Love & War in Afghanistan

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Author :
Publisher : Seven Stories Press
ISBN 13 : 1583229752
Total Pages : 313 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (832 download)

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Book Synopsis Love & War in Afghanistan by : Alex Klaits

Download or read book Love & War in Afghanistan written by Alex Klaits and published by Seven Stories Press. This book was released on 2011-01-04 with total page 313 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Love and War in Afghanistan presents true stories of fourteen ordinary men and women living in Northern Afghanistan. In a quarter-century of uninterrupted war, the people of Afghanistan have endured foreign invasions, ethnic strife, a fundamentalist Islamic totalitarian regime, and the unending crossfire of rival warlord factions. The country remains an object of fascination for journalists, academics, and filmmakers from around the world. In the midst of it all it is a startlingly powerful experience to discover, here, the voices of the Afghan people themselves. Young lovers who elope against the wishes of their kin; a mullah whose wit is his only defense against his armed captors; a defector from the Soviet army; a woman who is forced to stand up to gangsters in Tajikistan—their dramatic stories emerge in their own unforgettable words. Whether in the sudden awakening of mercy in a Taliban militiaman, the lingering contempt of a woman for her husband’s first wife, the pain and confusion of flight into exile, or the resourcefulness of a child who must provide for an entire family, the real focus of these narratives is the strength of solitary individuals faced daily with their own vulnerability. Men, women, orphans, widows, widowers, Tajiks, Pashtuns, Uzbeks, Turkmens, schoolteachers, mullahs, former Taliban, mujahideen, big brothers, little sisters, captive wives, lovers in flight: Love and War in Afghanistan tells their stories, putting human faces onto a country torn by war.

Songs of Love and War

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Publisher : Other Press, LLC
ISBN 13 : 1635421276
Total Pages : 71 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (354 download)

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Book Synopsis Songs of Love and War by : Sayd Majrouh

Download or read book Songs of Love and War written by Sayd Majrouh and published by Other Press, LLC. This book was released on 2020-10-06 with total page 71 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The authors of oral literature in the Pashtun language create their work at a far remove from any books. Generally deprived of the support of schools and universities, their compositions are inseparable from song. Their poetry is never declaimed; rather, their rhyme and rhythm have melodic value. These popular improvisations do not exalt mystic love. In them there is no aspiration whatsoever to an unfathomable and incommunicable heaven, nor devotion to the lord, nor praise for an absolute master, nor any Adonis. To the contrary, they are songs of the earth. They celebrate nature, mountains, rivers, dawn and night’s magnetic space. They are songs of war and honor, shame and love, beauty and death. The repression of Afghan women has caused untold suffering, particularly through moral subjugation. Infant daughters and their mothers are received with scorn and shame, and lead lives of subordination and humiliation. Their rebellion against these tribal codes comes only through suicide and song. Translated from the Pashtun into French by the eminent Sayd Bahodine Majrouh, the greatest Afghan poet of the twentieth century, his text has been rendered into English in the expert hands of Marjolijn de Jager of the Translation Department at NYU.

The American War in Afghanistan

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Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 0197550797
Total Pages : 601 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (975 download)

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Book Synopsis The American War in Afghanistan by : Carter Malkasian

Download or read book The American War in Afghanistan written by Carter Malkasian and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2021-06-15 with total page 601 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A New York Times Notable Book Winner of 2022 Lionel Gelber Prize The first authoritative history of American's longest war by one of the world's leading scholar-practitioners. The American war in Afghanistan, which began in 2001, is now the longest armed conflict in the nation's history. It is currently winding down, and American troops are likely to leave soon but only after a stay of nearly two decades. In The American War in Afghanistan, Carter Malkasian provides the first comprehensive history of the entire conflict. Malkasian is both a leading academic authority on the subject and an experienced practitioner, having spent nearly two years working in the Afghan countryside and going on to serve as the senior advisor to General Joseph Dunford, the US military commander in Afghanistan and later the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff. Drawing from a deep well of local knowledge, understanding of Pashto, and review of primary source documents, Malkasian moves through the war's multiple phases: the 2001 invasion and after; the light American footprint during the 2003 Iraq invasion; the resurgence of the Taliban in 2006, the Obama-era surge, and the various resets in strategy and force allocations that occurred from 2011 onward, culminating in the 2018-2020 peace talks. Malkasian lived through much of it, and draws from his own experiences to provide a unique vantage point on the war. Today, the Taliban is the most powerful faction, and sees victory as probable. The ultimate outcome after America leaves is inherently unpredictable given the multitude of actors there, but one thing is sure: the war did not go as America had hoped. Although the al-Qa'eda leader Osama bin Laden was killed and no major attack on the American homeland was carried out after 2001, the United States was unable to end the violence or hand off the war to the Afghan authorities, which could not survive without US military backing. The American War in Afghanistan explains why the war had such a disappointing outcome. Wise and all-encompassing, The American War in Afghanistan provides a truly vivid portrait of the conflict in all of its phases that will remain the authoritative account for years to come.

The Forty-Year War in Afghanistan

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Author :
Publisher : Verso Books
ISBN 13 : 1839768177
Total Pages : 273 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (397 download)

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Book Synopsis The Forty-Year War in Afghanistan by : Tariq Ali

Download or read book The Forty-Year War in Afghanistan written by Tariq Ali and published by Verso Books. This book was released on 2021-11-30 with total page 273 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The occupation of Afghanistan is over, and a balance sheet can be drawn. These essays on war and peace in the region reveal Tariq Ali at his sharpest and most prescient. Rarely has there been such an enthusiastic display of international unity as that which greeted the invasion of Afghanistan in 2001. Compared to Iraq, Afghanistan became the “good war.” But a stalemate ensued, and the Taliban waited out the NATO contingents. Today, with the collapse of the puppet regime in Kabul, what does the future hold for a traumatised Afghan people? Will China become the dominant influence in the country? Tariq Ali has been following the wars in Afghanistan for forty years. He opposed Soviet military interven- tion in 1979, predicting disaster. He was also a fierce critic of its NATO sequel, Operation Enduring Freedom. In a series of trenchant commentaries, he has described the tragedies inflicted on Afghanistan, as well as the semi-Talibanisation and militarisation of neighbouring Pakistan. Most of his predictions have proved accurate. The Forty-Year War in Afghanistan: A Chronicle Foretold brings together the best of his writings and includes a new introduction.

Of Love & War

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Publisher : Penguin
ISBN 13 : 0525560025
Total Pages : 274 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (255 download)

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Book Synopsis Of Love & War by : Lynsey Addario

Download or read book Of Love & War written by Lynsey Addario and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2018-10-23 with total page 274 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “Spectacular . . . a majestic collection that captures the drama of everyday existence in war zones around the world. . . . There is no disputing the impact of this revelatory collection.” —BookPage From the Pulitzer Prize-winning photojournalist and New York Times bestselling author, a stunning and personally curated selection of her work across the Middle East, South Asia, and Africa Pulitzer Prize–winning photojournalist and MacArthur Fellow Lynsey Addario has spent the last two decades bearing witness to the world’s most urgent humanitarian and human rights crises. Traveling to the most dangerous and remote corners to document crucial moments such as Afghanistan under the Taliban immediately before and after the 9/11 attacks, Iraq following the US-led invasion and dismantlement of Saddam Hussein’s government, and western Sudan in the aftermath of the genocide in Darfur, she has captured through her photographs visual testimony not only of war and injustice but also of humanity, dignity, and resilience. In this compelling collection of more than two hundred photographs, Addario’s commitment to exposing the devastating consequences of human conflict is on full display. Her subjects include the lives of female members of the military, as well as the trauma and abuse inflicted on women in male-dominated societies; American soldiers rescuing comrades in the Korengal Valley of Afghanistan, and Libyan opposition troops trading fire in Benghazi. Interspersed between her commanding and arresting images are personal journal entries and letters, as well as revelatory essays from esteemed writers such as Dexter Filkins, Suzy Hansen, and Lydia Polgreen. A powerful and singular work from one of the most brilliant and influential photojournalists working today, Of Love & War is a breathtaking record of our complex world in all its inescapable chaos, conflict, and beauty.

American Spartan

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Publisher : Harper Collins
ISBN 13 : 0062115006
Total Pages : 377 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (621 download)

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Book Synopsis American Spartan by : Ann Scott Tyson

Download or read book American Spartan written by Ann Scott Tyson and published by Harper Collins. This book was released on 2014-03-25 with total page 377 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Lawrence of Arabia meets Sebastian Junger's War in this unique, incendiary, and dramatic true story of heroism and heartbreak in Afghanistan written by a Pulitzer Prize–nominated war correspondent. Army Special Forces Major Jim Gant changed the face of America’s war effort in Afghanistan. A decorated Green Beret who spent years in Afghanistan and Iraq training indigenous fighters, Gant argued for embedding autonomous units with tribes across Afghanistan to earn the Afghans’ trust and transform them into a reliable ally with whom we could defeat the Taliban and counter al-Qaeda networks. The military's top brass, including General David Petraeus, commander of U.S. Forces in Afghanistan, approved, and Gant was tasked with implementing his controversial strategy. Veteran war correspondent Ann Scott Tyson first spoke with Gant when he was awarded the Silver Star in 2007. Tyson soon came to share Gant’s vision, so she accompanied him to Afghanistan, risking her life to embed with the tribes and chronicle their experience. And then they fell in love. Illustrated with dozens of photographs, American Spartan is their remarkable story—one of the most riveting, emotional narratives of wartime ever published.

The Afghanistan Papers

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Publisher : Simon and Schuster
ISBN 13 : 1982159014
Total Pages : 384 pages
Book Rating : 4.9/5 (821 download)

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Book Synopsis The Afghanistan Papers by : Craig Whitlock

Download or read book The Afghanistan Papers written by Craig Whitlock and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2022-08-30 with total page 384 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A Washington Post Best Book of 2021 ​The #1 New York Times bestselling investigative story of how three successive presidents and their military commanders deceived the public year after year about America’s longest war, foreshadowing the Taliban’s recapture of Afghanistan, by Washington Post reporter and three-time Pulitzer Prize finalist Craig Whitlock. Unlike the wars in Vietnam and Iraq, the US invasion of Afghanistan in 2001 had near-unanimous public support. At first, the goals were straightforward and clear: defeat al-Qaeda and prevent a repeat of 9/11. Yet soon after the United States and its allies removed the Taliban from power, the mission veered off course and US officials lost sight of their original objectives. Distracted by the war in Iraq, the US military become mired in an unwinnable guerrilla conflict in a country it did not understand. But no president wanted to admit failure, especially in a war that began as a just cause. Instead, the Bush, Obama, and Trump administrations sent more and more troops to Afghanistan and repeatedly said they were making progress, even though they knew there was no realistic prospect for an outright victory. Just as the Pentagon Papers changed the public’s understanding of Vietnam, The Afghanistan Papers contains “fast-paced and vivid” (The New York Times Book Review) revelation after revelation from people who played a direct role in the war from leaders in the White House and the Pentagon to soldiers and aid workers on the front lines. In unvarnished language, they admit that the US government’s strategies were a mess, that the nation-building project was a colossal failure, and that drugs and corruption gained a stranglehold over their allies in the Afghan government. All told, the account is based on interviews with more than 1,000 people who knew that the US government was presenting a distorted, and sometimes entirely fabricated, version of the facts on the ground. Documents unearthed by The Washington Post reveal that President Bush didn’t know the name of his Afghanistan war commander—and didn’t want to meet with him. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld admitted that he had “no visibility into who the bad guys are.” His successor, Robert Gates, said: “We didn’t know jack shit about al-Qaeda.” The Afghanistan Papers is a “searing indictment of the deceit, blunders, and hubris of senior military and civilian officials” (Tom Bowman, NRP Pentagon Correspondent) that will supercharge a long-overdue reckoning over what went wrong and forever change the way the conflict is remembered.

Blindsided by the Taliban

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Publisher : Simon and Schuster
ISBN 13 : 1510729704
Total Pages : 240 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (17 download)

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Book Synopsis Blindsided by the Taliban by : Carmen Gentile

Download or read book Blindsided by the Taliban written by Carmen Gentile and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2018-03-06 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: I turn to see a rocket-propelled grenade screaming toward me. The ordinance strikes me in the side of the head, instantly blinding me in one eye and crushing the right side of my face. On September 9, 2010, while embedded with an Army unit and talking with locals in a small village in eastern Afghanistan, journalist Carmen Gentile was struck in the face by a rocket propelled grenade. Inexplicably, the grenade did not explode and Gentile survived, albeit with the right side of his face shattered and blinded in one eye. Making matters worse, his engagement was on the ropes and his fiancée absent from his bedside. Blindsided by the Taliban chronicles the author’s numerous missteps and shortcomings while coming to terms with injury and a lost love. Inventive and unprecedented surgeries would ultimately save Gentile’s face and eyesight, but the depression and trauma that followed his physical and emotional injuries proved a much harder recovery. Ultimately, Gentile would find that returning to the front lines and continuing the work he loved was the only way to become whole again. As only he can, Gentile recounts the physical and mental recovery which included staring only at the ground for a month, a battle with opiate-induced constipation and a history of drug addiction, attacks by Taliban assassins born of post-traumatic stress, the Jedi-like powers of General David Petraeus, and finding normalcy under falling mortars in an Afghan valley. The result is an unapologetic, self-deprecating, occasionally cringe-worthy, and always candid account of loss and redemption in the face of the self-doubt common to us all. Blindsided by the Taliban also features the author’s photos from the field that depict the realities of life in Afghanistan for soldiers and civilians alike. #KissedbytheTaliban

Between War and Peace

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Publisher : Random House
ISBN 13 : 0307430693
Total Pages : 306 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (74 download)

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Book Synopsis Between War and Peace by : Victor Davis Hanson

Download or read book Between War and Peace written by Victor Davis Hanson and published by Random House. This book was released on 2007-12-18 with total page 306 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In his acclaimed collection An Autumn of War, the scholar and military historian Victor Davis Hanson expressed powerful and provocative views of September 11 and the ensuing war in Afghanistan. Now, in these challenging new essays, he examines the world’s ongoing war on terrorism, from America to Iraq, from Europe to Israel, and beyond. In direct language, Hanson portrays an America making progress against Islamic fundamentalism but hampered by the self-hatred of elite academics at home and the cynical self-interest of allies abroad. He sees a new and urgent struggle of evil against good, one that can fail only if “we convince ourselves that our enemies fight because of something we, rather than they, did.” Whether it’s a clear-cut defense of Israel as a secular democracy, a denunciation of how the U.N. undermines the U.S., a plea to drastically alter our alliance with Saudi Arabia, or a perception that postwar Iraq is reaching a dangerous tipping point, Hanson’s arguments have the shock of candor and the fire of conviction.

God, Love and War

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Author :
Publisher : Xlibris Corporation
ISBN 13 : 1503589757
Total Pages : 137 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (35 download)

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Book Synopsis God, Love and War by : Spozhmae

Download or read book God, Love and War written by Spozhmae and published by Xlibris Corporation. This book was released on 2015-09-26 with total page 137 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This story is about my journey from a little girl in Afghanistan to fleeing to the united states and returning back to Afghanistan as an Afghan interpreter/cultural advisor to the U.S. military. This story highlights the difficulties and struggles my family and I endured leaving Afghanistan and adapting to a new culture in the United States. As a reader you will return with me back to Afghanistan with the U.S. military. You will learn about the conflict through my eyes. You will follow me through several life saving humanitarian missions as well as violent armed conflict.

Understanding War in Afghanistan

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Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9780160888311
Total Pages : 0 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (883 download)

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Book Synopsis Understanding War in Afghanistan by : Joseph J. Collins

Download or read book Understanding War in Afghanistan written by Joseph J. Collins and published by . This book was released on 2011 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Love in Despair

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Publisher : Xlibris Corporation
ISBN 13 : 1664163530
Total Pages : 192 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (641 download)

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Book Synopsis Love in Despair by : Shughla Karzai

Download or read book Love in Despair written by Shughla Karzai and published by Xlibris Corporation. This book was released on 2021-03-24 with total page 192 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The book will be divided into two major parts, each with a number of shorter chapters. Part I will tell the story of Shughla’s journey and how Sana Orphanage came into existence, in chronological order. Each chapter will tell about a particular step on the way, an incident or a milestone that was significant. Part II will tell the stories of some of the individual children at Sana. Some chapters will be extremely brief, while others will be longer. Not all of the children’s stories can be told, as there are over fifty children now at the orphanage; but a sampling of various stories will be included, to give the reader an idea of the kinds of things these children have been forced to deal with in their short lives.

War in Afghanistan

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Publisher : Capstone
ISBN 13 : 1476541906
Total Pages : 113 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (765 download)

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Book Synopsis War in Afghanistan by : Matt Doeden

Download or read book War in Afghanistan written by Matt Doeden and published by Capstone. This book was released on 2014 with total page 113 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Describes the people and events of the U.S. war in Afghanistan. The reader's choices reveal the historical details"--

Games without Rules

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Publisher : Public Affairs
ISBN 13 : 1610393198
Total Pages : 418 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (13 download)

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Book Synopsis Games without Rules by : Tamim Ansary

Download or read book Games without Rules written by Tamim Ansary and published by Public Affairs. This book was released on 2014-03-04 with total page 418 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: By the author of Destiny Disrupted: an enlightening, accessible history of modern Afghanistan from the Afghan point of view, showing how Great Power conflicts have interrupted its ongoing, internal struggle to take form as a nation

No Good Men Among the Living

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Publisher : Macmillan
ISBN 13 : 0805091793
Total Pages : 319 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (5 download)

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Book Synopsis No Good Men Among the Living by : Anand Gopal

Download or read book No Good Men Among the Living written by Anand Gopal and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2014-04-29 with total page 319 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Told through the lives of three Afghans, the stunning tale of how the United States had triumph in sight in Afghanistan--and then brought the Taliban back from the dead In a breathtaking chronicle, acclaimed journalist Anand Gopal traces in vivid detail the lives of three Afghans caught in America's war on terror. He follows a Taliban commander, who rises from scrawny teenager to leading insurgent; a US-backed warlord, who uses the American military to gain personal wealth and power; and a village housewife trapped between the two sides, who discovers the devastating cost of neutrality. Through their dramatic stories, Gopal shows that the Afghan war, so often regarded as a hopeless quagmire, could in fact have gone very differently. Top Taliban leaders actually tried to surrender within months of the US invasion, renouncing all political activity and submitting to the new government. Effectively, the Taliban ceased to exist--yet the Americans were unwilling to accept such a turnaround. Instead, driven by false intelligence from their allies and an unyielding mandate to fight terrorism, American forces continued to press the conflict, resurrecting the insurgency that persists to this day. With its intimate accounts of life in war-torn Afghanistan, Gopal's thoroughly original reporting lays bare the workings of America's longest war and the truth behind its prolonged agony. A heartbreaking story of mistakes and misdeeds, No Good Men Among the Living challenges our usual perceptions of the Afghan conflict, its victims, and its supposed winners.

Killing the Cranes

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Author :
Publisher : Chelsea Green Publishing
ISBN 13 : 160358319X
Total Pages : 445 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (35 download)

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Book Synopsis Killing the Cranes by : Edward Girardet

Download or read book Killing the Cranes written by Edward Girardet and published by Chelsea Green Publishing. This book was released on 2012-08-08 with total page 445 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Few reporters have covered Afghanistan as intrepidly and humanely as Edward Girardet. Now, in a gripping, personal account, Girardet delivers a story of that nation's resistance fighters, foreign invaders, mercenaries, spies, aid workers, Islamic extremists, and others who have defined Afghanistan's last thirty years of war, chaos, and strife. As a young foreign correspondent, Girardet arrived in Afghanistan just three months prior to the Soviet invasion in 1979. Over the next decades, he trekked hundreds of miles across rugged mountains and deserts on clandestine journeys following Afghan guerrillas in battle as they smuggled French doctors into the country, and as they combated each other as well as invaders. He witnessed the world's greatest refugee exodus, the bitter Battle for Kabul in the early 1990s, the rise of the Taliban, and, finally, the US-led Western military and recovery effort that began in 2001. Girardet's encounters with key figures-including Ahmed Shah Massoud, the famed "Lion of Panjshir" assassinated by al Qaeda two days before 9/11, Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, an Islamic extremist massively supported by the Americans during the 1980s only to become one of today's most ruthless anti-Western insurgents, and Osama bin Laden-shed extraordinary light on the personalities who have shaped the nation, and its current challenges, from corruption and narcotics trafficking to selfish regional interests. Killing the Cranes provides crucial insights into why the West's current involvement has turned into such a disaster, not only rekindling a new insurgency, but squandering billions of dollars on a recovery process that has shown scant success.

Outlaw Platoon

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Publisher : Harper Collins
ISBN 13 : 0062066412
Total Pages : 416 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (62 download)

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Book Synopsis Outlaw Platoon by : Sean Parnell

Download or read book Outlaw Platoon written by Sean Parnell and published by Harper Collins. This book was released on 2012-02-28 with total page 416 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 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.