
The Fourth Star
Four Generals and the Epic Struggle for the Future of the United States Army
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Narrated by:
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Richard McGonagle
About this listen
Collectively, their lives tell the story of the Army over the last four decades and illuminate the path it must travel to protect the nation over the next century.
In The Fourth Star, you'll follow:
The Fourth Star ranges far beyond today's battlefields, evoking the Army's tumultuous history since Vietnam through these four captivating lives and ultimately revealing a fascinating irony: In an institution that prizes obedience, the most effective warriors are often those who dare to question.
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The Nightingale's Song
- By: Robert Timberg
- Narrated by: Patrick Lawlor
- Length: 22 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
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Robert Timberg weaves together the lives of Annapolis graduates John McCain, James Webb, Oliver North, Robert McFarlane, and John Poindexter to reveal how the Vietnam War continues to haunt America. Casting all five men as metaphors for a legion of well-meaning if ill-starred warriors, Timberg probes the fault line between those who fought the war and those who used money, wit, and connections to avoid battle.
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Too Long
- By Tom Carroll on 11-15-18
By: Robert Timberg
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Little America
- The War within the War for Afghanistan
- By: Rajiv Chandrasekaran
- Narrated by: Rajiv Chandrasekaran
- Length: 12 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
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When President Barack Obama ordered the surge of troops and aid to Afghanistan, Washington Post correspondent Rajiv Chandrasekaran followed. He found the effort sabotaged not only by Afghan and Pakistani malfeasance, but by infighting and incompetence within the American government: a war cabinet arrested by vicious bickering among top national security aides; diplomats and aid workers who failed to deliver on their grand promises; and generals who dispatched troops to the wrong places.
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Easily Confused with Vietnam
- By Chris Reich on 07-12-12
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Knife Fights
- A Memoir of Modern War in Theory and Practice
- By: John Nagl
- Narrated by: Brian Hutchison
- Length: 7 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
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From one of the most important army officers of his generation, a memoir of the revolution in warfare he helped lead, in combat and in Washington. When John Nagl was an army tank commander in the first Gulf War of 1991, fresh out of West Point and Oxford, he could already see that America’s military superiority meant that the age of conventional combat was nearing an end.
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There's so much I didn't know.
- By Lori James on 12-07-22
By: John Nagl
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The Insurgents
- David Petraeus and the Plot to Change the American Way of War
- By: Fred Kaplan
- Narrated by: Kevin Foley
- Length: 15 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
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Based on previously unavailable documents and interviews with more than 100 key players, including General David Petraeus, The Insurgents unfolds against the backdrop of two wars waged against insurgencies in Iraq and Afghanistan. But the main insurgency is the one led at home by a new generation of officers - including Petraeus, John Nagl, David Kilcullen, and H. R. McMaster - who were seized with an idea on how to fight these kinds of "small wars" and who adapted their enemies' techniques to overhaul their own army.
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How to fight a war and win
- By Chupuk on 05-03-16
By: Fred Kaplan
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Without Hesitation
- The Odyssey of an American Warrior
- By: General Hugh Shelton, Ronald Levinson, Malcolm McConnell
- Narrated by: General Hugh Shelton
- Length: 6 hrs and 58 mins
- Abridged
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During a nearly 40-year career in the United States Army, Hugh Shelton has been known as a straight shooter - when he speaks he means what he says. Whether serving under a Democratic president or a Republican president, whether in a war that was popular at home or not, Hugh Shelton gave all he had, and asked nothing less of the men and women who worked for him. Politically independent, Shelton told the truth - not what his superiors wanted to hear.
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Week done!
- By Jennifer on 04-13-18
By: General Hugh Shelton, and others
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The Assassins' Gate
- America in Iraq
- By: George Packer
- Narrated by: Richard Poe
- Length: 19 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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The Assassins' Gate, so dubbed by American soldiers, is the entrance to the American zone in the city of Baghdad. In 2003, the United States blazed into Iraq to depose dictator Saddam Hussein. But after three years and unknown thousands killed, that country faces an escalating civil war and an uncertain fate. How did it get to this point?
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Highly Recommended
- By Drapeau on 02-01-07
By: George Packer
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The Mirror Test
- America at War in Iraq and Afghanistan
- By: J. Kael Weston
- Narrated by: J. Kael Weston
- Length: 22 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
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J. Kael Weston spent seven years on the ground in Iraq and Afghanistan working for the US State Department in some of the most dangerous frontline locations. Upon his return home, while traveling the country to pay respect to the dead and wounded, he asked himself: When will these wars end? How will they be remembered and memorialized? What lessons can we learn from them?
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A Must Read
- By Jessica Myrick on 06-04-16
By: J. Kael Weston
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The Unraveling
- High Hopes and Missed Opportunities in Iraq
- By: Emma Sky
- Narrated by: Henrietta Meire
- Length: 11 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
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When Emma Sky, an intrepid young British woman, volunteered to help rebuild Iraq after the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, she had little idea what she was letting herself in for: a tour that would last over a decade, longer than that of any senior military or political official. As the only adviser to the Coalition Provisional Authority in Kirkuk and the closest confidante to US General Odierno, Sky was valued for her controversial voice and outsider's point of view.
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Inspiring memoir; irritating narration
- By Amazon Customer on 09-17-16
By: Emma Sky
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The Operators
- The Wild and Terrifying Inside Story of America's War in Afghanistan
- By: Michael Hastings
- Narrated by: Lloyd James
- Length: 12 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
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An explosive, behind-the-scenes look into the workings of the U.S. war in Afghanistan that lifts the curtain of the world stage to reveal the devastating greed, waste, and failure surrounding this unwinnable war.
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VERY INTERESTING STORY
- By Professor on 01-04-13
By: Michael Hastings