* Longlisted for the HWA Debut Crown Longlist 2022 * 'A stunning achievement' TLS 'Unforgettable' Nguyen Phan Que Mai, author of The Mountains Sing As the Korean independence movement gathers pace, two children meet on the streets of Seoul. Fate will bind them through decades of love and war. They just don't know it yet. It is 1917, and Korea is under Japanese occupation. With the threat of famine looming, ten-year-old Jade is sold by her desperate family to Miss Silver's courtesan school in the bustling city of Pyongyang. As the Japanese army tears through the country, she is forced to flee to the southern city of Seoul. Soon, her path crosses with that of an orphan named JungHo, a chance encounter that will lead to a life-changing friendship. But when JungHo is pulled into the revolutionary fight for independence, Jade must decide between following her own ambitions and risking everything for the one she loves. Sweeping through five decades of Korean history, Juhea Kim's sparkling debut is an intricately woven tale of love stretched to breaking point, and two people who refuse to let go.

G-DAY, Rendezvous with Eagles is a 20th Anniversary reflection on Operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm as seen through the eyes of 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault) Forward Observer, Stephen Wiehe. G-DAY details the critical missions and movements of the First Battalion of the historic 502nd Infantry Regiment during the Gulf War as well as the soldier 's day-to-day activities. G-DAY, Rendezvous with Eagles has been declared by the Don F. Pratt Museum as the best first person narrative of the Gulf War and has been included in the museum at Fort Campbell, Kentucky.

During two decades of fighting in Afghanistan, U.S. service members confronted numerous challenges in their mission to secure the country from the threat of al-Qaeda and the Taliban and assist in rebuilding efforts. Because the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan occurred simultaneously, much of the American public conflated them or failed to notice the Afghanistan War; and most of the war's archival material remains classified and closed to civilian researchers. Drawing on interviews and letters home, this book relates the Afghanistan War through the experiences of American troops, with firsthand accounts of both combat and humanitarian operations, the environment, living conditions and interactions with the locals.

A highly entertaining account of a young woman who went straight from her college sorority to the CIA, where she hunted terrorists and WMDs Reads like the show bible for Homeland only her story is real. --Alison Stewart, WNYC A thrilling tale...Walder's fast-paced and intense narrative opens a window into life in two of America's major intelligence agencies --Publishers Weekly (starred review) When Tracy Walder enrolled at the University of Southern California, she never thought that one day she would offer her pink beanbag chair in the Delta Gamma house to a CIA recruiter, or that she'd fly to the Middle East under an alias identity. The Unexpected Spy is the riveting story of Walder's tenure in the CIA and, later, the FBI. In high-security, steel-walled rooms in Virginia, Walder watched al-Qaeda members with drones as President Bush looked over her shoulder and CIA Director George Tenet brought her donuts. She tracked chemical terrorists and searched the world for Weapons of Mass Destruction. She created a chemical terror chart that someone in the White House altered to convey information she did not have or believe, leading to the Iraq invasion. Driven to stop terrorism, Walder debriefed terrorists--men who swore they'd never speak to a woman--until they gave her leads. She followed trails through North Africa, Europe, and the Middle East, shutting down multiple chemical attacks. Then Walder moved to the FBI, where she worked in counterintelligence. In a single year, she helped take down one of the most notorious foreign spies ever caught on American soil. Catching the bad guys wasn't a problem in the FBI, but rampant sexism was. Walder left the FBI to teach young women, encouraging them to find a place in the FBI, CIA, State Department or the Senate--and thus change the world.

NEW PAPERBACK EDITION ' Salmon' s vivid use of recollections and dramatic quotes brings alive an unjustly forgotten conflict' Time Out With even World War II now just on the edges of living memory, and with British forces now engaged in a lengthy, brutal and attritional old-fashioned war in Afghanistan, historical attention is starting to turn to the Korean War of the early 1950s. And remarkably, the most notorious and celebrated battle in that conflict, from a British point of view, has never previously been written about at length. Andrew Salmon' s book, which has garnered excellent reviews and sold out two hardback printings already, has filled that gap. This is the story of the Battle of the Imjin River, when the British 29th Infantry Brigade, and above all the " Glorious Glosters" of the Gloster Regiment, fought an epic last stand against the largest communist offensive of the war. It lasted three days, of bitter hand-to-hand combat. By the end of it one battalion of the Glosters - some 750 men - had been reduced to just 50 survivors. Andrew Salmon' s definitive history, which gained excellent reviews in hardback and sold very steadily, is very much in the Antony Beevor mould: accessible, pacy, narrative, and painting a moving and exciting picture through the extensive use of eyewitness accounts of veterans, of whom he has tracked down and interviewed dozens. Andrew Salmon is a Seoul-based journalist who writes for The Times, The Washington Times, and Forbes magazine. He first became fascinated by the battle in 2001 when he met British veterans returning to the Imjin River to mark the 50th anniversary.

Comic books have presented fictional and fact-based stories of the Korean War, as it was being fought and afterward. Comparing these comics with events that inspired them offers a deeper understanding of the comics industry, America's "forgotten war," and the anti-comics movement, championed by psychiatrist Fredric Wertham, who criticized their brutalization of the imagination. Comics--both newsstand offerings and government propaganda--used fictions to justify the unpopular war as necessary and moral. This book examines the dramatization of events and issues, including the war's origins, germ warfare, brainwashing, Cold War espionage, the nuclear threat, African Americans in the military, mistreatment of POWs, and atrocities.

In this fully illustrated introduction, Dr Carter Malkasian provides a concise overview of the so-called "Forgotten War" in Korea. From 1950 to 1953, the most powerful countries in the world engaged in a major conventional war in Korea. Yet ironically this conflict has come to be known as the USA's "Forgotten War." Esteemed historian Dr Carter Malkasian explains how this conflict in a small peninsula in East Asia had a tremendous impact on the entire international system and the balance of power between the two superpowers, America and Russia. In this illustrated history, he examines how the West demonstrated its resolve to thwart Communist aggression and the armed forces of China, the Soviet Union and the United States came into direct combat for the only time during the Cold War. Updated and revised for the new edition, with specially commissioned color maps and new images throughout, this is a detailed introduction to a significant turning point in the Cold War.

'An Intimate War' tells the story of the last thirty-four years of conflict in Helmand Province, Afghanistan as seen through the eyes of the Helmandis. In the West, this period is often defined through different lenses -- the Soviet intervention, the civil war, the Taliban, and the post-2001 nation-building era. Yet, as experienced by local inhabitants, the Helmand conflict is a perennial one, involving the same individuals, families and groups, and driven by the same arguments over land, water and power. This book -- based on both military and research experience in Helmand and 150 interviews in Pashto -- offers a very different view of Helmand from those in the media. It demonstrates how outsiders have most often misunderstood the ongoing struggle in Helmand and how, in doing so, they have exacerbated the conflict, perpetuated it and made it more violent -- precisely the opposite of what was intended when their interventions were launched. Mike Martin's oral history of Helmand underscores the absolute imperative of understanding the highly local, personal, and non-ideological nature of internal conflict in much of the 'third' world.

Fusing perspectives from politics, media studies and cultural studies, and focusing on Iraq, this title offers detailed insights into the impact of different media forms. Fusing perspectives from politics, media studies and cultural studies, "Sousveillance, Media and Strategic Political Communication" offers insights into impacts on strategic political communication of the emergence of web-based participatory media ('Web 2.0') across the first decade of the 21st century. Countering the control engendered in strategic political communication, Steve Mann's concepts of hierarchical sousveillance (politically motivated watching of the institutional watchers) and personal sousveillance (apolitical, human-centred life-sharing) is applied to web 2.0. Focusing on interplays of user-generated and mainstream media about, and from, Iraq, detailed case studies explore different levels of control over strategic political communication during key moments, including the start of the 2003 Iraq war, the 2004 Abu Ghraib scandal, and Saddam Hussein's execution in 2006. These are contextualized by overviews of political and media environments from 2001-09. Dr Bakir outlines broader implications of sousveillant web-based participatory media for strategic political communication, exploring issues of agenda-building, control, and the cycle of emergence, resistance and reincorporation of web 2.0. Sousveillance cultures are explored, delineating issues of anonymity, semi-permanence, instanteneity resistance and social change.

Ideal for general readers as well as professionals conducting extensive research, this informative book offers a collection of documents on the origins and conduct of the Iraq War. The Iraq War: A Documentary and Reference Guide gives readers the opportunity to investigate this costly and controversial conflict as professional researchers do-by looking closely at key samples of historical evidence. As readers will see, that evidence proves to be extraordinarily revealing about the drive to war, the course of the initial invasion, the counterinsurgency, the "surge," and the continuing difficulties in unifying and stabilizing the country. From relevant exchanges in the 2000 Bush/Gore debates to interviews with Saddam Hussein to the latest reorganization of the Coalition Provisional Authority, The Iraq War gives readers an insider's view of the conflict's key decisions and events. Each chapter brings together primary and secondary sources on an important phase of the war, with the author providing context, analysis, and insight from a historian's perspective. The book also provides a solid framework for working with the documentary record-a particularly difficult task in this case, as so many vital sources will remain classified and inaccessible for years to come. More than 100 excerpts of government documents, military briefings, Congressional reports, media articles, and more, all related to specific phases of the Iraq War An introductory chapter on the processes and challenges of researching the historic record Commentary in each chapter showing what can be interpreted from the collected sources Sidebars offering biographical notes on key figures; explanations of key terms and concepts; accounts of international treaties, laws, and agreements, and background notes on historical events

From master storyteller Andy McNab, this is the opening book in an adventure-filled and action-packed new series telling, for the first time ever, the true stories of Special Forces missions. 'McNab's first major non-autobiographical work of non-fiction ... The operation is told like a novel [...] and it is as refreshingly informal and compellingly immediate as his other books' Daily Express 'Part history lesson, part military manual, part fixed-bayonets thriller. A must for Special Forces fans' The Sun It is the early 2000s and 9/11 is fresh in the world's memory. The Taliban have taken over Afghanistan, and armed militants and explosive devices are terrorising the people. And now a new threat is emerging in the country: suicide bombings, ordered by military commander of the Taliban, Mullah Dadullah. Special Forces are sent in to stop him. The Hunt is the thrilling story of the secret mission to catch Dadullah, one of the most dangerous men alive. Using classified sources and his unique insight into the way the SAS works, Andy McNab gives a page-turning account of what it took the Special Forces to find their target and what they would have to do to take him down. An explosive story of hostage negotiations, undercovers missions and a final, epic assault on Dadullah's compound that could leave only one side alive, The Hunt is a powerful retelling of a real-life Special Forces mission.

Admiral William H. McRaven is a part of American military history, having been involved in some of the most famous missions in recent memory, including the capture of Saddam Hussein, the rescue of Captain Richard Phillips, and the raid to kill Osama bin Laden.Sea Stories begins in 1960 at the American Officers' Club in France, where Allied officers and their wives gathered to have drinks and tell stories about their adventures during World War II -- the place where a young Bill McRaven learned the value of a good story. Sea Stories is an unforgettable look back on one man's incredible life, from childhood days sneaking into high-security military sites to a day job of hunting terrorists and rescuing hostages.Action-packed, inspiring, and full of thrilling stories from life in the special operations world, Sea Stories is a remarkable memoir from one of America's most accomplished leaders.

In March 2004, the unprovoked ambush, killing and desecration of the bodies of American civilian security contractors in Fallujah, Iraq, caused the National Command Authorities in Washington, DC. to demand that the newly arrived Marine Expeditionary Force there take action against the perpetrators and other insurgent forces. Planned Stability and Support Operations were cast aside as insurgent fighters dared the Marines to enter Fallujah. Marine infantrymen, tankers, helicopter crews, and amphibious vehicle drivers all pitched into high-intensity battles and firefights during the first fights of Fallujah in April 2004. Across the board cooperation and innovation marked these fighting Marines in combined arms fights that no one expected. Marines fought in the streets, conducted house-to-house searches, cleared buildings of enemy, and used tank main guns in direct support of urban environment operations. Helicopter crews supported operations on the ground with rockets and machine-gun fire, and Amtrac Marines transported forces to face enemy RPG and machine-gun fire. Marines from infantry squad members to a battalion commander were interviewed by Marine Corps field historians within days or weeks of the events at nearby combat outposts and camps. This book combines these interview notes and the words of the men themselves to create a unique narrative of Marines in this combat.

***SOON TO BE A MAJOR HOLLYWOOD FILM*** 'This is aerial drama at its best. Fast, powerful, and moving.' Erik Larson Devotion tells the gripping story of the US Navy's most famous aviator duo - Tom Hudner, a white New Englander, and Jesse Brown, a black sharecropper's son from Mississippi. Against all odds, Jesse beat back racism to become the Navy's first black aviator. Against all expectations, Tom passed up Harvard to fly fighter planes for his country. While much of America remained divided by segregation, the two became wingmen in Fighter Squadron 32 and went on to fight side-by-side in the Korean War. Adam Makos follows Tom and Jesse's dramatic journey to the war's climatic battle at the Chosin Reservoir, where they fought to save an entire division of trapped Marines. It was here that one of them was faced with an unthinkable choice - and discovered how far they would go to save a friend.

This book examines the United States neoconservative movement, arguing that its support for the 2003 invasion of Iraq was rooted in an intelligence theory shaped by the policy struggles of the Cold War. The origins of neoconservative engagement with intelligence theory are traced to a tradition of labour anti-communism that emerged in the early 20th century and subsequently provided the Central Intelligence Agency with key allies in the state-private networks of the Cold War era. Reflecting on the break-up of Cold War liberalism and the challenge to state-private networks in the 1970s, the book maps the neoconservative response that influenced developments in United States intelligence policy, counterintelligence and covert action. With the labour roots of neoconservatism widely acknowledged but rarely systematically pursued, this new approach deploys the neoconservative literature of intelligence as evidence of a tradition rooted in the labour anti-communist self-image as allies rather than agents of the American state. This book will be of great interest to all students of intelligence studies, Cold War history, United States foreign policy and international relations.

In 1950, just five years after the end of World War II, Britain and America again went to war--this time to try and combat the spread of communism in East Asia following the invasion of South Korea by communist forces from the North. This book charts the course of the UK-US 'special relationship' from the journey to war beginning in 1947 to the fall of the Labour government in 1951. Ian McLaine casts fresh light on relations between Truman and Attlee and their officials, diplomats and advisors, including Acheson and MacArthur. He shows how Britain was persuaded to join a war it could ill afford and was forced to rearm at great cost to the economy. The decision to participate in the war caused great strain to the Labour party--provoking the Bevan-Gaitskell split which was to keep the party out of office for the next decade. McLaine's revisionist study shows how disastrous the war was for the British--and for the Labour party in particular. It sheds important new light on UK-US relations during a key era in diplomatic and Cold War history.

The United States and its allies have been fighting the Taliban and al-Qaeda in Afghanistan for a decade in a war that either side could still win. While a gradual drawdown has begun, significant numbers of US combat troops will remain in Afghanistan until at least 2014, perhaps longer, depending on the situation on the ground and the outcome of the US presidential election in 2012. Given the realities of the Taliban's persistence and the desire of US policymakers - and the public - to find a way out, what can and should be the goals of the US and its allies in Afghanistan? "Afghan Endgames" brings together some of the finest minds in the fields of history, strategy, anthropology, ethics, and mass communications to provide a clear, balanced, and comprehensive assessment of the alternatives for restoring peace and stability to Afghanistan. Presenting a range of options - from immediate withdrawal of all coalition forces to the maintenance of an open-ended, but greatly reduced military presence - the contributors weigh the many costs, risks, and benefits of each alternative. This important book boldly pursues several strands of thought suggesting that a strong, legitimate central government is far from likely to emerge in Kabul; that fewer coalition forces, used in creative ways, may have better effects on the ground than a larger, more conventional presence; and that, even though Pakistan should not be pushed too hard, so as to avoid sparking social chaos there, Afghanistan's other neighbors can and should be encouraged to become more actively involved. The volume's editors conclude that while there may never be complete peace in Afghanistan, a self-sustaining security system able to restore order swiftly in the wake of violence is attainable.

American military power in the War on Terror has increasingly depended on the capacity to see the enemy. The act of seeing-enhanced by electronic and digital technologies-has separated shooter from target, eliminating risk of bodily harm to the remote warrior, while YouTube videos eroticize pulling the trigger and video games blur the line between simulated play and fighting. Light It Up examines the visual culture of the early twenty-first century military. Focusing on the Marine Corps, which played a critical part in the invasion and occupation of Iraq, John Pettegrew argues that U.S. military force in the Iraq War was projected through an "optics of combat." Powerful military technology developed in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars has placed war in a new posthuman era. Pettegrew's interviews with marines, as well as his analysis of first-person shooter videogames and combat footage, lead to startling insights into the militarization of popular digital culture. An essential study for readers interested in modern warfare, policy makers, and historians of technology, war, and visual and military culture.

In February 1989, the CIA's chief in Islamabad famously cabled headquarters a simple message: "We Won." It was an understated coda to the most successful covert intelligence operation in American history. In What We Won , CIA and National Security Council veteran Bruce Riedel tells the story of America's secret war in Afghanistan and the defeat of the Soviet 40th Red Army in the war that proved to be the final battle of the cold war. He seeks to answer one simple question - why did this intelligence operation succeed so brilliantly? Riedel has the vantage point few others can offer: He was ensconced in the CIA's Operations Center when the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan on Christmas Eve 1979. The invasion took the intelligence community by surprise. But the response, initiated by Jimmy Carter and accelerated by Ronald Reagan, was a masterful intelligence enterprise. Many books have been written about intelligence failures - from Pearl Harbor to 9/11. Much less has been written about how and why intelligence operations succeed. The answer is complex. It involves both the weaknesses and mistakes of America's enemies, as well as good judgment and strengths of the United States. Riedel introduces and explores the complex personalities pitted in the war - the Afghan communists, the Russians, the Afghan mujahedin, the Saudis, and the Pakistanis. And then there are the Americans - in this war, no Americans fought on the battlefield. The CIA did not send officers into Afghanistan to fight or even to train. In 1989, victory for the American side of the cold war seemed complete. Now we can see that a new era was also beginning in the Afghan war in the 1980s, the era of the global jihad. This book examines the lessons we can learn from this intelligence operation for the future and makes some observations on what came next in Afghanistan - and what is likely yet to come.

This compelling and timely collaboration between photographer/writer Jim Lommasson and American veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars presents Lommassons portraits and interviews as well as soldiers own photographs from the war zones. The stories expressed in words and in images are intimate, profound, and timeless. In their own words, 50 men and women speak their truth about these warswhat they saw and what they did. They talk about the wars impact on themselves and on their loved ones at home as well as on the Iraqis and Afghanis caught in the crossfire. They talk about why they went to war and how the war came home with them. Our soldiers need to tell their stories, and we need to listen.

Based on in-depth interviews with tribal Sheiks involved in the Awakening and their American military counterparts, Confronting al Qaeda is a study of decision-making processes and the political psychology of the Sunni Awakening in al Anbar. It traces the change in American military strategy that made the Awakening collaboration between the Sunni tribes and the U.S. forces possible. It explains how the evolution of the tribal leaders' perspective and of the American military strategy led to defeat al Qaeda in al Anbar. The process of these changing mutual images is detailed as well as how the cooperation between groups led to further evolution of perceptions. Political and military realities urgently forced these perceptual and social identity shifts initially, but the process of cooperation and engagement accelerated these shifts through increasingly mutually beneficial cooperation and interaction during the battle with al Qaeda in Iraq.