A Great Place to Have a War: America in Laos and the Birth of a Military CIA
- phuketrichard
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A Great Place to Have a War: America in Laos and the Birth of a Military CIA
worth a read;
A Great Place to Have a War: America in Laos and the Birth of a Military CIA, by Joshua Kurlantzick, an expert on Southeast Asia at the Council on Foreign Relations, is a quite exhaustive history of US involvement in tiny, landlocked Laos in the lead up to and during the American war in Vietnam.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1451667884/
get the ebook here
[Link to piracy site deleted. Admin.]
A Great Place to Have a War: America in Laos and the Birth of a Military CIA, by Joshua Kurlantzick, an expert on Southeast Asia at the Council on Foreign Relations, is a quite exhaustive history of US involvement in tiny, landlocked Laos in the lead up to and during the American war in Vietnam.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1451667884/
get the ebook here
[Link to piracy site deleted. Admin.]
In a nation run by swine, all pigs are upward-mobile and the rest of us are fucked until we can put our acts together: not necessarily to win, but mainly to keep from losing completely. HST
- SternAAlbifrons
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Re: A Great Place to Have a War: America in Laos and the Birth of a Military CIA
Not arguing with your recommendation at all PR.
I'd believe even you, more than some of the faulty intell and interp that comes from that org.
Here is another review - from the CIA Reading Room
(The review's author, T L Ahern, is a highest level CIA academic and historian - so they must be feeling pretty uncomfortable if he is running the counter-view)
A Great Place to Have a War: America and the Birth of a Military CIA
Reviewed by Thomas L. Ahern
"Joshua Kurlantzick says that over the course of a full decade he talked to numerous participants in the so-called “secret war” in Laos. The book that emerged from those interviews, A Great Place to Have a War, rather reads like the result of an attempt to find a new narrative in which to fit the interviews. Following a current fashion in popular history, Kurlantzick treats policy as mostly a byproduct of personalities or bureaucratic competition—and any untoward outcome as the result of someone’s incompetence and/or bad faith. Kurlantzick asserts that in 1961 CIA found in Laos “a unique opportunity to increase the agency’s powers.” It had “already amassed influence, in the heart of a Cold War battlefield” that the US military was ignoring and could use the little kingdom as the site of an “inexpensive—in American money and lives, at least—proxy war [that] could be a template for fights in other places around the world.” No documentation is furnished for any of these claims, which are presented as the CIA’s justification for becoming “focused increasingly on killing rather than spying.”
The result is an intellectually rickety account based on the allegation that the war represented the culmination of a calculated CIA effort to compete with the US armed forces as a military arm of the US Government."
I'd believe even you, more than some of the faulty intell and interp that comes from that org.
Here is another review - from the CIA Reading Room
(The review's author, T L Ahern, is a highest level CIA academic and historian - so they must be feeling pretty uncomfortable if he is running the counter-view)
A Great Place to Have a War: America and the Birth of a Military CIA
Reviewed by Thomas L. Ahern
"Joshua Kurlantzick says that over the course of a full decade he talked to numerous participants in the so-called “secret war” in Laos. The book that emerged from those interviews, A Great Place to Have a War, rather reads like the result of an attempt to find a new narrative in which to fit the interviews. Following a current fashion in popular history, Kurlantzick treats policy as mostly a byproduct of personalities or bureaucratic competition—and any untoward outcome as the result of someone’s incompetence and/or bad faith. Kurlantzick asserts that in 1961 CIA found in Laos “a unique opportunity to increase the agency’s powers.” It had “already amassed influence, in the heart of a Cold War battlefield” that the US military was ignoring and could use the little kingdom as the site of an “inexpensive—in American money and lives, at least—proxy war [that] could be a template for fights in other places around the world.” No documentation is furnished for any of these claims, which are presented as the CIA’s justification for becoming “focused increasingly on killing rather than spying.”
The result is an intellectually rickety account based on the allegation that the war represented the culmination of a calculated CIA effort to compete with the US armed forces as a military arm of the US Government."
- frank lee bent
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Re: A Great Place to Have a War: America in Laos and the Birth of a Military CIA
It was the strategic lynchpin of the war, and horribly mishandled by interference from Washington.
Between mismanagement by DC politicians and the corrupt ARVN, they were bound to lose.
The book "The Ravens" makes the mistakes very plain.
They were not even allowed to attack airfields under the insane rules of engagement.
Between mismanagement by DC politicians and the corrupt ARVN, they were bound to lose.
The book "The Ravens" makes the mistakes very plain.
They were not even allowed to attack airfields under the insane rules of engagement.
- phuketrichard
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Re: A Great Place to Have a War: America in Laos and the Birth of a Military CIA
The result is an intellectually rickety account based on the allegation that the war represented the culmination of a calculated CIA effort to compete with the US armed forces as a military arm of the US Government."
really goes into how the "secret war", ( it wasn't secret to the Laotians) was the first time the cia got their fingers dirty setting up, training, financing, and running a war without any congress approval.
later to be duplicated in other areas of the world
Its a good read..
In a nation run by swine, all pigs are upward-mobile and the rest of us are fucked until we can put our acts together: not necessarily to win, but mainly to keep from losing completely. HST
- Ravensnest
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Re: A Great Place to Have a War: America in Laos and the Birth of a Military CIA
is that site a pay service Rich?
Still here, in country...
- phuketrichard
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Re: A Great Place to Have a War: America in Laos and the Birth of a Military CIA
1,000 % FREE, its where i get all my ebooks....
Fantastic...
In a nation run by swine, all pigs are upward-mobile and the rest of us are fucked until we can put our acts together: not necessarily to win, but mainly to keep from losing completely. HST
- General Mackevili
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Re: A Great Place to Have a War: America in Laos and the Birth of a Military CIA
It was a torrent site, and you don't pay anything. I deleted the link, but the site is called LibGen.
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- Ravensnest
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Re: A Great Place to Have a War: America in Laos and the Birth of a Military CIA
I'm too fast for youGeneral Mackevili wrote: ↑Tue Jul 23, 2019 7:59 amIt was a torrent site, and you don't pay anything. I deleted the link, but the site is called LibGen.
Still here, in country...
Re: A Great Place to Have a War: America in Laos and the Birth of a Military CIA
Did you find the link for LibGen to download the book? If so, PM me the link. Cheers...Ravensnest wrote: ↑Tue Jul 23, 2019 8:02 amI'm too fast for youGeneral Mackevili wrote: ↑Tue Jul 23, 2019 7:59 amIt was a torrent site, and you don't pay anything. I deleted the link, but the site is called LibGen.
- SternAAlbifrons
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Re: A Great Place to Have a War: America in Laos and the Birth of a Military CIA
Can you download Karmageddon's book for free from LibGen?.Doc67 wrote: ↑Tue Jul 23, 2019 9:58 amDid you find the link for LibGen to download the book? If so, PM me the link. Cheers...Ravensnest wrote: ↑Tue Jul 23, 2019 8:02 amI'm too fast for youGeneral Mackevili wrote: ↑Tue Jul 23, 2019 7:59 amIt was a torrent site, and you don't pay anything. I deleted the link, but the site is called LibGen.
I want to have a look but not sure i want to invest 99c.
(If it's worth it Karma, 'promise to wing you the 99c directly)
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