1925-1953, and founder of the State of Saudi Arabia. The documents selected for this set are unusual in that they all originate from a single record class, HW12. The documents in HW12 are derived from wireless messages intercepted by British intelligence operatives at the Government Code and Cypher School, a department that was an intelligence-gathering unit formed in 1919. The level of secrecy attached to them meant they were not circulated within Whitehall and they were only released in 1997, this therefore, is their first large-scale public exhibition.

Few nations have endured a birth as traumatic and painful as the world's youngest country, East Timor. Born amid the flames, pillage and mayhem that surrounded Indonesia's reluctant withdrawal in 1999, it will for years be coping with the effects of destruction. Irena Cristalis, one of a handful of foreign journalists who stayed on during that nightmare to report it to the world, has kept faith with the Timorese friends whose story she decided to tell. Her book is a first-hand account of the lives of individual Timorese during the long decades of Indonesia's repressive occupation, their often heroic struggle for freedom, and their efforts to cope with the dramatic historic shifts engulfing them. Based on years of research and lengthy interviews with East Timor's past, present and future leaders, it explores the complexities of East Timor's internal politics. The book also tells the story of the ordinary students, farmers, nuns, priests, journalists and others, who found themselves playing extraordinary roles in terrible times.

The first succinct and authoritative overview of the making of the modern Middle East, this lucid book brings a valuable mix of historical perspectives and contemporary analysis to a wide audience of readers seeking expert knowledge about this troubled and fascinating region. Giving a rich perspective on the region's historical and political evolution, the book traces the influence of factors such as religion, culture, and economics and illuminates events and topics currently in the news. With its broad thematic sweep and its balanced presentation of contentious issues, it is essential reading for general readers and students who want to better understand the world today. Mehran Kamrava sets the stage with a concise discussion of the evolution of Islam and the religion's profound role in the region. He then looks at, in turn, the rise and fall of the Ottomans, the trials of independence and state-building, the emergence and fiery spread of nationalism, the two Arab-Israeli wars of 1967 and 1974, the Iranian Revolution, and the two Gulf Wars and beyond, including discussion of the invasion of Iraq by the United States. After tracing the consequences of these historical events for a host of political phenomena, Kamrava gives detailed attention to three pivotal issues: the challenges of economic development, the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, and the question of democracy. He also examines issues that will shape the future: population growth, environmental pollution, and water scarcity.

This monograph deals with issues of concern in the rewriting of the 20th century history of Mongolia. It provides interpretations of the activity of the Third Communist International (the 'Comintern') in Central Asia and of the politics of Soviet Russia towards the East, using original research based on previously inaccessible material from the Comintern archives. The book covers the 1920s and 1930s, when Mongolian society was in transition from a theocratic monarchy to a republic. It describes the strategies of non-capitalist development undertaken in order to build socialism, and illuminates the political, military and economic aspects of Mongol-Soviet relations. Particular emphasis is placed on the way the Comintern and Moscow interfered in the political struggles among the Mongolian elite, and determined the policy of social transformation in this nomadic society. The emergence of the Mongolian People's Revolutionary Party, its coming to power, and its complete domination of the capital city and peripheral regions is decribed in detail. The politics of the MPRP towards the Buddhist monasteries and lamas is also given special attention. The central issue of the work is the problem of Mongolian nationalism and the tactics employed by the Comintern in dealing with it. A wide and useful bibliography is included and the book is illustrated with contemporary photographs of Mongolian revolutionaries and of Comintern activists in Mongolia. This book is No.3 in the Inner Asia Book Series, published for the Mongolia and Inner Asia Studies Unit at the University of Cambridge under the general editorship of Professor Caroline Humphrey. The Series is an adjunct to the journal Inner Asia from the same Unit.