Adams, James. Secret
Armies: Inside the American, Soviet and European Special Forces. New
York: Atlantic Monthly Press, 1988.
Valcourt, IJI&C 2.3, says the "title is overly ambitious," since there is "a relative lack of information on the special forces of all nations except the United States.... Despite considerable lip service by politicians and military chieftains..., the units have generally been resented and ignored." The book is "readable" and a "good introduction to the field."
According to NameBase, "Adams ... frequently seems overly enthusiastic, as if he were writing ad copy in a magazine for would-be mercenaries. But ... [he] does manage some credible reporting on Britain's Special Air Service (SAS) and their efforts against the IRA, the war in Afghanistan, and the series of complete screw-ups in Grenada.... Other chapters deal with special forces training and equipment, Charles Beckwith's Delta Force, and Soviet operations. There is also a bibliography with 90 titles, and a 13-page appendix that describes special forces alphabetically by country."
Adams, Thomas K. "The New Mercenaries and the Privatization of Conflict." Parameters 29, no. 2 (Summer 1999): 103-16. [http://www.carlisle.army.mil/usawc/parameters/99summer/adams.htm]
"At the dawn of the 21st century, when various entities ... find themselves in need of military or large-scale security services, hiring mercenaries is an obvious recourse.... During the 1990s a number of corporations termed 'international security firms' or 'private military companies' have sprung up to service this demand.... [T]here has been little success in creating international legislation that will prevent the existence of mercenaries, and it may be impossible to do so."
Adams,
Thomas K. U.S. Special Forces in Action: The Challenge of Unconventional
Warfare. London and Portland, OR: Frank Cass, 1998.
Hightower, Parameters, Winter 1998, calls this "an excellent historical treatment of the organizational and doctrinal development of Army Special Operations Forces (SOF), illustrated with operational vignettes of those forces in action.... Adams pulls no punches in pointing out the facts: the Army, when given the opportunity, has consistently attempted to do away with the Special Forces, civil affairs, and psychological operations units."
For Prados, I&NS 15.4, the author "supplies the best account to date of the nadir of Special Forces after the Vietnam war and its regeneration during the 1980s and into the 1990s." The reviewer concludes that "this is a fine study that offers something for observers of intelligence, modern history, and military affairs more generally."
Adolph, Robert B.,
Jr. "Strategic Rationale for SOF." Military Review 72 (Apr.
1992): 36-46. [Gibish]
Arostegui, Martin C.
Twilight Warriors: Inside the World's Special Forces. New York: St.
Martin's, 1997.
Bosiljevec, Proceedings, Jun. 1997, finds the focus in Twilight Warriors to be on direct-action raid operations from World War II to the present. Included in his survey are U.S. Special Forces, the British Special Air Service (SAS), Germany's GSG-9 counterterrorist force, and the French GIGN. Nevertheless, he misses the U.S. Navy SEALs and the Israeli special units, such as Prime Minister Netanyahu's old unit, Sayaret Matkal. And the absence from the book of the Son Tay POW rescue attempt "is an inexcusable omission." This book is a "good read and paints a colorful story," but it fails to comes to grips with the broader significance of the dichotomy between the successes and failures of special forces, especially in the United States.
Arquilla, John. From
Troy to Entebbe: Special Operations in Ancient and Modern Times. Lanham,
MD: University Press of America, 1996.
This is a book of readings on "special operations," beginning with two selections from Robert Graves on the Trojan War and concluding with a selection from Chaim Herzog on the Entebbe raid. Despite the title's suggestion of a sweep across history, the 19th and 20th centuries dominate.
Asprey, Robert B. War
in the Shadows: The Guerrilla in History. 2 vols. Garden City, NY: Doubleday,
1975. Revised and updated. 1 vol. Fairfield, NJ: William Morrow, 1994.
Petersen sees War in the Shadows as a "masterful account of irregular warfare from ancient times to Vietnam."
Commenting on the 1994 edition, Surveillant 3.6 says this is a "must have, benchmark work, now updated and expanded to include guerrilla activity since the original publication." The book includes a "comprehensive and hard-hitting strategic evaluation of the Vietnam War."
Bank, Aaron [COL/USA (Ret.)]. From OSS to Green Berets: The Birth of Special Forces.
Novato, CA: Presidio, 1986. New York: Pocket Books, 1986.
Barber, Willard F., and C. Neale Ronning. Internal Security and Military Power: Counterinsurgency and Civic Action in Latin America. Columbus, OH: Ohio State University, 1966.
Barker, Geoffrey T. A
Concise History of U.S. Army Special Operations Forces, with Lineage and
Insignia. 2d ed. Tampa, FL: Anglo-American Publishing, 1993.
Barnet, Richard J.
Intervention and Revolution: America's Confrontation with Insurgent Movements
Around the World. Cleveland, OH: World, 1968.
Petersen: "Critical of CIA and U.S. policy."
Barnett, Frank R.,
B. Hugh Tovar, and Richard H. Shultz, eds. Special Operations in U.S.
Strategy. Washington, DC: National Defense University Press/National
Strategy Information Center, 1984.
Wilcox: Eight papers from 1983 conference at the National Defense University.
Beckett, Ian F.W., and John Pumlot. Armed Forces and Modern Counter-Insurgency. New
York: St. Martin's, 1985.
Beckwith, Charlie A. [COL/USA (Ret.)], and Donald Knox. Delta Force: The Army's Elite Counterterrorist Unit. New York: Harcourt, 1983. Delta Force. New York: Dell, 1984. [pb] With an Epilogue by C.A. Mobley. Delta Force: The Army's Elite Counterterrorist Unit. New York: Avon, 2000. [pb]
Beckwith was Commander of Delta Force.
Bevilacqua, A.C. "Intelligence and Insurgency." Marine Corps Gazette 60 (Jan. 1976): 40-46.
[Petersen]
Blackstock, Paul W. "Covert
Military Operations." In Handbook of Military Institutions,
ed. Roger W. Little, 455-492. Beverley Hills, CA: Sage Publications, 1971.
[Petersen]
Blaufarb,
Douglas S. The Counterinsurgency Era: U.S. Doctrine and Performance,
1950 to the Present. New York: Free Press, 1977.
"The crime of Phoenix was not the use of harsh methods to apprehend or destroy the enemies of the GVN. Its crime was ineffectiveness, indiscriminateness, and, in some areas at least, the violation of the local norms to the extent that it appeared to the villagers to be a threat to them in the peaceful performance of their daily business. The Americans involved erred in not appreciating the extent to which the pathology of Vietnamese society would distort an apparently sound concept. The GVN was guilty of both misfeasance and malfeasance in executing the program." (p. 276)
Blaufarb, Douglas S.,
and George K. Tanham. Who Will Win? A Key to the Puzzle of Revolutionary
War. Bristol, PA: Crane Russak, 1989.
Brock, Tony [LT/USN]. "Special Operations Require Special Intelligence Officers." U.S. Naval Institute Proceedings, Dec. 1999, 71-73.
"[T]he intelligence billets within the Naval Special Warfare (NSW) community are manned today by a passing parade of new officers who, regardless of rank, lack formal training and experience in special operations."
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