Still vivid in many Americans' memories are the 444 days of 1979 when Islamic militants held U.S. diplomatic personnel hostage in Iran. Though their story has been told before, never has it been related from such a perspective. Unique among the hostages, the author was an officer for the Central Intelligence Agency serving at the U.S. embassy in Tehran. Once his CIA connection was discovered, Bill Daugherty became a special target of his captors and was subjected to extraordinarily harsh t...

Bill Daugherty has been collecting and telling jokes and humorous stories for many years. He does this, not for profit, but for the sheer enjoyment he receives from making people laugh.With stories such as these, he has entertained his Rotary Club, local and National Audubon Societies, literary group meetings, humorous roast, and members of his weekly bridge games.Bills occupation has not been entertainment. Rather, he has post graduate degrees in Physics and Education, and...

New York Times bestseller: The true behind-the-scenes story of the manhunt for the 9/11 mastermind is "a page-turner" ( Minneapolis Star-Tribune).From the author of Black Hawk Down and Hue 1968, this is a gripping account of the hunt for Osama bin Laden. With access to key sources, Mark Bowden takes us inside the rooms where decisions were made and on the ground where the action unfolded.After mastermind...

Every American president, when faced with a crisis, longs to take bold and decisive action. When American lives or vital interests are at stake, the public-and especially the news media and political opponents-expect aggressive leadership. But, contrary to the dramatizations of Hollywood, rarely does a president have that option.In Presidents in Crisis, a former director of the Situation Room takes the reader inside the White House during seventeen grave international emer...

**"There wasn't a meeting when someone didn't mention Black Hawk Down ." - A senior Obama administration official, as quoted in The New York Times, 02/05/2011From Mark Bowden, internationally bestselling and acclaimed author of Black Hawk Down and the preeminent chronicler of the actions of the US military and special forces writing today, comes an intensely gripping account of the hunt for and elimination of Osama bin Laden.** With unprecedented access to key sources and ...

The news-breaking book that has sent schockwaves through the White House, Ghost Wars is the most accurate and revealing account yet of the CIA's secret involvement in al-Qaeada's evolution.Prize-winning journalist Steve Coll has spent years reporting from the Middle East, accessed previously classified government files and interviewed senior US officials and foreign spymasters. Here he gives the full inside story of the CIA's covert funding of an Islamic jihad against Soviet forces...

George Friedman delivers the geopolitical story that the mainstream media has been unable to uncover — the startling truth behind America’s foreign policy and war effort in Afghanistan, Iraq, and beyond**.**Friedman, founder of Stratfor, one of the world’s most respected private global intelligence firms, and Geopolitical Futures, has an unmatched ability to provide clear perspective on the current geopolitical map. In America's Secret War, George Friedman identifies the United Sta...

A powerful memoir from the late former U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald RumsfeldWith the same directness that defined his career in public service, Rumsfeld's memoir is filled with previously undisclosed details and insights about the Bush administration, 9/11, and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. It also features Rumsfeld's unique and often surprising observations on eight decades of history.Rumsfeld addresses the challenges and controversies of his illus...

“Saudi Arabia is more and more an irrational state—a place that spawns global terrorism even as it succumbs to an ancient and deeply seated isolationism, a kingdom led by a royal family that can’t get out of the way of its own greed. Is this the fulcrum we want the global economy to balance on?”In his explosive New York Times bestseller, See No Evil, former CIA operative Robert Baer exposed how Washington politics drastically compromised the CIA’s efforts to fight ...

LONGLISTED FOR THE NATIONAL BOOK AWARD • A searing reassessment of U.S. military policy in the Middle East over the past four decades from retired army colonel and New York Times bestselling author Andrew J. BacevichFrom the end of World War II until 1980, virtually no American soldiers were killed in action while serving in the Greater Middle East. Since 1990, virtually no American soldiers have been killed in action anywhere else. What caused this shift?...

**Winner of the the National Book Critics Circle Award for Non-Fiction'Spellbinding ... a magisterial account of the great tragedy of our age ... it is a classic' Evening Standard**'In the finest traditions of American investigative journalism' The Times'Spectacular ... makes Bourne movies pale in comparison' Financial TimesFrom the Pulitzer Prize winning of the acclaimed Ghost Wars, this is...

Al Qaeda expert and CNN national security analyst Peter Bergen paints a multi-dimensional picture of the hunt for bin Laden over the past decade, as well as the recent campaign that gradually tightened the noose around him. Other key elements of the book include:* A careful account of Obama's decision-making process throughout the final weeks and days during which the raid was planned, as well as what NSC cabinet members were advising him. The fascinating story of ...