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The Last Stand of Fox Company by Bob Drury and Tom Clavin. 10,000 Chinese PLA vs 1 company of marines 4,900 ft above sea level in a narrow, mountain pass during the battle of the Chosin Reservoir. Just let those numbers sink in for a moment.
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Feb 19, 2015 14:26
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| # ? Apr 25, 2024 06:12 |
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The Korean War was packed to the gills with moments that make the Hollywood version of 300 look like a couple of 7 year olds playing with Nerf guns
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Feb 19, 2015 15:37
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Hector Cafferata was part of Fox Company. His medal of honor citation reads:quote:For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty while serving as a Rifleman with Company F, Second Battalion, Seventh Marines, First Marine Division (Reinforced), in action against enemy aggressor forces in Korea on 28 November 1950. When all the other members of his fire team became casualties, creating a gap in the lines, during the initial phase of a vicious attack launched by a fanatical enemy of regimental strength against his company's hill position, Private Cafferata waged a lone battle with grenades and rifle fire as the attack gained momentum and the enemy threatened penetration through the gap and endangered the integrity of the entire defensive perimeter. Making a target of himself under the devastating fire from automatic weapons, rifles, grenades and mortars, he maneuvered up and down the line and delivered accurate and effective fire against the onrushing force, killing fifteen, wounding many more and forcing the others to withdraw so that reinforcements could move up and consolidate the position. Again fighting desperately against a renewed onslaught later that same morning when a hostile grenade landed in a shallow entrenchment occupied by wounded Marines, Private Cafferata rushed into the gully under heavy fire, seized the deadly missile in his right hand and hurled it free of his comrades before it detonated, severing part of one finger and seriously wounding him in the right hand and arm. Courageously ignoring the intense pain, he staunchly fought on until he was struck by a sniper's bullet and forced to submit to evacuation for medical treatment. Stouthearted and indomitable, Private Cafferata, by his fortitude, great personal valor and dauntless perseverance in the face of almost certain death, saved the lives of several of his fellow Marines and contributed essentially to the success achieved by his company in maintaining its defensive position against tremendous odds. His extraordinary heroism throughout was in keeping with the highest traditions of the United States Naval Service. At this point of the battle, Fox had been reduced to 25% effective strength. Good book.
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Feb 19, 2015 23:05
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I have a request for the thread: there was a book I read a long time ago about some guy who joined an SF detachment (I swear it was delta, but it might have been alpha or maybe something else entirely). The book starts with selection and I particularly remember him talking about the 40-mile march taking all night. There's a bunch of other poo poo in there from the cold war (I think he spent a lot of time talking about vietnam) but I know he talked about working plain clothes in Lebanon and how the car they were in would always get shot up. Does anyone have any idea what this book is called? I really want to download it for my Kindle because I remember enjoying it. I swore it was called "Delta Force", so I downloaded the book by Charlie Beckwith, but that's not the one. In apology for my lack of detail, I will say that Beckwith's book is very good, and he talks about founding Delta Force and the political struggles he encountered as an officer basically starting a new branch in the army. The book ends talking about the failure to resolve the Iran Hostage Crisis and what went wrong at the staging site that caused it to be a colossal fuckup.
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May 25, 2015 08:11
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Pretty sure you're thinking of Inside Delta Force by Eric Haney, who isn't very highly regarded by his peers.
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May 25, 2015 16:10
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Mustang posted:Pretty sure you're thinking of Inside Delta Force by Eric Haney, who isn't very highly regarded by his peers. It's def this book. Why isn't Haney liked? Hunting the Jackal is a cool book btw by Mr. Billy Waugh who is a certified bad rear end. I mean look at this poo poo  He was SOG in Vietnam, performed one of, if not the first HALO jumps, chased Bin Laden around Sudan (I think), and was active in Iraq for OIF and the Battle of Tora Bora in Afghanistan. CIA book called Jawbreaker even mentions him. I read it for entertainment, def a fun read.
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May 26, 2015 03:46
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I looked at some of Haneys critics. A lot of them appear to be other special ops people who are mad that he was never SF, he was just a ranger. Some people say that they heard he was a "shitbag" (they did not know he was a shitbag, they heard from third parties that he was), but a shitbag who got into delta force and was a member for nearly a decade, so I'm not certain what that means exactly. There are two specific incidents that many people thought were embellished or fabricated in the book: Haney fighting another operator in Nicaragua and something about a dude getting punched in the face in Iran, but there was never any comment on the material from anyone in an official capacity (whoever makes sure that no classified material is in the book or existing sources or methods evidently gave it the thumbs-up for it to hit store shelves). Haney also claims to be "army founding member of delta force" when really he wasn't part of delta until a couple years after the unit had been founded by Colnel Beckwith. Then there are also lots of people who sound resentful that he went public with his experiences and monetized his time with the unit, including evidently trying to copyright delta's unit patch or something. I just googled "Haney delta force critics" and I found one tiny article and a couple special ops forums where people were asking a similar question, so my information is now adding to the small pool of poo poo someone heard. Having looked over some of that material, I believe I will be buying it, maybe I'll read it again in a new light. I'll post about a couple books I actually have on my shelf tomorrow.
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May 26, 2015 05:26
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First book I'll talk about is probably something everyone has read or been mentioned a couple times in older threads, but it's such a good read I have to give it a shoutout. 'Marine Sniper' by Charles Henderson is a biography of Carlos Hathcock, a scout-sniper in the Marine Corps during the Vietnam War. Hathcock wasn't just a sniper who sat on hilltops or in towers and did long-distance shooting, he spent a lot of his time crawling through the jungle alone or with a small team of scouts and kept track of enemy movements, spotted for artillery, and even assassinated high-priority targets. Near the end of the book, Hathcock gets injured and separated from the Marine Corps, and the book follows his struggle to transitioning to civilian for a bit. The book is a great read and pretty inspiring. And now for something completely different: 'Killing Hope' by William Blum is a book that tracks efforts made by the American intelligence and military communities to make the world more amenable to America as a superpower following America's triumph in World War 2, and basically loving up everything. It begins in China and Japan with American military very rapidly switching support from the Chinese to the Japanese (which had the effect of making the Chinese hate us from jump street after their revolution), and follows American efforts in Korea, Vietnam, Europe, South America, Africa and the Middle East to control the local leadership or the people; although the book is mostly chronological, each chapter is dedicated to a different country or region. It should be obvious, but I'll make it explicit that this is not an "America, gently caress Yeah!" book; this is an "America hosed Up" book. The book can get pretty graphic in describing atrocities as well; I felt like I knew enough about history to not be surprised that the American government did some evil poo poo, but on a couple occasionsI had to put the book down and go do something else. Blum was and is a very vocal critic of American foreign policy, and the book is basically "Here is how Americans were evil in Korea, here's how Americans were evil in Iran, etc, etc....no wonder we're the most hated country on Earth right now!", there is very little attention paid to any positive things Americans did in any of the places covered. All of his books and most of his life since he left the State Department in the 1960s has been to this effect. With that in mind, my brother asked me a couple days ago why Iran hates the US so much,and material from this book helped me answer that question for him.
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May 28, 2015 03:47
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The Big Show by Pierre Colstermann http://www.amazon.com/The-Big-Show-Greatest-Paperbacks/dp/0304366242 Its about a French pilot who joined the RAF and became one of the highest scoring aces. Its one of my favorite. By the end of the war you can feel the fatigue. About Face - David Hackworth http://www.amazon.com/About-Face-Odyssey-American-Warrior/dp/0671695347/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1441048314&sr=1-3&keywords=about+face A young soldier joins at the end of WWII and then fights in korea, gets a battlefield commission, and then commands a battalion in Nam. Forever War- its awesome, I saw a few other people recommend it already but wanted to vouch for it.
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Aug 31, 2015 20:17
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I read Riding Rockets and it's really good. Mike Mullane is extremely military but that's kind of a given.
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Oct 11, 2015 19:54
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Larry Parrish posted:I read Riding Rockets and it's really good. Mike Mullane is extremely military but that's kind of a given. Just picked this up at the used bookstore last weekend. I'll likely start it this week when I finish Relentless Strike (which is really great btw).
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Oct 12, 2015 14:23
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Larry Parrish posted:I read Riding Rockets and it's really good. Mike Mullane is extremely military but that's kind of a given. Reading that right now. Dude is really down to earth about astronauts being as human as anybody else.
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Oct 12, 2015 14:48
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Rules of the Game is Yet Another Book About Jutland, but concentrates on decades of institutional decay in the RN. High points so far: the  -worthy efforts by battlecruiser captains to make absolutely, positively sure their ships would blow up, because they were all about rate of fire.
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Oct 12, 2015 19:47
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I know we had Saudichat a while back, so I went out and read Inside the Kingdom. Goddamn. I have no idea how they're our allies. The poo poo that goes on in Saudi Arabia boggles the mind. - Palace Intrigue - Religious Suppression - Having a National Guard to fight the Army (Making sure weapons systems are 1-to-1 counters to Army equipment) - Supporting Terrorism (duh!) - Dragging the US into all kinds of poo poo - (Secretly) Buying ballistic missiles from China in '91
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Oct 14, 2015 16:38
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Frosted Flake posted:I know we had Saudichat a while back, so I went out and read Inside the Kingdom. Goddamn. I have no idea how they're our allies. The poo poo that goes on in Saudi Arabia boggles the mind. Don't forget the slave labor!
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Oct 14, 2015 16:41
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also lol at the CIA helping the Saudis build madrasas in Afghanistan in the 80's and 90's.
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Oct 14, 2015 17:04
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Frosted Flake posted:I know we had Saudichat a while back, so I went out and read Inside the Kingdom. Goddamn. I have no idea how they're our allies. The poo poo that goes on in Saudi Arabia boggles the mind. They have lots of oil and are big and Not Iran.
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Oct 14, 2015 21:38
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I picked up Relentless Strike based on the recommendations here and it's fantastic! I'd like to recommend ARVN: Life and Death in the South Vietnamese Army . It's not a very long book, and the writing is very dry and academic but it is a good read on a topic that is often overlooked. The book explains the reasons behind the ARVN's shortcomings but also highlights little-known successes. The ARVN Airborne, Rangers and Marines were all excellent, as were the armoured cavalry formations. The ARVN as a whole was plagued by conscription destabilizing the patterns of rural life, and honestly unbelievable corruption in the officer corps. The way the ARVN was trained and equipped by the Americans was in many ways a response to the Korean War and the focus of the ARVN was force-on-force engagements with massive firepower and logistics support from the US. This was very effective in 1965-66 and again at An Loc in '72. As a counterinsurgency force the ARVN was not very flexible or effective, with the exception of the Rangers and Marines. When the Americans pulled out, the ARVN was unable to rely on firepower to blunt the North Vietnamese offensive, and morale fell apart as an entire Corps was destroyed in the Central Highlands. When people complain about the Iraqi Army or ANA they often use the ARVN comparison, and I think that's a little unfair. The ARVN did very well considering the state of South Vietnam. Corruption, coups, and poor policy overall doomed the ARVN more than cowardice or failings on the part of individual soldiers.
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Oct 30, 2015 15:39
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Finished Relentless Strike. It's... okay I guess?
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Nov 6, 2015 07:13
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OMFG PTSD LOL PBUH fucked around with this message at 08:51 on Nov 6, 2015 |
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Nov 6, 2015 08:42
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Read the Time Odyssey books by Arthur C. Clarke and Stephen Baxter this week. They were pretty rad. Time's Eye, Sunstorm, Firstborn
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Nov 21, 2015 19:23
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| # ? Apr 25, 2024 06:12 |
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Read The Lion's Gate recentlyquote:June 5, 1967. Israel is surrounded by enemies who want nothing less than her utter extinction. The Soviet-equipped Egyptian Army has massed a thousand tanks on the nation’s southern border. Syrian heavy guns are shelling her from the north. To the east, Jordan and Iraq are moving mechanized brigades and fighter squadrons into position to attack. So it's a recounting of various parts of the Six Day War as told by the various people Pressfield interviewed. There are weak parts - whole sections of the war are left out, he jumps to different pov's too frequently, and the bits with Moshe Dayan are fictional. But the book does a great job at capturing the feeling leading up to and during the war that the common soldier must have felt. The sections on the air portion of the war I found particularly fascinating, and he spends a lot of time on the minutiae of it if you're into that. Im currently reading Command and Control: Nuclear Weapons, the Damascus Accident, and the Illusion of Safety. It uses a recounting of a Titan II silo accident in 1980 to talk about the history of our nuclear program. I haven't read similar books on the same subject, some already mentioned in this thread, so I don't know how it stacks up or if all of this is just old info, but it's pretty good so far in that terrifying way reading about heads of state talk about killing millions of people matter of factly can be
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Nov 29, 2015 01:55
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