Jordan

Having never read (or listened) anything that Mr. Tapper had written I figured this would just be another "reporters eye view" of the war. What I found was a jewel that is so powerful I wish every man or woman who might have the power to send our armed forces into battle be required to read it.

More than once I was brought to tears as Mr. Tapper described the gut wrenching emotions of those who waited at home, and of the incredible personal sacrifice these soldiers were (and are) willing to make for one another on a battlefield whose tactical goals have become so muddled by politicians there can be no good result.

Woven into the fabric of this book is a look at the frustrating bureaucracy that has evolved due to the United States attempts to mix politics and the use of military force. The blatant disregard for the most basic rules of tactical planning and execution cast a dark shadow over the senior military officers who were at the root cause of this tragedy. It is hard for me, as a veteran, to understand how we can put men and women in harms way and then hobble them with ridiculous rules of engagement.

War is a very nasty business and needs to be fought with overwhelming force, violence and clear tactical goals. After Desert Storm I believed our leadership, both military and political, had relearned the key lessons of World War II, that being that you simply cannot fight a limited war and expect any good result. It is apparent they have not.

Mr.Tapper does a brilliant job of making that point over and over again in each of the many battle segments.

This is a great book and I hope that it will become required reading for both political and military leadership as a tool to remind all of the horrible costs our soldiers must pay when leadership forgets the basics.

Buy it, read it, and tell your friends about it. The more Americans who become enlightened about what this war has evolved into the sooner, I would hope, we will be able to make the decision to fish or cut bait.

Iggulden is a great story teller and Ferrone does a super job reading. The characters flow seamlessly through the series. Great book(s) for a relaxing evening away from the turmoil of the day.

I'll bet you a wooden nickel you will know more about the Pacific Theater in World War II after you read this one. It's a great story, well told. Hornfischer does an outstanding job of laying out the facts and lets the facts speak for themselves. Robert Dean does his usual fine job as well reading the story.

I was surprised at how close a thing it really was. There is no doubt in my mind now that had the Japanese been more confident and willing to go belly to belly after the initial sparing matches the US forces might easily have been kicked off Guadalcanal, allowing the Japanese to focus on the campaigns to the south and thus prolonging the war.

I heartily recommend this book to anyone interested in the nuts and bolts of the battles surrounding the "Iron Bottom Sound".

Hey, it's a great series to listen to while you are running down the road, and this installment is actually one of the better ones, although Anderson does tend to get bogged down in character development a little more than I care for.
He has a pretty good grasp of tactics and a great wealth of knowledge regarding seagoing minutia making the books a great listen. I keep buying them, so they have to be pretty good. I'd like to see a lot less talk and a little more action.
Mr. Dufris does a good job. Very consistent in the overall cadence and tone of the story.
If you are looking for a fun series to listen to, one not requiring any "in depth" thinking about, this is a great one, especially if you enjoy a good war story.

Not since Clancy have I read a techno thriller that held my attention from cover to cover like this one. I even broke by own Audible rule and listened to it at the house instead of reading conventional books!
Although the underlying plot was a little hard to swallow at first, Edwards did a good job of building it into a plausible deal. His grasp of naval technology is excellent and lends itself well the pace of the book, while not bogging down the reader with too much techno stuff. His treatment of military society is bang on too with enlisted men and women doing the heavy lifting and a few good officers running interference from the living breathing examples of the Peters Principle. A great listen. Can't wait for more from him.

If you have read the Navy Dept.s history of US Subs in WWII, and perhaps George Griders book you will find there is little new info here. Well told just the same. Lots of attention to detail about the Academy lives of the subjects in the book. It was worth the time to listen to it, but the roar of the depth charges comes out more like a "pop".

Clancy won my admiration for his early works, particularly The Hunt for Red October and Red Storm Rising, but his writing (novels) has continued to weaken over the years. This one looked like he was regaining some speed, but lost traction in the middle, ending so abruptly that I thought that my audio player had skipped part of the book. Great for killing time, but not much else. He is still on my short list, but I do long for the days when I could pick up a Clancy novel and know that I had a winner before I cracked the book.