No comments about Toronto Between the Wars: Life in the City 1919-1939.

1 comments about Besieged: A Doctor's Story of Life and Death in Beirut.

1. This book is an account of the seige of Shatila refugee camp in Beirut in 1987-1988. Giannou was sent to the camp by the Palestinian Red Crescent Society in 1986 to set up and run a field hospital to serve the camp during the coming siege. Giannou, a Canadian by passport of Greek heritage, had had too much experience serving in war zones before, having been a camp surgeon during the Israeli invasion. In 1986, he flew into Lebanon, was surreptitiously brought into the Shatila camp, and did not leave the camp again for 27 months. As Giannou explains it, the word `camp' is a misnomer, since the refugee families had constructed permanent homes in the district many years before. Shatila was more accurately a ghetto within urban Beirut. The enemy forces surrounding the camp were the Amal militia, a Shi'ite faction who sought to eliminate Palestinian influence in Lebanese politics by attacking the refugee camps in Beirut.
   
   The book is a page-turner, leaving the reader constantly wondering whether Shatila will have the wherewithal to survive the siege. The book is quite informative about the situation of Palestinians in Lebanon during the 1980s. I found it quite surprising to read that the enemies of the Palestinians in this battle were other Arabs, rather than Israelis, and that the Palestinians were not united behind the PLO, but rather divided into numerous factions, many of which fought against the PLO forces even during the siege. Giannou does an excellent job of explaining the vastly complicated politics behind the battle as well as describing the horrid conditions that the residents of the camp managed to live through.

No comments about Slumach's Gold: In Search of a Legend.

1 comments about A Scattering of Seeds: The Creation of Canada.

1. A wonderfully written book that reads with ease. It is a compilation of stories of Canadian Immigrants who perservered in a rustic, new country to help lay the foundation of Canada. A must read for all those interested in Canadian history.

3 comments about Bull's Eye: The Assassination and Life of Supergun Inventor Gerald Bull.

1. I'll admit, when I got bought this book and began reading it I was quite prepared to dislike Doctor Gerald Bull, the designer of Saddam Hussein's "supergun." After all, what kind of mad scientist would consent to work for a madman like Saddam?
   
   Instead of portraying Bull as a 2-dimensional figure the author really made him, if not a sympathetic character then certainly an understandable one. A Canadian patriot, Bull found himself and his work increasingly marginalized. Even after the success of the HARP Project, a joint U.S.-Canadian project which sent a gun-launched projectile higher than any had ever gone before, Bull found himself out of place, a genius when it cam to guns in a world where guided missiles seemed poised to take over the battlefield.
   
   His imprisonment for breaking South African sanctions after designing guns and shells for them made him more interested in money than in political niceties. With the Iran-Iraq War going on no one seemed to have as much money to throw around as Saddam did and so his company went to work for Saddam, helping extend the range of his Scud missiles and coming up with a design for the biggest gun in the world.
   
   This is a great book. It reads like a novel but it all really happened.



2. This was a very good book. I bought the book wanting to learn more about Iraq, but got a lot more. The details of the efforts to launch satellites using a super gun was very interesting and the details of artillery gave me insights I did not have before. I was very interested in the contacts he made, South Africa, Israel, China and Iraq and the fact that the US for the most part created him. There are a good amount of facts that seem well put together. The writing is good and there are a good amount of pictures that really help tell the story. I think it is interesting to read this book and some of the other books about the Iraq process to gather WMD arms - the two would have fit together perfectly. I would have liked the author to focus a bit more on what the purposes the Iraq's were going o use the super gun for. If you are interested in these topics then this book is well worth the time.



3. well researched, well written, not too biased, very well researched. A really interesting, good book about a brillient inventer

5 comments about Memoirs.

1. In retrospect history will judge Trudeau as an unmitigated disaster for Canada. Many mistook his arrogance and aloofness for intellectual stature. The only thing greater than the sycophantic love displayed by some Canadians for Trudeau was his absolute contempt for Canadian voters.



2. J'ai trouvé ceci pour être le regard très instructif sur sa vie et sa carrière. J'apprécié les parties de Québec et le FLQ.

   M. Trudeau a fourni une touche personnelle ici qu'il a fait rarement. Comme un Fédéraliste vous ferez apperciate ces comptes.

   Excuser ma mauvaise écriture de français.

   Apprécier!

   I found this to be very informative look on his life and career. I espically enjoyed the parts about Québec and the FLQ.

   Mr. Trudeau provided a personal touch here which he rarely did. As a Federalist you will apperciate these accounts.

   Excuse my bad french writing.

   Enjoy!




3. I found this to be very informative look on his life and career. I espically enjoyed the parts about Québec and the FLQ.

   Mr. Trudeau provided a personal touch here which he rarely did. As a Federalist you will apperciate these accounts.

   Excuse my bad french writing.

   Enjoy.

   J'ai trouvé ceci pour être le regard très instructif sur sa vie et sa carrière. J'apprécié les parties de Québec et le FLQ.

   M. Trudeau a fourni une touche personnelle ici qu'il a fait rarement. Comme un Fédéraliste vous ferez apperciate ces comptes.

   Excuser ma mauvaise écriture de français.

   Apprécier.




4. This is as fine a memoir as one could expect from a man who kept his secret self so distant from others that one suspects he sometimes found the line difficult to cross himself. Trudeau was not only the most intelligent prime minister Canada ever had, but probably the most brilliant (intellectually speaking) statesman any nation ever had. However, his mind went to places that were not always to do with the ebb & flow of politics. It is unfortunate that this memoir does not tell us more about the man's secret self. I don't mean just gossip column things; I refer to his thoughts on life, literature, & art: topics on which anyone who knew him recognized his mastery. The book is brilliant too, but I suggest that it requires some reading between the lines to catch at what Monsieur Trudeau only hints. It's his truth from the inside, after all, so he shouldn't be expected to see himself "objectively" & account for the way he was seen by others. This can be uncomfortable sometimes. For example, when he was nearly defeated in the first election after "Trudeaumania" in 1972 because he attempted to be straight, true, & honest with the Canadian public, he roared back playing the "promise'em the world" consumate politician in 1974 to a majority government. I would have wished for more third person objectivity here. Still Trudeau was a giant mind & a giant will-power amongst mental idiots & usual politicoes during his tenure. I believe he has the right to do just what he did in this magnificent memoir: Speak from the heights & tell it as he alone saw it. Bravo! We'll not see his like again.



5. Although always a controversial man, P.E.T. embodied what it means to be a Canadian. Over his 16 years as Prime Minister he was directly involved in many major events which have shaped Canadian history. I write this the day after his passing, so in consequence I am probably a little biased. I grew up with Trudeau. The first 11 years of my life he was P.M. I could go on and on with the memories, as some have suggested he did with his Memoirs. However, that was the beauty of Trudeau. He was a brilliant man and loved life.

   In answer to the comment from the reader in Toronto that he glossed over many not so stellar performances on his part - have you ever read another auto-biography of a public figure which told the whole truth and nothing but? There are many sides to a story. I would challenge anyone to write about their lives and not smooth certain parts over abit!

   All in all Trudeau takes us through his tenure as P.M. in one of the most exciting periods in recent human history - 1968-1984. Anyone who is interested in world or Canadian affairs should read this book. And it's a must for every Canadian household.

1 comments about Arthur Ewert.

1. My grandfather wrote this book, so I'm probably a little partial. I only got a copy signed by him a short while back before he passed away, and I am thrilled at the way Ewert is described. From when he met his love, to when he met his fate. This book burrows deep into Comintern activity, and since the author worked for the CIA, is very true. It does, at times, say what Ewert was thinking, and it is doubtful that these feelings are correct. It gives an excellent definition of Ewert, but not much of anyone else. The book advances quickly, with Ewert going through his teens into his twentys in the first chapter. This is a good book for anyone who likes reading about spies (albiet it is not James Bond) and communism.

No comments about My Friends Call Me C.C..

2 comments about Cross-Border Warriors: Canadians in American Forces, Americans in Canadian Forces : From the Civil War to the Gulf.

1. Canadian military historian Fred Gaffen's book Cross Border Warriors attempts to fill in the gaps in Canadian and American military history. He shares detailed anecdotes of the Americans who fought in the Royal Canadian Forces and the Canadians who fought for the American military, while grounding their stories deep in a macro-historical analysis of the conflicts and cooperation between the two nations. He recognizes both the strong anti-American sentiment in Canada and the occasional fear of Americans that Canada was about to attack the U.S. Ultimately, he wants to tell the stories of the 60,000 American and Canadian citizens who served in each other's armed forces since 1812.

   Gaffen begins with the American Civil War, which is commonly thought of as an American only conflict, but it had a definite impact on Canada as well, not only because many Canadians served in the American Union and Confederate armies, but because the civil war was the backdrop for Canadian confederation. As skeptical as Canada's founding fathers were of the civil unrest in the United States, many Canadians "with a taste for adventure " enlisted in the American forces both North and South. Many Canadians also fell prey to crimpers from the States who enticed them under false pretenses or even drugs and alcohol to join the war in the States, usually taking the place of someone rich enough to buy his way out of service.

   Crimping occurred on both sides of the border, however, and in World War I before the U.S. joined the war, Americans were crimped into duty for the Canadians. The American Foreign Enlistment Act of 1818 was supposed to prevent such abuses in recruiting, and it was finally enforced and the crimping came to a halt. Canada joined WWI in 1914, two and a half years before the U.S., and since the U.S. was officially neutral, it could not compel or explicitly let its men fight for the Canadians.

   However, Canadian minister of defense Sam Hughes assembled a brigade of Americans living in Canada to fight overseas, and then when America joined the war, an agreement was reached that Canada, the U.S., and Britain could all draft each other's citizens into any of their armed forces. Many Americans chose to join the British Air Force for the chance to fly.

   It is interesting to note that despite this seemingly open cooperation and trust between the two countries during WWI, the U.S. and Canada both had contingency plans in case of attack or invasion by the other or by Britain before World War II. When Canada entered WWII, many Americans crossed the border to join the Canadian Air Force Special Reserve, which they could do without losing their citizenship. They would take an oath of obedience to the Canadian army, but not an oath of allegiance, and therefore retain their American citizenship. However, when the U.S. entered the war in 1941, many Americans returned to the U.S. forces because of national pride and better compensation.

   Canada also had the Clayton Knight committee dedicated to recruiting American pilots to fly for the Royal Canadian Air Force, which many Americans joined because of the more relaxed education and training requirements.

   Canadian participation in American conflicts in Korea, Vietnam, and the Persian Gulf was much less pronounced, mostly because of the smaller scale of these wars and less need for foreign soldiers. Canada did send a brigade of its own to fight in Korea, but most Canadians who fought in that war did so under U.S. command. Generally, Canadian Korea veterans had a much more positive experience than Canadian Vietnam veterans. Many Canadians went to fight for the U.S. in Vietnam seeking glory and adventure, but they were sadly disappointed, and most felt "used and abandoned by the American government." More Canadian veterans than American suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder caused by the horrors of Vietnam and they receive less public support. Canadian Vietnam veterans face considerable hostility from the Canadian public, and they are treated even more as outcasts than American Vietnam veterans in the U.S. Canadian involvement in the Persian Gulf war was limited mostly to Canadians already living in the U.S. or special forces assigned to help with the battle.

   Through detailed historical facts and personal anecdotes, Fred Gaffen makes an important contribution to the often neglected soldiers who fought across borders in the past two centuries. He provides the recognition that these brave men and women deserve and have often not received. He emphasizes the important and lasting ties that veterans from Canada and the United States keep to this day, and hopes that the two countries will continue their friendly relations and willingness to help a neighbor in times of crisis.




2. Gaffen shows our guys serving in each other's armed forces from the War of Northern Agression, through the World Wars, Korea, Vietnam and the Gulf.

   Gaffen begins each section with a history of the conflict.The first part brings to us the lives of Canadians who served in the Federal Army, including several Medal of Honour winners, and details how Canada was a tacit ally of the Confederate States of America. This part also tells the stories of several Americans who served in the Canadian Expeditionary Force during 1914-1918, including author Raymond Chandler and several Victoria Cross winners. The 1939-45 section begins with Americans in the RAF and RCAF, and goes on to the accounts of several Americans and Canadians serving in each other's militaries, including the only member of the US Coast Guard to win the Medal of Honour. The Korea part is shorter, but does briefly mention one American from New Jersey who was KIA while serving with the Royal Canadian Regiment. The Vietnam chapter is patterned after Gaffen's previous book <>, and includes two of Canada's greatest heros, Fidele Joseph Bastarache, and Michael John "Bat" Masterson. The Gulf section discusses two Canadians who served in the US military during that war. The appendices on Canadian Medal of Honour recipients (including some from the Indian Campaigns, the Spanish American War, The Mexican capaign against Pancho Villa and others in between), Canadian casualties of Vietnam, Medal of Honour recipients buried in Canada, and American recipients of the Victoria Cross are informative and inspiring.

   The only thing Gaffen missed was the death of US Special Forces Sergeant Robert Deeks, killed by a landmine on 2, March 1993, while serving with the Canadian Airborne Regiment in Somalia. However, this can hardly be a fault or a flaw in the book, as Gaffen was probably doing the research or writing during that time frame.

   This is a very heartwarming and inspiring book. In an era when Canadian politicians and wrestlers, and Canadian and American sports fans work very hard to foment enmity between our people, Gaffen's book reminds us that we have a lot more in common than a border and a language. Gaffen also shows he truly cares about the people of which he writes, expressing his personal support for the cause of Canadian Vietnam Veterans. Given that Gaffen works for the Government (the Canadian War Museum), this took guts.

   A very informative and touching tome. I would make it required reading in high school history classes on both sides of the border.

No comments about Somewhere Waiting: The Life and Art of Christiane Pflug.