Bøker av Richard Tregaskis

Scott Osterman was at the end of his spiritual rope when he rescued Martha Shoop from a rioting mob in the streets of Shanghai. She, too, was drifting, trying desperately to cling to principles and ideals that were fatally undermined by the disintegration of the world around her under the onslaught of the Communist forces. Their own shattered lives were reintegrated as Scott and Martha determined to shake off the immorality of their past and preserve what is decent in human life. Together they knew they had to act. Together they plunged into the turmoil. Their resolution led them to the thick of battle and into crises in which only their devotion to each other was the cause of freedom that sustained them. This inspiring, dramatic story of love and war is a tribute to the grandeur of the human spirit. This story is a major publishing event, wherein through a tender and effecting love story, a theme of great consequence is unrolled for the American people-perhaps not too late to save us in the generally unrecognized war which shakes our world. The setting is the China civil war, which placed one fifth of the world''s population in the Communist camp. The China War was the prototype of Cuba, the Congo, Laos, the first and greatest of the civil conflicts, the revolutions, the bush wars, through which the Reds have been conquering the world. This sets Last Plane to Shanghai apart from the many romance novels. 

The first definitive eyewitness account of the combat in Vietnam, this unforgettable, vividly illustrated report records the story of the 14,000 Americans fighting in a new kind of war. Written by one of the most knowledgeable and experienced of America''s war correspondents,Vietnam Diary shows how we developed new techniques for resisting wily guerrilla forces. Roaming the whole of war-torn Vietnam, Tregaskis takes his readers on the tense U.S. missions-with the Marine helicopters and the Army HU1B''s (Hueys); with the ground pounders on the embattled Delta area, the fiercest battlefield of Vietnam; then to the Special Forces, men chosen for the job of training Montagnard troops to resist Communists in the high jungles.Mr. Tregaskis tells the stirring human story of American fighting men deeply committed to their jobs-the Captain who says: "You have to feel that it''s a personal problem-that if they go under, we go under;" the wounded American advisor who deserted the hospital to rejoin his unit; the father of five killed on his first mission the day before Christmas; the advisor who wouldn''t take leave because he loved his wife and feared he would go astray in Saigon. And the dramatic battle reports cover the massive efforts of the Vietnamese troops to whom the Americans are leaders and advisors. "Mr. Tregaskis has written a lot of diaries and witnessed a lot of warfare in the past twenty-odd years. If this book isn''t up to Guadalcanal Diary and some of his others for stirring true-life adventure, well, the fault may not be entirely his own; Vietnam is a tedious, frustrating kind of war, especially for the 14,000 Americans involved in it. He was there from early October, 1962, to early January, 1963, and in those months he had an enormous amount of experience: flying with Army and Marine Corps helicopters and Vietnamese fighter planes, and slogging around in the rice paddies and jungles with the Arvins (Vietnamese infantry). As an intimate and unadorned account of what so many of our career soldiers and draftees (quite possibly you will know one of the hundreds mentioned by name) are going through day by day over there, this can be wholeheartedly recommended." -Kirkus Reviews, 1963.

From the bestselling author of Guadalcanal Diary: The thrilling true story of the future president's astonishing act of heroism during World War II. In the early morning hours of August 2, 1943, US Navy motor torpedo boat PT-109 patrolled the still, black waters of Blackett Strait in the Solomon Islands. Suddenly, the Japanese destroyer Amagiri loomed out of the darkness, bearing directly down on the smaller ship. There was no time to get out of the waythe destroyer crashed into PT-109, slicing the mosquito boat in two and setting the shark-infested waters aflame with burning gasoline. Ten surviving crewmembers and their young skipper clung to the wreckage, their odds of survival growing slimmer by the instant. Lt. John F. Kennedy's first command was an unqualified disaster. Yet over the next three days, the privileged son of a Boston multimillionaire displayed extraordinary courage, stamina, and leadership as he risked his life to shepherd his crew to safety and coordinate a daring rescue mission deep in enemy territory. Lieutenant Kennedy earned a Navy and Marine Corps Medal and a Purple Heart, and the story of PT-109 captured the public's imagination and helped propel the battle-tested veteran all the way to the White House. Acclaimed war correspondent Richard Tregaskiswho once beat out the future president for a spot on the Harvard University swim teambrings this remarkable chapter in American history to vivid life in John F. Kennedy and PT-109. From the crucial role torpedo boats played in the fight for the Solomon Islands to Kennedy's eager return to the front lines at the helm of PT-59, Tregaskis tells the full story of this legendary incident with the same riveting style and meticulous attention to detail he brought to Guadalcanal Diary and Invasion Diary. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Richard Tregaskis including rare images from the American Heritage Center at the University of Wyoming.

This celebrated classic gives a soldier''s-eye-view of the Guadalcanal battles--crucial to World War II, the war that continues to fascinate us all, and to military history in general. Unlike some of those on Guadalcanal in the fall of 1942, Richard Tregaskis volunteered to be there. An on-location news correspondent (at the time, one of only two on Guadalcanal), he lived alongside the soldiers: sleeping on the ground--only to be awoken by air raids--eating the sometimes meager rations, and braving some of the most dangerous battlefields of World War II. He more than once narrowly escaped the enemy''s fire, and so we have this incisive and exciting inside account of the groundbreaking initial landing of U.S. troops on Guadalcanal. With a new Introduction by Mark Bowden--renowned journalist and author of Black Hawk Down--this edition of Guadalcanal Diary makes available once more one of the most important American works of the war.

The Allied invasions of Sicily and Italy in 1943 were bloody and pivotal, securing the Mediterranean, capitalizing on the overthrow of Mussolini, and pinning down German troops that could have been used on the Russian Front or in France after D-Day. This title shares an intimate and rousing diary of the Sicilian and Italian campaigns.