One-of-a-kind retelling of the Normandy campaign Places the 1944 battle for France in its social, economic, scientific, and technological context

GI Ingenuity is in large part an old-fashioned combat narrative, with mayhem and mass slaughter at center stage. But the book goes farther, combining military history with the history of science, technology, and culture to show how the American soldier improvised, innovated, and adapted on the battlefield. Among the improvisations and technologies covered are tanks equipped with hedgerow cutters, the coordination of air and ground attacks, and the use of radios and aircraft to direct artillery fire--all of which contributed to American success on D-Day and afterwards.

In 1942, US and Australian forces waged a brutal war against the Japanese in the jungles of Papua New Guinea. Plunged into a primitive, hostile world in which their modes of battle seemed out of place and time, they fought, suffered, hated, starved, and killed in muck and mud. James Carafano's vivid history brings this all to life. Ranging from detailed descriptions of specific battles to accounts of the fates of prisoners and the crucial role played by New Guinea's Fuzzy Wuzzy Angels, Carafano chronicles the grueling, and ultimately successful, Allied campaign, telling a tale of war at the very edge of human endurance.

In 2011, amid the popular uprising against Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak, the government sought in vain to shut down the Internet-based social networks of its people.
WikiLeaks editor-in-chief Julian Assange has been branded "public enemy number one" by some in the United States for posting material on the World Wide Web that concerns airstrikes in Iraq, US diplomatic communications, and other sensitive matters.
In "Wiki at War," James Jay Carafano explains why these and other Internet-born initiatives matter and how they are likely to affect the future face of war, diplomacy, and domestic politics.
"The war for winning dominance over social networks and using that dominance to advantage is already underway," Carafano writes in this extremely timely analysis of the techno-future of information and the impact of social networking via the Internet. Drawing on his extensive knowledge of history and defense strategy, Carafano creates a cogent analysis of what is truly new about the "new media," and what is simply a recasting of human warfare in contemporary forms.
"Wiki at War" is written in a lively, accessible style that will make this technological development comprehensible and engaging for general readers without sacrificing the book's usefulness to specialists. Outlining the conditions under which a difference in degree becomes a difference in kind, detailing how ancient wisdom can still apply to national security decisions, and examining the conditions under which new expertise is required to wage effective diplomacy or successful military strategy, Carafano casts in stark relief the issues that face political, military, and social leaders in trying to manage and control information, in both the international and domestic arenas. "Wiki at War" affords stimulating thought about and definitive discussion of this vital emerging topic.

Contractors are big business and a big part of war, with businesses taking upon themselves many tasks previously designated to the armed forces. By 2007, there were over 100,000 individuals working on U.S. contracts in Iraq and Afghanistan-versus about 160,000 U.S. combat troops. By some estimates, contractors account for some 40 percent of the costs of running operations.

This important work examines how that came to be, as well as answering a number of critical questions: How have Congress, public interest groups, and other parties dealt with the issue? How is the marketplace affecting the American way of war? What impact will this have on force structure? How will the growing involvement of the private sector influence such matters as the all-volunteer force and the procurement and maintenance of advanced warfighting systems?

The emergent role of contractors on the battlefield reflects a deeply significant transition in the nature of armed conflict, a significant rebalancing between the roles of the private and public sectors. This change is the most significant upheaval in the nature of warfare since the rise of the nation-state in the 17th century. It represents a transformation started long before the invasion of Iraq and, absent a dramatic change in the evolution of the global marketplace, it will continue to increase, regardless of the course of American domestic politics. Government will have to change to keep up.

Understanding why the private sector has come to play such a prominent role in public wars requires tracing a story as torturous and, at times, mysterious as the search for the Holy Grail, a tale filled with deceit, greed, courage, selflessness, stupidity, misdirection, and myth. It includes following a winding path from Medieval Tuscan hills, to England, to colonial America, to the sands of Iwo Jima and of Iraq, the mountains of Afghanistan, the corridors of Wall Street, and the halls of the Pentagon. It demands walking through the cross sections of military, political, social, cultural, economic, intellectual, and business history. At the end of the journey lies the unvarnished truth about contractors in combat. That is the story "Private Sector, Public Wars" means to tell.

One of the greatest sources of America's troubles in Iraq, Afghanistan, and New Orleans was the inability of our government's many parts to work well together. Often called interagency operations, applying everything that official Washington can do to keep Americans safe, free, and prosperous, is no easy task. The Pentagon, State Department, Homeland Security, Treasury, FBI, CIA, and other agencies have different capabilities, budgets, cultures, operational styles, Congressional oversight committees, and even operate under different laws. Getting them all organized on battlefields, after disasters, and during other times of crisis is often equated with herding cats. The history of getting government agencies to cooperate is replete with stories of courage, heart-breaking tragedy, and blundering incompetence. To meet the dangers of the 21st century, interagency operations will be more important than ever, yet few Americans understand the troubling history of Washington's failures and the pressing needs for reform. One of the greatest sources of America's troubles in Iraq, Afghanistan, and New Orleans was the inability of our government's many parts to work well together. Often called interagency operations, the coordination of everything official Washington can do to keep Americans safe, free, and prosperous, is no easy task. The Pentagon, State Department, Homeland Security, Treasury, FBI, CIA, and other agencies have different capabilities, budgets, cultures, operational styles, Congressional oversight committees, and even operate under different laws. Getting them all organized on battlefields, after disasters, and during other times of crisis is often equated with herding cats. The history of getting government agencies to cooperate is replete with stories of courage, heart-breaking tragedy, and blundering incompetence. To meet the dangers of the 21st century, interagency operations will be more important than ever, yet few Americans understand the troubling history of Washington's failures and the pressing needs for reform. This book is the first comprehensive history and sober analysis of one of the most pressing national security challenges of the century. The goal is to make a serious and unappreciated subject accessible to a wide audience through a series of engaging and informative historical case studies. The case studies span American history from the turn of the 20th century to today. They cover a variety of subjects from dealing with the great flu epidemic of 1918, to responding to natural disasters at home and abroad, to fighting wars and rebuilding countries after war. Each engaging chapter is a single case study written by a distinguished scholar who covers the historical context, the key players, actions, incidents, and, perhaps most important, lessons learned.

World War II saw the first generation of young men that had grown up comfortable with modern industrial technology go into combat. As kids, the GIs had built jalopies in their garage and poured over glossy, full-color issues of Popular Mechanics; they had read Buck Rogers in the Twenty Fifth Century comic books, listened to his adventures on the radio, and watched him pilot rocket ships in the Saturday morning serials at the Bijou. Tinkerers, problem-solvers, risk-takers, and day-dreamers, they were curious and outspoken--a generation well prepared to improvise, innovate, and adapt technology on the battlefield. Since they were also a generation which had unprecedented technology available to them, their ability to innovate with technology proved an immeasurable edge on the field of combat. This book tells their story through the experience of the battle of Normandy, bringing together three disparate brands of history: (1) military history; (2) the history of science and technology; and (3) social, economic, cultural, and intellectual history. All three historical narratives combine to tell the tale of GI genius and the process by which GI ingenuity became an enduring feature of the American citizen-soldier. GI Ingenuity is in large part an old-fashioned combat history, with mayhem and mass slaughter at center stage. It tells the story of death and destruction on the killing fields of Normandy, as well as the battlegrounds that provide the prologue and postscript to the transformation of war that occurred in France in 1944. This story of GI ingenuity, moreover, puts the battles in the context of the immense social, economic, scientific, and technological changes that accompanied theevolution of combat in the twentieth century. GI Ingenuity illustrates the great transition of the American genius in battle from an industrial-age army to a postmodern military. And it does it by looking at the place where the transition happened--on the battlefield.