A brutal walkthrough of the misery of North Korea. A tough read, but a good one.

Having been both a soldier and the prime minister of Israel gives Chaim Herzog a unique perspective from which to write this book. One interesting thing was his position that by executing air strikes deep into Egypt, Israel drove them into the arms of the Soviets. So it was a tactical success but a strategic failure. This reminded me the CIA station chief's opinion in "Charlie Wilson's War", that is, that the US should not try to help the Afghans defeat the Soviets but instead just give them enough to tie up the Soviets in place. The personal anecdotes are really something; he'll say in a matter-of-fact manner "at this point an attack was launched to disable the SAM battery; the author of this book participated in that assault".

Interesting reading a later edition with a preface that talks about changes since it was written. This reminded me of "War at the Top of the World" by Eric Margolis when it talked about how demanding just staying in, let alone fighting in, Afghanistan is.

A thorough overview. The bits about the British experience in the 1800s are particularly gripping, as one would expect.

IIRC, "Quartered Safe Out Here" has some counterpoints on Paul Fussell's comments.