It is the world's most widely recognized weapon, the most profuse tool for killing ever made. More than fifty national armies carry the automatic Kalashnikov, as do an array of police, intelligence, and security agencies all over the world.
In this tour de force, prizewinning New York Times reporter C. J. Chivers traces the invention of the assault rifle, following the miniaturization of rapid-fire arms from the American Civil War, through World War I and Vietnam, to present-day Afghanistan, when Kalashnikovs and their knockoffs number as many as 100 million, one for every seventy persons on earth. It is the weapon of state repression, as well as revolution, civil war, genocide, drug wars, and religious wars; and it is the arms of terrorists, guerrillas, boy soldiers, and thugs.
It was the weapon used to crush the uprising in Hungary in 1956. American Marines discovered in Vietnam that the weapon in the hands of the enemy was superior to their M16s.
Fidel Castro amassed them. Yasir Arafat procured them for the P.L.O. A Kalashnikov was used to assassinate Anwar Sadat. As Osama bin Laden told the world that "the winds of faith and change have blown," a Kalashnikov was by his side. Pulled from a hole, Saddam Hussein had two Kalashnikovs.
It is the world's most widely recognized weapon—cheap, easy to conceal, durable, deadly. But where did it come from? And what does it mean? Chivers, using a host of exclusive sources and declassified documents in the east and west, as well as interviews with and the personal accounts of insurgents, terrorists, child soldiers, and conventional grunts, reconstructs through the Kalashnikov the evolution of modern war. Along the way, he documents the experience and folly of war and challenges both the enduring Soviet propaganda surrounding the AK-47 and many of its myths.
Top cybersecurity journalist Kim Zetter tells the story behind the virus that sabotaged Iran’s nuclear efforts and shows how its existence has ushered in a new age of warfare—one in which a digital attack can have the same destructive ca...
THE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLING FOLLOW-UP TO AMERICAN SNIPERJoin Chris Kyle on a fascinating journey to discover “how 10 firearms changed United States history” (New York Times Book Review)Drawing on his legendary fir...
Pulling back the curtain on the secretive world of the global arms trade, Andrew Feinstein
reveals the corruption and the cover-ups behind a range of weapons deals, from the largest in history—between the British and Saudi governments—t...
Based on fifteen years of research, Glock is the riveting story of the weapon that has become known as American’s gun. Today the Glock pistol has been embraced by two-thirds of all U.S. police departments, glamorized in countless Hollywo...
From “one of America’s smartest political writers” (Glenn Beck) comes a fascinating and accessible history of the United States’ unique and enduring relationship with guns, for fans of Chris Kyle’s American Gun.For Amer...
In Bomb Power, Garry Wills reveals how the atomic bomb transformed our nation down to its deepest constitutional roots—by dramatically increasing the power of the modern presidency and redefining the government as a national security state&mda...
“Unflinching, insightful, and humane. I can think of no other book that takes as its charge so ambitious a goal: to take the full measure of America’s wars in this new century. A landmark work.”—Doug Stanton, New York Times b...
A brand-new special edition recording of the first audiobook in the worldwide bestselling trilogy from Suzanne Collins!
In the ruins of a place once known as North America lies the nation of Panem, a shining Capitol surrounded by twelve outlying d...
This essential, page-turning narrative on the history of drone warfare by the acclaimed author of Rumsfeld explores how this practice emerged, who made it happen, and the real consequences of targeted killing.
Assassination by drone is a subject of...
