American Military

For more than three and a half years, from 1779 to 1783, the tiny territory of Gibraltar was besieged and blockaded, on land and at sea, by the overwhelming forces of Spain and France. It became the longest siege in British history, and the obsession with saving Gibraltar was blamed for the loss of the American colonies in the War of Independence.

This is the true story of an orphaned girl who managed to survive in an unforgiving world. When she grew up, she married a matinee idol. Just as her hardships in life were ending, they began again when her husband assassinated Abraham Lincoln.

James "Jim" Davis lived what he considered "an impossible dream" as he piloted a B-24, as part of the 8th Air Force, on nearly 30 missions in the European Theatre during World War II. In this memoir, Davis offers heart-wrenching detail concerning the difficulties of qualifying for the U.S. Army Air Forces pilot program, the strenuous nature of the pilot training program, the anxiety caused by a wartime marriage, and the dangers of flying combat missions over Nazi Germany.

En Francotirador, Kyle relata la extraordinaria historia de su carrera que duró una década. El fascinante relato de cómo pasó de ser un cowboy de rodeos de Texas a ser un experto franco tirador y temido asesino, ofrece una perspectiva única de la guerra actual y una de las descripciones más profundas, reveladoras y jamás escritas del mundo secreto de Special Ops (Operaciones Especiales) de Estados Unidos.

Gettysburg explains the battle's place in the Civil War, why two vast armies clashed there, and how, in the century and a half since, it has been re-imagined, re-created, and re-enacted. It is the story of a battle which no one planned but which became the bloodiest encounter of the war, and one with dramatically high stakes. The postwar romanticization of Gettysburg as the place of "might-have-beens" is based on a kernel of reality.

The heroic story of the founding of the US Navy during the Revolution has been told many times, yet largely missing from maritime histories of America's first war is the ragtag fleet of private vessels that truly revealed the new nation's character. In Rebels at Sea, Eric Jay Dolin corrects that significant omission, and contends that privateers, as they were called, were in fact critical to the American victory. Privateers were privately owned vessels that were granted permission by the new government to seize British merchantmen and men of war.

The American Civil War is often called the first “modern war.” Sandwiched between the Napoleonic Wars and World War I, it spawned a host of “firsts” and is considered a precursor to the larger and more deadly 20th century wars. Confederate Gen. James Longstreet made overlooked but profound modern contributions to the art of war. Retired Lt. Col. Harold M. Knudsen explains what Longstreet did and how he did it in James Longstreet and the American Civil War: The Confederate General Who Fought the Next War.

In this long-awaited successor to his #1 best seller The Best and the Brightest, David Halberstam describes in fascinating human detail how the shadow of Cold War Vietnam still hangs over American foreign policy, and how domestic politics have determined our role as a world power.

Throughout the 1850s, the issues of slavery and states' rights had divided the nation. With the election of 1860, these issues finally came to a head, setting the stage for the American Civil War. Compelling, action-packed text, vivid sensory details, and primary source quotes bring the story to life so that listeners feel as if they were actually alive during the historical event.

In this little-known story from World War II, a group of American POW camp leaders risk everything to save hundreds of fellow servicemen from a diabolical Nazi concentration camp. Their story begins in the dark forests of the Ardennes during Christmas 1944 and ends at the Buchenwald Concentration Camp in the spring of 1945. This appalling chapter of US military history and uplifting Holocaust story deserves to be widely known and understood. Operation Swallow provides a historical, first person perspective of how American GIs stood up against their evil SS captors.

The career of John Charles Frémont (1813-90) ties together the full breadth of American expansionism from its 18th-century origins through its culmination in the Gilded Age. Tom Chaffin's biography demonstrates Frémont's vital importance to the history of American empire and illuminates his role in shattering long-held myths about the ecology and habitability of the American West.

America’s chaotic retreat from Afghanistan in 2021 was nothing short of a horror show. Women and children were trampled to death outside the gates of the Kabul airfield. Desperate Afghans fell from the landing gear of departing planes. Taliban fighters mercilessly whipped and humiliated U.S. civilians. Countless Afghan interpreters were abandoned to the mercy of the Taliban after risking their lives alongside American troops for years. And thirteen U.S. service members were murdered in an ISIS suicide bombing. Still, the full story is worse than anyone imagined.

David Rivers is no ordinary mercenary. He’s just been assigned command of a team in the international criminal war raging in South America. But the Triple Frontier region is deadly. Narcos and terrorists rule its remote jungle, and David must lead his team into the heart of danger. Getting in is easy. Getting out might be impossible. When a high-risk recon mission turns deadly, David’s team must fight for survival against overwhelming odds. Desperate and on the run, they use everything at their disposal just to stay alive.

In 1991, the Kennedy brothers first published The South Was Right!, launching the modern movement of Southern awareness and activism. To date, the first and second edition of this book have sold more than 135,000 copies! Not for the faint of heart, The South Was Right! is an authoritative and well-documented study of the mythology behind “Civil War” history and its ongoing effects. In their new edition for a 21st-century audience, the Kennedys have updated their message to provide guidance for the harsh conditions against liberty.

Behind Japanese Lines has a great deal to say about the relations with the Filipinos and about the problems of dealing with and fighting the Hukbalahaps, the communist guerrillas or, indeed, in opposing the Japanese. This book adds considerable insights into the significance of guerrilla warfare as it relates to modern warfare in general

Despite all we know about the Civil War, its causes, battles, characters, issues, impacts, and legacy, few books have explored Canada's role in the bloody conflict that claimed more than 600,000 lives. A surprising 20,000 Canadians went south to take up arms on both sides of the conflict, while thousands of enslaved people, draft dodgers, deserters, recruiters, plotters, and spies fled northward to take shelter in the attic that is Canada. Though many escaped slavery and found safety through the Underground Railroad, they were later joined by KKK members wanted for murder.

Through clouds and over mountains and farmland... Two flies accompany listeners on an adrenaline-pumping flight over war-torn Europe as the U.S. Army Air Corps' Tuskegee airmen take on a heroic, history-making mission during World War II.

This audiobook exposes the misconceptions, half-truths, and outright lies that have shaped the still dominant but largely mythical version of what happened in the White House during those harrowing two weeks of secret Cuban missile crisis deliberations. A half-century after the event it is surely time to demonstrate, once and for all, that RFK's Thirteen Days and the personal memoirs of other ExComm members cannot be taken seriously.

Each year nearly four million people visit Yellowstone National Park—one of the most popular of all national parks—but few know the fascinating and complex historical context in which it was established. In late July 1871, the geologist-explorer Ferdinand Hayden led a team of scientists through a narrow canyon into Yellowstone Basin, entering one of the last unmapped places in the country. The survey’s discoveries led to the passage of the Yellowstone Act in 1872, which created the first national park in the world.

The explosive narrative of the life, captivity, and trial of Bowe Bergdahl, the soldier who was abducted by the Taliban and whose story has served as a symbol for America's foundering war in Afghanistan.