The Mammoth Book of Elite Forces: Graphic Accounts of Military Exploits by the World's Special Forces - Softcover

4

17 ratings by Goodreads

9780786709526: The Mammoth Book of Elite Forces: Graphic Accounts of Military Exploits by the World's Special Forces

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0786709529 ISBN 13: 9780786709526

Publisher: Carroll & Graf, 2002

The SS Special Troops in Italy in 1943, the U.S. Special Forces in Vietnam in 1964, Britain’s Special Air Services at Oman in 1972, the human torpedoes of the Italian Underwater Division of the Italian Navy in 1941—these stand among the many astonishing military operations recounted in this graphic, pulse-pounding volume of true tales told by fighters in the world’s most elite armed forces. Veteran editor Jon E. Lewis assembles firsthand reports from the battlefields, featuring John Pimlott’s Presidential citation for his bravery in Vietnam with the 1st Air Calvary, Claire Chennault’s exploits with the Flying Tigers against the Japanese in Burma, Eugene sledge’s island-hopping assaults with the U.S. 1st Marine Division, and John Lodwick’s participation in the last wartime action of the British Special Boat Squadron—the inspiration for Alistair MacLean’s Guns of Navarone. The Mammoth Book of Elite Forces covers the world’s crack outfits from the dashing missions of the unorthodox British “Private Army” of Vladimir “Popski” Peniakoff to spread “alarm and despondency” behind Axis lines in Libya and Tunisia to the highly trained Israeli paratroopers who rescued an airplaneful of hostages in Entebbe. Included, too, are brave adventures of the Green Berets, the Delta Force, the French Foreign Legion, and all the other special corps who get going when the going gets tough.

"synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.

From Publishers Weekly:

In 1980 Britain's Special Air Service, founded in North Africa in 1941, took on several Palestinian liberationists and members of Baader-Meinhof, a revolutionary organization, who hijacked a plane full of passengers. In 1941, members of Italy's Underwater Division of the 10th motor torpedo boat, aka the human torpedoes, drove underwater "chariots" amidst the British Mediterranean fleet and attached explosive warheads to the hulls of several ships. Despite the heroic stand of French Legionnaires, the nationalist-communist Viet Minh triumphed in 1954, effectively marking the end of French government in Vietnam. These and numerous other feats are recounted by participants, journalists and historians in The Mammoth Book of Elite Forces, edited by Jon E. Lewis. Nearly half of the accounts focus on WWII, and all of them feature Western armies.

"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.