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Books > Social sciences > Warfare & defence
Today more than one hundred small, asymmetric, and revolutionary
wars are being waged around the world. This book provides
invaluable tools for fighting such wars by taking enemy
perspectives into consideration. The third volume of a trilogy by
Max G. Manwaring, it continues the arguments the author presented
in "Insurgency, Terrorism, and Crime" and "Gangs,
Pseudo-Militaries, and Other Modern Mercenaries." Using case
studies, Manwaring outlines vital survival lessons for leaders and
organizations concerned with national security in our contemporary
world.
The insurgencies Manwaring describes span the globe. Beginning with
conflicts in Algeria in the 1950s and 1960s and El Salvador in the
1980s, he goes on to cover the Shining Path and its resurgence in
Peru, Al Qaeda in Spain, popular militias in Cuba, Haiti, and
Brazil, the Russian youth group Nashi, and drugs and politics in
Guatemala, as well as cyber warfare.
Large, wealthy, well-armed nations such as the United States have
learned from experience that these small wars and insurgencies do
not resemble traditional wars fought between geographically
distinct nation-state adversaries by easily identified military
forces. Twenty-first-century irregular conflicts blur traditional
distinctions among crime, terrorism, subversion, insurgency,
militia, mercenary and gang activity, and warfare.
Manwaring's multidimensional paradigm offers military and civilian
leaders a much needed blueprint for achieving strategic victories
and ensuring global security now and in the future. It combines
military and police efforts with politics, diplomacy, economics,
psychology, and ethics. The challenge he presents to civilian and
military leaders is to take probable enemy perspectives into
consideration, and turn resultant conceptions into strategic
victories.
From Paris to Stalingrad, the Nazis systematically plundered all
manner of art and antiquities. But the first and most valuable
treasures they looted were the Crown Jewels of the Holy Roman
Empire. In "Hitler's Holy Relics, "bestselling author Sidney
Kirkpatrick tells the riveting and never-before-told true story of
how an American college professor turned Army sleuth recovered
these cherished symbols of Hitler's Thousand-Year Reich before they
could become a rallying point in the creation of a Fourth and
equally unholy Reich.
Anticipating the Allied invasion of Nazi Germany, Reichsfuhrer
Heinrich Himmler had ordered a top-secret bunker carved deep into
the bedrock beneath Nurnberg castle. Inside the well-guarded
chamber was a specially constructed vault that held the plundered
treasures Hitler valued the most: the Spear of Destiny (reputed to
have been used to pierce Christ's side while he was on the cross)
and the Crown Jewels of the Holy Roman Empire, ancient artifacts
steeped in medieval mysticism and coveted by world rulers from
Charlemagne to Napoleon. But as Allied bombers rained devastation
upon Nurnberg and the U.S. Seventh Army prepared to invade the city
Hitler called "the soul of the Nazi Party," five of the most
precious relics, all central to the coronation ceremony of a
would-be Holy Roman Emperor, vanished from the vault. Who took
them? And why? The mystery remained unsolved for months after the
war's end, until the Supreme Allied Commander, General Dwight D.
Eisenhower, ordered Lieutenant Walter Horn, a German-born art
historian on leave from U.C. Berkeley, to hunt down the missing
treasures.
To accomplish his mission, Horn must revisit the now-rubble-strewn
landscape of his youth and delve into the ancient legends and
arcane mysticism surrounding the antiquities that Hitler had looted
in his quest for world domination. Horn searches for clues in the
burnt remains of Himmler's private castle and follows the trail of
neo-Nazi "Teutonic Knights" charged with protecting a vast hidden
fortune in plundered gold and other treasure. Along the way, Horn
has to confront his own demons: how members of his family and
former academic colleagues subverted scholarly research to help
legitimize Hitler's theories of Aryan supremacy and the Master
Race. What Horn discovers on his investigative odyssey is so
explosive that his final report will remain secret for decades.
Drawing on unpublished interrogation and intelligence reports, as
well as on diaries, letters, journals, and interviews in the United
States and Germany, Kirkpatrick tells this riveting and disturbing
story with cinematic detail and reveals-- for the first time--how a
failed Vienna art student, obsessed with the occult and dreams of
his own grandeur, nearly succeeded in creating a Holy Reich rooted
in a twisted reinvention of medieval and Church history.
From Revolution to Revolution (1973) examines England, Scotland and
Wales from the revolution of 1688 when William became King, to the
American Revolution of 1776. In this period lies the roots of
modern Britain, as it went from being underdeveloped countries on
the fringe of European civilization to a predominating influence in
the world. This book examines the union of the island, development
of an organized public opinion and national consciousness, as well
as Parliament and its factions, the landed and business classes.
Views on religion, art, architecture and the changing face of the
countryside are also examined, as is the tension between London and
the rest of the island. The important issues of colonial expansions
in Ireland, America, India and Africa are also analysed.
Reflections on the Puritan Revolution (1986) examines the damage
done by the Puritans during the English Civil War, and the enormous
artistic losses England suffered from their activities. The
Puritans smashed stained glass, monuments, sculpture, brasses in
cathedrals and churches; they destroyed organs, dispersed the
choirs and the music. They sold the King's art collections,
pictures, statues, plate, gems and jewels abroad, and broke up the
Coronation regalia. They closed down the theatres and ended
Caroline poetry. The greatest composer and most promising scientist
of the age were among the many lives lost; and this all besides the
ruin of palaces, castles and mansions.
Why do people wage war? How can wars be won? How has warfare been
an engine of change for human civilization-for better and for
worse? In this book Paul Schuurman shows how some of the best
Western minds between 1650 and 1900 tried to answer these questions
in an epoch when European developments became a matter of global
concern. In eight wide-ranging chapters he discusses the key
concepts that philosophers and generals of this era developed to
grasp and influence the dramatic and horrific phenomenon of war.
Their concepts remain fresh and relevant down to the present day.
How is foreign policy made in Iraq? Based on dozens of interviews
with senior officials and politicians, this book provides a clear
analysis of the development of domestic Iraqi politics since 2003.
Zana Gulmohamad explains how the federal government of Iraq and
Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) have functioned and worked
together since toppling Saddam to reveal in granular detail the
complexity of their foreign policy making. The book shows that the
ruling elites and political factions in Baghdad and in the capital
of the Kurdistan Region, Erbil, create foreign policies according
to their agendas. The formulation and implementation of the two
governments' foreign policies is to a great extent uncoordinated.
Yet Zana Gulmohamad places this incoherent model of foreign policy
making in the context of the country's fragmented political and
social context and explains how Iraq's neighbouring countries -
Iran, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Syria before the civil war - have
each influenced its internal affairs. The book is the first study
dedicated to the contemporary dynamics of the Iraqi state - outside
the usual focus on the "great powers" - and it explains exactly how
Iraqi foreign policy is managed alongside the country's economic
and security interests.
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