Pages Menu

Categories Menu

Posted on Jul 9, 2023 in Armchair Reading, Books and Movies, Front Page Features

Enter the (Keyboard) Warrior, The 21st Century Tom Sawyer – Book Review

Enter the (Keyboard) Warrior, The 21st Century Tom Sawyer – Book Review

Digital Influence Mercenaries: Profits and Power through Information Warfare Author: James J.F. Forest. Publisher: Naval Institute Press. Price $ 39.95 Use the term ‘mercenary’ and you likely conjure a visage of fourteenth century condottieri contracting with Italian princes or more recently the activities of the Russian-based Wagner group. Outlawed by international convention, the classic view of a mercenary has been supplanted by the verbally awkward, but legally accurate phrase ‘private military contractor’. But while the traditional role of mercenaries occupying the physical battlespace has been limited by international treaty and convention, the virtual battlespace is condottieri of a different color.  Dr. James J.F. Forest explores the current state of activity in the digital space in his recent book Digital Influence Mercenaries: Profits and Power through Information Warfare (2022, Naval Institute Press).  In defining his terms Dr. Forest draws a boundary around the activities of these modern Tom Sawyer’s, with digital influence mercenaries being concerned with profit above all else. A specific cause or ideology is irrelevant, as long as...

Read More

Posted on Jun 4, 2023 in Armchair Reading, Books and Movies, Front Page Features

Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra. Henry Stimson and FDR: Uniting America for Victory – Book Review

Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra. Henry Stimson and FDR: Uniting America for Victory – Book Review

Uniting America: How FDR and Henry Stimson Brought Democrats and Republicans Together to Win World War II. Author: Peter Shinkle. Publisher: St. Martin’s Press. Price $ 32.50 Students of World War II history, both professional and casual, are familiar with the grand sweep of the military scope of the war. That familiarity ranges from an understanding of the tactical decisions within a single battle to the grand strategy discussions at Casablanca and Yalta. The common theme is the focus on history through the lens of the war effort. National governments are mostly depicted as monolithic institutions subordinate to the direction of their senior leaders – Churchill, Stalin and Roosevelt. Like the Tamarian tale of Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra, the Second World War was a conflict that brought unlikely partners together to unite against a common foe. Author Peter Shinkle changes that focus in his book Uniting America: How FDR and Henry Stimson Brought Democrats and Republicans Together to Win World War II. Shinkle explores the fascinating partnership between...

Read More

Posted on May 16, 2021 in Armchair Reading, Front Page Features

“War and Resistance in the Philippines 1942-1944.” Book Review.

“War and Resistance in the Philippines 1942-1944.” Book Review.

War and Resistance in the Philippines 1942-1944. 2021.  Author: James Kelly Morningstar. Naval Institute Press. 384 pages. ISBN: 9781682475690 The popular perception of the Philippines during the Second World War is shaped by a handful of key events – the surrender of Corregidor, The Bataan Death March, MacArthur’s pledge to return and of course, the actual return of US combat forces to the Philippines beginning in 1944. But between the bookends of General Wainwright’s surrender of Corregidor and General MacArthur’s return at Leyte was a period of over a thousand days during which the Philippine islands were occupied by the Japanese Empire. Conventional histories suggests that the Filipino people were a people without agency, led into resistance by a handful of American troops that took to the hills, with a s trickle of aid provided by the United States and motivated by the remote directions of General MacArthur from Australia.  Dr. James Kelly Morningstar’s recent book War and Resistance in the Philippines 1942-1944 dispels that traditional interpretation and explores the...

Read More

Posted on May 3, 2021 in Armchair Reading, Front Page Features

“Taranto And Naval Air Warfare in The Mediterranean, 1940-1945”. Book Review.

“Taranto And Naval Air Warfare in The Mediterranean, 1940-1945”. Book Review.

Taranto And Naval Air Warfare in The Mediterranean, 1940-1945. 2021.  Author: David Hobbs. Seaforth Publishing. 440 pages. ISBN: 978-1-5267-9383-6 Years ago, a professor encouraged us to attend as many seminars as possible. His reasoning was that while some seminars might be tedious and most would not be useful, occasionally, you’d encounter a seminar that was a valuable gem. This memory came to mind while reading David Hobb’s recent book Taranto and Naval Air Warfare in The Mediterranean 1940-1945. The book is a chronological history of the Royal Navy’s Fleet Air Arm in the Mediterranean theater. In many ways Taranto is a sequel David Hobbs’ earlier books The Dawn of Carrier Strike. Taranto is an engaging story of the pilots of the Fleet Air Arm that conveys how, to paraphrase Churchill, so many owed so much to so few. But in this case the “so few” are the pilots of the Fleet Air Arm serving in the Mediterranean theater. By focusing on the Fleet Air Arm, David Hobbs provides a narrative...

Read More

Posted on Feb 25, 2021 in Armchair Reading, Front Page Features

The Decline of the Luftwaffe As a Maritime Power. Lawrence Patterson’s “Eagles Over the Sea 1943- 45”. Book Review.

The Decline of the Luftwaffe As a Maritime Power. Lawrence Patterson’s “Eagles Over the Sea 1943- 45”. Book Review.

Eagles Over the Sea 1943-45. Seaforth Publishing. 2020.  Author: Lawrence Patterson. 382 pages. ISBN-10: 1526777657 In Eagles over the Sea 1943-45, Lawrence Patterson focuses on the lens of maritime air operations to illuminate the decline of the Luftwaffe in the later half of World War II.  While maritime air operations drive the narrative, Patterson also highlights the organizational challenges and personality clashes that contributed to the decline of the Luftwaffe.  The time frame of this book tracks roughly with the change in the character of the broader war in which strategic momentum shifted to the Allies with Germany adopting a more defensive posture. It’s a case study in the economics of a global war in which Nazi Germany found itself “punching above its weight class” against the Allied economic powers which it was unable to match in terms of manpower, resources or industrial output. This volume completes Patterson’s history of Luftwaffe maritime operations begun with the prior book Eagles over the Sea 1935-42 which documents the growth and organization and...

Read More

Posted on Jan 18, 2021 in Armchair Reading, Front Page Features

Airpower Over Gallipoli: 1915-1916.

Airpower Over Gallipoli: 1915-1916.

If you asked a random reader about the Gallipoli campaign, they’d likely think of the Australian and New Zealand troops engaged in bitter combat with the Turks, or perhaps the French and British warships that tried to ‘force’ the Dardanelles, only to lose several ships to a Turkish minefield. Rarely would you have thought of how the war was being waged in the skies about those battlefields. There’s been a dearth of coverage of aerial operations in the Dardanelles, with much of what is accessible to be found in historical journals such as Over the Front, or Cross and Cockade International.  Dr. Sterling Michael Pavelec aims to change this lack of coverage through his recent book Airpower Over Gallipoli: 1915-1916. The result of decades of research, Dr. Pavelec has created an indispensable reference guide to air operations over Gallipoli. A professional historian working with the military, Dr. Pavelec approaches the subject through the lens of how well the aerial campaign was integrated into both naval and land operations during...

Read More

Posted on Jun 6, 2019 in Armchair Reading, Front Page Features

75th Anniversary D-Day A Millennials Guide – Book Review

75th Anniversary D-Day A Millennials Guide – Book Review

75th Anniversary D-Day A Millennials Guide – Book Review Anthology edited by Jay Wertz, Monroe Publications.  2019 315 pages  Soft Cover  $19.99  ISBN 9781732631502 It is a sad truth that the youth today, in aggregate, know less about history than any other generation for the last 100 years even though they have access to more research material than almost any generation in history thanks to the Internet.  According to the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation’s October 3rd, 2018 report, just one in three American citizens would pass the United States Citizenship Exam which focuses on American history and civics.  This is a cultural crime and must be rectified in the immediate future if we are to have any semblance of an educated citizenry by the mid to late 21st Century. Monroe Publications and Jay Wertz hope to rectify some of this deficiency by the release of the new soft cover book entitled the “75th Anniversary D-Day A Millennials Guide”.  The book is comprised of an introduction plus 23 chapters...

Read More

Posted on Oct 17, 2017 in Armchair Reading, Books and Movies, Front Page Features

David Doyle’s Fantastic New Book on the Panzer IV Tank! Book Review

David Doyle’s Fantastic New Book on the Panzer IV Tank! Book Review

Legends of Ground Warfare Panzerkampfwagen IV The Backbone of Germany’s WW II Tank Force – Book Review David Doyle, Shiffer Publishing, Ltd.. 2017 112 pages Hard Cover $19.99 ISBN 978-0-7643-5359-8 Rick Martin Prolific military scholar David Doyle has outdone himself with this 2017 look at the venerable Panzer IV medium tank. The Panzer IV (Pz IV) was, as the book’s title indicates, the backbone of the German Army during the 1940s. It was found serving on all fronts and over 8,500 tanks of this type were produced. This 112 page book is arranged with each chapter looking at a different Pz IV model from the prototype and Type As to the last production model, the Type J. Each chapter features a thorough discussion of the Type with a handy table showing the dimensions, engine type and performance, crew, speeds, fording depth and trench crossing ability and armaments of each particular model. In addition, the manufacturers, chassis numbers and quantities of each type are also shown. Crystal clear black and...

Read More

Posted on Sep 11, 2017 in Armchair Reading, Books and Movies, Front Page Features

Book Preview of David Doyle’s New CLEVELAND TANK PLANT Softcover!

Book Preview of David Doyle’s New CLEVELAND TANK PLANT Softcover!

Cleveland Tank Plant – Aircraft and military vehicle production at Cleveland Plant 2 (1942-1970) – Book Preview David Doyle, G-104 Press. 2017 112 pages Soft Cover $25.00 UPC:9781775013303 Silvio Iacuone David Doyle is world renowned for his books and magazine features on military vehicles, ranging from Squadron Walk Around and In Action books to his Ampersand 1100 combined page book set on Dodges in US Military Service. In his latest book though, he is stepping away from that and teaming up with G-104 Press, a new publishing company out of Ontario, Canada founded by Scott and Kim Taylor. Instead of a specific vehicle type or series, his newest title “Cleveland Tank Plant” focuses on a location, a location where parts of one of the best WW2 bombers and most unique Cold War vehicles were manufactured. The book is mainly comprised of well captioned photos featuring images of the XP-75 Eagle fighter, B-29 Super Fortress sub-assemblies, M41 Walker Bulldog, M42 Duster, M56 Scorpion, M114 Armored Recon Vehicle, M551 Sheridan, M108...

Read More

Posted on Jan 16, 2017 in Armchair Reading, Books and Movies, Front Page Features

MACARTHUR AT WAR – Book Review

MACARTHUR AT WAR – Book Review

Walter R. Borneman, Little, Brown and Company. 2016 595 pages Hard Back $30.00 ISBN 9780316405324 Walter Borneman’s range of history books cover from the Revolutionary War to the Westward expansion of the railroads to World War II. His new book, “MacArthur at War” is a warts and all biography of General Douglas MacArthur. “Douglas MacArthur always lived in his father’s shadow. It grew long before he was born…” are the first two sentences in chapter 1 of Borneman’s engrossing biography. Douglas’ father, Captain Arthur MacArthur, Jr., fought under Sheridan during the Civil War and won the Medal of Honor for a rather unorthodox and somewhat controversial frontal assault which may or may not have been ordered by his commander. It is this personal initiative which was shared by his son, Douglas, as well as other legendary commanders of World War Two such as Patton and Rommel, but which put these men in to conflict with their superiors. Douglas not only had to contend with a father whose experiences in...

Read More

Posted on Jun 27, 2016 in Armchair Reading, Books and Movies

Heroes of Peace is a Fascinating Read!

Heroes of Peace – Book Review Heroes of Peace – A History of the Third Kentucky Infantry in the Spanish-American War Colonel Greg Eanes, USAF (Retired), The Eanes Group, LLC. 2016 200 pages Paperback $18.95 ISBN 9781530755349 By Rick Martin Colonel Greg Eanes has written a fascinating look at the shaping of a fighting unit from disparate national guardsmen who still held resentments stemming from the American Civil War only 35 years before. His tightly written book, Heroes of Peace – A History of the Third Kentucky Infantry in the Spanish-American War features informative narration backed up by quotations from contemporary newspaper articles as well as first person accounts reprinted from letters and diaries. Plenty of footnotes offer citations as to source materials. In addition, three appendixes offer a chronology of the Spanish American War which focuses on the Third Kentucky, Division and Brigade Organization tables of the Third KY and a Regimental Roster of the Third KY. A complete Bibliography end caps the book. When the USS Maine was...

Read More