Books about Enlistments from Amazon.com

In June 1861, when the Civil War began, Charley Goddard enlisted in the First Minnesota Volunteers. He was 15. He didn't know what a "shooting war" meant or what he was fighting for. But he didn't want to miss out on a great adventure

The "shooting war" turned out to be the horror of combat and the wild luck of survival; how it feels to cross a field toward the enemy, waiting for fire. When he entered the service he was a boy. When he came back he was different; he was only 19, but he was a man with "soldier's heart," later known as "battle fatigue.".
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A short, snappy handbook detailing why the military may need you, but you really don't need it.

"The Army's top recruiter, already struggling to meet his quotas this year, said ….that 2006 would be even harder, and perhaps the toughest year for recruiting since the all-volunteer force began in 1973."—The New York Times, May 13, 2005

So you're walking out of school and parked at the gate is a new, bright red Ford Mustang with a hulk of a man in the front seat. He's sporting a razor cut and wraparound shades. Before you can pass he's out of the car and blocking your path. "Mind if I take a minute"—he has you by the arm now—"to tell you about the great life in today's Army and why you should seriously think about signing up?"

The armed forces are having a tough time attracting new recruits lately, in no small part due to the mess in Iraq. Young people are getting wise to the many excellent reasons not to join the U.S. Military, and this handy book brings them all together, combining accessible writing with hard facts and devastating personal testimony. Contributors with firsthand experience point out the dangers facing soldiers, describe the tricks used by recruiters, and emphasize that there really are other options, even in a sluggish economy. It's essential reading for anyone thinking of signing up.

Over 2,000 American soldiers have been killed in Iraq, and over 14,000 have been wounded.
• Nearly 100,000 civilians have been killed in Iraq as a result of the U.S. invasion.
• One in six soldiers returning from Iraq experiences mental health problems.
• Two-thirds of all recruits receive no college funding from the military, and only 15 percent graduate with a four-year degree.
• According to the VA, 90 percent of recent women veterans reported experiencing sexual harassment; a third were raped..
Price: $4.50 [Notify me when price goes down.]

An Industrial Age model continues to shape the way the Army approaches its recruiting, personnel management, training, and education This outdated personnel management paradigm--designed for an earlier era--has been so intimately tied to the maintenance of Army culture that a self-perpetuating cycle has formed, diminishing the Army's attempts to develop adaptive leaders and institutions. This cycle can be broken only if the Army accepts rapid evolutionary change as the norm of the new era. Recruiting the right people, then having them step into an antiquated organization, means that many of them will not stay as they find their ability to contribute and develop limited by a centralized, hierarchical organization. Recruiting and retention data bear this out. Several factors have combined to force the Army to think about the way it develops and nurtures its leaders. Yet, Vandergriff maintains, mere modifications to today's paradigm may not be enough. Today's Army has to do more than post rhetoric about "adaptability" on briefing slides and in literature. One cannot divorce the way the Army accesses, promotes, and selects its leaders from its leadership-development model. The Army cannot expect to maintain leaders who grasp and practice adaptability if these officers encounter an organization that is neither adaptive nor innovative. Instead, Army culture must become adaptive, and the personnel system must evolve into one that nurtures adaptability in its policies, practices, and beliefs. Only a detailed, comprehensive plan where nothing is sacred will pave the way to cultural evolution..
Price: $44.95 [Notify me when price goes down.]

The Red Badge of Courage (1895) is an impressionistic novel by American author Stephen Crane. The narrator tells about a young, 19-year-old boy named Henry Fleming, a recruit in the American Civil War. The story is about the meaning of courage. Although Crane was born after the war and had never seen battle himself, the novel is one of the most influential American stories of the character of the American fighting spirit and the ultimate source of bravery, written by an American author. Crane met and spoke with a number of veterans as a student and he created what is widely regarded as an unusually realistic depiction of a young man in battle.

Source: Wikipedia.org.
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This book is designed to explain when, how, and why the Romans began a policy of allowing large, unified, and potentially troublesome groups of barbarians onto Roman soil. It is also a study in the Roman decision-making processes that resulted from the flow of local and regional information up the chain and the corresponding strategic decisions moving downward through the administrative hierarchies..
Price: $15.00 [Notify me when price goes down.]

The war in Iraq and the problematic military occupation of that country have called into question the adequacy of America's all-volunteer force. Politicians and others have expressed doubts about its equity and capability; some have called for the reinstatement of the draft. Yet over the past twenty years the all-volunteer military has become a technologically advanced force that has contributed to America's overall military advantage. This book analyzes current military pay and personnel policies and identifies changes needed to maintain and improve America's all-volunteer force.

Filling the Ranks argues that to attract qualified and motivated volunteers, the armed forces need to offer better tangible inducements—pay, benefits, and training—to accompany such intangible rewards as pride in serving one's country. Many of the policies related to tangible rewards were established shortly after World War II and are no longer effective. Filling the Ranks presents detailed assessments of US military pay and personnel policies in light of the strategic, demographic, economic, and labor realities of the future. It identifies specific problems that today's military career patterns, training, pay, and benefits pose for officers and enlisted men and women in both active duty and reserve forces, discussing such issues as competition with the private sector for talent, the need to restructure compensation, and provision of family support. It offers recommendations for more flexible, adaptive, and effective policies and a blueprint for achieving them..
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This is the story of an inner city youth who was taken into a war zone and other foreign places..
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The U.S. defense budget has grown appreciably since 9/11. But too little of the increase has gone to purchase new equipment or to increase the size of the Army and Marine Corps. The result has been a hollow buildup that makes it increasingly difficult for the U.S. military to carry out its part of America's national security strategy. The global nature of the national security strategy requires significant amounts of defense expenditures and troop levels. In this book, Tom Donnelly and Gary Schmitt, along with experts of each military branch, discuss the necessity of maintaining a larger, better equipped military..
Price: $4.53 [Notify me when price goes down.]