Army

Title: Shadow Commander: The Epic Story of Donald D. Blackburn
Author: Mike Guardia
Genre: Non-Fiction Biography
Reviewer: Bob Doerr

ISBN (links go to the MWSA Amazon store)1612000657: ISBN / E

The fires on Bataan burned with a primitive fury on the evening of April 9, 1942 - illuminating the white flags of surrender against the nighttime sky. Woefully outnumbered, outgunned, and ill-equipped, the battered remnants of the American-Philippine army surrendered to the forces of the Rising Sun. Yet amongst the chaos and devastation of the American defeat, Army Captain Donald D. Blackburn refused to lay down his arms.

With future SF legend Russell Volckmann, Blackburn escaped from Bataan and fled to the mountainous jungles of North Luzon, where they raised a private army of over 22,000 men against the Japanese. Once there, Blackburn organized a guerrilla regiment from among the native tribes in the Cagayan Valley. "Blackburn's Headhunters," as they came to be known, devastated the Japanese 14th Army within the eastern provinces of North Luzon and destroyed the Japanese naval base at Aparri.

After the war, Blackburn remained on active duty and played a key role in initiating Special Forces operations in Southeast Asia. In 1959, as commander of the 77th Special Forces Group, he spearheaded Operation White Star in Laos. Seven years later, Blackburn took command of the highly classified Studies and Observations Group (SOG), charged with performing secret missions now that main-force Communist incursions were on the rise.

In the wake of the CIA's disastrous Leaping Lena program, Blackburn revitalized the Special Operations campaign in South Vietnam. Sending cross-border reconnaissance teams into Laos, he discovered the clandestine networks and supply nodes of the infamous Ho Chi Minh Trail. Taking this information directly to General Westmoreland, Blackburn received authorization to conduct full-scale operations against the NVA and Viet Cong operating along the Trail. In combats large and small, the Communists realized they had met a master of insurgent tactics - and he was on the US side.

Following his return to the United States, Blackburn was appointed "Special Assistant for Counterinsurgency and Special Activities," where he was the architect of the infamous Son Tay Prison Raid. Officially termed Operation Ivory Coast (and later, Operation Kingpin), the Son Tay raid was the largest POW rescue mission - and indeed, the largest Special Forces operation - of the Vietnam War.

During a period when United States troops in Southeast Asia faced guerrilla armies on every side, it has seldom been recognized today that America had a superb covert commander of its own, his guerrilla skills honed in resistance against Japan. This book follows Donald D. Blackburn from his youthful days in combat against an Empire, through his days as a senior commander, imparting his lessons to the newly-realized ranks of America's own Special Forces.

Title: Recall! Return of the IRR
Author: Doug DePew
Genre: Non-Fiction memoir
Reviewer: Jim Greenwald

ISBN (links go to the MWSA Amazon store): 1466216468

There hadn't been a full-scale recall of the Individual Ready Reserves since the Korean War. In January of 1991, with the fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of the Soviet Union, many people believed it would take World War III to trigger a recall of the IRR. Many people were wrong. They came from cities and farms and towns in every corner of the country. With only a few days' notice, they quit their jobs, dropped out of college, kissed their girlfriends or wives, and got on planes to Atlanta, Georgia with nothing but the clothes on their backs. They had long hair, beards, and bad attitudes. They descended by the thousands on Fort Benning, Georgia, and they were not happy about it at all.

In this entertaining, true story, the author relates his own experiences as one of the twenty-thousand IRR recalls who were ordered back to active duty in support of Operation Desert Storm. In a story reminiscent of "The Dirty Dozen" times ten thousand, the author takes you through the entire experience from beginning to end. He carries you along for the ride and explains exactly what it was like to be a recall. With the many IRR recalls over the last ten years of warfare, this first hand account could shed some light on how the current era of recalls began.

Title: The Deguello
Author: Scott Zastrow
Genre: Military Army
Reviewer: Jim Greenwald

ISBN (links go to the MWSA Amazon store): 1257058266

We simply call it 9/11 now. That day means something different to so many people, but for ten Green Berets, it means even more. Just days after the horrific attacks in New York, a handful of Green Berets from the decorated 5th Special Forces Group were secretly inserted deep behind enemy lines in Northern Afghanistan to set the stage for the upcoming War on Terror. Their mission was to seek out and kill as many Taliban and Al Qaida forces as they could find. Go inside the legend of one of Americas most elite units in this exciting and sometimes humorous account of their avenging the most horrific terrorist attack we have ever experienced.

Written as a fictional story and firsthand account of the actual events that transpired for the first Special Forces A-Team into Afghanistan after 9/11, The Deguello pulls the reader into the actual Team. You get the feeling you are right there with them as they infiltrate Afghanistan, attack enemy forces, get ambushed, train the Northern Alliance and move on the capitol city of Kabul. You get a sense of the camaraderie and brotherhood of being on a Special Forces A-Team and how these men train and fight.

Not written like a typical military historical book, this is a story based on the actual events that occurred to start the War on Terror. The reader is brought along from the very beginning and watches the entire story unfold before their eyes from the attacks of September 11th all the way through the dramatic and exciting conclusion of the assault on Kabul.

“This book is for Joe,” says the author, Scott A. Zastrow, a former Green Beret with more than 20-years in the Army. “With all the books out there by military historians written for the small group of intellectuals who enjoy them, Joe is kind of left out in the cold. He’s bored by statistics, random facts of supposed historical significance, and overblown dramatics that they will easily call bullsh*t on. When reading the Deguello, Joe will say ‘I can see that happening; I’ve done that; I’ve said that; I want to do that.”

When asked why this book is different than other historical military books about Afghanistan, Zastrow says, “It’s not your typical hubristic story of ‘look how cool I am’. It’s a real story about real men doing what they get paid to do. A bunch of jackasses who are good at their jobs and who made the best of the situations they were put in. It just so happens these jackasses were called to do their jobs at a pretty significant time in American history, and they did it very well.”

Nothing we know of the War in Afghanistan would be possible had it not been for what these men did. Bagrahm Air Base is now the largest Coalition Base in Theater and was held by the enemy when this Team arrived. Read how it all began in this exciting, action packed and sometimes humorous account of one our Nation’s most elite Special Operations units. They accomplished what no unit or larger force has ever done before……..or ever will again.

Title: Letters From Long Binh: Memoirs of a Military Policeman in Vietnam
Author: Randy Mixter
Genre: Non-Fiction Memoir
Reviewer: Jim Greenwald

ISBN (links go to the MWSA Amazon store): 1466426993

I boarded the plane to Vietnam at exactly midnight on January 1st, 1967. I was a 19 year old soldier with pen and paper in hand. I began to write.
“Letters from Long Binh gives the reader an honest appraisal of the everyday life of an MP in Vietnam. Sometimes poignant, sometimes humorous, but always gripping, the book is written with a deep sense of respect for his fellow brothers-in-arms in a war-torn county.” Lou Fantauzzi - Vietnam 1966-67

Title: South of Heaven: My Year in Afghanistan
Author: Daniel Flores
Genre: Military Army
Reviewer: Terry Shoptaugh

ISBN (links go to the MWSA Amazon store): 1462024386

A memoir of an Army Apache helicopter pilots tour of duty in the Afghanistan war. The book follows the author's life from enlisting in the Army as an infantry soldier. Then continues as the author goes through flight school then incredibly survives a devastating crash only months after getting married. The author then continues his training until he is activated for the Afghanistan campaign, in the Global War on Terror. Believing that the only fighting is in Iraq he is then suprised and challenged at the resurgence of the Taliban and the escalating battles throughout the year, 2006. This memoir is a gripping insight to the incredible helicopter war going on in the rugged yet beautiful Hindu Kush mountains. The reader will finish this memoir with a first hand account of flying and fighting the Apache helicopter and the patriotic heroic decisions and challenges facing a husband, father and God fearing Christian in the war in Afghanistan.