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Summary: Shadow Warriors
Review: Very slow. Not the normal exciting novel by Clancy. More of a history or philosophy book.
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Summary: Interesting Slice of Military History
Review: This is a brief history of the Special Forces from 1944 when the legendary Aaron Bank started a unit at the direction of Wild Bill Donovan. I was struck by the range of opinions by Amazon reviewers with military backgrounds. I suspect both extremes are valid in that: 1. Carl Stiner is a legitimate American hero, and 2. The book omits or glosses over some things he didn't want to get into.Here are a few points that peaked my interest along the way: 1. Special Forces was viewed early on as a renegade organization not fully trusted by the military establishment. Their early efforts were hampered by both inexperience and constraints in the chain of command. 2. JFK was a big early supporter. He visited the new group at Ft. Bragg in October '61 where troops wore green berets in publicly for the first time. Bill Yarborough was in charge of shaping a force that Kennedy believed would deal with warefare as it would become. 3. Stiner was a great trainer and team builder, but would he have followed the same path if he came out of West Point? He joined the Army from ROTC at Tennessee Tech in 1958, was sent to Special Forces at Bragg in '64, saw heavy action as a Major in the First Brigade in Viet Nam in '67-68 and made General in early 1980 4. Stiner and Schwarzkopf were both 4 star generals in Desert Storm with the latter, obviously, more senior in command. Stiner believes Schwarzkopf held a bias against Special Operations not uncommon among traditional military men, and one key special operation was approved only after Cheney overrode Powell's reservations about the plan. Stiner left this reader with the impression that more extensive use of Special Operations in '91 might have produced a more complete solution in Iraq. This is not in-depth history, for sure, but a very interesting and credible read.
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Summary: Shadow Warriors-Ho Hum
Review: This book should be renamed "The Life and Times of Carl Stiner". General Stiner is a tremendous warrior....I know because I served in SOF under him in combat and on his operations staff at the Special Operations headquarters - admittedly, this makes me a bias reviewer. Still, criticism is due for an opportunity lost. Why did the publisher and Gen Stiner forget to add the Air Force Special Operations Command patch from the front cover? The text "dances" around classified excerpts which are in open print elsewhere (e.g., "Blackhawk Down"). No mention of AF Special Tactics units. Nothing on the illustrious history of SEALs and their UDT roots. Nothing much on the Combat Talons (some errors on their basing in the early 80s as well). No mention of the tremendous support personnel behind the front line warriors. The subtitle encourages the use of terms such as "Special Forces" and "Special Operations Forces" to mean the same thing when they are, in fact, different (SF are a subset of SOF). The book does not measure up for an author with the giant reputation of Clancy. Did they rush this into print to take advantage of the current media love affair with Special Operations Forces?
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Summary: Truly a Disapointment for My First Clancy Book
Review: ...Although I still enjoyed reading the book, I thought it would be a lot better. They should just call this Stiner's biography. (Not necesarrily a bad thing, just not what I was expecting) I was expecting a pretty even account of special operation units and missions. What I got was one commando story told by someone other than Stiner and Stiner's biography. Stiner's story is very exciting at times, but also gets bogged down in administrative wranglings every now and then which slows the pace of the story down. This is a decent read, but you will be disapointed if you do not know what you are getting into. Check out the other negative reviews for more details; it is unnecessary for me to repeat what they say. If you want a more even account of US Special Forces along with slightly more entertaining account of missions and training check out The Commandos : The Inside Story of Americas Secret Soldiers
by Douglas C. Waller. Other books in this genre I love are Black Hawk Down and Bravo Two Zero.
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Summary: Mediocre, if even that...Clancy phones one in
Review: Having spent a chunk of my 12-year military career in and around Special Ops, I looked forward to reading this book. And as a continual student of unconventional warfare, I was expecting the book to be a detailed history of Special Forces, peppered with stories and detail from Stiner, someone who had obviously "been there, done that". It is not. The subtitle of the book is "Inside the Special Forces", and it is very misleading. Early in the book, some of the history of the Jedburghs and the OSS is given, but the book soon turns into a memoir for Stiner, with Clancy giving a few explanations here and there, and basically heaping his stamp of approval and admiration on the material written by Stiner. That's pretty much about all there is to the book. As far as the material goes, Stiner was on the inside during Just Cause, and so he presents an extremely glossed over and sanitized version of events. Anyone who was in or studying the military during that time knows that Just Cause was the epitome of a "charlie foxtrot" operation that barely came off. Special operations guys were used as shock troops and some of them - among them a platoon of Navy SEALs - were killed because the 'regular' military didn't know how to use them. He barely mentions this. Stiner was far enough away from the action not to have his career sacrificed by the fallout from Just Cause, so he gets to tell the story of how the military reorganized it's Special Operations Forces after that time. He had a part in that, so for that I guess the book is useful. All in all, don't be fooled into thinking that the book is as advertised. A few tidbits of useful information are presented here, but not anything that isn't easily found elsewhere. Obviously Stiner is a mover and shaker, and deserves all the respect he commands, but I think it's too bad he felt he had to conceal his memoir in this book. I would have read his story if it was published seperately, but I guess if you could get Clancy to front for you, this makes a great deal of sense. I'm a huge Clancy fan, fiction and non-fiction, but it's obvious he phoned this one in. Too bad.
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Summary: Clancy Clunker
Review: I have never offered a review before, but this book was such a waste of money that I felt compelled to. Unfortunately, without the tragic events of 9/11, this book would probably never have made a dime for Clancy. It is his clumsiest attempt ever at cobbling together an old story with a weak pretext for being fresh information. Aside from the fact that the narrative itself is about as boring as a high school history text; Clancy can't seem to decide whether he wants to actually tell the story of Special Ops Forces, or offer a platform for a dry and uninspiring autobiography of Carl Stiner. The reader is repeatedly assaulted with poorly camouflaged whining about the "big" Army mistreatment and misunderstanding of SF. The final insult is a meandering, condescending, and completely irrelevant lecture on leadership from Stiner that he has no doubt bored several ROTC classes with over the years. Save your money - this is Clancy at his commercial worst!
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Summary: Not bad. However, not as good as the fiction.
Review: In Shadow Warriors, Tom Clancy examines the history and purpose of the U.S. Special Forces. The approach is meaningful and well-put. The history of the elite forces is an interesting one, but it tends to drag a lot. We all are well aware of the status of the military ever since Vietnam, and the special ops troops took a large brunt of that. Yes, it was an unfair assessment, but it is the way history portrayed them. It wasn't until the 1980's that the special troops started getting the respect that they so well deserved. Grenada was the first example, followed by many others. Mr. Clancy examines the history, but I wish it would have included a thorough examination of the social climate which caused the poor attitudes toward the men and women who have been brave enough to resign themselves to this service. While it was never based upon respect, it did allow for those serving in the special forces to harden themselves to social opinion. I believe that this was a cornerstone in their determination to become even better than they were. Overall, a very good book. It was just lacking that one point, which I thought was a vary important one. Sorry to see that he missed it.
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Summary: Inside look at how it all began, inside the special forces!
Review: "Shadow Warriors" is the third in this series. Co-written by retired General Carl Stiner. A recap of how the Special Forces began and why.
A book well worth the read!
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Summary: An Engaging Glimpse Into The Evolution Of ...
Review: The U.S. Special Forces; Rangers, Seal's, Delta Force, Green Berets, and others. 'Shadow Warriors': Inside the Special Forces by Tom Clancy and Carl Stinger ( is the 3rd of Clancy's commander books)and, this time around he had teamed up with retired General Carl Stiner to recount the recent history of the U.S. Special Forces. Together, Clancy and Stinger prived the readers of this book an engaging glimpse into the evolution of the U.S. Special Forces. Most of the book centers around Stinger's military career from late 50s, his tour in Vietnam as a Green Beret, various assignments in the Middle East, and his final stint as commandar of SOCOM (first hand accounts of the Achille Lauro hostage rescue, the invasion of Panama, and operations in Desert Storm). 'Shadow Warriors' is a military man's/woman's dream book! You will enjoy it. On the fiction side you might enjoy David Meadows "Sixth Fleet" or Norm Harris "Fruit of a Poisonous Tree."
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Summary: Excerlent drama! A must see!!
Review: This is my first year baking cookies for 11 families. I used this recipe for my first batch. My kids loved them. Easy to make and taste great.
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