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Unlike Anything That Ever Floated: The Monitor and Virginia and the Battle of Hampton Roads, March 8–9, 1862 (Emerging Civil War Series)
by Dwight Sturtevant Hughes“Ironclad against ironclad, we maneuvered about the bay here and went at each other with mutual fierceness,” reported Chief Engineer Alban Stimers following that momentous engagement between the USS Monitor and the CSS Virginia (ex USS Merrimack) in Hampton Roads, Sunday, March 9, 1862. The day before, the Rebel ram had obliterated two powerful Union warships and was poised to destroy more. That night, the revolutionary—not to say bizarre—Monitor slipped into harbor after hurrying down from New York through fierce gales that almost sank her. These metal monstrosities dueled in the morning, pounding away for hours with little damage to either. Who won is still debated. One Vermont reporter could hardly find words for Monitor: “It is in fact unlike anything that ever floated on Neptune’s bosom.” The little vessel became an icon of American industrial ingenuity and strength. She redefined the relationship between men and machines in war. But beforehand, many feared she would not float. Captain John L. Worden: “Here was an unknown, untried vessel…an iron coffin-like ship of which the gloomiest predictions were made.” The CSS Virginia was a paradigm of Confederate strategy and execution—the brainchild of innovative, dedicated, and courageous men, but the victim of hurried design, untested technology, poor planning and coordination, and a dearth of critical resources. Nevertheless, she obsolesced the entire U.S Navy, threatened the strategically vital blockade, and disrupted General McClellan’s plans to take Richmond. From flaming, bloody decks of sinking ships, to the dim confines of the first rotating armored turret, to the smoky depths of a Rebel gundeck—with shells screaming, clanging, booming, and splashing all around—to the office of a worried president with his cabinet peering down the Potomac for a Rebel monster, this dramatic story unfolds through the accounts of men who lived it in Unlike Anything That Ever Floated: The Monitor and Virginia and the Battle of Hampton Roads, March 8-9, 1862 by Dwight Sturtevant Hughes.
Unlikely Ally: How the Military Fights Climate Change and Protects the Environment
by Marilyn SnellIn a curious incongruity, the planet's dominant fighting machine, the US military, has taken on a largely unrecognized yet crucial role in preserving California's cultural and ecological treasures. Recruits learn to spot murder holes and fire assault rifles amid one of the most biologically diverse regions in the world, and researchers look to the desert's flora and fauna for inspiration. Environmental stewardship is law on installations throughout the United States, but a few bases in Southern California have taken a more comprehensive approach-one in which energy security and protection of natural and cultural resources are embedded in the concept of national defense. With journalist Marilyn Berlin Snell as our guide, we explore a culture informed as much by the natural world as by human ideas of leadership.
Unlikely Ally: How the Military Fights Climate Change and Protects the Environment
by Marilyn Berlin SnellAn environmental journalist reveals how some California military bases are leading the charge in the fight against climate change. In California, the US military has begun to redefine how our national security operations relate to the destabilizing effects of climate change. Several bases have taken on a largely unrecognized yet crucial role in renewable-energy innovation and in preserving cultural and natural treasures. These facilities are going beyond environmental stewardship to align national defense with energy security and the protection of endangered species. In Unlikely Ally, environmental journalist Marilyn Berlin Snell takes readers through these bases to examine what twenty-first-century sustainable-energy infrastructure looks like; whether combat readiness and species protection can successfully coexist; how cutting-edge technology and water-conservation practices could transform life in a resource-constrained world; and how the Department of Defense's scientific research into the metabolic secrets of the endangered desert tortoise could speed human travel to Mars.
Unlikely General: "Mad" Anthony Wayne and the Battle for America
by Mary StockwellA “compelling” biography of the Revolutionary War hero, disgraced Congressman, and hard-drinking womanizer who came to the rescue of a brand-new America (Library Journal).In the spring of 1792, President George Washington chose “Mad” Anthony Wayne to defend America from a potentially devastating threat. Native forces had decimated the standing army and Washington needed a champion to open the country stretching from the Ohio River westward to the headwaters of the Mississippi for settlement.A spendthrift, womanizer, and heavy drinker who had just been ejected from Congress for voter fraud, Wayne was an unlikely savior. Yet this disreputable man raised a new army and, in 1794, scored a decisive victory at the Battle of Fallen Timbers, successfully preserving his country and President Washington’s legacy. Drawing from Wayne’s insightful and eloquently written letters, historian Mary Stockwell sheds light on this fascinating and underappreciated figure. Her compelling work pays long-overdue tribute to a man—ravaged physically and emotionally by his years of military service—who fought to defend the nascent American experiment at a critical moment in history.“Those interested in American military history, US–Native American relations, and the early republic will benefit from reading Unlikely General.” —Pennsylvania History“[A] fine biography of Wayne.” —The Wall Street Journal
Unlikely Heroes: The Place of Holocaust Rescuers in Research and Teaching (Contemporary Holocaust Studies)
by Ari Kohen Gerald J. SteinacherClasses and books on the Holocaust often center on the experiences of victims, perpetrators, and bystanders, but rescuers also occupy a prominent space in Holocaust courses and literature even though incidents of rescue were relatively few and rescuers constituted less than 1 percent of the population in Nazi-occupied Europe. As inspiring figures and role models, rescuers challenge us to consider how we would act if we found ourselves in similarly perilous situations of grave moral import. Their stories speak to us and move us. Yet this was not always the case. Seventy years ago these brave men and women, today regarded as the Righteous Among the Nations, went largely unrecognized; indeed, sometimes they were even singled out for abuse from their co-nationals for their selfless actions. Unlikely Heroes traces the evolution of the humanitarian hero, looking at the ways in which historians, politicians, and filmmakers have treated individual rescuers like Raoul Wallenberg and Oskar Schindler, as well as the rescue efforts of humanitarian organizations. Contributors in this edited collection also explore classroom possibilities for dealing with the role of rescuers, at both the university and the secondary level.
An Unlikely Spy: A Novel
by Rebecca Starford“A beguiling tale of espionage." -- Pam Jenoff, author of The Orphans Tale and The Lost Girls of ParisA twisting, sophisticated World War II novel following a spy who goes undercover as a part of MI5—in chasing the secrets of others, how much will she lose of herself?Evelyn Varley has always been ambitious and clever. As a girl, she earned a scholarship to a prestigious academy well above her parents’ means, gaining her a best friend from one of England’s wealthiest families. In 1939, with an Oxford degree in hand and war looming, Evelyn finds herself recruited into an elite MI5 counterintelligence unit.A ruthless secret society seeks an alliance with Germany and, posing as a Nazi sympathizer, Evelyn must build a case to expose their treachery. But as she is drawn deeper into layers of duplicity—perhaps of her own making—some of those closest to her become embroiled in her investigation. With Evelyn’s loyalties placed under extraordinary pressure, she’ll face an impossible choice: save her country or the people who love her. Her decision echoes for years after the war, impacting everyone who thought they knew the real Evelyn Varley.Beguiling and dark, An Unlikely Spy is a fascinating story of deception and sacrifice, based on the history of real people within the British intelligence community.
An Unlikely Union
by Shannon FarringtonThe Doctor's Wounded Heart Union Army physician Evan Mackay runs his ward of the Baltimore military hospital with tremendous skill but no warmth. He will do his duty by the Confederate soldiers in his care, but sympathy and tenderness left him after the death of his brother, a Federal soldier. So why can't he stop himself from warming to his beautiful, compassionate, unapologetically Southern nurse? Two years of war have shown Emily Davis that the men on both sides of the war need all the comfort and care they can get. And that includes a stubborn, prickly Scottish doctor. As Evan opens his heart to Emily, she can only hope he'll let her fill it with forgiveness...and love..
Unlocking the Ex-Army Doc's Heart
by Juliette HylandIt will take someone special……to thaw her frozen heart!The Arctic Circle’s remote tranquility made it the perfect place for ex-army doc and former child star Annie Masters to open her clinic. But her cherished anonymity is ruined when celebrity surgeon Rafe Bradstone arrives in town! Seeing that she uses her work as a safe haven, dynamic Rafe seems determined to show her what she’s missing out on. And it’s working… She’s beginning to imagine a future—with him!
Unmanned
by Dan FespermanFrom the widely acclaimed author of The Prisoner of Guantánamo and The Double Game, an electrifying, timely, psychologically gripping descent into the hidden, expanding world of drone warfare. Not very long ago, Darwin Cole was an F-16 fighter pilot. He was a family man. He was on top of the world. Now? He's a washout drunk with a dishonorable discharge from the U.S. Air Force, living alone in the Nevada desert and haunted by an image beamed from one of his last missions as a "pilot" of a Predator drone--a harrowing shot of an Afghan child running for her life. When Cole is approached by three journalists trying to uncover the identity of the possibly rogue intelligence operative who called the shots in Cole's ill-fated mission, Cole reluctantly agrees to team up with them. But in our surveillance culture, even the well intentioned are liable to find themselves under scrutiny, running for their lives, especially when the trail they're following leads to the very heart of that culture--in intelligence, in the military, and among the unchecked private contractors who stand to profit richly from the advancing technology . . . not merely for use "over there," but for right here, right now. From the Hardcover edition.
Unmanned Aerial Vehicles: Robotic Air Warfare 1917-2007
by Ian Palmer Steven J. ZalogaUnmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) are the most dynamic field of aerospace technology, and potentially the harbingers of new aviation technology and tactics. They have only emerged from the shadows in recent years, but in fact have been in use for decades. After some limited use in World War II, UAVs began to emerge as a substitute for manned reconnaissance aircraft in the 1950s for missions deemed too dangerous to risk an aircrew. Used in significant numbers in the Vietnam War as well as less-heralded missions such as spy flights over China in the 1950s and 1960s, the contemporary UAV began to emerge in the 1980s. This book examines the development of this unique and mysterious technology, revealing how it has changed combat through the years and speculating on its potential to transform the nature of warfare in the future. Steven J. Zaloga examines the pioneering use of UAVs conducted by the Israeli air and the use of UAVs during Operation Desert Storm. Packed with rare, recently declassified photographs and detailed full-color cutaways, this book investigates the wide deployment of UAVs over Iraq and Afghanistan today, and considers the possible future of the UAV as an actual military weapon.
Unmanning: How Humans, Machines and Media Perform Drone Warfare (War Culture)
by Katherine ChandlerUnmanning studies the conditions that create unmanned platforms in the United States through a genealogy of experimental, pilotless planes flown between 1936 and 1992. Characteristics often attributed to the drone—including machine-like control, enmity and remoteness—are achieved by displacements between humans and machines that shape a mediated theater of war. Rather than primarily treating the drone as a result of the war on terror, this book examines contemporary targeted killing through a series of failed experiments to develop unmanned flight in the twentieth century. The human, machine and media parts of drone aircraft are organized to make an ostensibly not human framework for war that disavows its political underpinnings as technological advance. These experiments are tied to histories of global control, cybernetics, racism and colonialism. Drone crashes and failures call attention to the significance of human action in making technopolitics that comes to be opposed to “man” and the paradoxes at their basis.
The Unnamable Present
by Roberto CalassoA meditation on the rise of nationalism and totalitarianism in the contemporary world, by the author of The Ruin of Kasch.The ninth part of Roberto Calasso’s masterwork, The Unnamable Present, is closely connected with themes of the first book, The Ruin of Kasch. But while Kasch is an enlightened exploration of modernity, The Unnamable Present propels us into the twenty first century.Tourists, terrorists, secularists, fundamentalists, hackers, transhumanists, algorithmicians: these are all tribes that inhabit the unnamable present and act on its nervous system. This is a world that seems to have no living past, but was foreshadowed in the period between 1933 and 1945, when everything appeared bent on self-annihilation. The Unnamable Present is a meditation on the obscure and ubiquitous process of transformation happening today in all societies, which makes so many previous names either inadequate or misleading or a parody of what they used to mean.Translated with sensitivity by Calasso’s longtime translator, Richard Dixon, The Unnamable Present is a strikingly original and provocative vision of our times, from the writer The Paris Review called “a literary institution of one.”Praise for The Unnamable Present“Calasso is keenly aware of the all-too-namable ills afflicting the contemporary world. His new book differs markedly from its predecessors not only in its brevity but in the urgency with which it addresses the burning issues—the raging inferno—of our time.” —The New York Review of Books
Unofficial Ambassadors: American Military Families Overseas and the Cold War, 1946-1965
by Donna AlvahAs thousands of wives and children joined American servicemen stationed at overseas bases in the years following World War II, the military family represented a friendlier, more humane side of the United States' campaign for dominance in the Cold War. Wives in particular were encouraged to use their feminine influence to forge ties with residents of occupied and host nations. In this untold story of Cold War diplomacy, Donna Alvah describes how these “unofficial ambassadors” spread the United States’ perception of itself and its image of world order in the communities where husbands and fathers were stationed, cultivating relationships with both local people and other military families in private homes, churches, schools, women's clubs, shops, and other places.Unofficial Ambassadors reminds us that, in addition to soldiers and world leaders, ordinary people make vital contributions to a nation's military engagements. Alvah broadens the scope of the history of the Cold War by analyzing how ideas about gender, family, race, and culture shaped the U.S. military presence abroad.
Unofficial History
by Field-Marshal Sir William SlimLike most members of the professional military freemasonry, Field Marshal Sir William Slim came to admire “all the soldiers of different races who have fought with me and most of those who have fought against me.” Among the most likable of his enemies were the Wazirs of India’s Northwest Frontier. In 1920, Slim took part in a retaliatory raid on an obscure village. It was an unusually easy victory over the canny Wazirs, whom the British took by surprise and escaped from with scant loss. Afterwards, in the casual frontier way, the British sent a message to the Wazirs, expressing surprise at the enemy’s unusually poor shooting. The Wazirs replied in courtly fashion that their rifles were Short Magazine Lee-Enfields captured in previous fights with the British, and that they had failed to sight the guns to accord with a new stock of ammunition. Now, having calculated the adjustment, they would be delighted to demonstrate their bull’s-eye accuracy any time the British wanted. “One cannot help feeling,” Slim says, “that the fellows who wrote that ought to be on our side.” Slim genuinely enjoyed his virtually blood-free skirmishes with such foes as the Turks, the Wazirs and the Italians in 1940 Ethiopia.“An attempt to depict the lives of ordinary men in and out of combat. The accounts are written with style, wit and exceptional humanity.”—Tom Hall-Print ed.
Unofficial History: Field-Marshal Sir Williams Slim
by Sir William SlimA career soldier, veteran of both World Wars, and British war hero remembers the campaigns he fought—and his worthy foes. Like most members of the professional military freemasonry, Field Marshal Sir William Slim came to admire &“all the soldiers of different races who have fought with me and most of those who have fought against me.&” Among the most likable of his enemies were the Wazirs of India&’s Northwest Frontier. In 1920, Slim took part in a retaliatory raid on an obscure village. It was an unusually easy victory over the canny Wazirs, whom the British took by surprise and escaped from with scant loss. Afterwards, in the casual frontier way, the British sent a message to the Wazirs, expressing surprise at the enemy&’s unusually poor shooting. The Wazirs replied in courtly fashion that their rifles were Short Magazine Lee-Enfields captured in previous fights with the British, and that they had failed to sight the guns to accord with a new stock of ammunition. Now, having calculated the adjustment, they would be delighted to demonstrate their bull&’s-eye accuracy any time the British wanted. &“One cannot help feeling,&” Slim says, &“that the fellows who wrote that ought to be on our side.&” Slim genuinely enjoyed his virtually blood-free skirmishes with such foes as the Turks, the Wazirs and the Italians in 1940 Ethiopia. &“An attempt to depict the lives of ordinary men in and out of combat. The accounts are written with style, wit and exceptional humanity.&”—Tom Hall
The Unpopular Mr. Lincoln: The Story of America's Most Reviled President
by Larry TaggA timely look at the atmosphere of political hostility surrounding the Civil War, and the venom faced by America’s sixteenth president. Today, Abraham Lincoln is a beloved American icon, widely considered to be our best president. It was not always so. This book takes a look at what Lincoln’s contemporaries actually thought and said about him during his lifetime, when political hostilities, and ultimately civil war, raged. The era in which our sixteenth president lived and governed was the most rough-and-tumble in the history of American politics. The hostility behind the criticism aimed at Lincoln by the great men of his time, on both sides of the Mason-Dixon line, is startling, the spectacular prejudice against him often shocking for its cruelty, intensity, and unrelenting vigor. The plain truth is that Lincoln was deeply reviled by many in his time. This book is both an entertaining read and a well-researched, serious look at the political context that begat the president’s predicament. Lincoln’s humanity has been unintentionally trivialized by some historians and writers who have hidden away the real man in a patina of bronze. This book helps us better understand the man he was, and how history is better and more clearly viewed through a long-distance lens. “Not the warm and fuzzy portrait we’re used to seeing . . . An eye-opening study, the first of its kind to focus on what Lincoln’s contemporaries really thought of him. On the other hand, this is not mean-spirited Lincoln-bashing . . . Tagg assesses his presidency through the social and political context of mid-19th century America. It was a time, for example, when ‘the rabid press routinely destroyed the reputations of public men,’ when the stature of the presidency, ‘stained by feeble performances from a string of the poorest presidents in the nation’s history,’ had plunged over decades.” —Civil War Times Magazine
The Unpredictability of the Past: Memories of the Asia-Pacific War in U.S.-East Asian Relations
by Marc GallicchioIn The Unpredictability of the Past, an international group of historians examines how collective memories of the Asia-Pacific War continue to affect relations among China, Japan, and the United States. The contributors are primarily concerned with the history of international relations broadly conceived to encompass not only governments but also nongovernmental groups and organizations that influence the interactions of peoples across the Pacific. Taken together, the essays provide a rich, multifaceted analysis of how the dynamic interplay between past and present is manifest in policymaking, popular culture, public commemorations, and other arenas. The contributors interpret mass media sources, museum displays, monuments, film, and literature, as well as the archival sources traditionally used by historians. They explore how American ideas about Japanese history shaped U. S. occupation policy following Japan's surrender in 1945, and how memories of the Asia-Pacific War influenced Washington and Tokyo policymakers' reactions to the postwar rise of Soviet power. They investigate topics from the resurgence of Pearl Harbor images in the U. S. media in the decade before September 11, 2001, to the role of Chinese war museums both within China and in Chinese-Japanese relations, and from the controversy over the Smithsonian Institution's Enola Gay exhibit to Japanese tourists' reactions to the USS Arizona memorial at Pearl Harbor. One contributor traces how a narrative commemorating African Americans' military service during World War II eclipsed the history of their significant early-twentieth-century appreciation of Japan as an ally in the fight against white supremacy. Another looks at the growing recognition and acknowledgment in both the United States and Japan of the Chinese dimension of World War II. By focusing on how memories of the Asia-Pacific War have been contested, imposed, resisted, distorted, and revised, The Unpredictability of the Past demonstrates the crucial role that interpretations of the past play in the present. Contributors. Marc Gallicchio, Waldo Heinrichs, Haruo Iguchi, Xiaohua Ma, Frank Ninkovich, Emily S. Rosenberg, Takuya Sasaki, Yujin Yaguchi, Daqing Yang
The Unquiet Earth: A Novel
by Denise GiardinaDillon Freeman returns from World War II to Blackberry Creek, West Virginia, where he confronts the coal mining industry as a union organizer and falls in love with his conventional cousin, Rachel. By the author of Storming Heaven.
Unquiet Ghosts: A Novel
by Glenn Meade“Powerful, moving...unforgettable.” —Janet Evanovich, #1 New York Times bestselling author “Glenn Meade doesn’t miss a beat…A high-octane game-changer.” —Steve Berry, New York Times bestselling author of The 14th Colony Eight years ago, her husband and children were killed in a plane crash. Now, new evidence reveals that they didn’t die—her husband deliberately vanished—and that he knows a secret the powerful forces will stop at nothing to keep hidden.Kathy Kelly’s world was shattered when a plane carrying her husband—an Iraq War veteran and devoted father—and her two children vanished from the sky one night. No trace of the plane was ever found. Eight years later, Kathy has struggled to rebuild her life, but then wreckage of his plane is found in the wilderness of Great Smoky Mountain National Park—hundreds of miles from where her husband’s plane should have been. The pilot perished in the crash, but there is no sign of Jack or the children. Could they have made it out alive after all? But if so, where have they been all this time? Where are they now? As Kathy searches for any clue about what happened to her family, the investigation uncovers some unsettling clues—including a briefcase containing millions of dollars in cash, a priceless mask stolen from an Iraqi museum, and a clue that links Jack’s disappearance with the suspicious death of Kathy’s mother years ago. But she soon learns that others have been looking for the wreckage and its occupants for a long time. Others who are determined to make sure she never finds her family and that they remain dead. Shadowy, powerful people who will kill for what was on board—a secret her husband was the keeper of. A secret so powerful it will open a Pandora’s box of bloody revenge—one that reaches back into the past and into the highest echelons of wealth and power, all the way to the White House. This breathless, pulse-pounding thriller examines the very real billions in cash and priceless artifacts that vanished into the pockets of powerful American men during the Iraq war, and examines the extreme lengths some people will go to protect the secrets of what really happened to all that money.
The Unraveling: An Update to The Gamble
by Thomas E. RicksIn this timely supplement to his 2009 New York Times bestseller The Gamble, Thomas E. Ricks reveals how the Iraq war has changed and how the national conversation has shifted since the time of writing. This Penguin eSpecial offers new insights into the difficulties likely to confront the United States in Iraq in the coming year, from our most trusted expert on the conflict there.
The Unraveling: High Hopes and Missed Opportunities in Iraq
by Emma SkyWhen Emma Sky, an intrepid young British woman, volunteered to help rebuild Iraq after the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, she had little idea what she was letting herself in for: a tour that would last over a decade, longer than that of any senior military of political official. As the only adviser to the Coalition Provisional Authority in Kirkuk and the closest confidante to U. S. General Odierno, Sky was valued for her controversial voice and outsider’s point of view--during the most painful stages of the war, she was one of the few to develop friendships and relationships with both Iraqis and Americans alike. In the West, violence in Iraq is typically explained away as the symptom of psychopathic terrorists, blurring and arbitrary colonial borders, and ancient hatreds between Sunni and Shia. But the violence stems from weak governance and corrupt elites, empowered by the U. S. -led coalition, who use sectarianism to mobilize support and fail to deliver service to the meet the needs of the country’s citizens. Women and men, Iraqis and Americans, soldiers and civilians, the ordinary and yet extraordinary, Western cultures and Eastern all collide in Iraq. Since the beginning of the invasion in 2003, Sky has been a tireless witness to American efforts to impose democracy on a country traumatized by decades of war and sanctions, newly liberated from the most brutal of regimes; the Iraqi who became insurgents and the insurgencies that morphed into civil war; the 2007 surge and then the drawdown of U. S. troops; the pitfalls and limitation of foreign powers; and the takeover by the Islamic State. A consummate insider, called the "modern-day Gertrude Bell” by the London Times, Sky provides insight into the ordered world of the US military, the complexities, diversity and evolution of Iraqi society during in the last ten years of uninterrupted conflict and the struggle to find stability in post-Saddam Iraq. With sharp detail, tremendous empathy and devotion to all those who served--The Unraveling is an intimate portrait of Americans who killed and cared, of friendships, humanity, the quest for peace and the failure of United States strategy.
Unraveling Freedom: The Battle for Democracy on the Home Front during World War I
by Ann Bausum"In 1915, the United States experienced the 9/11 of its time. A German torpedo sank the Lusitania killing nearly 2,000 innocent passengers. The ensuing hysteria helped draw the United States into World War I--the bitter, brutal conflict that became known as the Great War and the War to End All Wars. But as U.S. troops fought to make the world safe for democracy abroad, our own government eroded freedoms at home, especially for German-Americans. Free speech was no longer an operating principle of American democracy. Award-winning author Ann Bausum asks, just where do Americans draw the line of justice in times of war? Drawing thought-provoking parallels with President Wilson's government and other wartime administrations, from FDR to George W. Bush, Bausum's analysis has plenty of history lessons for the world today. Her exhaustive research turns up astonishing first-person stories and rare images, and the full-color design is fresh and stunning. The result is a gripping book that is well-positioned for the run-up to the World War I centennial."
The Unraveling of the Bush Presidency
by Howard ZinnHere, in the magisterial yet plain-spoken style of A People's History of the United States, is historian Howard Zinn's long-awaited telling of these last six years of United States history, a time when catastrophic machinations of war have dictated our foreign and domestic policy, and when voices of resistance have appeared in the unlikeliest places.Perhaps more than any other American, Howard Zinn has helped us understand ourselves by deepening our understanding of our own history.
Unravelling Enigma: Winning The Code War At Station X (Military History Ser.)
by Maurice FreedmanSeldom out of the news for long, code-breaking has had a bad time in the media so far, readers and viewers often finding it as perplexing as it is intriguing. As one of the greatest achievements of the century, code- breaking is a fascinating story, but all too often misunderstood and felt to be obscure. The author covers the story from the early code-breaking efforts through the rickety structure of the pre-war Government Code and Cypher School to Bletchley Park where a large powerful organisation arose, unscrambling thousands of secret enemy messages every day. Detailing how these amazing discoveries were actually used, taking us briefly into some of the battles of the Second World War, and in some detail the Battle of the Atlantic, when Britain was in danger of starving and where the war was nearly lost.For the first time, the code-breaking story with all its complexities is told in a straightforward and readable manner, whilst at the same time it will not fail to intrigue and astonish readers.
Unreasonable Behavior: An Autobiography
by Don McCullin“Unsparing reminiscences that effectively combine the bittersweet life of a world-class photojournalist with a generous selection of his haunting lifework” (Kirkus Reviews). Revised and updated after twenty-five years, Unreasonable Behavior traces the life and career of one of the top photojournalists of the twentieth century and beyond. Born in London in 1935, Don McCullin worked as a photographer’s assistant in the RAF during the Suez Crisis. His early association with a North London gang led to the first publication of his pictures. As an overseas correspondent for the Sunday Times Magazine beginning in 1966, McCullin soon became a new kind of hero, taking a generation of readers beyond the insularity of post-war domestic life through the lens of his Nikon camera. He captured the realities of war in Biafra, the Congo, Vietnam, Cambodia, and elsewhere, and the human tragedy of famine and cholera on the Bangladesh border and later, the AIDs epidemic in Sub-Saharan Africa. Already in 1968, when the Beatles wanted new press shots, they asked for Don McCullin. Harrowing and poignant, Unreasonable Behavior is an extraordinary account of a witness who survived to tell his tale and triumphed over the memories that could have destroyed him. “[Don McCullin] has been forfeit more times than he can remember, he says. But he is not bragging. Talking this way about death and risk, he seems to be implying quite consciously that by testing his luck each time, he is testing his Maker’s indulgence.” —John le Carré “McCullin handles much of the material culled from his war experiences like a seasoned thriller writer. His dialogue is convincing and sharp.” —The Observer