Discover Legally Popular Titles Full Audiobooks in History, Military

Please open https://hotaudiobook.com ONLY on your standard browser Safari, Chrome, Microsoft or Firefox to download full audiobooks of your choice for free.

Title: The Postwar Occupation of Japan

Subtitle: The History of the Transition from World War II to Modern Japan

Author: Charles River Editors

Narrator: Tim Welch

Format: Unabridged

Length: 1 hr and 44 mins

Language: English

Release date: 04-23-15

Publisher: Charles River Editors

Ratings: 4 of 5 out of 16 votes

Genres: History, Military

Publisher's Summary:

Explains the formation of a new constitution, as well as the democratization and demilitarization processes

Includes a bibliography for further reading

Includes a table of contents

The American occupation of Japan holds a singular and problematic place in the histories both of Japan and of American foreign policy. For the Japanese, the occupation marked the transition from war to peace, from authoritarianism to democracy, and from privation to plenty, making it a passage from one of the darkest chapters in Japanese history to one of the brightest. Nevertheless, the significance of that passage was fraught with ambiguities; after all, Japan did not win its new democracy through revolution from below in the form of a popular indigenous movement pressing for increased rights and a more open, inclusive politics. Instead, Japanese democracy came as a revolution from above, a system imposed wholesale and virtually without consultation by an occupying army whose Supreme Allied Commander General Douglas MacArthur wielded power as absolute and unchecked as any emperor.

Many critics at the time and since have worried that the political system established by the occupation was thus somehow hollow, a thin veneer of participatory democracy resting uncomfortably atop a deeply conservative and hierarchical culture, symbolized above all by the continuing presence of an emperor. Others have argued that the contradictions of a radical democratic revolution from above are real but irrelevant. Presented for the first time with open space for genuine political speech and action, ordinary Japanese seized the opportunity to exercise agency over the course of their own lives, pulling Japan in directions that neither the old Japanese political elite nor the new American occupation authorities had foreseen.

Members Reviews:

Short

I would not have minded a bit more detail and therefore length, but overall got what I was looking for in a well written and well read document.

Recommended

What did you love best about The Postwar Occupation of Japan?

The book had its own perspective of the war and the details it explained.

What did you like best about this story?

I liked the details in the story and how they described certain things making it easy to understand especially for someone who is learning English as a second language.

What about Tim Welchs performance did you like?

I liked how Tim Welch adding emotion in the reading making it easier to feel what the situation was like.

If you were to make a film of this book, what would the tag line be?

The war in our perspective.

Any additional comments?

This was a great learning experience for me.

Please open https://hotaudiobook.com ONLY on your standard browser Safari, Chrome, Microsoft or Firefox to download full audiobooks of your choice for free.

Title: The My Lai Massacre: The History of the Vietnam War's Most Notorious Atrocity

Author: Charles River Editors

Narrator: Richard Wayne Stageman

Format: Unabridged

Length: 1 hr and 33 mins

Language: English

Release date: 04-22-15

Publisher: Charles River Editors

Ratings: 4 of 5 out of 11 votes

Genres: History, Military

Publisher's Summary:

"I walked up and saw these guys doing strange things.... Setting fire to the hootches and huts and waiting for people to come out and then shooting them.... Going into the hootches and shooting them up.... Gathering people in groups and shooting them.... As I walked in you could see piles of people all through the village...all over. They were gathered up into large groups. I saw them shoot an M79 [grenade launcher] into a group of people who were still alive. But it was mostly done with a machine gun. They were shooting women and children just like anybody else. We met no resistance and I only saw three captured weapons. We had no casualties. It was just like any other Vietnamese village - old papa-sans, women, and kids. As a matter of fact, I don't remember seeing one military-age male in the entire place, dead or alive." (PFC Michael Bernhardt)

The Vietnam War could have been called a comedy of errors if the consequences weren't so deadly and tragic. In 1951, while war was raging in Korea, the United States began signing defense pacts with nations in the Pacific, intending to create alliances that would contain the spread of Communism. As the Korean War was winding down, America joined the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization, pledging to defend several nations in the region from Communist aggression. One of those nations was South Vietnam. Before the Vietnam War, most Americans would have been hard pressed to locate Vietnam on a map. South Vietnamese President Diem's regime was extremely unpopular, and war broke out between Communist North Vietnam and South Vietnam around the end of the 1950s. Kennedy's administration tried to prop up the South Vietnamese with training and assistance, but the South Vietnamese military was feeble.

Members Reviews:

A quick summary only.

Poor narration took away from story. Overall it did provide a quick summary of massacre however.

Monotone and boring

The "title" I give to this review is strictly based on the narrator. But that then results in the overall rating. While a good listen, the narrator needs "life saving measures" himself.

Please open https://hotaudiobook.com ONLY on your standard browser Safari, Chrome, Microsoft or Firefox to download full audiobooks of your choice for free.

Title: Secret Warriors

Subtitle: Key Scientists, Code Breakers, and Propagandists of the Great War

Author: Taylor Downing

Narrator: Derek Perkins

Format: Unabridged

Length: 13 hrs and 8 mins

Language: English

Release date: 04-15-15

Publisher: Blackstone Audio, Inc.

Ratings: 3.5 of 5 out of 6 votes

Genres: History, Military

Publisher's Summary:

A startling and vivid account of World War I, Secret Warriors uncovers how wartime code breaking, aeronautics, and scientific research laid the foundation for many of the innovations of the 20th century.

World War I is often viewed as a war fought by armies of millions living and fighting in trenches, aided by brutal machinery that cost the lives of many. But behind all of this an intellectual war was also being fought between engineers, chemists, code breakers, physicists, doctors, mathematicians, and intelligence gatherers. This hidden war was to make a positive and lasting contribution to how war was conducted on land, at sea, and in the air and, most importantly, to life at home.

Secret Warriors provides an invaluable and fresh history of World War I, profiling a number of the key incidents and figures that led to great leaps forward for the 20th century. Told in a lively and colorful narrative style, Secret Warriors reveals the unknown side of this tragic conflict.

Please open https://hotaudiobook.com ONLY on your standard browser Safari, Chrome, Microsoft or Firefox to download full audiobooks of your choice for free.

Title: Kontum

Subtitle: The Battle to Save South Vietnam

Author: Thomas P. McKenna

Narrator: Gary Regal

Format: Unabridged

Length: 13 hrs and 16 mins

Language: English

Release date: 04-15-15

Publisher: University Press Audiobooks

Ratings: 4 of 5 out of 11 votes

Genres: History, Military

Publisher's Summary:

In the spring of 1972, North Vietnam invaded South Vietnam in what became known as the Easter Offensive. Almost all of the American forces had already withdrawn from Vietnam except for a small group of American advisers to the South Vietnamese armed forces. The 23rd ARVN Infantry Division and its American advisers were sent to defend the provincial capital of Kontum in the Central Highlands. They were surrounded and attacked by three enemy divisions with heavy artillery and tanks but, with the help of air power, managed to successfully defend Kontum and prevent South Vietnam from being cut in half and defeated.

Although much has been written about the Vietnam War, little of it addresses either the Easter Offensive or the Battle of Kontum. In Kontum: The Battle to Save South Vietnam, Thomas P. McKenna fills this gap, offering the only in-depth account available of this violent engagement. McKenna, a US infantry lieutenant colonel assigned as a military adviser to the 23rd Division, participated in the battle of Kontum and combines his personal experiences with years of interviews and research from primary sources to describe the events leading up to the invasion and the battle itself.

Winner of the William E. Colby Award.

Critic Reviews:

"Thomas McKenna's fine work is an important addition to our knowledge of advisors and those they advised, during a critical period of the war... In a balanced and detailed account McKenna tells it like it was." (Journal of Military History)

Members Reviews:

Why You Should Read This Book

By the Spring of 1972, America had long wearied of the Viet Nam war. U.S. troop levels were being drastically reduced, the Paris peace negotiations dragged on and the country was looking for a way out of the most acrimonious and divisive conflict of the century. In the midst of flagging national support, the nature of the war suddenly changed.

Tom McKenna, a U.S. Army advisor to the South Vietnamese, gives us an excellent background to the North Vietnamese decision to escalate the conflict into a conventional war from the guerrilla war which it had been for the previous decade. Those of us serving in Vietnam in the late 1960's knew well the frustrations of small unit actions against an elusive enemy who could melt into the local population and needed only rudimentary supply lines to carry out their mission. Our superiority in weapons systems, technology and air support was limited in its effectiveness against such a foe. With the escalation to a conventional war, the enemy now had massed troop formations, armor and artillery and the long logistical trains needed to support such an effort. McKenna quotes a fellow officer as saying "this was the war we came to fight".

Facing this onslaught were the problematic South Vietnamese forces with their American advisors and air support. The author gives due credit to the effectiveness of the Air Force and Army air support in deciding the outcome of the battle for Kontum. Ironically U.S. air support at this stage of the war was probably more effective than earlier efforts due to the more lucrative targets provided by conventional enemy forces.

Victories are studied assiduously by those who seek to learn the lessons of the past. Defeats are often ignored or summarily dismissed as a series of mistakes or bad judgments.

Please open https://hotaudiobook.com ONLY on your standard browser Safari, Chrome, Microsoft or Firefox to download full audiobooks of your choice for free.

Title: Vietnam, 1969 - 1970: A Company Commander's Journal (No.1)

Author: Col. Michael Lee Lanning

Narrator: Alexander MacDonald

Format: Unabridged

Length: 8 hrs and 40 mins

Language: English

Release date: 04-13-15

Publisher: University Press Audiobooks

Ratings: 4.5 of 5 out of 35 votes

Genres: History, Military

Publisher's Summary:

Lieutenant Michael Lee Lanning went to Vietnam as an eager young patriot who was confident of surviving the war. After six months in-country, he was promoted at age 23 to company commander, and his sense of duty began to shift from his nation to preserving the lives of the men in Bravo Company.

Lanning and his men faced an enemy who was patient, elusive, and firm in the belief that they could outlast the Americans. The young commander also confronted the prospect of sudden, violent death, bone-numbing weariness, and the stench of blood and decaying flesh. He would lose friends and would acquire a cynical contempt for all Vietnamese, both allies and enemies.

Vietnam, 1969 - 1970 is taken from the journals the author kept during his tour of duty. He wrote, "I dusted off men with wounds that will disable them for the rest of their lives. I dusted off a dead man that was one of the best soldiers I ever have known. I am realizing the full burdens of being a company commander."

The book is published by Texas A&M University Press.

Critic Reviews:

"One of the most honest and horrifying accounts of a combat solder's life to come out of the Vietnam War." (The New York Times Book Review)

Members Reviews:

Great book and performance

this is a good book and it was read well by the narrator. it felt like the author himself was reading it.

Simply excellent

There are many good books about the Vietnam war and leadership in war. This is a brilliant account of both.

Brilliant story of the Vietnam war.

Would you listen to Vietnam, 1969 - 1970: A Company Commander's Journal (No.1) again? Why?

Yes I would listen again. It covered such an intense experience, I am sure there are details I missed.

What other book might you compare Vietnam, 1969 - 1970: A Company Commander's Journal (No.1) to, and why?

The first book written by Mr Lanning - "The Only War we Had". This book is better; better constructed, far better narration, better details.

Which character as performed by Alexander MacDonald was your favourite?

Mr Lanning.

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

No.

Any additional comments?

The narration of the first book really put me off. It was monotone and soporific. However, this improved immeasurably in this book and really added to it. The narrator gave different voices to different characters and used a broader range of tone and volume.

Please open https://hotaudiobook.com ONLY on your standard browser Safari, Chrome, Microsoft or Firefox to download full audiobooks of your choice for free.

Title: The Charge of the Light Brigade

Subtitle: The History and Legacy of Europe's Most Famous Cavalry Charge

Author: Charles River Editors

Narrator: John Skinner

Format: Unabridged

Length: 1 hr and 37 mins

Language: English

Release date: 04-02-15

Publisher: Charles River Editors

Ratings: 4 of 5 out of 2 votes

Genres: History, Military

Publisher's Summary:

The Charge of the Light Brigade is the most famous British cavalry charge in history, possibly also eclipsing the renown of any other mounted attack conducted by the armed forces of other nations in the general imagination. This cavalry action is certainly remembered far more vividly than the 1854 Battle of Balaclava during which it occurred, and even the wider Crimean War that led to the battle.

Of course, the prominence of the Charge in popular and historical memory is due primarily to Alfred, Lord Tennyson's poem describing the events of that distant late October afternoon. The bearded Poet Laureate crafted a powerful, gripping poetic narrative that fixed the encounter firmly in both the popular imagination and in the English literary oeuvre. Millions of people who know nothing else of the Crimean War between Great Britain and the Russian Empire are familiar with Tennyson's memorable verses.

At the same time, however, his words also created a narrative about the combat which has obscured much contrary evidence, replacing fact with legend and completely obscuring the true significance of the Charge of the Light Brigade. Indeed, its perception by historians and depiction in history books has been massively influenced by the sheer artistic power of Tennyson's poem. Sober historians have unwitting cherry-picked the existing original documents to support Tennyson's "version" of the events while disregarding much contrary evidence that provides a very different perspective of the Light Brigade's attack.

Members Reviews:

I enjoyed this modern retelling of the story

I enjoyed this modern retelling of the story. The linkages to modern historical facts was useful.

Please open https://hotaudiobook.com ONLY on your standard browser Safari, Chrome, Microsoft or Firefox to download full audiobooks of your choice for free.

Title: The Sinking of the USS Indianapolis

Subtitle: The Harrowing Story of One of the U.S. Navy's Deadliest Incidents During World War II

Author: Charles River Editors

Narrator: Charles Craig

Format: Unabridged

Length: 1 hr and 27 mins

Language: English

Release date: 03-31-15

Publisher: Charles River Editors

Ratings: 3.5 of 5 out of 13 votes

Genres: History, Military

Publisher's Summary:

"I awoke. I was in the air. I saw a bright light before I felt the concussion of the explosion that threw me up in the air almost to the overhead. A torpedo had detonated under my room. I hit the edge of the bunk, hit the deck, and stood up. Then the second explosion knocked me down again. As I landed on the deck I thought, 'I've got to get the hell out of here!'" - Dr. Lewis Haynes

The United States lost hundreds of ships during the course of World War II, from the deadly explosion of the USS Arizona during the attack on Pearl Harbor to the sinking of John F. Kennedy's PT-109, a patrol boat with a crew of less than 15. However, few of the ships lost in the Pacific suffered a fate as gripping or tragic as the sinking of the heavy cruiser USS Indianapolis on July 30, 1945. The USS Indianapolis had been launched nearly 15 years earlier, and it had already survived kamikaze attacks while fighting the Japanese. In July 1945, the cruiser and its crew of nearly 1,200 delivered parts for the first atomic bomb to an air base at Tinian, but due to a chain of events and miscommunication, the cruiser veered into the path of a Japanese submarine shortly after midnight on July 30. Torpedo attacks sank the ship within 15 minutes of the encounter, and about 300 men went down with the ship, but unfortunately, the trials and tribulations were just starting for the survivors. After the call to abandon ship and distress signals were sent out, nearly 900 men found themselves in the water, but the Navy remained unaware of the fate of the Indianapolis, so the survivors would end up spending over four days adrift at sea.

Members Reviews:

The Sinking of the Indianapolis

A Really good interesting book to read about the real story of the sinking of the Indianapolis near the end of world war 2'

Just after it had carried the parts for the first atomic bomb that was the first of 2 to be dropped on Japan

Wonderful

I lost my Uncle on the Indy

Pretty good

Good retelling of eyewitness reports. No storyline. Somewhat interesting but not intimate enough to be spellbinding. Only takes about an hour to read.

Story is very sad, thank you to those brave men

Story is very sad, thank you to those brave men. My parents and I knew the wonderful Paul Murphy and his wife who wrote and found the st9ries from their book" 317 Lived" excellent stories!!!!

!!!!!!!

Informative

This book isa quick telling of the Indianapolis and describes the tragic circumstances of its sinking. It is interesting to read the differences and similarities the sailors experienced. I recommend this book.

Escuche este audio libro completo gratis en https://hotaudiobook.com

Título: La caída del Comunismo [The Fall of Communism]

Subtitular: El fin de una era [The End of an Era]

Autor: Online Studio Productions

Narrador: uncredited

Formato: Unabridged

Duración: 33 mins

Idioma: Español

Fecha de publicación: 03-31-15

Editor: Online Studio Productions

Calificaciones: 4.5 de 5 de 2 votos

Categorías: History, Military

Resumen del editor:

Tras la II Guerra Mundial, y la derrota de la Alemania Nazi, Estados Unidos y la Unión Soviética se convirtieron en las dos superpotencias del planeta, capitalista la una, socialista la otra. Sin embargo, la antigua U.R.S.S no pudo soportar el enorme coste económico de tal liderazgo, enfrentando una serie problemas que con la llegada de Mijail Gorbachov al poder en 1989, se harían más visibles. Repase con nosotros este trascendental hecho de la historia contemporánea.

Please note: This audiobook is in Spanish.

Opiniones de los miembros:

La caída de la URSS va mas a fondo de lo mostrado

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

Al ser un libro corto, Si.

Any additional comments?

La historia en este libro es muy concisa para entender con profundidad la caída de URSS pero si te da un concepto básico de lo que la ocasionó.

Please open https://hotaudiobook.com ONLY on your standard browser Safari, Chrome, Microsoft or Firefox to download full audiobooks of your choice for free.

Title: The Red Baron

Subtitle: The Life and Legacy of Manfred von Richthofen

Author: Charles River Editors

Narrator: Jem Matzan

Format: Unabridged

Length: 1 hr and 27 mins

Language: English

Release date: 03-30-15

Publisher: Charles River Editors

Ratings: 5 of 5 out of 7 votes

Genres: History, Military

Publisher's Summary:

"Now I am within 30 yards of him. He must fall. The gun pours out its stream of lead. Then it jams. Then it reopens fire. That jam almost saved his life." - The Red Baron

Few participants in World War I are more famous than Manfred Albrecht Freiherr von Richthofen, better known as the Red Baron. A German known for victories in a war that his country lost, a cavalry officer made famous as mounted combat disappeared, and an aristocratic hero in a century dominated by democracy; Richthofen's celebrity stands in stark contrast to the era.

Furthermore, World War I is not remembered as a period in which the advance of technology empowered or emboldened individual human beings, and it certainly did not support the old romantic image of the lone, skilled warrior. The terrible grinding power of Europe's first great industrial war saw advances in gunnery and factory production that chewed up millions of young men and spit them out in fragments across the anonymous mud of no man's land. A soldier was more likely to be killed by an artillery shell flung from half a mile away than up close in combat, where his own skills might save his life, so there was little heroism and no glory to be found in the forms of violence provided by the modern war machine.

However, for the handful of men fighting in the air, it was a different matter, because World War I brought about the emergence of full-blooded aerial combat for the first time. In fact, airplanes were so foreign to past examples of warfare that few military officers were sure of how to utilize them at the start of the war.

Members Reviews:

Informative but short

This was a surprisingly short book. I know the story of Richthofen already, and was expecting more detail in this book, but it's brevity precluded that. If you don't know the story, it's a great introduction to the air war in WW1. The narrator on the other hand is, annoying at best. Multiple mispronunciations and constant over pronunciations, and his over the top German accent for quotes constantly took me out of the story.

Please open https://hotaudiobook.com ONLY on your standard browser Safari, Chrome, Microsoft or Firefox to download full audiobooks of your choice for free.

Title: Ground Pounder: A Marine's Journey Through South Vietnam, 1968-1969

Subtitle: North Texas Military Biography and Memoir Series

Author: Gregory V. Short

Narrator: Aaron Killian

Format: Unabridged

Length: 11 hrs and 58 mins

Language: English

Release date: 03-26-15

Publisher: University Press Audiobooks

Ratings: 4 of 5 out of 32 votes

Genres: History, Military

Publisher's Summary:

In early February of 1968, at the beginning of the Tet Offensive, Private First Class Gregory V. Short arrived in Vietnam as an 18-year-old US Marine. Amid all of the confusion and destruction, he began his tour of duty as an 81mm mortarman with the 2nd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment, which was stationed at Con Thien near the DMZ. While living in horrendous conditions reminiscent of the trenches in World War I, his unit was cut off and constantly being bombarded by the North Vietnamese heavy artillery, rockets, and mortars. Direct, honest, and brutal in his observations, Short holds nothing back in describing the hardships of modern warfare and our leaders' illusions of success.

History/Military Book Club Selection, 2012, Branson Stars and Flags Book Award, 2012; the book is published by University of North Texas Press.

Members Reviews:

Good book for those contemplatiing stint in milit

This book talks about the experiences on almost a daily basis of what one must go through upon

Entering the mo