Napalm was invented on Valentine’s Day 1942 at a secret Harvard war research laboratory. It created an inferno that killed over 87,500 people in Tokyo—more than died in the atomic explosions at Hiroshima or Nagasaki—and went on to incinerate 64 Japanese cities. The Bomb got the press, but napalm did the work. Robert Neer offers the first history.

The New York Times Bestseller2014 American Book Award WinnerWinner of the Ridenhour Prize for Reportorial Distinction“An indispensable, paradigm-shifting new history of the war...All these decades later, Americans still haven't drawn the right lesson from Vietnam.” —San Francisco ChronicleBased on classified documents and first-person interviews, a startling history o...

**A New York Times bestseller!An epic history of the decline of American military leadership—from the bestselling author of Fiasco and Churchill and Orwell.**While history has been kind to the American generals of World War II—Marshall, Eisenhower, Patton, and Bradley—it has been less kind to the generals of the wars that followed, such as Koster, Franks, Sanchez, and Petraeus. In The Generals, Thomas E. Ricks sets out to explain why that...

THE CENTRAL HIGHLANDS--WHERE DANGER REIGNED SUPREME AND DEATH WAS A CONSTANT COMPANIONThe fighting was fierce in the Central Highlands where Green Beret George Dooley served with elite Special Forces A-teams, training the rugged Montagnards in guerrilla warfare and accompanying them on patrols. The Viet Cong and NVA were entrenched in the sparsely populated Highlands, where towering mountains gave them the ruthless upper hand.The missions Dooley led, often in enemy territor...

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David Maraniss tells the epic story of Vietnam and the sixties through the events of a few gripping, passionate days of war and peace in October 1967.With meticulous and captivating detail, They Marched Into Sunlight brings that catastrophic time back to life while examining questions about the meaning of dissent and the official manipulation of truth—issues that are as relevant today as they were decades ago.In a seamless narrative, Maraniss weave...

It was the war that lasted ten thousand days. The war that inspired scores of songs. The war that sparked dozens of riots. And in this stirring chronicle, Pulitzer Prize- winning journalist Philip Caputo writes about our country's most controversial war -- the Vietnam War -- for young readers. From the first stirrings of unrest in Vietnam under French colonial rule, to American intervention, to the battle at Hamburger Hill, to the Tet Offensive, to the fall of Saigon, 10,000 Days of Th...

"A terrific book, lively and brisk . . . a must read for anyone who tries to understand the Vietnam War ." —Thomas E. RicksIs it possible that the riddle of America's military failure in Vietnam has a one-word, one-man answer?Until we understand Gen. William Westmoreland, we will never know what went wrong in the Vietnam War. An Eagle Scout at fifteen, First Captain of his West Point class, Westmoreland foug...

Airpower, more than any other factor, has shaped war in the twentieth century. In this fascinating narrative history, Martin van Creveld vividly portrays the rise of the plane as a tool of war and the evolution of both technology and strategy. He documents seminal battles and turning points, and relates stories of individual daring and collective mastery of the skies.However, the end of airpower's glorious age is drawing near. The conventional wisdom to the contrary, modern precisi...

The US-Soviet arms race, told through the story of a colorful and visionary American Air Force officer—melding biography, history, world affairs, and science to transportthe reader back and forth from individual drama to world stage."Compulsively readable and important.” —The New York Times Book ReviewIn this never-before-told story, Neil Sheehan—winner of the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award -- details American Air Force...

"This is the history of the war in Vietnam we have been waiting for. This is a marvelous achievement--meticulously documented, excitingly narrated, written with grace, wit, and passion."– Howard Zinn"This terrible history is told with such clarity and passion, detail, intelligence it's hard to stop reading. The tension in the writing keeps your sadness in some kind of check as you read about opportunities for peace lost again and again, and think of today's...

While the Japanese war cabinet argued about whether to surrender, and on what terms, the U.S. Army Strategic Air Force on Guam and Tinian geared up for a thousand-plane raid upon the Empire. It would be the last air raid of the Second World War. This little book, which first appeared in Air & Space / Smithsonian magazine on the 50th anniversary of the war's end, tells the story of those momentous forty-eight hours. Revised and expanded for e-book publication, including: a portfoli...