In 2008, Ryan Flavelle, a reservist in the Canadian Army and a student at the University of Calgary, volunteered to serve in Afghanistan. For seven months, twenty-four-year-old Flavelle, a signaller attached to the Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry, endured the extreme heat, the long hours and the occasional absurdity of life as a Canadian soldier in this new war so far from home. Flavelle spent much of his time at a Canadian Forward Operating Base (FOB), living among his fellow ...

With the centenary of the First World War, communities across Canada arranged commemorations of the war experience to honour local servicemen who, through their triumphs and sacrifices, were presented as laying the foundation for a free and independent country. Often overlooked are the triumphs and sacrifices of those who supported those soldiers, and the war effort in general, back at home. The Frontier of Patriotism provides an in-depth look at all aspects of Alberta’s involvement in the...

Seven soldiers. Seven military specialties. Seven stories.What was it like to serve in the combat mission in Afghanistan? Journalists’ reports from 2006 to 2011 could only give brief glimpses of the reality on the ground for Canadian soldiers. This book reveals the full story of what happened to seven soldiers, ranking from corporal to captain, who were deployed during Operation ATHENA, Phase 2. The operation became known as “the combat mission” as Canadian battle ...

Captain Robert Semraus military trial made international headlines—a Canadian soldier serving in Afghanistan arrested for allegedly killing a grievously wounded Taliban soldier in the field. The trial and its outcome are a matter of public record. What you are about to read about the tour of duty that inspired this book is not. What you are about to read is an emotionally draining and mind-snapping firsthand account of war on the ground in Afghanistan. It's raw and explosive. Names have be...

Elite sniper Jody Mitic loved being a soldier. His raw, candid, and engrossing memoir follows his personal journey into the Canadian military, through sniper training, and firefights in Afghanistan, culminating on the fateful night when he stepped on a landmine and lost both of his legs below the knees.Afghanistan, 2007. I was a Master Corporal, part of an elite sniper team sent on a mission to flush out Taliban in an Afghan village. I had just turned thirty, a...

No Lack of Courage is the story of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization's Operation Medusa, the largely Canadian action in Afghanistan from 1 to 17 September 2006, to dislodge a heavily entrenched Taliban force in the Pashmul district of Afghanistans Kandahar Province. At stake, according to senior Afghan politicians and NATO military commanders, was nothing less than the very existence of the reconstituted state of Afghanistan, as well as the NATO alliance itself. In a bitterly...

Frontline offers an insight into the life of just one soldier out of the many thousands in the British Infantry deployed to Afghanistan. These modern day heroes risk their lives on a daily basis to help bring peace to a troubled country.Some of these soldiers are fresh out of school, or college, and within a few months find themselves in a war zone fighting for their lives.The book gives a candid account of life on the front line. The highs and the lows of fighting a war tho...

Every American president, when faced with a crisis, longs to take bold and decisive action. When American lives or vital interests are at stake, the public-and especially the news media and political opponents-expect aggressive leadership. But, contrary to the dramatizations of Hollywood, rarely does a president have that option.In Presidents in Crisis, a former director of the Situation Room takes the reader inside the White House during seventeen grave international emer...

Clearing the Way: Combat Engineers in Kandahar is the story of the men and women of 23 Field Squadron who served with the 1st Royal Canadian Regiment Battle Group in Kandahar in 2006. Through the eyes of thirteen Squadron members relive the early days of the war in Kandahar and the coming of age of a group of soldiers recorded in graphic detail. The reader experiences the large scale battles with Taliban fighters during Operation Medusa the building of Route Summit and the construction of ...

Nobody really knows who these men are- men in black dropped off by a helicopter on the outskirts of a small Afghan village; wading through swamps in Croatia, intent on killing a war criminal; who ensure the protection of a Canadian General in Rwanda; who subdue hostage takers in Peru; and who prove, on-site, the Serbian disarmament lies told by President Milosevic. DENIS MORISSET was part of the initial sixteen-member Joint Task Force 2 (JTF 2) unit from 1993-2001. His extensive and rigoro...

Flying at 120 knots with the unique roar from its aerodynamic rotors and twin turbines the AH64 Apache is the world's most fearsome attack helicopter its pilots refer to it as 'Riding the Dragon'. The Taliban would more often than not flee rather than suffer its 30mm cannon, 2.75 rockets or Hellfire missiles. Some of the Apache systems are truly amazing such as being able to read a car number plate at 4.2Km away with its 127 times-magnification day TV camera. A thermal camera so powerful i...

From retired Air Force pilot Marshall Harrison comes a remarkable memoir of aerial warfare in Vietnam. In his third combat tour, Harrison found himself converted from the high performance world of jets to the awkward-looking OV-10 Bronco and assigned as a FAC forward air controller. A captivating tale of valor, brotherhood, and patriotism unravels in the pages of A Lonely Kind of War, Forward Air Controller, Vietnam, a posthumous release by this published author through Xlibris. Harrison i...