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    American Soldier
    American Soldier
    American Soldier
    Audiobook19 hours

    American Soldier

    Written by Tommy R. Franks

    Narrated by Eric Conger

    3.5/5

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    About this audiobook

    Few individuals have the chance to contribute so much of themselves to theAmerican story as General Tommy Franks. In American Soldier, he captures it all.

    The Commander in Chief of the United States Central Command from July 2000 through July 2003, General Tommy Franks made history leading American and Coalition forces to victory in Afghanistan and Iraq -- the decisive battles that launched the war on terrorism.

    General Franks retraces his journey from a small-town boyhood through a lifetime of military service -- including his heroic tour as an Artillery officer in Vietnam, where he was wounded three times.

    Drawing on military records declassified for this book, Franks offers the first true insider's account of the war on terrorism. He puts you in the Operations Center for the launch of Operation Enduring Freedom just weeks after 9/11, capturing its uncertain early days and the historic victory that followed.

    When President Bush focused world attention on the threat of Iraq, Franks seized the moment to implement a bold new vision of joint warfare in planning Operation Iraqi Freedom. Rejecting Desert Storm-style massive troop deployment in favor of flexibility and speed, Franks was questioned by the defense establishment -- including Secretary of State Colin Powell. Yet his vision was proven on the ground: Within three weeks, Baghdad had fallen.

    Franks describes the covert diplomacy that helped secure international cooperation for the war, and speaks frankly of intelligence shortcomings that endangered our troops, and of the credible WMD threats that influenced every planning decision. He offers an unvarnished portrait of the ""disruptive and divisive"" Washington bureaucracy, and a candid assessment of the war's aftermath. Yet in the end, as American Soldier demonstrates, the battles in Afghanistan and Iraq remain heroic victories -- wars of liberation won by troops whose valor was ""unequalled,"" Franks writes, ""by anything in the annals of war.""

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHarperAudio
    Release dateAug 3, 2004
    ISBN9780060784287
    Author

    Tommy R. Franks

    General Tommy Franks retired from the Army on August 1, 2003. Commissioned a Second Lieutenant in 1967 as a distinguished graduate of the Artillery Officer Candidate School, Fort Sill, Oklahoma, he was assigned to the 9th Infantry Division, Republic of Vietnam. He also served as an Assistant Division Commander during Operations Desert Shield/Desert Storm. General Franks has been awarded three Defense Distinguished Service Medals, two Distinguished Service Medals, and four Legion of Merit awards. His other decorations include three Purple Hearts, three Bronze Stars, an Air Medal, and an Army Commendation Medal -- all with ""V"" for valor. In 2004 he was named a Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire. General Franks lives with his wife, Cathy, in Tampa, Florida.

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    Reviews for American Soldier

    3.5/5

    74 ratings4 reviews

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    • 5/5
      Great book! Thank You For Your Service Sir! God Bless America!
    • 3/5
      Very interesting to read about how the attack in Afganistan and Iraq was planned and executed. Includes behind the scenes discssions with the President and Rumsfeld during and after 9/11. Also interesting to note the differences in how we have changed the way our military command structure works with CENTCOM commanding all services in a geographical area rather than the different branches of the services controlling their assets as we did in WWII, Korea, and Vietnam. It seems like the practice works well here. Interesting to note that after commanding CENTCOM Gen Franks turned down the chief of the Army job becasue he was only interested in a warfighting position.

      His experiences in Vietnam as a young artillary officer was a high point of the book as he was in the thick of the fighting on many occaisions. It is somewhat comforting to see commanders sending people to die that have experienced combat themselves and know the price and how to count the cost.

    • 4/5
      An extremely easy book to read. I actually had to do a report on him when I was in ROTC. The first half of the book is his career and how he got started. It seemed as though he just stumbled up the chain and had a lot of lucky breaks. The second half is his time as commander during the war. Like I said the book was easy to read, and I would suggest it for anyone in the military. It was written in a military format, in that every chapter or section he summarized everything he was going to talk about, explained it, and then recapped it. Just like we are taught to do. I would recommend this book for military people, not sure if people outside the military would enjoy this book. This book does stay in my library at the house
    • 5/5
      An excellent account of current history.