BOOK TWO IN THE SERIES, SURVIVE TO FIGHT, IS AVAILABLE NOW! THE FIRST IN A BRAND NEW SERIES FROM SAS: WHO DARES WINS STAR. A country in turmoil. A rescue mission gone wrong. A hero on unlike any other fighting to save a broken world. Matt 'Mace' Mason is deployed on a deniable SAS mission in war-torn Yemen, becoming embroiled in a hostage rescue that goes terribly wrong. Pulling at the strings of the local political scene is not only the local warlord who is destined to become Mace's nemesis, General Ruak Shahlai, but hardbitten American arms dealer Erica Atkins, who controls a whole international network to her advantage. As well as his own team, Mace has to work, initially unwillingly, with female CIA Agent (and Islamic scholar) Redford. Together they will need to prevent an attack that would spark a regional war and create the largest environmental disaster the world has ever seen. DON'T MISS THE FIRST IN THE NEW MACE MASON SERIES FROM AN AUTHOR WHO HAS BEEN THERE AND DONE IT ALL, BILLY BILLINGHAM. About the Author Billy Billingham spent 17 years in the SAS. He was responsible for planning and executing strategic operations and training at the highest level in locations including Iraq, Afghanistan, South America and Africa, and has led countless hostage rescues. He later became a bodyguard to A list celebrities such as Brad Pitt, Sir Michael Caine, and Tom Cruise. Since 2015, Billy has been one of the lead presenters on the popular Channel Four series SAS: Who Dares Wins. Of the lead line-up, he is the only one with a genuine SAS career.

'Highly readable . . . an intimate and varied account of fascinating stories of people at war' History of War War Stories is a fascinating account of ordinary men and women swept up in the turbulence of war. These are the stories - many untold until now - of thirty-four individuals who have pushed the boundaries of love, bravery, suffering and terror beyond the imaginable. They span three centuries and five continents. There is the courage of Edward Seager who survived the Charge of the Light Brigade; the cunning of Krystyna Skarbek, quick-thinking spy and saboteur during the Second World War; the skullduggery of Benedict Arnold, who switched sides in the American War of Independence and the compassion of Magdalene de Lancey who tenderly nursed her dying husband at Waterloo. Told with vivid narrative flair and full of unexpected insights, War Stories moves effortlessly from tales of spies, escapes and innovation to uplifting acts of humanity, celebrating men and women whose wartime experiences are beyond compare.

E. Tayloe Wise served in Vietnam from May 1969 through April 1970. During those 11 months, he wrote an estimated 750-800 letters home. This memoir is based on those letters, which recounted the details of his experiences and also served as an outlet where he could express the terror, tedium and even boredom of his daily life while in Vietnam. It tells the story of the Vietnam War as this foot soldier viewed it from the jungle, as both a rifleman and a combat medic who was forced to learn his medical skills under fire, and who later became a personal waiter in the private mess hall of Major General E.B. Roberts, the Commanding General of the 1st Cavalry Division (Air Mobile).

The story begins with a record of Wises military history, his training as an infantryman in Leesville, Louisiana and his arrival in Vietnam on May 2, 1969. Chapter two details his first experience under enemy fire on May 11, when suicide squads penetrated their perimeter with the purpose of inflicting the maximum amount of damage with disregard to even the attackers' own lives. Chapters five and six recount the August 1969 battle of LZ Becky, a landing zone that was constructed just south of the Cambodian border and was destroyed only four weeks later. Chapter seven relates Wises experiences after receiving a job as a waiter in the Commander Generals mess hall. On April 9, 1970, his service ended and he headed home. The book contains diagrams of several battles and the authors personal photographs taken while he was in the jungle and in the rear echelon area of Phuoc Vinh.

** Shortlisted for the Military History Matters Book of the Year Award ** 'Magnificent. Narrative history at its vivid and compelling best' Fergal Keane The first major history of the International Brigades: a tale of blood, ideals and tragedy in the fight against fascism. The Spanish Civil War was the first armed battle in the fight against fascism, and a rallying cry for a generation. Over 35,000 volunteers from sixty-one countries around the world came to defend democracy against the troops of Franco, Hitler and Mussolini. Ill-equipped and disorderly, yet fuelled by a shared sense of purpose and potential glory, these disparate groups of idealistic young men and women formed a volunteer army of a size and type unseen since the Crusades, known as the International Brigades. Were they heroes or fools? Saints or bloodthirsty adventurers? And what exactly did they achieve? In this magisterial history, Giles Tremlett tells - for the first time - the story of the Spanish Civil War through the experiences of this remarkable group. Drawing on the Brigades' archives in Moscow, as well as first-hand accounts, The International Brigades captures all the human drama of a historic mission to halt fascist expansion in Europe.

Republished to coincide with the new ITV film, My Boy Jack? starring Daniel Radcliffe, this is the full account of the tragic life of John 'Jack" Kipling. On 27th September 1915 John Kipling, the only son of Britain's best loved poet, disappeared during the Battle of Loos. The body lay undiscovered for 77 years. Then, in a most unusual move, the Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC)re-marked the grave of an unknown Lieutenant of the Irish Guards, as that of John Kipling. There is considerable evidence that John's grave has been wrongly identified and for the first time in this book, the authors name the soldier they believe is buried in 'John's grave'. This is the first biography of John's short life, analysing the devastating effect it had on his famous father's work.

Scientists have always kept secrets. But rarely in history have scientific secrets been as vital as they were during World War II. In the midst of planning the Manhattan Project, the U.S. Office of Strategic Services created a secret offshoot - the Alsos Mission - meant to gather intelligence on and sabotage if necessary, scientific research by the Axis powers. What resulted was a plot worthy of the finest thriller, full of spies, sabotage, and murder. At its heart was the 'Lightning A' team, a group of intrepid soldiers, scientists, and spies - and even a famed baseball player - who were given almost free rein to get themselves embedded within the German scientific community to stop the most terrifying threat of the war: Hitler acquiring an atomic bomb of his very own. While the Manhattan Project and other feats of scientific genius continue to inspire us today, few people know about the international intrigue and double-dealing that accompanied those breakthroughs. Bastard Brigade recounts this forgotten history, fusing a non-fiction spy thriller with some of the most incredible scientific ventures of all time.

Before, during, and after World War II, Maria Savchyn Pyskir served in the Ukrainian Underground resistance. Her dramatic and poignant memoir tells of her recruitment into underground service at age 14, her participation in resistance activities during the War, her bittersweet marriage to revolutionary leader "Orlan," her struggle against Stalinist forces, and her captures by and escapes from the KGB. In the 1950s when she escaped to the West, she began these memoirs, which were not published in Ukrainian until after the fall of the Soviet Union. Their appearance in Ukrainian caused a sensation, as she remains the only survivor of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) to have told her tale, now offered in English. Pyskir, whose escape came at the cost of her husband, children, and family, recreates in her memoir an astonishing account of her experiences as a Ukrainian partisan, a woman, a wife, a mother, and an outcast from her own land. The book contains maps, many of the author's own photographs, and a foreword by John A. Armstrong.

In March 1943 a team of expatriate Norwegian commandos sailed from the most northerly part of Britain for Nazi-occupied Norway. Their mission was to organise and support the Norwegian resistance. They were betrayed, and only one man survived the ambush by the Nazis. Crippled by frostbite, snow-blind and hunted by the Nazis, Jan Baalstrud managed to find a tiny arctic village. There - delirious, near death - he found villagers willing to risk their own lives to save him. David Howarth narrates his incredible escape in this gripping tale of courage and the resilience of the human spirit.

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.

In Bonzo's War, Clare Campbell told the fascinating story of what it was like for Britain's pets when the world was at war. This time, she follows the incredible journey of the dogs who conscripted to fight for their country, with some even returning with medals for their bravery. During the most dangerous days of the Second World War, the British government set out to recruit an army of canines - a 'Guard Dog Unit'. This experimental team of brave hounds would later use their incredible sense of smell to sniff out the anti-personnel mines that barred the way to reclaiming Europe. Dog owners countrywide shed tears as they bid farewell to their beloved 'Brian', 'Rex', or 'Molly' and packed them off to the War Dogs Training School to learn the skills they'd need to 'do their bit for Britain' on the very frontiers of the Third Reich. The soldiers waiting out in the field to greet their canine counterparts were under strict instructions: do not get too attached to your new four-legged companion. That bit proved disastrously impossible. Based on original documents, first-hand accounts and interviews, Dogs of Courage tells a story of human determination, heartbreak and uncompromising canine courage that has never been told before.

This book recounts the World War II journeys of a soldier, a ship, and a bottle of spirits through, and around, five great turning-point battles. Those battles were influenced more by geography and climate than by generals and admirals. Properly titled they would be known as the Battles of the Sky (Britain), the Sand (El Alemein), the Snow (Stalingrad), the Sea (North Atlantic), and the Shore (Normandy). Slogging their way through this quintet are an eighteen-year-old G.I. from Missouri (as seen through his letters home), an "ugly duckling" of a Liberty ship (as seen through its Armed Guard reports), and a bottle of rum (as traced by those who, after the war, made money in selling war souvenirs). It is the history of the North Atlantic sea basin and its extensions at war: the story of the lulls between battles, when America's teenage warriors often watched war movies (Humphrey Bogart made and Warner Brothers released seven during the war), sang or listened to popular tunes by songsmiths like Irving Berlin, and drank rum-and-Coke (while listening to Dick Haymes sing the hit "Rum & Coca-Cola"). While accessible and vastly entertaining, this is a serious work of history. By treating World War II in Europe much as Fernand Braudel treated the origins of Western civilization in his masterpiece The Mediterranean and the Mediterranean World in the Age of Philip II, Hatcher brings Braudelian detachment to his narrative.

"Another Man's Shoes" is a gripping first-hand account of a Norwegian scientist's escape from German custody during the Second World War after his arrest for spying. Written just after the war, Sven Somme vividly describes his 200-mile trek across the mountains, pursued by German soldiers, in a bid to reach Sweden and freedom in 1944. Sixty years later, his daughter Ellie set out on foot with her sister to retrace their father's flight from Nazi-occupied Norway, meeting some of the people who helped him along the way. She recounts the emotional moment when a pair of her father's shoes, exchanged for mountain boots, were returned to her by one family who sheltered him along the way and pays special tribute to her uncle Iacob who was also arrested and later executed.

'The Book Collectors of Daraya celebrates the political and therapeutic power of the written word . . . defiant and cautiously optimistic' Financial Times '[An] incredible chronicle . . . The book tells the kind of story that often gets buried beneath images of violence' LitHub In 2012 the rebel suburb of Daraya in Damascus was brutally besieged by Syrian government forces. Four years of suffering ensued, punctuated by shelling, barrel bombs and chemical gas attacks. People's homes were destroyed and their food supplies cut off; disease was rife. Yet in this man-made hell, forty young Syrian revolutionaries embarked on an extraordinary project, rescuing all the books they could find in the bombed-out ruins of their home town. They used them to create a secret library, in a safe place, deep underground. It became their school, their university, their refuge. It was a place to learn, to exchange ideas, to dream and to hope. Based on lengthy interviews with these young men, conducted over Skype by the award-winning French journalist Delphine Minoui, The Book Collectors of Daraya is a powerful testament to freedom, tolerance and the power of literature. Translated from the French by Lara Vergnaud.

The youngest living Medal of Honor recipient delivers an unforgettable memoir that will inspire every reader" (Jim Mattis) NATIONAL BESTSELLER 2020 Marine Commandant's Reading List selection On November 21, 2010, U.S. Marine Lance Corporal Kyle Carpenter was posted atop a building in violent Helmand Province, Afghanistan, when an enemy grenade skittered toward Kyle and fellow Marine Nick Eufrazio. Without hesitation, Kyle chose a path of selfless heroism that few can imagine. He jumped on the grenade, saving Nick but sacrificing himself. One of the year's most anticipated books, Kyle's remarkable memoir reveals a central truth that will inspire every reader: Life is worth everything we've got. It is the story of how one man became a so-called hero who willingly laid down his life for his brother-in-arms--and equally, it is a story of rebirth, of how Kyle battled back from the gravest challenge to forge a life of joyful purpose. Kyle Carpenter's heart flatlined three times while being evacuated off the battlefield in Afghanistan. Yet his spirit was unbroken. Severely wounded from head to toe, Kyle lost his right eye as well as most of his jaw. It would take dozens of surgeries and almost three years in and out of the hospital to reconstruct his body. From there, he began the process of rebuilding his life. What he has accomplished in the last nine years is extraordinary: he's come back a stronger, better, wiser person. In 2014, Kyle was awarded the nation's highest military decoration, the Medal of Honor, for his "singular act of courage" on that rooftop in Afghanistan, an action which had been reviewed exhaustively by the military. Kyle became the youngest living recipient of the award-and only the second living Marine so honored since Vietnam. You Are Worth It is a memoir about the war in Afghanistan and Kyle's heroics, and it is also a manual for living. Organized around the credos that have guided Kyle's life (from "Don't Hide Your Scars" to "Call Your Mom"), the book encourages us to become our best selves in the time we've been given on earth. Above all, it's about finding purpose, regardless of the hurdles that may block our way. Moving and unforgettable, You Are Worth It is an astonishing memoir from one of our most extraordinary young leaders.

On 31st January 2010, Trooper Corie Mapp of The Life Guards was driving his armoured vehicle on combat operations in Afghanistan when it ran over an IED. The explosion that followed caused him massive injuries. But this was not the end of his active life but rather the beginning. The next thing Corie remembers was waking in the Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Selly Oak, Birmingham, not realising that he was a double amputee. Two months later, and having made an almost miraculous against-the-odds recovery, Corie was back with his regiment in Windsor, and continued to serve until 2013. Sport was an important part of Corie's life before the explosion and a vital one after. In rehabilitation, he rediscovered his sporting skills, and competed successful in disabled cricket at a national level, and was a member of Team GB for sitting volley ball and athletics at the Warrior and the Invictus Games. However, when he was offered the chance to bobsleigh, his horizons widened considerably. After just one year of training, in 2014 Corie won gold in the inaugural Para Bobsleigh World Cup competition in St Moritz, was second overall in the World Cup 2014/15 season and became the overall World Cup champion in 2018. In the 2021-22 season, he will continue to train and compete at the highest levels in North America and Europe. On the international bobsleigh circuit he is affectionately known 'Black Ice'. This book is Corie Mapp's remarkable story of triumph over adversity.

On November 8, 1943, U.S. Army nurse Agnes Jensen stepped out of a cold rain in Catania, Sicily, into a C-53 transport plane. But she and twelve other nurses never arrived in Bari, Italy, where they were to transport wounded soldiers to hospitals farther from the front lines. A violent storm and pursuit by German Messerschmitts led to a crash landing in a remote part of Albania, leaving the nurses, their team of medics, and the flight crew stranded in Nazi-occupied territory. What followed was a dangerous nine-week game of hide-and-seek with the enemy, a situation President Roosevelt monitored daily. Albanian partisans aided the stranded Americans in the search for a British Intelligence Mission, and the group began a long and hazardous journey to the Adriatic coast. During the following weeks, they crossed Albania's second highest mountain in a blizzard, were strafed by German planes, managed to flee a town moments before it was bombed, and watched helplessly as an attempt to airlift them out was foiled by Nazi forces. Albanian Escape is the suspense-filled story of the only group of Army flight nurses to have spent any length of time in occupied territory during World War II. The nurses and flight crew endured frigid weather, survived on little food, and literally wore out their shoes trekking across the rugged countryside. Thrust into a perilous situation and determined to survive, these women found courage and strength in each other and in the kindness of Albanians and guerrillas who hid them from the Germans.

The explosive true story of a gun for hire. 'Hard eyes stare out of massive beards, their faces marked by the scars of battle. With these guys their webbing looks like it belongs to them, rather than it's been hung on a pair of reluctant shoulders. There's not a word been said to us, but the ante has clearly been upped. There's a dark and sinister feeling in the air. It doesn't take a genius to figure it's about to kick off.' Former SAS soldier Big Phil Campion tells it like is in this brutally honest account of his insanely dangerous life as a private military operator. From playing chicken with a suicide bomber in backstreet Kabul, to taking on pirates with his bare hands, this is true-life action-packed drama at its best.

The Gulf War and its aftermath has testified once again to the significance placed on the meanings and images of Vietnam, by the US media and culture. Almost two decades after the end of hostilities, the Vietnam war remains a dominant moral, political and military touchstone in American cultural consciousness. "Vietnam War Stories" provides an introduction to ten key narratives, including personal accounts as well as novels. The work of, amongst others, Philip Caputo, Michael Herr, Tim O'Brien and Bobbi Ann Mason is located in the context of contemporary cinema and TV and a tradition of modern war literature from Crane and Hemingway to Mailer and Jones. By tracing cultural and literary themes generated by the conflict, Tobey Herzog charts the transformations undergone by US soldiers and by the American nation in their experience of modern war. He examines the "John Wayne syndrome" of pre-war innocence through the "Heavy Heart of Darkness trip" of the conflict itself and beyond to the "aftermath novels" of the post-war adjustment period.

On a clear night in late June 2005, four U.S. Navy SEALs left their base in northern Afghanistan for the mountainous Pakistani border. Their mission was to capture or kill a notorious al Qaeda leader known to be ensconced in a Taliban stronghold surrounded by a small but heavily armed force. Less then twenty-four hours later, only one of those Navy SEALs remained alive. This is the story of fire team leader Marcus Luttrell, the sole survivor of Operation Redwing, and the desperate battle in the mountains that led, ultimately, to the largest loss of life in Navy SEAL history. But it is also, more than anything, the story of his teammates, who fought ferociously beside him until he was the last one left-blasted unconscious by a rocket grenade, blown over a cliff, but still armed and still breathing. Over the next four days, badly injured and presumed dead, Luttrell fought off six al Qaeda assassins who were sent to finish him, then crawled for seven miles through the mountains before he was taken in by a Pashtun tribe, who risked everything to protect him from the encircling Taliban killers. A six-foot-five-inch Texan, Leading Petty Officer Luttrell takes us, blow-by-blow, through the brutal training of America's warrior elite and the relentless rites of passage required by the Navy SEALs. He transports us to a monstrous battle fought in the desolate peaks of Afghanistan, where the beleaguered American team plummeted headlong a thousand feet down a mountain as they fought back through flying shale and rocks. In this rich, moving chronicle of courage, honor, and patriotism, Marcus Luttrell delivers one of the most powerful narratives ever written about modern warfare-and a tribute to his teammates, who made the ultimate sacrifice for their country.

As a twenty-three-year-old veterinarian, William W. Putney joined the Marine Corps at the height of World War II. He commanded the Third Dog Platoon during the battle for Guam and later served as chief veterinarian and commanding officer of the War Dog Training School, where he helped train former pets for war in the Pacific. After the war, he fought successfully to have USMC war dogs returned to their civilian owners.Always Faithful is Putney's celebration of the four-legged soldiers that he both commanded and followed. It is a tale of immense courage as well as of incredible sacrifice. For anyone who has ever read "Old Yeller" or the books of Jack London, here is a real-life story that rivals any fiction. At once a wistful tribute and a stirring adventure, "Always Faithful" will enthrall readers with one of the great animal stories of all time.

Adolf Hitler was hardly the modern world's only murderous tyrant and imperialist. Yet he and the regime he ruled over for 12 years exerted an enormous impact on the history of the 20th Century. We are still living with the consequences. Interpretations of his life and legacy continue to extert a range of influences - some beneficial and other deleterious - on our politics and popular culture. "For the world to be done with Hitler," the German journalist and historian Sebastian Haffner wrote in 1978, "it had to kill not just the man, but the legend as well." That legend has proven to be like the mythical hydra. Adolf Hitler: A Reference Guide to His Life and Works captures Hitler's life, her works, and legacy. It features a chronology, an introduction offers a brief account of his life, a dictionary section lists entries on people, places, and events related to him. A comprehensive bibliography offers a list of works by and about Hitler.

November 1944: Army airmen set out in a B-24 bomber on what should have been an easy mission off the Borneo coast. Instead they found themselves unexpectedly facing a Japanese fleet - and were shot down. When they cut themselves loose from their parachutes, they were scattered across the island's mountainous interior. Then a group of loincloth-wearing natives silently materialized out of the jungle. Would these Dayak tribesmen turn the starving airmen over to the hostile Japanese occupiers? Or would the Dayaks risk vicious reprisals to get the airmen safely home? The tribal leaders' unprecedented decision led to a desperate game of hide-and-seek, and, ultimately, the return of a long-renounced ritual: head-hunting.A cinematic survival story that features a bamboo airstrip built on a rice paddy, a mad British major, and a blowpipe-wielding army that helped destroy one of the last Japanese strongholds, "The Airmen and the Headhunters" is a gripping, you-are-there journey into the remote world and forgotten heroism of the Dayaks.

" With a foreword by Stephen Ambrose and a preface by Franklin D. Anderson Forrest Pogue (1912-1996) was undoubtedly one of the greatest World War II combat historians. Born and educated in Kentucky, he is perhaps best known for his definitive four-volume biography of General George C. Marshall. But, as Pogue's War makes clear, he was also a pioneer in the development of oral history in the twentieth century, as well as an impressive interviewer with an ability to relate to people at all levels, from the private in the trenches to the general carrying four stars. Pogue's War is drawn from Forrest Pogue's handwritten pocket notebooks, carried with him throughout the war, long regarded as unreadable because of his often atrocious handwriting. Pogue himself began expanding the diaries a few short years after the war, with the intent of eventual publication. At last this work is being published. Supplemented with carefully deciphered and transcribed selections from his diaries, the heart of the book is straight from the field. Much of the material has never before seen print. From D-Day to VE-Day, Pogue experienced and documented combat on the front lines, describing action on Omaha Beach, in the Huertgen Forest, and on other infamous fields of conflict. He not only graphically -- yet also often poetically -- recounts the extreme circumstances of battle, but he also notes his fellow soldiers' innermost thoughts, feelings, opinions, and attitudes about the cruelty of war. As a trained historian, Pogue describes how he went about his work and how the Army's history program functioned in the European Theater of Operations. His entries from his time at the history headquarters in Paris show the city in the early days after the liberation in a unique light. Pogue's War has an immediacy that much official history lacks, and is a remarkable addition to any World War II bookshelf. Franklin D. Anderson, Forrest Pogue's nephew by marriage, is a longtime educator. He lives in Princeton, Kentucky.

Many years after becoming the youngest person ever to be awarded the VC for attacking a company of Panzer Grenadiers on his own - an action that proved a turning point in one of the major battles of the Second World War - John Kenneally made an extraordinary confession. The courageous hero of the Irish Guards, who had taken on a whole company single-handed was not, in fact, John Kenneally at all, but Leslie Jackson, the illegitimate son of Neville Blond and Gertrude Robinson (a 'high-class whore'), who had deserted his former regiment, the Honourable Artillery Company. In THE HONOUR AND THE SHAME, he tells his story with great verve and frankness - a story of riotous living, great courage on the front line, and intense loyalties. Full of the escapades of battle - from the triumphant Tunisian campaign to the bloodbath of Anzio - and the many adventures of a freewheeling youth, THE HONOUR AND THE SHAME is a vivid portrait of a fascinating man.