Takedown: The 3rd Infantry Division's Twenty-one Day Assault on Baghdad
by James G Lacey (9781591144588)

"Takedown" is the untold story of one of the most vicious and brilliant campaigns in the annals of American military history. Drawing extensively on personal accounts by the soldiers who did the fighting as well as interviews with senior Iraqi officers and translations of their memoirs and papers, it offers an unprecedented primary report of combat at the gates of Baghdad. At one stage, during the fighting, a brigade of the 3rd was fighting for its life and on the verge of being overrun by the Republican Guard. To hold his position the brigade commander, was forced to blow-up a bridge in his sector, which he did not have the strength to hold. One of his subordinates was so hard pressed that he called on the artillery to fire their final protective fires (FPF), which tells the artillery to fire until their gun barrels melt. When the fighting was over, the 3rd ID had destroyed two Iraqi Regular Army divisions and three divisions of the much vaunted Republican Guard. Baghdad saw the most intense fighting during the Iraq War and 3rd ID found themselves at its centre, in continuous combat for three weeks. Every Armoured vehicle in the assault battalions was hit by rockets, with some absorbing well over a dozen hits. Several times entire combat battalions ran out of ammunition; one battalion under heavy assault called for the Air Force to drop munitions almost directly on its own positions. Air Force controllers were so concerned about killing Americans that they demanded the battalion commander's social security number before they would drop any bombs - they wanted to know who to blame if things went wrong.

USD $29.95

   Dispatch: 3 to 7 business days, stock levels permitting