[BIBLIOGRAPHY]

	Below are some select titles that we think are "essential reading" for the topics, region and types of combat that you will see in Combat Mission: Shock Force.
	Baghdad Bound - Devil Dog Diaries Video Experience the full force of coalition forces in Iraq and live life on the frontlines. The Devil Dog Diaries provides a rare, inside look at life in wartime from the perspective of the young men in a battalion of the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force With veteran filmmaker Gary Scurka in tow, the marines encounter ambushes and fire fights, engage in dangerous missions in cities along the way, endure sniper fire and sandstorms and lead the charge into Baghdad. Yet despite their feats, most of these Marines are young cadets straight out of high school, shipped to a far off desert to engage in a war for reasons they may not fully understand.
	Ambush Alley This is a very detailed and well researched account of the battle for Nasiriyah. It has everything; tanks, APC's, infantry, conventional and unconventional enemy forces, ambushes, RPG attacks, artillery, mortars, air strikes, Close Support A-10s, and more. While it is true that this battle was waged by Marines, the nature of the combat is applicable 110% to CM:SF. -Battlefront.com
	No True Glory Fallujah: Iraq's most dangeours city unexpectedly emerged as the major battleground of the Iraqi insurgency. For twenty months, one American battalion after another tried to quell the violence. The Marines had planned to slip into Fallujah "as soft as fog". But after four American contractors were brutally murdered, President Bush ordered an attack on the city - against the advice of the Marines. Victory came at a terrible price. Based on months spent with battalions in Fallujah and hundreds of interviews at every level - senior policymarkers, negotiators, generals, and soldiers and Marines on the front lines - No True Glory is a testament to the bravery of the American soldier and a cautionary tale about the complex, and often costly, interconnected roles of policy, politics, and battle in the twenty-first century.
	My War: Killing Time in Iraq "...by Colby Buzzel, who was in the first Stryker brigade deployed to Iraq. He had a popular and semi-famous blog while he was there." - fytinghellfish (Battlefront Forum Member # 3701)
	The March Up: Taking Baghdad with the 1st Marine Division Description from Publishers Weekly: This very readable eyewitness history of the 1st Marine Division in the recent Iraq War was penned by two very qualified observers: both West and Smith served in Vietnam as Marines; Smith also served in Granada and Beruit, while West (The Village; The Pepperdogs) is a former Assistant Secretary of Defense. Unsurprisingly, their account of Marines advancing from Kuwait to Baghdad-and thereby ending up farther from the sea than any Marines in history-is far from anti-military. Perhaps more unexpectedly, though, they present their campaign history warts and all. The portrait of the division owes its breadth to interviews from several hundred sources, not all of whom survived. Two stand out: Shane Ferkovich, whose squad prevented sabotage of an oil-pumping station in the beginning of the march and helped take down Saddam's statue at the end; and General Mattis, the division commander and chief juggler of conflicting demands. An exceptional selection of photographs and better maps than most books to date on the war add to this account's appeal. Copyright © 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.
	Thunder Run: The Armored Strike to Capture Baghdad Based on reporting that was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, Thunder Run chronicles one of the boldest gambles in modern military history. Three battalions, and fewer than a thousand men, launched a violent thrust of tanks and Bradley Fighting Vehicles into the heart of a city of five million and in three bloody days of combat captured Baghdad. Thunder Run is the story of the surprise assault on Baghdad - one of the most decisive battles in recent American combat history - by the Spartan Brigade, the Second Brigade of the Third Infantry Divison (Mechanized). "This is an excellent read! One of the best, most thrilling and moving accounts of combat I have read since Black Hawk Down!" -Madmatt, Battlefront.com
	Storm on the Horizon ...by David Morris is a book about the battle of Khafji on the eve of Gulf War 1. "The first half of the book is about an attacking Iraqi tank formation that comes in contact with a LAV company. I think it also answers the question of, "How can the game be balanced with US airpower?" In this book you see instances where the CAS took a couple hours to arrive, attacked the wrong people, or wouldnt engage because of proximity of friendly forces. Definitely gives the impression that 30 min to 1 hour engagements without CAS are normal." -David Chapuis (Battlefront Forum Member #12606)
	Heavy Metal: A Tank Company's Battle to Baghdad Book Description from Amazon.com: During the Iraq War, coauthor Capt. Jason Conroy commanded Charlie Company, which was part of Task Force 1-64 of the 2d Brigade Combat Team, part of the U.S. Army’s 3d Infantry Division. A tank unit equipped with mammoth M1A1 Abrams tanks, Conroy’s company was literally at the tip of the U.S. Army’s spear and one of the first elements into Baghdad. Veteran journalist Ron Martz was embedded in Charlie Company. Together, from the unique perspective of an armor unit that was in nearly continuous combat for four straight weeks, Conroy and Martz tell the unvarnished story of what went right and what went deadly wrong in Iraq. Conroy and his soldiers were able to overcome supply shortages, intelligence failures, and miserable weather to battle their way into downtown Baghdad, a place where they were told they would never have to fight. Heavy Metal evaluates the Army’s performance, including its use of tactics that were developed during the war but for which the soldiers had never trained. Through the exciting personal stories of the young troopers of Charlie Company—who experienced a very different war from what was seen back home on TV—Heavy Metal tells us much about the qualities of today’s American soldier, about twenty-first-century desert and urban warfare, and about how the Army should prepare to fight future wars.
	Basrah, Baghdad, and Beyond: U.S. Marine Corps in the Second Iraq War Book Description from Amazon.com: This is the story of the Marine Corps in the major combat phase of Operation Iraqi Freedom (OIF). It tells how the I Marine Expeditionary Force (MEF) planned and prepared for war in 2002 and deployed to theater in early 2003, and then how it crossed the line of departure and fought its way to Baghdad—and beyond. Written by Marine Corps historian Col. Nicholas Reynolds, this first overview of the history of OIF is solidly grounded in oral history interviews and buttressed by official reports and firsthand journals. It describes not only the execution of the original plan but some of the unusual additions carried out by the Marines, including a small mission sent to Kurdistan to work with local fighters and a task force sent to seize Saddam Hussein’s hometown of Tikrit. The book draws to a close with the commanders analyzing the lessons learned in this "transformational" war as the last Marine left the theater in the fall of 2003. While not intended as finished history, this authoritative analysis of what happened will prove useful to students of Marine Corps history and operations and easily accessible to the general reader who wants to understand what the Marines did in a historical context. It is certain to stimulate further research and healthy debate. Comprehensive notes are included for the reader who wants to learn more about a particular part of the war.
	On Point: The United States Army in Operation Iraqi Freedom Book Description from Amazon.com: Foreword by Gen. Tommy R. Franks, USA (Ret.) This hard-hitting, authoritative account of U.S. Army operations during the Second Gulf War draws on official records and work carried out by the Army’s Operation Iraqi Freedom Study Group. The authors cover everything from logistical operations to gunfights at platoon level to help readers understand the complexity, scale, and rigors of the war and what it was like for the solders in the field. As Gen. Tommy Franks says in the foreword, the book is far more than a standard campaign history. It not only puts the Army’s story in the context of joint operations in Iraq but also analyzes the operation in admirable detail. Using hundreds of interviews of the troops and scores of detailed maps and illustrations, it provides a user-friendly guide to the Army’s first major campaign in more than a decade and ten-years worth of investments in digitalization and interservice operability. The first part of the book reviews the evolution of the Army since the First Gulf War and establishes the context in which preparation for the second occurred. A narrative of combat operations through 1 May 2003 follows with a focus at the tactical level but set in the context of theater-level operations. The book concludes with suggestions of early implications for the Army and joint forces as they shape future force structure and training. This book is published in cooperation with the Association of the United States Army.
	Death Ground: Today's American Infantry in Battle From Publishers Weekly: Bolger, a serving army colonel, is an established writer of military fiction (Feast of Bones) and military analysis (The Battle for Hunger Hill). This is his most significant work to date, important both for students of the contemporary U.S. Army and for general readers?even those normally uninterested in military matters. Bolger documents the infantry's change, over the past 60 years, from a mass force of citizen soldiers to a small body of elite professionals. He presents each currently existing type of infantry?paratroopers, air assault, mechanized, light, rangers and marines?in recent action. For the paratroops, it's the jump into Panama during Operation Just Cause. The helicopter-borne air assault battalions and the mechanized infantry are showcased, along with the rangers, in Operation Desert Storm. The light infantry's finest hour was in Mogadishu, where its flexibility and fighting power saved a trapped American raiding party. The marines appear as peace enforcers in Liberia. In each case study, Bolger emphasizes the importance of quality and preparation, making it quite clear that will without skill and motivation without competence are certain routes to disaster. His style is colloquial and his tone triumphalist, but his message and his subtext are both clear: the grunt has evolved into a warrior, but the gain in expertise brings its own perils. While praising today's infantry as the best the country has ever fielded, Bolger raises the prospect that the U.S. military, by emphasizing technology and economy, will leave the country with an elite infantry too small to sustain heavy losses and too specialized to be quickly replaced. Copyright © 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.
	Afghan Guerilla Warfare Highly recommended! -Nadir_E (Battlefront Forum Member #17907)
	McCoy's Marines: Darkside to Baghdad San Francisco Chronicle reporter and marine veteran Koopman was embedded in the Third Battalion, Fourth Marines, during the most recent war in Iraq. He enjoyed a close working relationship with the CO, the battalion sergeant major, and several other members of the battalion. This didn't destroy his ability to distance himself from aspects of the military that he never liked, or from political judgments on the war. The combination of embedding and prior service did give him a rare perspective on the gritty (literally, when a sandstorm blew up) details of ground combat in Iraq and how the modern American marine relates to his buddies, his enemies, and his family back home. The conclusion of the book offers equally rare material on the nation-building efforts that continue, with sympathy for both the U.S. military and most shades of Iraqi opinion. Koopman occasionally dwells on his own emotions at excessive length, and the book is sometimes jumbled; but one keeps turning pages. Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
	Not a Good Day to Die: The Untold Story of Operation Anaconda Reviewers lauded Naylor’s "meticulously reported" account (Oregonian). It includes in-person observations during the operation (Naylor was imbedded with the 101st Airborne Division troops who fought in the battle), and scores of after-the-fact interviews, many with sources who wouldn’t allow themselves to be identified. His two-year undertaking to bring those 17 days to life yields an extraordinarily detailed account of the fateful mission. While a few critics felt that some aspects of the book were unbalanced, all agreed that Naylor did a good job in portraying the drama, heroism, and blunders that defined Anaconda while raising broader issues of warfare and its ultimate purpose. Copyright © 2004 Phillips & Nelson Media, Inc.
	The Sling and the Stone: On War in the 21st Century "...by Thomas Hammes is a really good read. Also, I think it gives an interesting look at how OPFOR could act in building scenarios and campaigns." -TheKhaosProject (Battlefront Forum Member #18470)
	Tactics of the Crescent Moon: Militant Muslim Combat Methods H. John Poole and Ray Smith (foreword). "Tactics of the Crescent Moon comes none too soon for deployed U.S. service personnel. Little, if any, of their battlefield intelligence has been tactically interpreted. U.S. analysts are generally more interested in the enemy’s strategic or technological capabilities. Even if those analysts did want to tactically assess the information, most lack the infantry and historical background to do so. This book fills that void. It reveals—for the first time in any detail—the most common small-unit maneuvers of the Iraqi and Afghan resistance fighters. Its author is a retired infantryman and recognized authority on guerrilla warfare. He has traveled the world extensively and still trains active-duty U.S. units. Tactics of the Crescent Moon could save many lives (if not turn the tide of war) in the Middle East. It is a heavily researched, well-illustrated, and spell-binding account of how Muslim militants fight. While the book delves mainly into their tactical method, it also uncovers their cultural orientation. This nail-biting nonfiction covers events as recent as 15 September 2004." http://www.smallwarsjournal.com/
	Certain Victory: The U.S. Army in the Gulf War (The History of War) Best of the bunch if it is a serious military history of the 1st Gulf War that you are after. -kipanderson (Battlefront Forum Member #1529)
	The Iraq War Written by Anthony Cordesman. Not so much a narrative military history as a 500 page “after action report” on the 2nd Gulf War. If you really wish to know what worked and what did not then this is the book to go for. -kipanderson (Battlefront Forum Member #1529)
	Command Legacy: Tactical Primer for Junior Leaders of Infantry Book Description from Amazon.com: The burden of fighting wars, large or small, often rests on the soldiers and junior leaders of small infantry units. COMMAND LEGACY presents a combat officer's conclusions about how to approach tactical problems and missions and about the links among tactical theory, doctrine, and practice. It is meant to prime junior leaders for tactical operations, team building, and professional development. From developing company doctrine, preparing for a mission, and conducting assaults to addressing such concerns of the individual soldier as supply, terrain, and weather, any leader (officer or enlisted) tasked to conduct tactical operations needs this valuable book.