Asia Audiobooks | Travel

Susan L. Shirk, a former Deputy Assistant Secretary of State responsible for China, knows many of today's Chinese rulers personally and has studied them for three decades. She offers invaluable insight into how they think-and what they fear. In this revealing book, you will see the world through the eyes of men like President Hu Jintao and former President Jiang Zemin. We discover a fragile communist regime desperate to survive in a society turned upside down by miraculous economic growth and a stunning new openness to the greater world. Theirs is a regime afraid of its own citizens, and this fear motivates many of their decisions when dealing with the US and other foreign nations. In particular, the fervent nationalism of the Chinese people, combined with their passionate resentment of Japan, and attachment to Taiwan, have made relations with these two regions a minefield. It is here, Shirk concludes, in the tangled interactions between Japan, Taiwan, China, and the United States, that the greatest danger lies. Shirk argues that rising powers such as China tend to provoke wars in large part because other countries mishandle them. Unless we understand China's brittle internal politics and the fears that motivate its leaders, we face the very real possibility of avoidable conflict with China.

Susan L. Shirk (Author), Kyle Tait (Narrator)

Audiobook

7 Seconds to Die: A Military Analysis of the Second Nagorno-Karabakh War and the Future of Warfighti

The first full analysis of the second Nagorno-Karabakh war-the first war in history won primarily by unmanned systems. The second Nagorno-Karabakh war-fought between Armenia and Azerbaijan between September 24 and November 10, 2020-was the first war in history won primarily by unmanned systems. This forty-four-day war resulted in a decisive military victory for Azerbaijan. Armenia was outfought, outnumbered, and outspent and lost even though they controlled the high ground in a mountainous region that favored traditional defense. Azerbaijan's alliance with Turkey, and close technological support from Israel, strategically isolated Armenia. In addition, Turkey's posturing influenced the Russians not to intervene to support Armenia. That Azerbaijan attacked Armenia during the pandemic was an additional factor. The fact that Azerbaijan won the war is not extraordinary, considering the correlation of forces arrayed against Armenia. What is exceptional is that this was the first modern war primarily decided by unmanned weapons. In this war the Turkish-made BAYRAKTAR TB2 Unmanned Air Combat Vehicle (UCAV) and the Israeli-made HAROP Loitering Munition (LM) dominated the fighting and provided Azerbaijan with a war-winning advantage.

John Antal (Author), Jim Seybert (Narrator)

Audiobook

Agents of Subversion: The Fate of John T. Downey and the CIA's Covert War in China

In the winter of 1952, at the height of the Korean War, the CIA flew a covert mission into China to pick up an agent. Trained on a remote Pacific island, the agent belonged to an obscure anti-communist group known as the Third Force based out of Hong Kong. The exfiltration would fail disastrously, and one of the Americans on the mission, a recent Yale graduate named John T. Downey, ended up a prisoner of Mao Zedong's government for the next twenty years. Unraveling the truth behind decades of Cold War intrigue, John Delury documents the damage that this hidden foreign policy did to American political life. The US government kept the public in the dark about decades of covert activity directed against China, while Downey languished in a Beijing prison and his mother lobbied desperately for his release. Mining little-known Chinese sources, Delury sheds new light on Mao's campaigns to eliminate counterrevolutionaries and how the chairman of the Chinese Communist Party used captive spies in diplomacy with the West. Agents of Subversion is an innovative work of transnational history, and it demonstrates both how the Chinese Communist regime used the fear of special agents to tighten its grip on society and why intellectuals in Cold War America presciently worried that subversion abroad could lead to repression at home.

John Delury (Author), Lee Goettl (Narrator)

Audiobook

The Search for Modern China

The history of China is as rich and strange as that of any country on earth. Yet for many, China’s history remains unknown, or known only through the stylized images that generations in the West have cherished or reviled as truth. With his command of character and event––the product of thirty years of research and reflection in the field––Spence dispels those myths in a powerful narrative. Over four centuries of Chinese history, from the waning days of the once-glorious Ming Dynasty to Deng Xiaoping’s bloody suppression of the pro-democracy demonstrations in Tiananmen Square, Spence fashions the astonishing story of the effort to achieve a modern China. Through the ideas and emotions of its reformist Confucian scholars, its poets, novelists, artists, and visionary students, we see one of the world’s oldest cultures struggling to define itself as Chinese and modern.

Jonathan D. Spence (Author), Frederick Davidson (Narrator)

Audiobook

Overreach: How China Derailed Its Peaceful Rise

For three decades after Mao's death in 1976, China's leaders adopted a restrained approach to foreign policy. To facilitate the country's inexorable economic ascendance, and to prevent a backlash, they reassured the outside world of China's peaceful intentions. Then, as Susan Shirk shows, something changed. China went from fragile superpower to global heavyweight. Combining her decades of research and experience, Shirk, one of the world's most respected experts on Chinese politics, argues that we are now fully embroiled in a new cold war. As she shows, the shift toward confrontation began in the mid-2000s under the mild-mannered Hu Jintao. When Xi Jinping took power in 2012, he capitalized on widespread official corruption and open splits in the leadership to make the case for more concentrated power at the top. Those who implement Xi's directives compete to outdo one another, provoking an even greater global backlash and stoking jingoism within China on a scale not seen since the Cultural Revolution. Here is a devastatingly lucid portrait of China today. Understanding the domestic roots of China's actions will enable us to avoid the mistakes that could lead to war.

Susan L. Shirk (Author), Teri Schnaubelt (Narrator)

Audiobook

Bose: The Untold Story (Part 1): The Untold Story Of An Inconvenient Nationalist

A comprehensive and gripping narrative' Vikram Sampath, author, historian and Fellow of Royal Historical Society'A must-read' Sandeep Unnithan, managing editor, India TodayThere are not many Indian heroes whose lives have been as dramatic and adventurous as that of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose. That, however, is an assessment of his life based on what is widely known about him. These often revolve around his resignation from the Indian Civil Service, joining the freedom movement, to be exiled twice for over seven years, throwing a challenge to the Gandhian leadership in the Congress, taking up an extremist position against the British Raj, evading the famed intelligence network to travel to Europe and then to Southeast Asia, forming two Governments and raising two armies and then disappearing into the unknown. All this in a span of just two decades.Now, new information throws light on Bose's intense political activities surrounding the revolutionary groups in Bengal, Punjab, Maharashtra and United Provinces, his efforts to bridge the increasing communal divide and his influence among the splintered political landscape; his outlook and relations with women; his plunge into the depths of spirituality; his penchant for covert operations and his efforts to engineer a rebellion among the Indian armed forces. With this new information, what appeared to be dramatic now becomes more intense with plots and subplots under one man's single-minded focus on freeing the motherland and envisioning its development in a new era.Furthermore, one of the most sensitive issues that have prevented political parties and successive governments from talking much about Bose is his joining the Axis camp. While Jawaharlal Nehru and other prominent Congress leaders publicly denounced the move, the Communist Party of India went on to a prolonged vilification campaign. Sardar Patel issued instruction to Congress leaders to defend the INA soldiers without eulogizing their leader.Was Bose really a Nazi sympathiser? Knowing very well about the strong public opinion that existed among the political leadership and the intelligentsia in India against Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy, and imperial Japan, why did he risk his own political image by allying with the Axis powers?Pacey, thought-provoking and absolutely unputdownable, Bose: The Untold Story of an Inconvenient Nationalist will open a window to many hitherto untold and unknown stories of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose.Probably the first critical biography of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose till date.

Chandrachur Ghose (Author), Dev J. Haldar (Narrator)

Audiobook

The Political Thought of Xi Jinping

Over the course of the last half dozen years, China's supreme leader Xi Jinping has made extraordinary changes which have profound implications not only for the Chinese people but nations throughout the world. Given how swiftly and fundamentally China's relations with the rest of the world are changing under Xi's rule, it is imperative that we know what Xi Jinping Thought is, how it evolved, and why it is so important. In The Political Thought of Xi Jinping, Steve Tsang and Olivia Cheung provide an authoritative overview of what 'Xi Jinping Thought' is and is not and what it means for both China and the world. Xi, now effectively leader for life, has worked to ensure that 'Xi Jinping Thought' becomes cemented as the new state ideology. Clearly inspired by the doctrine of 'Mao Zedong Thought,' which shaped the parameters of acceptable thinking for a quarter century, Xi wants his doctrine to define what he calls the 'China Dream of national rejuvenation' and serve the pathway to its fulfillment by 2050. Drawing from original research of Xi's speeches, writings, and policies, Tsang and Cheung conceptualize Xi's vision independently from interpretations provided by the Chinese Communist Party or other sources. They further examine and explain how Xi seeks to transform this vision into reality.

Olivia Cheung, Steve Tsang (Author), Rebecca Lam (Narrator)

Audiobook

Ground Truth: 3 Para Return to Afghanistan

Afghanistan, 2008. After their eighteen-month epic tour of Helmand Province, the troops of 3 Para are back. This time, the weight of experience weighs heavily on their shoulders. In April 2006 the elite 3 Para Battle Group was despatched to Helmand Province, Afghanistan, on a tour that has become a legend. All that summer the Paras were subjected to relentless Taliban attacks in one of the most gruelling campaigns fought by British troops in modern times. Two years later the Paras are back in the pounding heat of the Afghanistan front lines. The conflict has changed. The enemy has been forced to adopt new weaponry and tactics. But how much progress are we really making in the war against the insurgents? And is there an end in sight? In this searing account of 3 Para's return, bestselling author Patrick Bishop combines gripping, first-person accounts of front-line action with an unflinching look at the hard realities of our involvement in Afghanistan. Writing from a position of exclusive access alongside the Paras, he reveals the 'ground truth' of the mission our soldiers have been given. It's a sombre picture. But shining out from it are stories of courage, comradeship and humour, as well as a gripping account of an epic humanitarian operation through Taliban-infested country to deliver a vitally needed turbine to the Kajaki Dam. Frank, action-packed and absorbing, 'Ground Truth' is a timely and important book that will set the agenda for discussion of the Afghan conflict for years to come.

Patrick Bishop (Author), Colin Salmon (Narrator)

Audiobook

Remembering Shanghai: A Memoir of Socialites, Scholars and Scoundrels

Winner of 26 book awards including the 2019 Rubery Award BOOK OF THE YEAR True stories of glamour, drama and tragedy told through five generations of a Shanghai family, from the last days of imperial rule to the Cultural Revolution Audiobook narrated by two-time Asian American Film Lab Best Actress Rachel Yong and authors Isabel Sun Chao and Claire Chao www.rememberingshanghai.com “An engaging and entertaining saga.” South China Morning Post 'A volume that demands to be held.' Los Angeles Review of Books “Jaw-dropping, exciting, touching, tragic and insightful.” Historic Shanghai A high position bestowed by China’s empress dowager grants power and wealth to the Sun family. For Isabel, growing up in glamorous 1930s and ’40s Shanghai, it is a life of utmost privilege. But while her scholar father and fashionable mother shelter her from civil war and Japanese occupation, they cannot shield the family forever. When Mao comes to power, eighteen-year-old Isabel journeys to Hong Kong, not realizing that she will make it her home—and that she will never see her father again. Meanwhile, the family she has left behind struggles to survive, only to have their world shattered by the Cultural Revolution. Isabel returns to Shanghai fifty years later with her daughter, Claire, to confront their family’s past—one they discover is filled with love and betrayal, kidnappers and concubines, glittering pleasure palaces and underworld crime bosses. Lavishly illustrated and meticulously researched, Remembering Shanghai follows five generations from vibrant Shanghai to the bright lights of Hong Kong. By turns harrowing and heartwarming, this vivid memoir explores identity and loss against the epic backdrop of a country in turmoil.

Claire Chao, Isabel Sun Chao (Author), Claire Chao, Isabel Sun Chao, Rachel Yong (Narrator)

Audiobook

The Odyssey of Echo Company: The 1968 Tet Offensive and the Epic Battle to Survive the Vietnam War

A powerful work of literary military history from the New York Times bestselling author of In Harm's Way and Horse Soldiers-the harrowing and redemptive account of an American army platoon fighting for survival during the Vietnam War. On a single night, January 31, 1968, some 100,000 soldiers in the North Vietnamese Army attacked thirty-six cities throughout South Vietnam, hoping to topple that government and dislodge American forces. The twelve American boys of the recon platoon of the 101st Airborne Division, average age nineteen, are from small farms, California beach towns, and big cities like Chicago, and they are cast into a war they neither understand, nor, ultimately, feel they can win. The fighting was hand-to-hand, nonstop, and waged in endless small battles that forged this group into a lifelong brotherhood of survivors. The Odyssey of Echo Company is about the young men who survived sixty days on the run from the enemy during the Tet Offensive, at the height of the Vietnam War. Each young man lived one hundred years in these days and came home to a country that did not understand, and didn't try to understand, what they had survived. They came home winners because they were alive; but were losers for having fought there. When they arrived, they landed in San Francisco, took off their uniforms, and walked back into America, where they fell silent and realized that not many wanted to hear the remarkable story they had to tell-until now. Based on hundreds of hours of interviews, dozens of detailed letters written to and from Echo Company soldiers, a huge trove of Pentagon after-action reports, and travel to the scenes of battle with the American soldiers and some of their Vietnamese enemy soldiers, The Odyssey of Echo Company breaks through the wall of time to tell this important story of ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances.

Doug Stanton (Author), CJ Wilson (Narrator)

Audiobook

The Rape of Nanking

In December 1937, one of the most brutal massacres in the long annals of wartime barbarity occurred in the capital of China. The Japanese army swept into Nanking and not only looted and burned the defenseless city but systematically raped, tortured, and murdered half of the city's remaining population, some 300,000 Chinese civilians. Amazingly, the account of this atrocity was denied by the Japanese government. The Rape of Nanking tells the story from three perspectives: that of the Japanese soldiers who performed it, of the Chinese civilians who endured it, and finally, that of a group of Europeans and Americans who refused to abandon the city and were able to create a safety zone that saved almost 300,000 Chinese. Among these was John Rabe, the tireless German leader of the rescue effort, whom Iris Chang called the "Oskar Schindler of China." "Compelling in its emotional breadth, impressive in its intellectual width. From the first page, it seizes hold of your emotional and intellectual centers and will not loosen its grip until the last page, if even then."-Ventura Star

Iris Chang (Author), Anna Fields (Narrator)

Audiobook

The Rising Sun: The Decline and Fall of the Japanese Empire, 1936–1945

This Pulitzer Prize–winning history of World War II chronicles the dramatic rise and fall of the Japanese empire, from the invasion of Manchuria and China to the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Told from the Japanese perspective, The Rising Sun is, in the author’s words, “a factual saga of people caught up in the flood of the most overwhelming war of mankind, told as it happened—muddled, ennobling, disgraceful, frustrating, full of paradox.” In weaving together the historical facts and human drama leading up to and culminating in the war in the Pacific, Toland crafts a riveting and unbiased narrative history. “Quite possibly the most readable yet informative account of the Pacific war.”—Chicago Sun-Times

John Toland (Author), Tom Weiner (Narrator)

Audiobook

Asia Audiobooks in Travel