100 books like The Bomber Mafia

This book recounts the fascinating history of the Troubles in North Ireland and the period of violence that ensued between Irish separatists seeking freedom from England and the British Army, who essentially occupied entire parts of Ireland and put its citizens under martial law. 

Part the biography of key figures in the Irish Republican Army, part anatomy of how violence happens in inter-communal disputes, the book reminds us that the same dynamics that existed during the Iraq War in Anbar province between occupier and occupied also existed in the United Kingdom in the 1970s.

Wars used to be fought with steel. Today, they are fighting with Silicon. Chris Miller writes powerfully about this shift, the inventors, inventions, and supply chains that made this possible, and how precarious global chip supplies are today, with tensions between China and the U.S. rising. 

Miller takes us to Taiwan, where most of the advanced chips in the world are manufactured, as well as inside debates in Washington about what to do about China’s ability to hold hostage TSMC chip foundries that make the material underpinnings to the modern world.  A must-read!

This book is a real-life thriller. Andy Greenberg chronicles the battle between crypto-enthusiasts determined to mint untraceable currency that would evade controls by all governments and the mathematicians, cryptologists, and law enforcement agents who hunted down those who used cryptocurrencies to break the law.

The story is about technological cops vs robbers. Still, in another way, it tells a tale about what it will take for states to maintain sovereign control when powerful digital tools and encryption become widely distributed. The same wave of powerful technology enabling a skilled set of crypto hackers to nearly outrun the entire FBI is also why scrappy Ukrainian technologists are building drones in garages that can take out Russian tanks. We are in a brave new world, which you can see on these pages.

This is a book about how the U.S. military missed every major technology revolution in the 2010s: the shift to modern software development methods, cloud computing, the revolution in commercial space, and, most critically, artificial intelligence.

A former advisor to the legendary Senator John McCain, Brose’s diagnosis of how the U.S. military was so “ambushed by the future” in his memorable phrase is as sharp as his prescriptions for what to do about it. Brose also has a thorough overview of the rise of China and why the People’s Liberation Army is on its way to achieving a near-parity with U.S. forces in the Pacific.

All of Richard Frank’s books are excellent, but Downfall is the most important.

We learn about the massive preparations for 39 American divisions to invade the Japanese Home Islands commencing in late 1945, along with Imperial Army and Navy plans to defeat the US landing force with more than four million men and 13,000 aircraft.

Had the invasion gone forward, casualties would have been counted in the millions with the Japanese planning to unleash kamikaze attacks on the US fleet in vast numbers while the Emperor’s fanatical soldiers backed by an armed civilian population readied themselves to kill as many American soldiers as possible before embracing their own honorable deaths.

It is difficult to finish this book and not conclude that the two atomic bombs which ended the war was a blessing for both sides.

Tojo Hideki, a general in Japan’s army, became the country’s Prime Minister in October 1941, was still at the helm when the Pearl Harbor attack occurred on December 7, 1941, and remained in power until 1944. Although Tojo was later vilified as a war criminal, he did take to heart Emperor Hirohito’s request in October 1941 that he explore ways to avoid war with the United States – but soon convinced the Emperor that there was no alternative to war. Butow, a professor of US-Japanese relations at the University of Washington, shows how Tojo rose to power in Japan’s convoluted system of government, how the decision to proceed with the Pearl Harbor attack unfolded, and how that decision affected Tojo.

The masterful Toland weaves a narrative of jaw-dropping detail, drama and complexity that tells the grand and harrowing story of the Pacific War between the United States and Japan from the perspective of the Japanese. The tale takes the reader from Tokyo cabinet meetings to the deck of warships to the frontline of critical battles, to share the experiences of everyone from national leaders to top generals to ordinary soldiers. It’s one of those books that’s so good it leaves you wondering how it was even written.

At last (2015) there is a balanced and carefully researched study of a central figure in the modern history of Japan and the war in the Pacific. The substantial utilization and integration of Japanese sources enhances the work but does not lead to any distortion of the real picture.

This is a World War II memoir by United States Marine Eugene Sledge, first published in 1981. 

It is a powerful depiction of war, honest and authentic, describing what it was like to fight in some of the fiercest battles of World War II. The writing is vivid and gripping, sometimes humorous, but mostly reflective of the horrors of war. There is a very refreshing “non-commercial” tone to the narrative.

Sledge originally wrote this as a private memoir for his immediate family, a way to finally tell them what he could never verbalize in person. Sledge’s passion comes through on every page, a reminder that the best books come from the heart.  

Takashi Fujitani offers a surprising historical narrative, telling the story of Korean soldiers in the Japanese army alongside that of Japanese-American soldiers in the United States during World War II. What is striking here is how total global war pushed both the United States and Japan to similar policies toward minority populations. Both abandoned more “vulgar” forms of racism (explicit discrimination) for what Fujitani calls a “polite racism,” where minority groups were now deemed as capable of cultural assimilation. But what really is inspiring is that Fujitani juxtaposes two wartime enemies—the United States and Japan—to show just how similar they actually were.