I normally find the author of interest; her book, Paris 1919, was an excellent work; tight, concise, and provided excellent portraits of many of the key players.  This work, however, would be better titled, War 101 for beginners. If you have a high schooler, purchase it for them (or save your money, get it from the library) so that they will have an overview of how strategies have changed due to weapon developments, the changing role of civilians and international law, the reasons, even the evolution of war.  For the individual who does not understand war, for the naïve, this is a good book. 

Grossman is best remembered for his novel, Life and Fate which has been described as the greatest Russian novel since War and Peace. When originally shown to the Soviet censors, they agreed that it was a great novel but that it could not be published for at least two hundred years; its descriptions of the men and women fighting in the Great Patriotic War were too real and did not pay any homage to Stalin.

The first book that I have read which really examines the contribution, militarily and politically of Russia to the defeat of Napoleon from the time of his invasion of Russia to his fall in 1814. An outstanding work which corrects many historical myths such as it was not Kutuzov who developed the strategy of retreating into Russia’s interior, but rather the Czar and Barclay de Tolly, and that the Czar while an autocrat sat on a very shaky throne.  He also points out the political intelligence of Czar Alexander I who welded together the alliance which defeated Napoleon, overcoming the reluctance of the Austrians and the fear of the Prussians.

Finland managed to fight two wars with the Soviet Union during the 20^th century; once it was attacked, and in the second, it was the attacker, an ally of Nazi Germany.  There was never any doubt that Finland could win either war; the best Finland could do was to ride on the coattails of a Germany victory.  In fact, the Finnish offensive action during the second war was limited and basically was aimed at regaining the territory lost during the first war.

The author spent thirty years as an American diplomat in Washington, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Tunisia, and the UAE, including working for fifteen years as the Consulates in Jeddah and Dhahran.  Fluent in Arabic.  He participated in Operation Desert Storm, the Saudi accession to the WTO and the defeat of the al-Qaeda terror campaign in Saudi Arabia.

Imagine there is a famine in part of your country; you are the Minister who control the rail system which can move food where needed when needed.  You are told that in the entire rail system there are too few cars to carry the good; being a diligent Minister, you find a car here, one there, four there and get them to the correct siding where the much-needed food is needed.  Finally, the train with its precious cargo is loaded and on its way; you wait by your telephone, calling and check on the progress of the train.  It must travel over a thousand miles, but you are determined that it arrives safely even though it must travel over a dangerous route and deal with a massive snow storm.  Finally, past the snowstorm you let yourself to relax only to receive a call that it was all mistaken, there was no train and no, the extra cars you found cannot now be found.  Welcome to the Soviet Union.

It has often been said that the Versailles Treaty imposed by the victors in 1919 ensured that there would be a Second World War.  Normally, this phrase is used to describe the harsh terms imposed on Germany who was partially occupied, saddled with a huge war indemnity, and assigned sole responsibility for the war.  This book, while not breaking any major new ground, does bring to one place, the other factors which lead to two decades of revolution, riots, murders and bloody political struggles in the lands formerly ruled by the Russian, German, Ottoman and Austrian empires as well as the unsatisfied demands of Italy.

This massive (about 2,000 words) trilogy (An Army at Dawn, The Day of Battle and The Guns at Last Light) detailing the U.S. led coalition which fought in North Africa, Italy, and Western Europe to help defeat Hitler.  It offers not only a strategic view of the war, but many interesting human stories of the men who both led and did the actual fighting.  They certainly are not all saints; all the human emotions are evident in the telling, including arrogance, lust for glory, stupidity, cruelty, humanity, and anger.  Despite the length of each book (and their weight), they are easy to read and difficult to put down, even for a reader with knowledge of the subject.

Why would a man join the French Foreign Legion?  For some, it is to hide, to escape a wife, a prison sentence, bad debts.  For Simon Murray, at the age of twenty, it was simply because he could not think of anything else to do with his life.  Thus, he signed a contract for five years in what is often considered the most disciplined military in the world.  The Legion needs to be disciplined given the nature of the recruits, the location of its bases, the brutality of the wars it wages and the harshness of its discipline.

Legends die hard and when this book originally came out, there still existed a legend of the golden time when John F Kennedy was President; youthful, good looking with a glamorous wife, he represented to many a time of idealism and vigor before the Viet Nam war.  Those who were with him in the White House during those famous “thousand days” wished to make sure that his image, and thus theirs was preserved for they had been called “the best and the brightest”.  They all worked hard but had a hardy manly mystique and wherever they went, people could feel their energy and purpose. But was the reality close to the legend?