Military History Marine Memoirs

Four weeks after Navy SEALs had killed Osama bin Laden, the President of the United States stood in Arlington National Cemetery. In his Memorial Day address, he extolled the courage and sacrifice of the two young men buried side by side in the graves before him: Travis Manion, a fallen US Marine, and Brendan Looney, a fallen US Navy SEAL. Although they were killed three years apart, one in Iraq and one in Afghanistan, these two best friends and former roommates were now buried together - "brothers forever".

Russell Vineyard joined the United States Marine Corps as an M1A1 Tank crewman. After USMC Boot Camp and Marine Armor School, Vineyard found himself at Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Training and Education Facility Twentynine Palms with 1st Tank Battalion. In November of 2004, he learned he'd be joining the Marine Corps' 1st Tank Battalion, Delta Company as a tank gunner and headed out on the 13th Marine Expeditionary Unit. The United States Military would send the tank platoon across the ocean to participate in a global military exercise in Egypt and to fight the War on Terror in Iraq.

"Kids like me didn't go to Vietnam", writes Jack McLean in his must-listen memoir. Raised in suburban New Jersey, he attended the Phillips Academy in Andover, MA, but decided to put college on hold. After graduation in the spring of 1966, faced with the mandatory military draft, he enlisted in the United States Marine Corps for a two-year stint. "Vietnam at the time was a country, and not yet a war", he writes. It didn't remain that way for long.

In November 2006, then-first-lieutenant Thomas Daly arrived as part of the surge in Ramadi to take part in Operation Squeeze Play, a division-size effort to remove al-Qaeda from Anbar province. In this powerful memoir, he describes the successful clearing of Southern Ramadi's Second Officer's district, the Qatana, and the uprising of local citizens against al-Qaeda on the eastern edge of the city (the result of an unlikely alliance between Daly's company and Thawar al Anbar).

On Easter morning, 1972, Marine captain John Ripley braved intense enemy fire to blow up a bridge during the North Vietnamese "Easter Offensive." Ripley became a legend within the Marine Corps for his daring act of heroism. His story is described here by fellow Marine John Grider Miller. Miller lays bare Ripley's innermost thoughts during the 3 hours it took to place and set the fuses while some 30,000 enemy troops and 200 tanks prepared to cross just yards away. Such a compelling act of raw courage and personal resolve is rarely encountered.

This audiobook is built around Fred Edward's journals, sent home during his first tour in Vietnam in 1966-67. His own meticulous research fits his individual experiences into a larger context, through Postscripts, extensive notes, and a thorough historical chronology

A brand-new recording read by the author. The memoir of Jason Delgado, a US Marine scout sniper and MARSOC's first lead sniper instructor. The fight for Jason Delgado's life and soul began when he was just a boy. He ultimately escaped the death and drugs of a crime-riddled Bronx by way of the US Marine Corps. However, after earning his way into the esteemed ranks of the service's famed Scout Snipers, Delgado saw that old struggle reignited when he was dumped into the hell of war in Iraq.

Among them was green young Lieutenant Pat Caruso who became de facto company commander when the five officers ranking him were killed or wounded. He led his rapidly diminishing force steadily forward for the next few days, when a day's gains were measured in yards. Caruso was eventually wounded himself and was evacuated. Realizing that the heroism of his comrades would be lost by the decimation of his unit, Caruso latched onto any paper he could find and filled every blank space with his memory of the fighting.

In January 1968, the 26th Marine Regiment was ordered to a place in the far northwest corner of South Vietnam called Khe Sanh. John Corbett, an untested replacement in a clean, green uniform, and his fellow leathernecks were responsible for building and defending the combat base, and holding positions on the strategic hills overlooking the Ho Chi Minh Trail as it crossed into Laos and South Vietnam from nearby North Vietnam. Only days after Corbett arrived at Khe Sanh, some 20,000 North Vietnamese soldiers surrounded the base, outnumbering the American Marines seven to one.

Terry McGowan had been a beat cop, a marine captain, and a special agent for the FBI before retiring at the age of 50. But when tragedy struck the United States on September 11, 2001, Terry felt an undiminished sense of duty to protect and serve his country. Six years later he was in Iraq as a member of a team of high-ranking retired and active-duty military working for the highest level of marine military intelligence. His success in Iraq led to a position as a law enforcement professional with the marines in Afghanistan.