Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ

The first real world historic event I can recall from my childhood is a Pathe News report (yes, before television we watched 'newsreels' at the movies) of the Berlin Blockade. As a nine-year old I followed newspaper accounts of our forces advance towards the Yalu River and the resulting cataclysm when Chinese intervention punished MacArthur's hubris. For the fall of Dienbienphu we had Life magazine and of course the Vietnam War was a television nightly news staple. So I literally grew up with the conflicts recounted in this book and they proceeded throughout my lifetime - the book ends with an account of the first year of the Ukraine conflict. Our joint authors, a distinguished British historian and America's most successful (unfortunately that's not saying a lot) general officer, have created a fascinating though uneven book. (Delighted they seem to have agreed to call the season betwixt summer and winter 'autumn' however), held together by a definition of strategic success. I agree with one of their judgements I'd not seen expressed before, that the Vietnam War can actually be placed on the positive side of the ledge because postponing the Communist triumph from 1954 to 1975 saved much of Asia (especially Indonesia) from much worse. The book concludes with speculations on how drones, precision weapons, and AI will continue to affect warfare.