The Battle of Pusan Perimeter was a large-scale battle between United Nations and North Korean forces lasting from August 4 to September 18, 1950. It was one of the first major engagements of the Korean War. An army of 140,000 UN troops, having been pushed to the brink of defeat, were rallied to make a final stand against the invading North Korean army, 98,000 men strong. UN forces, having been repeatedly defeated by the advancing North Koreans, were forced back to the "Pusan Perimeter," a 140-mile (230 km) defensive line around an area on the southeastern tip of the Korean Peninsula that included the port of Pusan. The UN troops, consisting mostly of forces of the Republic of Korea Army (ROK), United States Army, and British Army, mounted a last stand around the perimeter, fighting off repeated North Korean attacks for six weeks as they were engaged around the cities of Taegu, Masan, and P'ohang, and the Naktong River. The massive North Korean assaults were unsuccessful in forcing the United Nations troops back further from the perimeter, despite two major pushes in August and September. North Korean troops, hampered by supply shortages and massive losses, continually staged attacks on UN forces in an attempt to penetrate the perimeter and collapse the line. However, the UN used the port to amass an overwhelming advantage in troops, equipment, and logistics, and its navy and air forces remained unchallenged by the North Koreans during the fight. After six weeks, the North Korean force collapsed and retreated in defeat after the UN force launched a counterattack at Inchon on September 15. The battle would be the furthest the North Korean troops would advance in the war, as subsequent fighting ground the war into a stalemate.

Early on the morning of January 17, 1991, the Persian Gulf War began. It consisted of massive allied air strikes on Iraq and Iraqi targets in Kuwait. The United States Air Force spearheaded the air offensive and furnished the bulk of the attacking aircraft. During forty-two days of fighting, the U.S. Air Force simultaneously conducted two closely coordinated air campaigns: one in support of allied ground forced; the other, attacking strategic targets. Planners of the strategic air campaign sought to isolate and incapacitate Saddam Hussein's government; gain and maintain air supremacy to permit unhindered air operations; destroy Iraq's nuclear, biological, and chemical capabilities; and eliminate Iraq's offensive military capability, which included its key military production facilities, their infrastructure, and the instruments it used to project its power - the Iraqi Air Force, the Republican Guard, and short-range ballistic missiles. This study develops background information to place the Persian Gulf War in its proper historical and cultural contexts, unfamiliar to and not easily understood by Americans. The first essay quickly summarizes the relationship between Arab culture and Islam, the history of Islam and the Arab conquests, and the creation of one of the flash points in present-day Middle Eastern conflicts - the Arab-Jewish dispute over Palestine. The second essay provides a military analysis of the Arab-Israeli wars from 1948 to 1982. It describes the performance of the engaged armed forces, the performance of Western versus Soviet weapons systems, the development of the respective forces' military professionalization, and the ability of the warring parties to learn from their experiences. The final three essays describe the recent history of the three regional powers of the Persian Gulf - Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Iraq. In addition to providing a detailed character analysis of Saddam Hussein and a military analysis of the Iran-Iraq War, these final sections examine the tension that arose in the three nations when the desire for modernization confronted the demands of Islamic conservatism.

The term "Battles of the Outposts" encompasses the fighting that took place in the final two years of the Korean War. In the first year of the war sweeping movement up and down the peninsula characterized the fighting. Combat raged from the 38th Parallel south to the Pusan Perimeter then, with the landing at Inchon and the Perimeter breakout, up to the Yalu, and finally a retreat south again in the face of the massive Chinese intervention.

This edited volume describes various analytic methods used by intelligence analysts supporting military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan as members of the Iraq and Afghan Threat Finance Cells-interagency intelligence teams tasked to disrupt terrorist and insurgent funding. All contributors have deployed to Iraq and/or Afghanistan and detail both the bureaucratic and intellectual challenges in understanding terrorist and insurgent finance networks and then designing operations to attack such networks via conventional military operations, Special Forces kill/capture targeting operations, and non-kinetic operations such as asset freezing or diplomacy. The analytic methods described here leverage both quantitative and qualitative methods, but in a language and style accessible to those without a quantitative background. All methods are demonstrated via actual case studies (approved for release by the U.S. government) drawn from the analysts' distinct experiences while deployed. This book will be of interest to current or aspiring intelligence analysts, students of security studies, anti-money laundering specialists in the private sector, and more generally to those interested in understanding how intelligence analysis feeds into live operations during wartime at a very tactical level.

Three days after North Korean premier Kim Il Sung launched a massive military invasion of South Korea on June 24, 1950, President Harry S. Truman responded, dispatching air and naval support to South Korea. Initially, Congress cheered his swift action; but, when China entered the war to aid North Korea, the president and many legislators became concerned that the conflict would escalate into another world war, and the United States agreed to a truce in 1953. The lack of a decisive victory caused the Korean War to quickly recede from public attention. However, its impact on subsequent American foreign policy was profound. In Truman, Congress, and Korea: The Politics of America's First Undeclared War, Larry Blomstedt provides the first in-depth domestic political history of the conflict, from the initial military mobilization, to Congress's failed attempts to broker a cease-fire, to the political fallout in the 1952 election. During the war, President Truman faced challenges from both Democratic and Republican legislators, whose initial support quickly collapsed into bitter and often public infighting. For his part, Truman dedicated inadequate attention to relationships on Capitol Hill early in his term and also declined to require a formal declaration of war from Congress, advancing the shift toward greater executive power in foreign policy. The Korean conflict ended the brief period of bipartisanship in foreign policy that began during World War II. It also introduced Americans to the concept of limited war, which contrasted sharply with the practice of requiring unconditional surrenders in previous conflicts. Blomstedt's study explores the changes wrought during this critical period and the ways in which the war influenced US international relations and military interventions during the Cold War and beyond.

A marine's diary of the Korean War and the battle of Chosin Reservoir. A story of courage, strong faith, and determination by a young marine to lead others against incredible odds to become one of the "Chosin Few." A religious picture of the Boy Jesus was found amidst rubble and destruction became a relic that Richard Janca carried with him for life. This is a story of heroism of a young marine who earned the Bronze Star and Purple Heart.