Reddit reviews The Bear Went Over the Mountain: Soviet Combat Tactics in Afghanistan

If this kind of analysis interests you, check out [The Bear Went Over the Mountain] (https://www.amazon.com/Bear-Went-Over-Mountain-Afghanistan/dp/1304069451) by Grau, and its sequel [The Other Side of the Mountain] (https://www.amazon.com/Other-Side-Mountain-Mujahideen-Soviet-Afghan/dp/1907521054/ref=pd_lpo_sbs_14_img_0?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=P1171X9CC3THF6FVCD30).

They are first-hand accounts of small-unit fights in the Soviet-Afghan war. When the US invaded AFG in 2001, the price went to hundreds of dollars per copy, because every LT and up wanted to know how his enemy fought, what worked, and what didn't.

I believe they can be downloaded FOC from the US DoD.

Currently: The Twilight War: The Secret History of America's Thirty-Year Conflict with Iran

After this I will probably read

The Bear Went Over the Mountain: Soviet Combat Tactics in Afghanistan

On War

Black Flags: The Rise of ISIS

The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11

Illusions of Victory: The Anbar Awakening and the Rise of the Islamic State

On Grand Strategy

A fellow on the combined defense discord layed out his recommendations for books on nukes, so I'll list them here.

On Thermonuclear War By Herman Kahn

On Limited Nuclear War in the 21st Century by Jeffrey Larsen and Kerry Kartchner

The Evolution of Nuclear Strategy, Third Edition by Lawrence Freedman

Russian Strategic Nuclear Forces by Pavel Podvig

Nuclear Statecraft: History and Strategy in America's Atomic Age by Francis J. Gavin

Eating Grass: The Making of the Pakistani Bomb by Feroz Khan

Prevention, Pre-emption and the Nuclear Option: From Bush to Obama by Aiden Warren

Nuclear Deterrence in the 21st Century: Lessons from the Cold War for a New Era of Strategic Piracy by Thérèse Delpech

Analyzing Strategic Nuclear Policy by Charles L. Glaser

Making of the Atomic Bomb by Richard Rhodes

Dark Sun: The Making of the Hydrogen Bomb by Richard Rhodes

Nuclear Strategy in the Modern Era: Regional Powers and International Conflict by Vipin Narang

Building the H Bomb: A Personal History By Kenneth W Ford

The Logic of American Nuclear Strategy by Matthew Kroenig

Paper Tigers: china's Nuclear Posture by Jeffery Lewis

Arms and Influence by Thomas Schelling

I've heard good things! I just finished my copy of The Great Gamble and am working my way through The Bear Went Over the Mountain.

With regards to the military history of Afghanistan, I don't know if it was required reading but many of the guys I know (and myself) read The Bear Went Over the Mountain as well as its companion piece The Other Side of the Mountain.

The Army does a pretty good job of making the cultural history of the area you're deploying to available and you'll take classes on it. Hell, some of the units in the brigade were in bases next to outposts that Alexander the Great built over 2 thousand years ago.

I don't think we ever should have gone in to Afghanistan the same way we did in Iraq. The main difference I saw in my time in the two countries is that the people of Iraq feel like they are Iraqi, while the people of Afghanistan do not feel a national connection/pride.

For example, if we told a town in Iraq about how Al Qaeda was putting bombs in front of schools and blowing up little kids somewhere else in Iraq, that would resonate with them. They would be mad that Iraqi kids were being killed and worry about it happening to their own kids, they would then start reporting the suspicious activity or outsiders coming into their community.

In Afghanistan, if you went up into the valleys of a mountain range and told the village there that another village 3 mountain ranges away had been killed by the Taliban, they wouldn't care. It seemed, to me, that beyond their own village or maybe local collection of villages, they didn't identify with each other the same way with each other as say a person in New York feels for a shooting victim in California. I felt that Afghanistan was much too tribal for the COIN piece and "hearts and mind" campaign to work effectively. There's no real trickle down effect, you literally have to do a good work for every person to get them to come over.

So, a thing to keep in mind is that PFC Bowe Bergdahl volunteered for the Army, the infantry, and airborne school. All of this while the country had been at war for many years already, and had no sign of slowing down. It seems that he went into the situation with the wrong mindset, and there were plenty of times along the way where he could have stopped his progress down the path.

I've read it, and I don't know how much stock to put into the perspective of an imbedded reporter. I've been in platoons or supported platoons where a reporter was with them, and they seem to act differently. I think, to a certain extent, that the soldiers play to the camera so to speak.

The constant "sacking and replacing" is out of the norm for down range, thats why units go to JRTC or NTC prior to a deployment. Not so much to see how the individual soldiers will do at their tasks, but to see how the leadership will handle a combat situation. That's where I saw officers get fired. You could have an ineffective leader in garrison, but the platoon sergeant, first sergeant, xo, other pls can pick up the slack. But when the big boss sees an lt that can't run a mission, or a co that can't in a field environment, they most likely get replaced on the spot.

What I will say about deployments is that people still get promoted down range, and sometimes a new officer is brought in or the old officer moves on. There's no fixing that. The military would be a worse place if your career advancement got put on hold during a deployment.

Lack of clear over-all mission. My mission was to do whatever I could within my abilities to get every troop home safely and sound. When you deploy all that democracy and apple pie stuff goes out the window. Its about making sure the guy next to you gets home to his wife and kids or his mom and dad hale and hearty, and they're doing the same for you. Maybe that's why what PFC Bowe Bergdahl rubs so many veterans the wrong way. He clearly didn't give a shit about his comrades from that perspective, because he abandoned them.

Hope this answers your question.