Education About Asia: Online Archives

The Afghanistan War: Diverse Voices and Viewpoints

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Bing West’s Home Page

http://www.bingwest.com/

Bing West served as assistant secretary of defense for international security affairs in the Reagan administration. Bing was a combat Marine in Việt Nam, authored the counterinsurgency classic, The Village, and has been on hundreds of patrols in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Việt Nam. He has published widely on the war in numerous periodicals and journals, including Foreign Affairs and The Wall Street Journal. West is a leading critique of the Pentagon’s Afghanistan war policies. (Thanks to Peter Frost for this contribution.)

Fotini Christia, “Letter from Kabul: Fear and Abandonment in Afghanistan”

Foreign Affairs, Council on Foreign Relations, June 26, 2011. Christia, an MIT assistant professor and a member of the MIT Security Studies Program, contrasts the Obama administration’s claim that the Afghans will soon be “ready to stand on their own” with the vulnerability many citizens of that country feel in light of a potential quick American withdrawal, http://www.fam.ag/7P1Vd9.

Lone Survivor: The Eyewitness Account of Operation Redwing and the Lost Heroes of Seal Team Ten

BY MARCUS LUTTRELL WITH PATRICK ROBINSON

LITTLE, BROWN ANDCOMPANY, 2007

208 PAGES, ISBN: 978-0316067591, PAPERBACK 

This national best-seller, written by a Navy Seal, is the story of an attempt by four Seals in June 2005 to capture or kill a major al-Qaeda leader near the Pakistan border. The author, who is now a frequent guest on national media, also has established the Lone Survivor Foundation to honor and remember American military, http://www.lonesurvivorfoundation.org/.

Max Boot’s Website

http://www.maxboot.net/ Max Boot, a military historian and foreign policy analyst, is the Jeane J. Kilpatrick Senior Fellow in National Security Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations. He has advised American military commanders, and he is a contributor to a number of publications including Commentary, The New York Times, and The Weekly Standard. Boot considers the Afghanistan war to be winnable by coalition forces.

The Wars in Afghanistan: Messianic Terrorism, Tribal Conflicts, and the Failures of the Great Powers

BY PETER TOMSEN

PUBLIC AFFAIRS, 2011

912 PAGES, 978-1586487638, HARDCOVER 

The author, former ambassador, and special envoy on Afghanistan from 1989 to 1992 has dealt with a variety of Afghan political, military, and religious leaders. Reviewers in liberal and conservative publications in both the US and abroad have praised his book. Tomsen’s basic argument is that American policymakers still do not understand Afghanistan.

Welcome to Afghanistan: Send More Ammo

BY BENJAMIN TUPPER

EPIGRAPH PUBLISHING, 2009

208 PAGES, ISBN: 978-0982525500, PAPERBACK 

The author served as one member of a two-man Embedded Training team with the Afghan army fighting the Taliban in a remote part of Afghanistan. His dispatches were broadcast on NPR, and his book has been described by a wide variety of readers, including parents of soldiers and veterans, as humorous, thought-provoking, multifaceted, and eloquent. (Thanks to Mike Breakey for this contribution.)