Re: Printed works of future combat

At 15:57 8/13/98, Stuart Murray wrote:

>If you are looking for combat and tactics you couldn't go very wrong
>looking either at modern military books.  There are a number of books
<snip>
>OK, so my point is that generally (and I feel reasonable confident
saying
>this) sci-fi combat is poor on tactics and heavy on gizmos, whereas
modern
>novels, especially in the genres that i've metioned tend to be weak on
>gizmos and very strong on the thoughts and actions of the individual
>soldiers.  I personally think that future war, at least in the
timescale

I tend to agree! Some recommendations:

Non-fiction
Anything by Matther Brennan. _Brennan's War_ is his story, _Headhunters_
and _Hunter-Killer Squadron_ are stories collected from others in his
unit.
Excellent autobiographical material. And through the stories, you get a
feel for how units on the lines adapted their equipment and tactics to
meet
the tactical challenges they faced.

_Inside the LRRPS: Rangers In Vietnam_ by Michael Lee Lanning. A bit on
the
dry side, but an in-depth look at the development of LRRPS and
specialized
small-unit tactics in Vietnam. Includes TO&E, SOP, training details,
etc.

_Low Level Hell_ by Hugh Mills, Jr. Helicopter action

_Tank Sargent_ by Ralph Zumbro. The only first-person account of armor
actions in Vietnam that I've been able to find. Reminds me a bit of
Hammer's Slammers, but that's not surprising, as I believe Drake was
attached to a unit similar to this one.

_Sniper_ by Adrain Gilbert. A historical look at the development of the
sniper as a specialized troop type from the civil war to the present.
Very
comprehensive, good source material.

Fiction
Anything by Bob Mayer, especially _Operation Dragon-Sim_ (Dragon-Sim 13
in
hardcover), _Eyes of the Hammer_, _Synbat_ and _Z_. The last two border
on
science fiction, but all are good action novels with technically
accurate
looks at small unit action. The author is a former Green Beret.

Steven Hunter: _The Master Sniper_, _The Day Before Midnight_, _Point of
Impact_ and _Dark Light_ are my favorites. A bit less applicable to
wargaming, as the focus is squarely on the action of a few individuals.
But
Hunter knows his firearms, and writes good action. There may be
something
here to steal for a scenario (especially Day Before Midnight!)

_Vortex_ by Larry Bond covers a South African civil war, and the
subsequent
invasion and counterinvasion of Cuban and US troops. Good company- and
brigade-level action.

Anything and everything by Harry Coyle, of course. _Trial by Fire_, _The
Ten Thousand_ and _Code of Honor_ are my favorites. Techincally accurate
and compelling stories set in the modern US armed forces. Fire and Code
both feature as a side story the exploits of a female infantry officer,
one
of the first few the Army allows. Not quite Honor Harrington, but still
a
quite likeable character.

_The Five Fingers_ and _The Teheran Contract_ by Gayle Rivers and James
Hudson purport to be fictionalized accounts of real-life mercenary
actions,
but I'm not sure how true they are. Fun reads, though.

_Mission MIA_ by J.C. Pollock is a bit dated, but still decent. One of
the
early 'let's go back and rescue the POWs' books of the early/mid-80s,
and
probably the one I liked the most.

------------------------------------------------------------------------
------
Jim 'Jiji' Foster / jfoster@kansas.net / Jiji @ AnimeMUCK / TIP #28 /
PPIG #42

"The wisest and best of men, nay, the wisest and best of their actions,
may
be rendered ridiculous by a person whose first object in life is a joke.
"
    - Jane Austen, _Pride & Predjudice_