Helicopters, discusses how helicopters fly and the various ways that helicopters are used in todays world. This title features a table of contents, glossary, index, vivid color photographs and diagrams, photo labels, sidebars, and recommended web sites for further exploration.

When the photographs depicting torture at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison were released in 2004, U.S. politicians attributed the incident to a few bad apples in the American military, exonerated high-ranking members of the George W. Bush administration, promoted Guantánamo as a model prison, and dismissed the illegality of the CIA's use of "enhanced interrogation." By the end of the Bush administration, members of both major congressional parties had come to denounce enhanced interrogation as torture and argue for the closing of Guantánamo. What initiated this shift? In Talking About Torture, Jared Del Rosso reviews transcripts from congressional hearings and scholarship on denial, torture, and state violence to document this wholesale change in rhetoric and attitude toward the use of torture by the CIA and the U.S. military during the War on Terror. He plots the evolution of the "torture issue" in U.S. politics and its manipulation by politicians to serve various ends. Most important, Talking About Torture integrates into the debate about torture the testimony of those who suffered under American interrogation practices and demonstrates how the conversation continues to influence current counterterrorism policies, such as the reliance on drones.

During Operation IRAQI FREEDOM I (OIF I), U.S. soldiers waged a desperate war against a growing insurgency. Mounting U.S. casualties became the catalyst for a hidden “war within the war.” Arrayed on one side of this secret conflict were leaders who believed that the “ends justify the means.” Opposing this camp were those who believed that U.S. soldiers do not torture because of the higher ideals to which all Americans should subscribe. This clandestine conflict was waged at every level of command, from the fields of Iraq to Washington, D.C. In this history, the adverse influence of the ends-justify-the-means camp in Iraq is charted. Conversely, interrogation operations within the largest division task force and brigade combat team of OIF I are explored to explain why most interrogators treated detainees humanely. Those deficiencies of Army doctrine, force structure, and training that enabled harsh interrogation policies to sometimes trump traditional virtues are explained. Lastly, the Army’s recent dramatic improvements with regard to interrogations are summarized and still-existing deficiencies are noted. This history concludes that the damage done by abusive interrogations will be felt for years to come—and that much work still needs to be done to ensure such damage never recurs.

A powerful memoir from the late former U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld With the same directness that defined his career in public service, Rumsfeld's memoir is filled with previously undisclosed details and insights about the Bush administration, 9/11, and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. It also features Rumsfeld's unique and often surprising observations on eight decades of history. Rumsfeld addresses the challenges and controversies of his illustrious career, from the unseating of the entrenched House Republican leader in 1965, to helping the Ford administration steer the country away from Watergate and Vietnam, to the war in Iraq, to confronting abuse at Abu Ghraib. Along the way, he offers his plainspoken, first-hand views and often humorous and surprising anecdotes about some of the world's best-known figures, ranging from Elvis Presley to George W. Bush. Both a fascinating narrative and an unprecedented glimpse into history,Known and Unknown captures the legacy of one of the most influential men in public service.

How hundreds of lawyers mobilized to challenge the illegal treatment of prisoners captured in the war on terror and helped force an end to the US government's most odious policies. In The War in Court, sociologist Lisa Hajjar traces the fight against the US torture policy by lawyers who brought the "war on terror" into the courts. Their victories, though few and far between, forced the government to change the way prisoners were treated and focused attention on state crimes perpetrated in the shadows. If not for these lawyers and their allies, US torture would have gone unchallenged because elected officials and the American public, with a few exceptions, did nothing to oppose it. This war in court has been fought to defend the principle that there is no legal right to torture. Told as a suspenseful, high-stakes story, The War in Court clearly outlines why challenges to the torture policy had to be waged on the legal terrain and why hundreds of lawyers joined the fight. Drawing on extensive interviews with key participants, her own experiences reporting from Guantánamo, and her deep knowledge of international law and human rights, Hajjar reveals how the ongoing fight against torture has had transformative effects on the legal landscape in the United States and on a global scale.

The Law of Armed Conflict provides a complete operational scenario and introduction to the operational organization of United States forces. The focus remains on United States law perspective, balanced with exposure to areas where the interpretation of its allied forces diverge. Jus ad bellum and jus in bello issues are addressed at length. The casebook comes to students with stunning authority. All of the authors are active or retired United States Army officers with more than 140 years of collective military operational experience among them. Several have experience in both legal and operational assignments as well. They deliver a comprehensive coverage of all aspects of the law of armed conflict, explaining the difference between law and policy in regulation of military operations.

The surprising truth behind Barack Obama's decision to continue many of his predecessor's counterterrorism policies. Conventional wisdom holds that 9/11 sounded the death knell for presidential accountability. In fact, the opposite is true. The novel powers that our post-9/11 commanders in chief assumed—endless detentions, military commissions, state secrets, broad surveillance, and more—are the culmination of a two-century expansion of presidential authority. But these new powers have been met with thousands of barely visible legal and political constraints—enforced by congressional committees, government lawyers, courts, and the media—that have transformed our unprecedentedly powerful presidency into one that is also unprecedentedly accountable. These constraints are the key to understanding why Obama continued the Bush counterterrorism program, and in this light, the events of the last decade should be seen as a victory, not a failure, of American constitutional government. We have actually preserved the framers’ original idea of a balanced constitution, despite the vast increase in presidential power made necessary by this age of permanent emergency.

This book addresses a dilemma at the heart of counter-terrorist policy: is it ever justifiable to torture terrorists in order to save the lives of others, the so-called 'ticking bomb' scenario? The book opens with an analysis of the pure moral argument from the standpoint of the individual as torturer. It then looks at the issues that arise once a state has decided to sanction torture in certain situations: how to establish factually that the situation is urgent, deciding who to torture, training people to carry out torture, and the efficacy of torture as a means of gathering information. The final part examines attempts to operate legal systems which tolerate torture; how they relate to the criminal law notion of necessity and to international human rights norms. After examining the utilitarian arguments for torture, and the impact on a society of permitting torture, the author presents a powerful argument for maintaining the absolute legal prohibition.