Heroes on the Frontline - True Stories of the Deadliest Missions Behind the Enemy Lines in Afghanistan and Iraq PDF Download

Author: Nigel Cawthorne
Publisher: Kings Road Publishing
ISBN: 1843584360
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 148

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Book Description
In the current conflict in Iraq and Afghanistan, Britain's Special Forces are on the front line, these heroes are so respected that they are even called upon by the Americans when a particularly difficult and dangerous job has to be done. Time after time they have proved their worth on the battlefield, confirming that their commitment and professionalism are second to none.Military expert Nigel Cawthorne looks at the crucial role the British special forces have played since the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. Of course, the circumstances have changed dramatically since the 'War on Terror' began, which has made the task facing these brave soldiers even more complicated than it originally appeared.This insightful book examines how the relationship between our special forces and their American counterparts has developed, as they try to stabilise a volatile region, fighting side-by-side against the ruthless enemies of the West.

Author: Sean Parnell
Publisher: Harper Collins
ISBN: 0062066412
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 308

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A riveting story of American fighting men, Outlaw Platoon is Lieutenant Sean Parnell’s stunning personal account of the legendary U.S. Army’s 10th Mountain Division’s heroic stand in the mountains of Afghanistan. Acclaimed for its vivid, poignant, and honest recreation of sixteen brutal months of nearly continuous battle in the deadly Hindu Kesh, Outlaw Platoon is a Band of Brothers or We Were Soldiers Once and Young for the early 21st century—an action-packed, highly emotional true story of enormous sacrifice and bravery. A magnificent account of heroes, renegades, infidels, and brothers, it stands with Sebastian Junger’s War as one of the most important books to yet emerge from the heat, smoke, and fire of America’s War in Afghanistan.

Author: Mitch Weiss
Publisher: Berkley
ISBN: 9780425245262
Category : Afghan War, 2001-
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Weiss and Maurer recount the story of an elite team of Special Forces who were ambushed while on their mission to capture a terrorist in Afghanistan, and the 10 men from the unit who earned Silver Stars--the Army's third highest award for combat valor.

Author: U S Marine Corps History Division
Publisher: St, John's Press
ISBN: 9781946411235
Category :
Languages : en
Pages :

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This volume presents a collection of 38 articles, interviews, and speeches describing many aspects of the U.S. Marine Corps' participation in Operation Enduring Freedom from 2001 to 2009. This work is intended to serve as a general overview and provisional reference to inform both Marines and the general public until the History Division completes monographs dealing with major Marine Corps operations during the campaign. The accompanying annotated bibliography provides a detailed look at selected sources that currently exist until new scholarship and archival materials become available. From the Preface - From the outset, some experts doubted that the U.S. Marines Corps would play a major role in Afghanistan given the landlocked nature of the battlefield. Naval expeditionary Task Force 58 (TF-58) commanded by then-Brigadier General James N. Mattis silenced naysayers with the farthest ranging amphibious assault in Marine Corps/Navy history. In late November 2001, Mattis' force seized what became Forward Operating Base Rhino, Afghanistan, from naval shipping some 400 miles away. The historic assault not only blazed a path for follow-on forces, it also cut off fleeing al-Qaeda and Taliban elements and aided in the seizure of Kandahar. While Corps doctrine and culture advocates Marine employment as a fully integrated Marine air-ground task force (MAGTF), deployments to Afghanistan often reflected what former Commandant General Charles C. Krulak coined as the "three-block war." Following TF-58's deployment during the initial take down of the Taliban regime, the MAGTF made few appearances in Afghanistan until 2008. Before then, subsequent Marine units often deployed as a single battalion under the command of the U.S. Army Combined Joint Task Force (CJTF) to provide security for provincial reconstruction teams. The Marine Corps also provided embedded training teams to train and mentor the fledgling Afghan National Army and Police. Aviation assets sporadically deployed to support the U.S.-led coalition mostly to conduct a specific mission or to bridge a gap in capability, such as close air support or electronic warfare to counter the improvised explosive device threat. From 2003 to late 2007, the national preoccupation with stabilizing Iraq focused most Marine Corps assets on stemming the insurgency, largely centered in the restive al-Anbar Province. As a result of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) taking over command of Afghan operations and Marine Corps' commitments in Iraq, relatively few Marine units operated in Afghanistan from late 2006 to 2007. Although Marines first advocated shifting resources from al-Anbar to southern Afghanistan in early 2007, the George W. Bush administration delayed the Marine proposal for fear of losing the gains made as a result of Army General David H. Petraeus' "surge strategy" in Iraq. By late 2007, the situation in Afghanistan had deteriorated to the point that it inspired Rolling Stone to later publish the story "How We Lost the War We Won." In recognition of the shifting tides in both Iraq and Afghanistan, the Bush administration began to transfer additional resources to Afghanistan in early 2008. The shift prompted senior Marines to again push for a more prominent role in the Afghan campaign, even proposing to take over the Afghan mission from the Army. . . .

Author: Bing West
Publisher: Random House Trade Paperbacks
ISBN: 0812980905
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 370

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Book Description
NATIONAL BESTSELLER In this definitive account of the conflict, acclaimed war correspondent and bestselling author Bing West provides a practical way out of Afghanistan. Drawing on his expertise as both a combat-hardened Marine and a former assistant secretary of defense, West has written a tour de force narrative, rich with vivid characters and gritty combat, which shows the consequences when strategic theory meets tactical reality. Having embedded with dozens of frontline units over the past three years, he takes the reader on a battlefield journey from the mountains in the north to the opium fields in the south. A fighter who understands strategy, West builds the case for changing course. His conclusion is sure to provoke debate: remove most of the troops from Afghanistan, stop spending billions on the dream of a modern democracy, and insist the Afghans fight their own battles. Bing West’s book is a page-turner about brave men and cunning enemies that examines our realistic choices as a nation.

Author: Seth W. B. Folsom
Publisher: Potomac Books, Inc.
ISBN: 1597973459
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 715

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Book Description
The Highway War is the compelling Iraq War memoir of then-Capt. Seth Folsom, commanding officer of Delta Company, First Light Armored Reconnaissance Battalion, U.S. Marine Corps. Mounted in eight-wheeled LAVs (light armored vehicles), this unit of 130 Marines and sailors was one of the first into Iraq in March 2003. It fought on the front lines for the war's entire offensive phase, from the Kuwaiti border through Baghdad to Tikrit. Folsom's thoughtful account focuses on his maturation as a combat leader--and as a human being enduring the austere conditions of combat and coming to terms with loss of life on both sides. Moreover, The Highway War is the story of a junior officer's relationships with his company's young Marines, for whose lives he was responsible, and with his superior officers. Folsom covers numerous unusual military actions and conveys truthfully the pace, stress, excitement, mistakes, and confusion of modern ground warfare. The Highway War is destined to be a Marine Corps classic.

Author: Colonel Nathan S. Lowrey
Publisher: Pickle Partners Publishing
ISBN: 1786256223
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 1011

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Includes more than 100 maps, plans and illustrations. “This monograph is more than the story of Marine expeditionary operations in Afghanistan. It describes who our nation’s enemies are; how America became involved in the Global War on Terrorism; and how the Marine Corps struggled to acquire a major role in Operation Enduring Freedom, as well as the actions of Marines and sailors who helped prosecute the air and ground campaigns against Taliban and al-Qaeda forces.”— Dr. Charles P. Neimeyer, Director of Marine Corps History

Author: Ephraim Mattos
Publisher: Center Street
ISBN: 154608181X
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 304

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A frontline witness account of the deadly urban combat of the Battle of Mosul told by former Navy SEAL and frontline combat medic Ephraim Mattos. After leaving the US Navy SEAL teams in spring of 2017, Ephraim Mattos, age twenty-four, flew to Iraq to join a small group of volunteer humanitarians known as the Free Burma Rangers, who were working on the frontlines of the war on ISIS. Until being shot by ISIS on a suicidal rescue mission, Mattos witnessed unexplainable acts of courage and sacrifice by the Free Burma Rangers, who, while under heavy machine gun and mortar fire, assaulted across ISIS minefields, used themselves as human shields, and sprinted down ISIS-infested streets-all to retrieve wounded civilians. In City of Death: Humanitarian Warriors in the Battle of Mosul, Mattos recounts in vivid detail what he saw and felt while he and the other Free Burma Rangers evacuated the wounded, conducted rescue missions, and at times fought shoulder-to-shoulder with the Iraqi Army against ISIS. Filled with raw and emotional descriptions of what it's like to come face-to-face with death, this is the harrowing and uplifting true story of a small group of men who risked everything to save the lives of the Iraqi people and who followed the credence, "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends." As the coauthor of the #1 New York Times bestselling American Sniper, Scott McEwen has teamed up with Mattos to help share an unforgettable tale of an American warrior turned humanitarian forced to fight his way into and out of a Hell on Earth created by ISIS.

Author: Nigel Cawthorne
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Iraq War, 2003-
Languages : en
Pages : 286

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Author: Dakota Meyer
Publisher: Random House
ISBN: 0679645446
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 266

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“The story of what Dakota did . . . will be told for generations.”—President Barack Obama, from remarks given at Meyer’s Medal of Honor ceremony In the fall of 2009, Taliban insurgents ambushed a patrol of Afghan soldiers and Marine advisors in a mountain village called Ganjigal. Firing from entrenched positions, the enemy was positioned to wipe out one hundred men who were pinned down and were repeatedly refused artillery support. Ordered to remain behind with the vehicles, twenty-one year-old Marine corporal Dakota Meyer disobeyed orders and attacked to rescue his comrades. With a brave driver at the wheel, Meyer stood in the gun turret exposed to withering fire, rallying Afghan troops to follow. Over the course of the five hours, he charged into the valley time and again. Employing a variety of machine guns, rifles, grenade launchers, and even a rock, Meyer repeatedly repulsed enemy attackers, carried wounded Afghan soldiers to safety, and provided cover for dozens of others to escape—supreme acts of valor and determination. In the end, Meyer and four stalwart comrades—an Army captain, an Afghan sergeant major, and two Marines—cleared the battlefield and came to grips with a tragedy they knew could have been avoided. For his actions on that day, Meyer became the first living Marine in three decades to be awarded the Medal of Honor. Into the Fire tells the full story of the chaotic battle of Ganjigal for the first time, in a compelling, human way that reveals it as a microcosm of our recent wars. Meyer takes us from his upbringing on a farm in Kentucky, through his Marine and sniper training, onto the battlefield, and into the vexed aftermath of his harrowing exploits in a battle that has become the stuff of legend. Investigations ensued, even as he was pitched back into battle alongside U.S. Army soldiers who embraced him as a fellow grunt. When it was over, he returned to the States to confront living with the loss of his closest friends. This is a tale of American values and upbringing, of stunning heroism, and of adjusting to loss and to civilian life. We see it all through Meyer’s eyes, bullet by bullet, with raw honesty in telling of both the errors that resulted in tragedy and the resolve of American soldiers, U.S. Marines, and Afghan soldiers who’d been abandoned and faced certain death. Meticulously researched and thrillingly told, with nonstop pace and vivid detail, Into the Fire is the unvarnished story of a modern American hero. Praise for Into the Fire “A story of men at their best and at their worst . . . leaves you gaping in admiration at Medal of Honor winner Dakota Meyer’s courage.”—National Review “Meyer’s dazzling bravery wasn’t momentary or impulsive but deliberate and sustained.”—The Wall Street Journal “[A] cathartic, heartfelt account . . . Combat memoirs don’t get any more personal.”—Kirkus Reviews “A great contribution to the discussion of an agonizingly complex subject.”—The Virginian-Pilot “Black Hawk Down meets Lone Survivor.”—Library Journal