Showing titles in War & Crisis

Objective Troy tells the gripping and unsettling story of Anwar al-Awlaki, the once-celebrated American imam who called for moderation after 9/11, a man who ultimately directed his outsized talents to the mass murder of his fellow citizens. It follows Barack Obama's campaign against the excesses of the Bush counterterrorism programs and his eventual embrace of the targeted killing of suspected militants. And it recounts how the president directed the spy agencies to hunt Awlaki down.

ISIS rocketed onto the world stage seemingly out of nowhere, beheading American hostages, bulldozing international borders, routing the American-trained Iraqi Army, and carving out a new state that rules eight million people and a territory larger than the United Kingdom. But who are they? Where did ISIS come from, and how did they rise to power in so little time? What is driving them - and how can they be stopped?

Most violent jihadi movements in the 20th century focused on removing corrupt, repressive secular regimes throughout the Muslim world. But following the 1979 Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, a new form of jihadism emerged - global jihad - turning to the international arena as the primary locus of ideology and action. With this book, Glenn E. Robinson develops a compelling and provocative argument about this violent political movement's evolution.

The terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, led most American citizens to feel that we are no longer safe and secure in our communities. However, terrorism is not a new phenomenon in the United States. This book chronicles 37 such assaults on American soil from the end of the Civil War to the present day. Not only are the most infamous attacks discussed; events that are obscure and relatively unknown - but fascinating nonetheless - are detailed as well.

Academy Award-nominated filmmaker Morgan Spurlock is a jittery father-to-be with a simple question: If OBL is behind 9/11 and all the ensuing worldwide chaos, why can't we just catch him? And furthermore, why is his message so compelling to so many people?

For over 100 years, at least one concentration camp has existed somewhere on Earth. First used as battlefield strategy, camps have evolved with each passing decade, in the scope of their effects and the savage practicality with which governments have employed them. Even in the 21st century, as we continue to reckon with the magnitude and horror of the Holocaust, history tells us we have broken our own solemn promise of "never again".

In 2011, an elite group of US Navy SEALS stormed an enclosure in the Pakistani city of Abbottabad and killed Osama bin Laden, the man the United States had begun chasing before the devastating attacks of 9/11. The news did much to boost President Obama’s first term and played a major part in his reelection victory of the following year. But much of the story of that night, as presented to the world, was incomplete, or a lie. The evidence of what actually went on remains hidden.

Between 1846 and 1873, California's Indian population plunged from perhaps 150,000 to 30,000. Benjamin Madley is the first historian to uncover the full extent of the slaughter, the involvement of state and federal officials, the taxpayer dollars that supported the violence, indigenous resistance, who did the killing, and why the killings ended. This deeply researched book is a comprehensive and chilling history of an American genocide.

Forty years ago, a majority of Americans were highly engaged in issues of war and peace. Whether to go to war or keep out of conflicts was a vital question at the heart of the country's vibrant, if fractious, democracy. But American political consciousness has drifted. In the last decade, America has gone to war in Iraq and Afghanistan, while pursuing a new kind of warfare in Yemen, Somalia, Libya, and Pakistan.

Brigitte Gabriel delves deeply into Islam - a religion rooted in the seventh century with teachings that are absolutely opposed to democracy and equality - and its spread across the U.S. and Europe.

When the ashes had settled after World War II and the Allies convened an international war crimes trial in Nuremberg, a psychiatrist, Douglas Kelley, and a psychologist, Gustave Gilbert, tried to fathom the psychology of the Nazi leaders using extensive psychiatric interviews, IQ tests, and Rorschach inkblot tests. Never before or since has there been such a detailed study of governmental leaders who orchestrated mass killings.

In the heart of the Ottoman Empire as World War I rages, Stepan Miskjian's world becomes undone. He is separated from his family as they are swept up in the government's mass deportation of Armenians into internment camps. Gradually realizing the unthinkable - that they are all being driven to their deaths - he fights, through starvation and thirst, not to lose hope.

The US-led war in Iraq from 2003 to 2011 was one of the most controversial wars in recent history. The invasion of Iraq was justified by claims that the regime of Saddam Hussein had links with terrorist groups such as al-Qaeda, and possessed weapons of mass destruction that might be used in an attack on another country. Both these claims were later shown to be false.

North Korean nukes. Dirty bombs in train stations. Chemical warfare. Americans have more reasons than ever to be afraid. If a nuclear missile strikes, will you know what to do? If a nerve agent is released in your subway system or office building, will you be safe? The US Armed Forces Nuclear, Biological and Chemical Survival Manual gives you the information you need to survive a terrorist attack. It contains the best practices of all the United States' military services, adapted for the first time for civilian use. With this manual, you will be able to take action.

In Twilight Warriors, award-winning foreign correspondent James Kitfield introduces us to the tight-knit brotherhood that strives to keep the United States safe from the dimly understood threats it now faces. Together these men have broken down the boundaries between their respective agencies to engineer a network-centric way of fighting using a seamless web of intelligence analysts, information networks, FBI forensics experts, and Special Forces units to take the fight to America's enemies as never before.

Revolutionary War officer Nathan Hale, one of America's first spies, said, "Any kind of service necessary to the public good becomes honorable by being necessary." A statue of Hale stands outside CIA headquarters, and the agency often cites his statement as one of its guiding principles. But who decides what is necessary for the public good, and is it really true that any kind of service is permissible for the public good? These questions are at the heart of James M. Olson's book, Fair Play: The Moral Dilemmas of Spying.

The Osama bin Laden I Know is the definitive history of the world's most wanted man. Author Peter Bergen is CNN's terrorism analyst and an acclaimed journalist who actually spent time with bin Laden prior to the events of September 11, 2001. The book features interviews with people from each stage of bin Laden's life, from childhood to the present day, and reveals both formative moments and intimate details that reveal his character and personality.

For ten years, Senator Bob Graham served on the Senate Intelligence Committee, where he oversaw the conduct of the CIA and had access to some of the nation's most closely guarded secrets. In this explosive, controversial, and profoundly alarming insider's report, Senator Graham reveals faults in America's national security network severe enough to raise fundamental questions about the competence and honesty of public officials in the CIA, the FBI, and the White House.

Japan's Holocaust combines research conducted in over eighteen research facilities in five nations to explore Imperial Japan's atrocities from 1927 to 1945 during its military expansions and reckless campaigns throughout Asia and the Pacific. This book brings together the most recent scholarship and new primary research to ascertain that Japan claimed a minimum of thirty million lives, slaughtering more than Hitler's Nazi Germany. Japan's Holocaust shows that Emperor Hirohito not only knew about the atrocities his legions committed, but actually ordered them.

The breathtaking memoir by a member of "Nicky's family", a group of 669 Czechoslovakian children who escaped the Holocaust through Sir Nicholas Winton's Kindertransport project. My Train to Freedom relates the trials and achievements of award-winning humanitarian and former Episcopal priest Ivan Backer.