Military Politics

Turning her back on her privileged life in Victorian England, Gertrude Bell (1868-1926), fired by her innate curiosity, journeyed the world and became fascinated with all things Arab. Traveling the length and breadth of the Arab region, armed with a love for its language and its people, she not only produced several enormously popular books based on her experiences but became instrumental to the British foreign office. When World War I erupted, and the British needed the loyalty of the Arab leaders, it was Gertrude Bell's work and connections that helped provided the brain for T. E. Lawrence's military brawn.

This book paints a vivid picture of Jefferson Davis as a multifaceted, often charismatic man who mirrored the turbulent times in which he lived and who stood solidly for the South that he loved. Ranging over the complete span of his long life, it shows him as a hardworking Mississippi planter, a compassionate slave owner, a hero of the Mexican War, and an able secretary of war under Franklin Pierce. But it is on the years of the Civil War and Davis’s controversial performance as president of the Confederacy that the book focuses.

When the launch of their powerful new hypersonic missile ends in destruction, the Chinese government needs someone to blame. Was it a failure of engineering, or sabotage? The chief engineer on the project, Dr. Yang Dàyóu, is targeted as the scapegoat and arrested—unable to help his family as they are hunted down by the military. Op-Center’s Lt. Grace Lee is sent to China on a solo reconnaissance mission, but when she sees an opportunity to free the imprisoned scientist, she seizes it.

First, a team of Navy SEALs wiped out in a surprise attack. Then, a motorcade of dignitaries is ambushed - and the US Secretary of State is abducted. Coordinated and flawlessly executed, this is no random act of terror. A vision of evil unprecedented in scope has been triggered....

In 2012, Hakeem al-Araibi was a promising young player on Bahrain's national football team when he was arrested for attacking a police station during the Arab Spring, despite television footage showing him playing soccer at the time of the alleged attack. After three months of torture and wrongful imprisonment, Hakeem was released. He fled the country and made his way to Australia, where he was granted refugee status. Hakeem made a life here and was playing for the suburban Pascoe Vale Football Club, in Melbourne. He thought he was safe.

When a military coup in Iran leads to a crackdown on religious jihadists, it seems as if a new era is dawning in the Middle East, especially when the new leader, General Buzhazi, seeks to normalize relations with both America and Israel. But the Iranians are not really interested in peace....In the guise of pursuing and destroying Islamic militants, Buzhazi is planting thousands of Iranian Pasdaran special-ops troops throughout the oil-rich Kurdish region of Northern Iraq and in a lightning-quick operation brutally occupies the territory.

An explosive, behind-the-scenes look into the workings of the U.S. war in Afghanistan that lifts the curtain of the world stage to reveal the devastating greed, waste, and failure surrounding this unwinnable war.

Winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize Peter Maass went to the Balkans as a reporter at the height of the nightmarish war there, but this audiobook is not traditional war reportage. Maass examines how an ordinary Serb could wake up one morning and shoot his neighbor, once a friend - then rape that neighbor's wife. He conveys the desperation that makes a Muslim beg the United States to bomb his own city in order to end the misery.

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.

The American military is a tightly sealed community, and few outsiders have reason to know that a great many senior officers view the Iraq war with incredulity and dismay. But many officers have shared their anger with renowned military reporter Thomas E. Ricks, and in Fiasco, Ricks combines these astonishing on-the-record military accounts with his own extraordinary on-the-ground reportage to create a spellbinding account of an epic disaster.

On March 7, 2004, former SAS soldier and mercenary Simon Mann prepared to take off from Harare International Airport. His destination was Equatorial Guinea; his intention was to remove one of the most brutal dictators in Africa in a privately organized coup d’état. The plot had the tacit approval of Western intelligence agencies, and Mann had already planned, overseen, and won two wars in Angola and Sierra Leone. So why did it go so wrong?

Keith Jeffery’s fascinating and revealing account draws on a wealth of archival materials never before seen by any outsider to unveil the inner workings of the world’s first spy agency. Britain’s Secret Intelligence Service—or MI6—was born a century ago amid rising fears of foreign military powers, especially Germany. The next 40 years saw MI6 taking an increasingly important—and, until now, largely hidden—role in shaping the history of Europe and the world.

The navy created by the people of Athens in ancient Greece was one of the finest fighting forces in the history of the world and the model for all other national navies to come. The Athenian navy built a civilization, empowered the world's first democracy, and led a band of ordinary citizens on a voyage of discovery that altered the course of history.

In Rogue Command, a group of European terrorists have a new, unexpected target, with nuclear-level consequences. With the clock ticking for Troy to stop them before they set off a global war, Troy, partnered with an Interpol agent whom he grudgingly respects, is up against the enemy of his life.

We last saw Eve and Villanelle in a spy-vs.-spy race around the world, crossing powerful criminal organizations and dangerous governments, each trying to come out on top. But they aren't finished yet. In this sequel, Eve, the former MI6 operative and the novel's heroine, reveals a new side to her strengths, while coming ever closer to a confrontation with Villanelle, the evasive and skilled assassin Eve is hunting.

In No Mission Is Impossible, Michael Bar-Zohar and Nissim Mishal return with the intensely absorbing, fast-paced story of 30 of the boldest missions of the Israeli special forces. Bar-Zohar and Mishal depict in electrifying detail major battles, raids in enemy territory, and death-defying commando missions while also sharing the personal stories of both soldiers and top commanders, revealing their hopes and fears. The stories are often of victories, but sometimes they're of immense failures.

Former special ops soldier Alex Reeve is Operative 66. One of the UK's deadliest weapons, he is part of the mysterious C6 - an elite and top-secret security service with a remit to neutralise the country's most dangerous enemies. But now Reeve is in the firing line. Framed as a traitor, Reeve is forced to flee as every operative is instructed to kill the 'rogue asset'. On the run from his own government, alone and under the radar, Reeve must survive off grid with fearsome assassins on his trail. He doesn't know why he's a target. Or who betrayed him.

As the 1960s drew to a close, the United States was coming apart at the seams. From August 1969 to August 1970, the nation witnessed 9,000 protests and 84 acts of arson or bombings at schools across the country. It was the year of the My Lai massacre investigation, the Cambodia invasion, Woodstock, and the Moratorium to End the War. The American death toll in Vietnam was approaching 50,000, and the ascendant counterculture was challenging nearly every aspect of American society.

David Bell emphasizes the astonishing sense of human possibility that Napoleon represented. Bell emphasizes the importance of the French Revolution in understanding Napoleon's career. The revolution made possible the unprecedented concentration of political authority that Napoleon accrued. Without the political changes brought about by the revolution, Napoleon could not have fought his wars. Without the wars, he could not have seized and held onto power. Though his virtual dictatorship betrayed the ideals of liberty and equality, his life and career were revolutionary.

At a Mexican roadblock, a U.S. Embassy SUV is stopped at gunpoint, three of its passengers murdered, and a fourth kidnapped. Everything points to the drug cartels, especially when the kidnappers say they will return the hostage if a cartel kingpin is released from U.S. federal prison.But when word gets to Charley Castillo and his group of “retired” spies and special operators, they have their doubts.