Perhaps with one I just finished. It's one of the best accounts of WWII submarine warfare I've ever read, and I've read several great ones:
I am surprised how many I have read and how many I now need to read.
There is a lot of money to be made in war. I’m surprised there’s no book about it.
“There’s no question it is a good thing a full generation has passed in the West without requiring the majority of young people to feel the full brunt of war.
At the same time, this can lead to a profound ignorance and naivete”
So women should be excluded? Maybe everyone should read them. One of my favorites is The Guns of August by Barbara Tuchman. There are several books on the War of Secession aka The Civil War. Then there is the biography of Curtis LeMay, Ulysses S. Grant, Eisenhower, Churchill, etc. Not being argumentative and all but .....
Why do I need 43 books about war?
This idiot downplayz Sun Tzu. Chairman Moa’s Little Red Book was almost a verbatim plagiarism of Sun Tzu.
“The Art of War” was in fact and indeed the “ART OF WAR.”
Couple THOUSAND years OLD. And as new as the newest day.
I agree with a few of the books but not most of the list.
I have read most of these books, and most of those that I haven’t read I will add to my list and read in short order. But, very few of these books would have made much sense to me until I had experience the unmistakable sound and pressure of a bullet passing by my eye. Until you have seen the elephant, you know little and can understand nothing. Manliness in the metrosexual context of present day has nothing to do with it.
The list cannot be taken seriously. He has Caputo’s drugged out freak fantasy on Vietnam which is an insult to Vietnam vets who served honorably. Caputo even makes insulting comments about the bodies of dead American soldiers.
The list is a hodgepodge made up over many minutes of consideration.
I was surprised that I had read several of these since I am not much of a reader.
I agree that Xenophon’s story of the 10,000 Greek Mercenaries is an absolute must not for just a military historian but for everyone.
Thucydides is a real treasure but it is really long and tough going. The amount of information is really incredible.
Perhaps with one I just finished. It's one of the best accounts of WWII submarine warfare I've ever read, and I've read several great ones:
Lost Victories by von Manstein. One of the most brilliant German generals speaks about what it was like obeying a fool and playing with a losing hand.
The Real War, 1914-1918 by B. Liddell Hart. A guy who interviewed all of the WWII generals on an even basis. This is his take on WWI.
The Forgotten Soldier by Guy Sajer. Astonishing.
The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich by William Shirer. Take your time with this one. It's worth it.
The Second World War Six volumes by somebody named Churchill. If you have to ask you'll never know.
Anything by John Keegan, Victor Davis Hanson, or Bruce Catton.
It isn't so much war, I think, it's about war as a facet of the overall human condition. Why can we not do this? What is it about war that is so inextricably linked with what we are? Good stuff...
Victor Davis Hanson is controversial? Right away I have to disregard whatever this person has to say.
Cripes. A swipe of 43 titles. That’ll take 15 min just to scroll past.
Face of Battle by John Keegan is a book that follows a handful of important battles. Each is from the view of an actual specific soldier or low officer fighting it. Fascinating and sobering. Needs to be in the top five here.
J.F.C. Fuller’s classic two volume tome: Decisive Battles of the Western World is important in that it contradicts the modern psuedo-wisdom that the tides of history are such that the battles are unimportant. No, often it is a closely won battle that changes the tides.
I’m surprised, but I’ve read about half of these listed books.
Oldplayer
He also wrote the movie "Operation Dumbo Drop" for Disney.
Anyone else notice that nearly all of his Civil War books are by Union Generals. None by Confederate ones.
Some that should be added to the list:
The Harper Encyclopedia of Military History: From 3500 BC to the Present, by R. Ernest Dupuy, Ernest R. Dupuy, Trevor N. Dupuy. The essential guide to battles and wars, great and small. The index is divided into three parts: “General Index,” “Index to Wars,” and “Index of Battles and Sieges.” It is an important feature of the encyclopedia since it is the best way to pinpoint information in the chronological arrangement.
The Influence of Sea Power Upon History: 1660-1783, by Alfred Thayer Mahan. It details the role of sea power during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and discusses the various factors needed to support and achieve sea power, with emphasis on having the largest and most powerful fleet. Scholars consider it the single most influential book in naval strategy. Its policies were quickly adopted by most major navies, ultimately causing the World War I naval arms race.
War On The Eastern Front 1941-1945 : The German Soldier in Russia, by James Lucas. Some of the most extraordinary and surreal battles between intelligent, determined Germans and rigidly hierarchical Russians, who while vastly outnumbering their enemy, abhorred initiative and common sense, resulting in terrible destruction of men and equipment.
Devil’s Guard, Recall to Inferno (Devil’s Guard II), Devil’s Guard III: Unconditional Warfare, all by George R. Elford. The story of a Waffen-SS battalion at the end of WWII that was converted to French Foreign Legion and sent to fight in French Indochina. One of the top 10 books read by US soldiers fighting in the Gulf War.
The Liberators, by Viktor Suvorov (Vladimir Bogdanovich Rezun). The Liberators is a collection of Viktor Suvorov’s shockingly revealing, and often hilarious, first-hand stories about the inside of the Soviet-army during the 1960’s, culminating in the 1968 invasion of Czechoslovakia. The author brilliantly contrasts the outside world’s perception of the Soviet Union with the pathetic reality: an internally weak nation run by a system of corruption, brutality and incompetence. (Several of his books are top notch, both informative and entertaining.)
While many people have read All Quiet on the Western Front, by Erich Maria Remarque, few have read its sequel, entitled The Road Back, about the hardships suffered by veterans, many of who were horribly crippled, after World War I.
M4L