When President George W. Bush stood on the decks of the U.S.S. Lincoln in May 2003 and announced the victorious end to major combat operations in Iraq, he did so in front of a huge banner that proclaimed "Mission Accomplished." American forces had successfully removed the regime of Saddam Hussein with "rapid decisive operations"--and yet the United States was unprepared to effectively replace that regime. Gordon Rudd's excellent history reveals why in stark detail.

Between the invasion of Iraq in March 2003 and the creation of the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) that May, the Allied...

From the American Revolution to the global war on terror, U.S. Army doctrine has evolved to regulate the chaos of armed conflict by providing an intellectual basis for organizing, training, equipping, and operating the military. Walter E. Kretchik analyzes the service's keystone doctrine over three centuries to reveal that the army's leadership is more forward thinking and adaptive than has been generally believed.

The first comprehensive history of Army doctrine, Kretchik's book fully explores the principles that have shaped the Army's approach to warfare. From Regulations For the Order...

Timothy Lomperis knows the Vietnam War, both as a soldier and as a scholar. In the latter role he has published extensively, including The War Everyone Lost--and Won, hailed as one of the best books ever written on that conflict. Even though he served two tours "in country" during the war's most frustrating period-from the infamous Easter Invasion through the Paris Peace negotiations-this is the first time he has written about the war from such a personal perspective.

An intelligence officer at the Military Assistance Command, Vietnam (MACV), Lomperis and his comrades were tasked...

When General Ormsby Mitchel and his Third Division, Army of the Ohio, marched into North Alabama in April 1862, they initiated the first occupation of an inland region in the Deep South during the Civil War. As an occupying force, soldiers were expected to adhere to President Lincoln's policy of conciliation, a conservative strategy based on the belief that most southerners were loyal to the Union. Confederate civilians in North Alabama not only rejected their occupiers' conciliatory overtures, but they began sabotaging Union telegraph lines and trains, conducting guerrilla operations, and...

In his farewell speech, President Dwight Eisenhower famously warned us of the dangers of a military-industrial complex (MIC). In Paul Koistinen's sobering new book, that warning appears to have been both prophetic and largely ignored.

As the final volume in his magisterial study of the political economy of American warfare, State of War describes the bipolar world that developed from the rivalry between the U.S. and USSR, showing how seventy years of defense spending have bred a monster that has sunk its claws into the very fabric of American life. Koistinen underscores how during the...

In the summer of 1942, Axis forces controlled almost the entire southern shore of the Mediterranean. Less than a year later, they had been swept from the African continent-thanks in no small part to efforts of the fledgling U.S. Army Air Force. Indeed, USAAF in North Africa emerged as a senior partner in the Alliance, supplying aircraft and crews at a rate the other partners were unable to match.

Going beyond the spare analysis of North African air operations in previous accounts, Christopher Rein shows how American fighter planes and heavy bombers, employed in almost exclusively tactical...

Jackson's Sword is the initial volume in a monumental two-volume work that provides a sweeping panoramic view of the U.S. Army and its officer corps from the War of 1812 to the War with Mexico, the first such study in more than forty years. Watson's chronicle shows how the officer corps played a crucial role in stabilizing the frontiers of a rapidly expanding nation, while gradually moving away from military adventurism toward a professionalism subordinate to civilian authority.

Jackson's Sword explores problems of institutional instability, multiple loyalties, and...

The 4th Marine Brigade, with roughly 10,000 men, was the only large Marine unit to see major action in World War I. Dubbed "Devil Dogs" by the Germans, the 4th was part of the 2nd Division of the American Expeditionary Forces, nicknamed the "Race Horse Division" for its rapid and devastating pursuit of the enemy. The 4th Brigade fought at Verdun, Soissons, St. Mihiel, Blanc Mont, and the Meuse-Argonne, and its signature victory at Belleau Wood saved Paris from falling into German hands. It was also one of the major reasons that the 2nd Division advanced more miles, captured more territory,...

"Black smoke drifted about the scene. The first thing I noticed was the huge crater yawning next to the damaged truck."

In the Vietnam War, American "rough riders" drove trucks through hostile territory delivering supplies, equipment, ammunition, weapons, fuel, and reinforcements to troops fighting on the war's ever-shifting front lines. But, all too often, the convoys themselves became the front lines.

Frank McAdams, a Marine Corps lieutenant, learned that the hard way during a tour of duty that began right after the 1968 Tet Offensive and the siege at Khe Sanh. In this...

Most histories of the U.S. Army in World War II view the Mediterranean Theater of Operations primarily as a deadly training ground for very green forces, where lessons learned on the beaches of Oran, in the hills of the Kasserine Pass area, and at the collapse of the Tunis bridgehead all contributed to later success in Western Europe. Steven Barry, however, contends that victory in the MTO would not have materialized without the leadership of battalion-level commanders. They operated at a high level, despite the lack of combat experience for themselves and their troops, ineffective leadership...