Category: History

The World’s First SWAT Team: W. E. Fairbairn and the Shanghai Municipal Police Reserve Unit by Leroy Thompson
Requirements: ePUB Reader, 6.4MB
Overview: In turbulent Shanghai in the years between the World Wars, the International Settlement was a mercantile powerhouse that faced unrest from Communist labor unions, criminal gangs, spies, political agitators, armed kidnappers and assassins. Adjoining the Settlement were the French Concession and the Chinese city, both hotbeds of intrigue and crime themselves. Called the most sinful in the world, the Settlement relied on its police: the Shanghai Municipal Police, one of the most advanced forces in the world.

After an incident in 1926 when the police fired upon demonstrators, which resulted in unrest and strikes, W. E. Fairbairn was charged with forming a specialized unit to deal with riots and armed encounters. The resulting Reserve Unit became the prototype for future SWAT teams, as it developed tactics for using snipers in barricade and hostage incidents, techniques for use of the submachine gun during raids, hostage rescue tactics, aggressive riot-dispersal tactics and various other tactical innovations. Out of the experiences of the unit came many of the techniques later taught by W. E. Fairbairn, E. A. Sykes, Pat O’Neill and others to the Commandos, Rangers, SOE, OSS, 1st Special Service Force and other Second World War elite units. Those same techniques still resonate today with special forces and police tactical units.
Genre: Non-fiction | History

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Carthaginian Warrior 264–146 BC by Nic Fields
Requirements: ePUB Reader, 24.5MB
Overview: The armies of Carthage were diverse, made up of men of various ethnic groups, military specializations, and even motivations. Whilst some were citizen soldiers fighting on behalf of their state, others were ruthless mercenaries who remained loyal only so long as they were paid. As the Punic Wars progressed and the merits of professional soldiers became appreciated, mercenaries became the backbone of Carthaginian armies.

Backed up by detailed reference to historical sources, this book examines the life of a Carthaginian warrior, following his experiences from initial recruitment to final battle, and focusing on what he ate, the equipment he carried and the tactics he used on the battlefield. This in-depth analysis of warriors in daily life and battle is accompanied by archival photographs and vibrant illustrations from Steve Noon. [Warrior – 150]
Genre: Non-fiction | History

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The Advance from Mons 1914: The Experiences of a German Infantry Officer by Walter Bloem
Requirements: ePUB Reader, 1MB
Overview: Here is an outstanding personal memoir penned by a German infantry officer recalling his experiences during the initial days and weeks of the war in the West, July-September 1914.

Walter Bloem was a Captain in the German 12th Grenadier Regiment (Royal Prussian Grenadier Regiment Prinz Carl von Preuen, 2nd Brandenburg, Nr 12 – to give his unit its full title). His narrative gives a superb insight into the outbreak of war and his regiment’s mobilisation, followed by the advance through Belgium and France, including the author’s participation at the battles of Mons, Le Cateau, the Marne and the Aisne. His account of what it was like to face Britain’s ‘Old Contemptibles’ at Mons is particularly valuable.

Before the war, the author was a novelist, and The Advance from Mons clearly shows this – it is written with a great eye for detail, careful yet vivid descriptions abound and importantly, from a historical perspective, the book was penned whilst Herr Bloem convalesced from a wound he received at the battle of the Aisne. Such was the quality of his writing, that J.E. Edmonds, the British official historian of the Great War commented: "Some of the scenes … are so truly and vividly depicted that I gave translations of them in the Official History, feeling that they could not be bettered."
Genre: Non-fiction | History

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The "German Spirit" in the Ottoman and Turkish Army, 1908-1938: A history of military knowledge transfer by Gerhard Grübhaber
Requirements: PDF Reader, 17.4 MB
Overview: The study focuses on the mutual transfer of military knowledge between the German and the Ottoman/ Turkish army between the 1908 Young Turk revolution and the death of Atatürk in 1938. Whereas the Ottoman and later the Turkish army were the main beneficiaries of this selective appropriation, the German armed forces evaluated their (prospective) ally’s military experiences to a lesser extent. Through the analysis of archival and published sources and memoir literature the study provides evidence for the impact of this exchange on the armies of both countries and on the Turkish civil society. Indeed, the officer corps in both countries was a small but influential group of the society for the further development of their nations.
Genre: Non-Fiction > History

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The Ruin of Kasch by Roberto Calasso
Requirements: ePUB or AZW3 Reader, 2.1MB
Overview: A brilliant new translation of a classic work on violence and revolution as seen through mythology and art

The Ruin of Kasch takes up two subjects—"the first is Talleyrand, and the second is everything else," wrote Italo Calvino when the book first appeared in 1983. Hailed as one of those rare books that persuade us to see our entire civilization in a new light, its guide is the French statesman Charles-Maurice de Talleyrand, who knew the secrets of the ancien régime and all that came after, and was able to adapt the notion of "legitimacy" to the modern age. Roberto Calasso follows him through a vast gallery of scenes set immediately before and after the French Revolution, making occasional forays backward and forward in time, from Vedic India to the porticoes of the Palais-Royal and to the killing fields of Pol Pot, with appearances by Goethe and Marie Antoinette, Napoleon and Marx, Walter Benjamin and Chateaubriand. At the center stands the story of the ruin of Kasch, a legendary kingdom based on the ritual killing of the king and emblematic of the ruin of ancient and modern regimes.
Genre: Non-Fiction, History

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