Soldiers Of The Dragon

The turbulent history of China has seen many dynastic struggles over the centuries, ever since the semi-nomadic tribes of ancient China were unified under the first emperor, Cheng. From the Great Wall to the terracotta army at Xian, monuments to China's many wars, and the men who fought them, litter the landscape. This book tells the incredible story of China's armies form the first documented civilization over 3,000 years ago to the outbreak of the first Opium War with Britain in the middle of the 19th century. Written by an acknowledged expert on Chinese armies, this volume offers details of their colourful uniforms and fascinating weaponry with colour and black and white photographs, artwork, maps and diagrams.

“The adventure and danger levels crackle” (Booklist) in the second book of the Dragonback saga by the #1 New York Times–bestselling author of Star Wars: Thrawn. Even though he’s been on the run from the law for a while, young Jack Morgan never wanted a bodyguard. But that’s what he got when a desperate alien named Draycos bonded with him for survival. When all is well, Draycos looks like nothing more than a tattoo on Jack’s back. But when Jack’s threatened, the K’da warrior appears in his true, dragonlike form. Now, Jack’s indebted to his new symbiotic friend for saving his life, and feels obligated to help Draycos fulfill his vow to discover who’s behind the plot to eradicate his kind. All they know for sure is that whoever annihilated the fleet of K’da refugee ships used mercenaries to do their dirty work. To investigate, Jack signs up with a merc outfit known for using teenagers to fill their ranks. But life in the military is far more unpleasant than Jack bargained for—and it turns out he’s not the only new recruit who isn’t what they appear to be . . .

Western historians have long speculated about Chinese military intervention in the Vietnam War. It was not until recently, however, that newly available international archival materials, as well as documents from China, have indicated the true extent and level of Chinese participation in the conflict of Vietnam. For the first time in the English language, this book offers an overview of the operations and combat experience of more than 430,000 Chinese troops in Indochina from 1968-73. The Chinese Communist story from the "other side of the hill" explores one of the missing pieces to the historiography of the Vietnam War. The book covers the chronological development and Chinese decision-making by examining Beijing's intentions, security concerns, and major reasons for entering Vietnam to fight against the U.S. armed forces. It explains why China launched a nationwide movement, in Mao Zedong's words, to "assist Vietnam and resist America" in 1965-72. It details PLA foreign war preparation, training, battle planning and execution, tactical decisions, combat problem solving, political indoctrination, and performance evaluations through the Vietnam War. International Communist forces, technology, and logistics proved to be the decisive edge that enabled North Vietnam to survive the U.S. Rolling Thunder bombing campaign and helped the Viet Cong defeat South Vietnam. Chinese and Russian support prolonged the war, making it impossible for the United States to win. With Russian technology and massive Chinese intervention, the NVA and NLF could function on both conventional and unconventional levels, which the American military was not fully prepared to face. Nevertheless, the Vietnam War seriously tested the limits of the communist alliance. Rather than improving Sino-Soviet relations, aid to North Vietnam created a new competition as each communist power attempted to control Southeast Asian communist movement. China shifted its defense and national security concerns from the U.S. to the Soviet Union.

One June 25, 1950, a massive surprise North Korean invasion sent Allied forces reeling back to a last-ditch defensive perimeter around the far-southern port city Pusan.

It was no time to fear animals when the possibility of the enemy counteroffensive was increasing. It didn't suit a soldier to lose nerve in the presence of a mere crocodile At the end of World War II, a garrison of the Twenty-eighth Japanese Army is deployed to Ramree Island, off the coast of Burma, to fight the Allies' severe counteroffensive. While on the island, Superior Private Minoru Kasuga questions a local villager about the terrible smell coming from the saltwater creek. To his horror, the old man tells him it is the stench of death from the breath of man-eating crocodiles that inhabit Myinkhon Creek. Fierce fighting drives the battalion to the island's east coast, and they must evacuate to Burma by crossing the creek. Just before they embark, Kasuga smells the same putrid odor that he'd questioned the villager about and warns his commanding officer of the underwater danger. His sergeant ignores him, thinking Kasuga is obsessed with wild stories from the villagers, and he tells the soldiers to cross the creek. Ordered to save the penned-in garrison, Second Lieutenant Yoshihisa Sumi arrives on Ramree Island. But what awaits him at Myinkhon Creek is a sight too horrible to contemplate

From award-winning author Daniel Fox comes a ravishingly written epic of revolution and romance set in a world where magic is found in stone and in water, in dragons and in men–and in the chains that bind them. Deposed by a vicious usurper, a young emperor flees with his court to the small island of Taishu. There, with a dwindling army, a manipulative mother, and a resentful population–and his only friend a local fishergirl he takes as a concubine–he prepares for his last stand. In the mountains of Taishu, a young miner finds a huge piece of jade, the potent mineral whose ingestion can gift the emperor with superhuman attributes. Setting out to deliver the stone to the embattled emperor, Yu Shan finds himself changing into something more than human, something forbidden. Meanwhile, a great dragon lies beneath the strait that separates Taishu from the mainland, bound by chains that must be constantly renewed by the magic of a community of monks. When the monks are slaughtered by a willful pirate captain, a maimed slave assumes the terrible burden of keeping the dragon subdued. If he should fail, if she should rise free, the result will be slaughter on an unimaginable scale. Now the prisoner beneath the sea and the men and women above it will shatter old bonds of loyalty and love and forge a common destiny from the ruins of an empire.

Touched by the Dragon is a collection of gripping narratives of Vietnam veterans from Newport County, Rhode Island. We learn of the experiences of men and women, the enlisted and officers, those in combat and those behind the lines, in a way that resonates far beyond Rhode Island. What makes this book truly unique is its absence of literary pretensions. These oral accounts speak in a no-nonsense, matter-of-fact way. Personalities emerge as the veterans discuss their prewar days, their training and preparation for Vietnam, their in-country experiences - some heroic, some frightening, some amusing, some nearly unbelievable - and their return to a country that didn't value their sacrifice.

“Jimmy Hatch is a personal hero of mine.” —Anderson Cooper “Irresistible. . . . A wounded SEAL’s shame becomes a salvation.” —J. Ford Huffman, Military Times James Hatch is a former special ops Navy SEAL senior chief, master naval parachutist, and expert military dog trainer and handler. On his fateful final mission in Afghanistan, his SEAL team was sent to recover Bowe Bergdahl—the soldier who deserted his post and fell into the hands of Al-Qaida and the Taliban. The mission went south, and Hatch was left with a shattered femur from an AK-47 round and the SEAL dog who fought alongside him was dead. As a result of his horrific leg wound, his twenty-four-year military career came to an end—and with it the only life he’d ever known. In Touching the Dragon, we witness his long road to recovery. Getting well physically required eighteen surgeries, twelve months of recovery, and learning to walk again. But getting well mentally would prove to be much tougher, as he fought through the depths of despair, alcoholism, and the pull to end his own life. What emerges is a different kind of hero’s journey, one in which Hatch shows the courage it takes to confess, confront, and overcome his own brokenness. Through the love of family, friends, and his military dogs, Hatch learned remarkable tools and found his purpose, and now he wants to share this wisdom with the rest of us because we all have wounds.

Black Dragon recounts the experience of a single Marine rifle company—2-F-23, or “Fox” Company—and its drive through the central Pacific in World War II. Author Steven D. McCloud, through painstaking research of battlefield reports and extensive interviews with surviving members of Fox Company, has reanimated the grueling, day-by-day slog through the Pacific theater through the eyes of the US Marines who endured it. This is the story of American teenagers who left home, many for the first time, trained together, and formed a team that held strong until, at last, those who survived tried to leave it all behind as they dispersed, returned home, and sought to build their lives. Decades later, Fox Company re-formed through correspondence and reunions and also welcomed McCloud into their midst by telling him their stories. McCloud took notes, chased down company reports and other documents to fill in the gaps, and carefully reconstructed their journey. As one member of Fox Company recalled after returning to Iwo Jima half a century later, “I think the pilgrimage to Iwo has helped me conquer my black dragons—those bloody and stinking nightmares that made nightly uninvited visits for fifty-six years. My dreams were in color, predominantly bloody red. Those remaining are in black and white and shades of gray, not so violent and stinking. These I can live with.” Readers who reveled in Stephen Ambrose’s masterful oral history of E Company in the European theater will find similar heroism and heartbreak in the pages of Black Dragon.