Military Audiobooks | History

Presidential Courage: Brave Leaders and How They Changed America 1789-1989

"From the acclaimed bestselling author of The Conquerors comes a brilliantly readable and inspiring saga about crucial times in America's history when a courageous president dramatically changed the future of the United States. With surprising new sources and a dazzling command of history and human character, Michael Beschloss brings to life the flawed, complex men who changed America's history. From George Washington, braving threats of impeachment and assassination to make peace with England, to John Adams, incurring his party's unrelenting hatred by refusing to fight France, and from Andrew Jackson, in a death struggle against the corrupt Bank of the United States, to Abraham Lincoln, risking his Presidency to insist that slaves be freed, Beschloss provides an intimate, behind-the-scenes view of presidents coping with the supreme dilemmas of their lives. Gripping and important, Presidential Courage reveals that none of these presidents were eager to incur ridicule, vilification, or threats of political destruction and even assassination. But in the end, bolstered by friends and family, hidden private beliefs, and faith, each ultimately proved himself to be, in Andrew Jackson's words, 'born for the storm.'"

Michael Beschloss (Author), Michael Beschloss (Narrator)

Audiobook

Scorpion Down: Sunk by the Soviets, Buried by the Pentagon: The Untold Story of the USS Scorpion

"The Hunt for Red October meets Blind Man's Bluff in the untold story of an American submarine torpedoed at the height of the Cold War—and the forty-year cover-up that followed. The last thing they heard was the faint scree-scree of a high-speed propeller. Then the torpedo hit, the warhead detonated, the ocean thundered in, and ninety-nine men died. On May 22, 1968, an American submarine was sunk by the Soviets as reprisal for the sinking of a Soviet sub just ten weeks before. The tragic loss of the USS Scorpion and its crew is still described by the U.S. Navy as an 'inexplicable accident.' In fact, it was a secret buried by both the U.S. and the Soviet governments to prevent the Cold War from turning into World War III. For nearly forty years, researchers, journalists, and family members of the lost crew have tried to learn the truth while the Navy and U.S. intelligence communities have covered up the facts. Based on a quarter-century of research, an extraordinary array of new resources, and hundreds of interviews with military personnel with direct connections to the disaster, Scorpion Down is the first book to tell what really happened. It's the first to reveal that the official Scorpion story—the sub's failure to make port, the frantic open-ocean hunt, the search that ultimately 'found' the wreckage, and the Court of Inquiry's carefully crafted conclusions—was all a lie."

Ed Offley (Author), Richard Ferrone (Narrator)

Audiobook

Last Flag Down: The Epic Journey of the Last Confederate Warship

"a loyal warrior. a dying cause. an epic race for salvation. As the Confederacy felt itself slipping beneath the Union juggernaut in late 1864, the South launched a desperate counteroffensive to force a standoff. Its secret weapon? A state-of-the-art raiding ship whose mission was to sink the U.S. merchant fleet. The raider’s name was Shenandoah, and her executive officer was Conway Whittle, a twenty-four-year-old warrior. Whittle would share command with a dark and brooding veteran of the seas, Capt. James Waddell, and together with their crew, they would spend nearly a year destroying dozens of Union ships, all while continually dodging the enemy. Then, in August of 1865, a British ship revealed the shocking truth to the men of Shenandoah: The war had been over for months, and they were now being hunted as pirates. What ensued was an incredible 15,000-mile journey to the one place the crew hoped to find sanctuary, only to discover that their fate would depend on how they answered a single question. Wondrously evocative, LAST FLAG DOWN is a riveting story of courage, nobility, and rare comradeship forged in the quest to achieve the impossible."

John Baldwin, Ron Powers (Author), Michael Kramer (Narrator)

Audiobook

Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East, 1776 to the Present

"This is the first comprehensive history of America's involvement in the Middle East from George Washington to George W. Bush. From the first cannonballs fired by American warships at North African pirates to the conquest of Falluja by the Marines, and from the early American explorers who probed the sources of the Nile to the diplomats who strove for Arab-Israeli peace, the United States has been dramatically involved in the Middle East. For well over two centuries, American statesmen, merchants, and missionaries, both men and women, have had a profound impact on the shaping of this crucial region. Yet their story has never been told—until now. Drawing on thousands of government documents and personal letters, this book reconstructs the diverse and remarkable ways in which Americans have interacted with this alluring yet often hostile land stretching from Morocco to Iran and from the Persian Gulf to the Bosporus. Covering over 230 years of history, Power, Faith, and Fantasy is an indispensable work for anyone interested in understanding the roots of America's Middle East involvement today. 'This is a wonderfully rich and thought-provoking history.' —Library Journal Starred Review"

Michael B. Oren (Author), Norman Dietz (Narrator)

Audiobook

The Wilderness and Spotsylvania: A Guided Tour from Jeff Shaara's Civil War Battlefields: What happe

"TRAVEL THROUGH A PIVOTAL TIME IN AMERICAN HISTORY Jeff Shaara, America's premier Civil War novelist, gives a remarkable guided tour of a Civil War battlefield every American should visit: The Wilderness and Spotsylvania. Shaara explores the history, the people, and the places that capture the true meaning and magnitude of the conflict and provides engaging narratives of the war's crucial battles."

Jeff Shaara (Author), Robertson Dean (Narrator)

Audiobook

Black Virgin Mountain: A Return to Vietnam

Larry Heinemann (Author), Larry Heinemann (Narrator)

Audiobook

Spitfire Ace

"The Battle of Britain, 1940, was one of the most famous air battles in the history of warfare and it is a story of ruthless organisation, brilliant control and command. But at its heart is one particular figure, a legend ever since - the RAF fighter pilot. And one particular plane - a piece of machinery that has almost mythic historical glamour - the Supermarine Spitfire. Spitfire Ace reintroduces the few that flew in the Battle of Britain and includes interviews with many of the surviving veteran Spitfire pilots. Combined with a historical narrative of the events surrounding the Battle of Britain, you will learn for the first time what it was really like to fly a Spitfire and to experience combat flying at its most visceral."

Martin Davidson (Author), David Shaw Parker, Steven Pacey, Tyler Butterworth (Narrator)

Audiobook

My Tank Is Fight!: Deranged Inventions of WWII

"My Tank Is Fight! contains a humorous and exciting examination of twenty real inventions from World War II that never saw the light of day. Each entry includes full technical details, a complete development history, in-depth analysis, and a riveting fictionalized account of the invention's success or failure on the battlefield. Dive under the Atlantic in the turreted U-Cruiser, or rule its surface from an aircraft carrier made out of ice. Shred bomber formations in a high-performance flying wing fighter and then rocket to your untimely end from the cockpit of your very own suicide missile. We've got a pair of German armored land vehicles for you that are so large they had to be powered by naval engines! My Tank Is Fight! delivers the thrilling action of the Second World War as it might have been with a touch of humor and a lack of class."

Zack Parsons (Author), Patrick Lawlor (Narrator)

Audiobook

Shades of Blue and Gray: An Introductory Military History of the Civil War

"Shades of Blue and Gray places the 1861-1865 conflict within the broad context of evolving warfare. Emphasizing technology and its significant impact, Hattaway includes valuable material on land and sea mines, minesweepers, hand grenades, automatic weapons, the Confederate submarine, and balloons. The evolution of professionalism in the American military serves as an important connective theme throughout. Hattaway extrapolates from recent works by revisionists William Skelton and Roy Roberts to illustrate convincingly that the development of military professionalism is not entirely a post-Civil War phenomenon. Informative and clearly written, enhanced by graceful prose and colorful anecdotes, Shades of Blue and Gray will appeal to all listeners."

Herman Hattaway (Author), Lloyd James (Narrator)

Audiobook

Sherman: A Biography

"William Tecumseh Sherman was an American soldier, businessman, educator, and author who served as a general in the Union Army during the American Civil War. He received recognition for his outstanding command of military strategy, as well as criticism for the harshness of the "scorched earth" policies that he implemented in conducting total war against the Confederate states. Military historian Basil Liddell Hart famously declared that Sherman was "the first modern general.""

Steven E. Woodworth (Author), Tom Weiner (Narrator)

Audiobook

The Fall of Che Guevara: A Story of Soldiers, Spies, and Diplomats

"This book tells the story-for the first time-of the United States government's response to Guevara's ill-starred insurgency in Bolivia in 1967. Henry Butterfield Ryan argues that Guevara's life must be reevaluated in light of secret documents only recently released by the CIA, the State Department, the Pentagon, and the National Security Council. Ryan's dramatic account of the last days of Che Guevara is sure to appeal to scholars and students of United States foreign policy, Latin American history, military history, and to all others interested in this modern revolutionary's remarkable life."

Henry Butterfield Ryan (Author), Richard McGonagle (Narrator)

Audiobook

Lincoln’s Spymaster: Thomas Haines Dudley and the Liverpool Network

"The Civil War conjures images of blood-soaked battlefields in the United States, but few are aware of the equally important diplomatic and intelligence contest that raged between the North and South in Europe. While the Confederacy sought Great Britain as a strategic ally, the Union utilized diplomacy and espionage to avert both the construction of a Confederate navy and the threat of war with England. At the forefront of the international fray was Thomas Haines Dudley, the American consul in Liverpool and "the father of modern American intelligence." As the Confederates determined to utilize British shipyards, Dudley established a network of agents throughout England to report on enemy activities and, ultimately, to negate foreign intervention in the American Civil War."

David Hepburn Milton (Author), William Hughes (Narrator)

Audiobook

Military Audiobooks in History