Gold Key Archives: Star Trek Vol. 1 (Four Stars)

I remember the first time I saw these... the artwork is decent but the writing is awful. Someone who never watched Star Trek wrote the dialog (Spock: "Thank a thousand star heavens!" Kirk: "Great Novas," Scotty: "Bejabbers!") and some plot devices (lunar hours and galaxy minutes) but it they're still worth looking at.

Now the story can be told, 25 years later...

In 1990 I was deployed with Bravo Battery, 2nd Battalion, 1st Air Defense Artillery. Officially, we were equipped with the third generation of the Hawk surface-to-air missile system. However, a handful of us knew that we were also equipped with a second, secret weapon system which used missiles identical to the Hawk but employed a detection, identification and engagement system based on a totally different principle. It was called Alpha and I was only given permission to write about it in 2015.

Secrets and Scuds follows Bravo Battery from Fort Bliss to southern Iraq, the misadventures of its soldiers and the Catch-22s of the Army. Tent City, Baghdad Betty, an accidental missile launch, scud attacks, IQAF MiG-25s, disguised generators and  a close call on a fratricide incident all occupy the pages Secrets and Scuds. Now available on Amazon.com.

The book is illustrated with photos by the author and cartoons.

 I review almost exclusively history books (with rare exceptions). I will gladly review any book having to do with antiaircraft or air defense. Get in touch with me for more information. Most of my book reviews are also on Goodreads and Amazon.

The Courage of a Samurai (Five Stars)

This excellent book looks at the principles of Courage, Integrity, Benevolence, Respect, Honesty, Honor, Loyalty and Ganbaru, all principles which guided the traditional samurai in their duties. Ms. Whaley uses vignettes of many Japanese and Japanese-Americans to illustrate these principles and to make them relevant to the reader.

While I am interested in Japanese history and culture and have done some readings on both topics I still learned from this excellent book. Ms.Whaley knows the philosophy of the samurai and writes extremely well on the topic. I wish she had expanded on the chapter on Courage and the circumstances surrounding Chiune Sugihara, i.e. that as consul he found himself first in an independent Lithuania and then in a corner of the USSR as Stalin occupied the Baltic States as part of his devil's bargain with Hitler. Another part of that bargain was the persecution of the Jewish population of those states. It's a minor thing, but it does clarify the situation Sugihara was in.

As a book this makes you think and challenges what you think you would do in certain situations... the hallmark of great writing.

The Geneva Convention: the Hidden History of the Red Cross (two stars)

As I am currently doing some research now on the Geneva Convention and the treatment of prisoners of war I thought that this book might be handy. It is a good (not a great) history of the circumstances surrounding the original Geneva Convention, the Red Cross and the evolution of law regarding warfare prior to WWI. The writing is OK, although there is some layout and grammar issues (such as the use of a period where a comma would be more appropriate and compound words divided into two words by means of a hyphen) but these do not distract from the story of Dunant and the original founders of the Red Cross. In fact, Dunant is such an eccentric character it would be hard not to write about him in a way that makes him interesting.

The main problem with the book comes from the way it is framed... literally.

The Introduction does not simply give the reader an oversight into the topic but rather rambles off into an attack on Alberto Gonzales, the Attorney-General (in this case a hyphen is warranted but missing) of the United States. He is described as a "religious Texan," as if that is somehow relevant to the point she is trying to make. She describes the detention facility built for terrorists at Guantanamo Bay as a "concentration camp" (it isn't). And she was critical about Gonzales' description of the Geneva Conventions (as applied to terrorists) as "quaint."

But at least the introduction is mercifully short.

However, Ms. Bennett can't leave it at that. In the last chapter she goes back to bashing the U.S. treatment of terrorists at Guantanamo. She is angry that Flex Plexico (actually, Lt. Cmdr. Flex Plexico, USN) has the nerve to deny that detainees are mistreated with the "equivalent" of torture. She notes that 15 articles of the Geneva Convention are not being observed at Guantanamo Bay... according to the UK Guardian. Apparently, Gonzales disagrees with the US "Ministry of Justice"(sic) as to whether or not detainees deserve the protections that captured soldiers do.

Ms. Bennett, described as a "historian of the Red Cross," fails to note the Geneva Conventions put into play in regards to "irregular warfare." Because of Prussia's experiences during the Franco-Prussian War, which saw French civilians arming themselves with shotguns and other firearms and shooting at German soldiers from windows and other ambushes clauses were put in which described "illegal combatants." These fighters, who have no uniforms, no national symbol, no identification papers, do not get the same protections as regular soldiers.

With that being said, the United States of America, which lost thousands of civilian lives on September 11th, 2001, has graciously used the provisions of the Geneva Conventions as a yardstick for the treatment of detainees. Sorry, but the detainees can't have a canteen as laid out in  Article 28. The detainees food is prepared by the same people who prepare the guards food but with Islamic dietary restrictions in mind (Article 26)... with the exception of those detainees attempting to hunger strike so when they die their lawyers can claim they were murdered. Respect for persons and honor is irrelevant (Article 14)... these are murderers and thieves and if you doubt that I'm sure you can find some beheading videos on YouTube. I can refute or discuss any or all of the articles she claims are not being complied with but it would take too long.

Needless to say, this is like eating a plain chees sandwich between two moldy pieces of bread. If you ditched the liberal hand-wringing at the beginning and end and just concentrated on THE ORIGINS OF THE RED CROSS it would make a decent book.

Elvis's Army (Four Stars)

This started out as an excellent book. Linn has written a solid piece on the U.S. Army, primarily between the end of WWII and the beginnings of Vietnam. During this period the Army experimented with the New Look, tried the Pentomic concept, and eventually reorganized the major units of action with ROAD. The author does an excellent job of explaining the contradictory needs within the Army for trained, career-minded  technicians and large numbers of draftees. When the U.S. Army tried to give draftees more of an incentive to remain, with education and other benefits, it made it more difficult to keep weapons maintained and to conduct  training. When the Army attempted to retain NCO technicians it found that only the least qualified men were staying in.

Linn explored several interesting topics. First and foremost was the role public relations played in the 1950s. The Army was not only redefining itself, it was busy SELLING itself as a branch of the service which still had a role to play in the atomic era. Unfortunately, the same personnel shortfalls in the Army at large made it hard to find and keep good PIOs, but some of the public affairs efforts were really quite good. Other programs, which gave TV and movie companies access to Army stock footage and equipment, allowed the Army to have a "say" on scripts.

Unfortunately, the book does not transition well into the Vietnam era, when ROAD divisions were committed to fighting an insurgency. Instead it winds up going into a critique of the invasion of Iraq (!) which is so inappropriate that it provides an intellectual "jolt." Too bad. If the end of the book was as good as the first 9/10ths I would have suggested it deserved six stars. As it is, the book does have some very good information, much of it statistical but weaved by Linn in a way that makes it engaging.

The History and Uncertain Future of Handwriting (Four Stars)

An interesting book, Handwriting talks about the first forms of writing and how it evolved into the cursive style we use today. Ms. Trubek's writing style is good and she discusses some of the ideas and opinions people have about handwriting in an age when the computer and the internet seems to be making it obsolete. She does a great job of explaining how lower case and upper case letters evolved and the creation of illuminated manuscripts. Overall, very enjoyable.

NEWEST TITLE OUT TODAY! Geneva Convention POW Handbook

This book contains the Geneva Conventions Relative to the Treatment of Prisoners of War (Signed 21OCT1950). The Geneva Convention is currently accepted world-wide as the standard for the treatment of POWs, although it has not always been followed by all combatants.  The POW handbook also provides an index to important topics up front and descriptive list of articles, hopefully making this the easiest copy of the Geneva Convention to use.