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Post by Keith Heitmann on Feb 1, 2005 23:37:59 GMT -5
I've always been a fan of "what if" WWIII books like Red Storm Rising, The Ten Thousand, First Clash, Sword Point, Bright Star, etc.
So I just ordered a couple of paperbacks from Amazon called "Tin Soldiers" and "Iron Tigers" which are in the same vein. They should be arriving as early as tomorrow. Both are stories about armored warfare in the "next war".
I'll post more once I start to read them.
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Post by Keith Heitmann on Feb 2, 2005 6:32:35 GMT -5
I had RSR for my old Tandy 1000TX and later for a C64 which I bought used for amatuer radio use but never got around to using it for anything but games. 
I still have both games and the C64 computer. I let my wife get rid of the 1000TX a couple of years ago.
I have all the computer games I ever bought or acquired dating back to 1978 when they were only on cassette tapes. ;D
My eyes give me a bit a problem now too, so reading is more difficult. I can't read at all with either pair of glasses I have (my old ones and my newer ones that I got last year.) In fact I read much easier without my glasses on at all.
I'll probably dig into one of the books as soon as they arrive, which should be soon, since Amazon said they shipped them on Monday.
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Phil Walker
Scharfuehrer
VERY opinionated. Best stay away from. You've been warned!!!
Posts: 251
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Post by Phil Walker on Feb 2, 2005 9:08:10 GMT -5
Well it does sound interesting so do let me know. As to glasses, I KNOW what you are saying. However in my situation, my eyesight is but 20/200 without in both near and a bit worse for far. They say they can't do anything with the far, but I have THICK magnifiers for reading. Works OK, BUT not good enough to read. Only to 20/30 but not for small print. I use them for online and you know my frustration about small print on the net, so you can guess. In reality I NEED about size 16 characters for reading and have YET to see ANY book with that big of print. Close, but no cigar   !!!
As far as my older computers, I only started when the C64 was out and being the cheapest and some of the games they had, thought it a good start. Wasn't even into them when the cassettes were popular, but still have all of what I had for it too, including a BBS program I had configurred with a 512k Ram expander, 3 SFD1001's (1 meg floppies) and 2 1541's (170k floppies, the "normal" drives), all at 2400BAUD. Not bad but SLOW compared to today ;D  !!!
Sincerely,
Phil
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Post by Keith Heitmann on Feb 2, 2005 16:55:03 GMT -5
Remember that if you have a mouse with a center scroll wheel, hold down the CTRL key and move the scroll wheel to change the font size on the pages you view on line.
I know this works with my Microsoft Intelipoint mouse. I rarely use it myself but it does come in handy.
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Post by Keith Heitmann on Feb 3, 2005 6:47:19 GMT -5
Well, my books arrived late yesterday afternoon and I found the time to sit down and start reading "Tin Soldiers". I haven't gotten very far as yet, but here's the situation so far....
We have a young M1A1 tank platoon lieutenant, who loses half his troop during a move on night maneuvers, fails to report it to the CO in a timely manner, then pulls a bonehead move by ordering his tanks over the top of a hill at night to get to a rally point on time. Naturally he and his wingman tank get "killed" immediately by Bradleys with TOWS.
His CO, doesn't chew him out because he's got new problems to think about, thus establishing him as the kindly wise, but firm, commander in the story.
Then we have the ever evil new leader of Iraq that has allied himself with Iran to invade Kuwait once again.
The President sizes up the situation and orders reinforcements to the area, but it will take time. There is only one heavy mechinized brigade in Kuwait at the present, along with the Kuwaiti army and their M1A2s, but they are the "export" versions without the super armor the US tanks have.
......that's about it so far. Pretty stock formula at this point, which is what I expected.
The print is a reasonable size and the book is a quick read so far.
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PUFF88
Scharfuehrer
Posts: 388
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Post by PUFF88 on Feb 3, 2005 10:09:49 GMT -5
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Phil Walker
Scharfuehrer
VERY opinionated. Best stay away from. You've been warned!!!
Posts: 251
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Post by Phil Walker on Feb 3, 2005 10:43:00 GMT -5
I'll take it under advisement. SHOULD they put it on CD, it doesn't have to be an audio. MANY of them that are visual you can adjust the fonts to suit your needs, so that WOULD suffice, but we shall see!
Sincerely,
Phil
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Post by Keith Heitmann on Feb 4, 2005 8:51:19 GMT -5
I'm now about halfway through the book "Tin Soldiers" at Chapter 11. At this point things have heated up. The various characters have all been introduced to the read and the battle is now underway.
On the one side we have the Iraqi army eager to avenge their humiliation at the hands of the Americans in the Gulf Wars and now equipped with a "equalizer" (my term) that will let them deall successfully with the once nearly invulnerable M1A1s of the Americans. Another question hinted at is whether or not the Iraqis will become desperate enough to unleash their chemical arsenal on the Americans.
The U.S. forces have deployed into their postions and after some taking some losses in men and combat vehicles and dishing out some tremendous punishment of their own in the early engagements have managed to hold the line and are awaiting the Iraqi next move.
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Post by Keith Heitmann on Feb 5, 2005 7:44:40 GMT -5
The battle rages on. The U.S. forces are maintaining control of the battlefield and anticipating the Iraqi moves, artillery and air strikes are holding up the Iraqi trail divisions allowing the Americans to deal with the enemy one division at a time.
After one battle a rescue mission is mounted to retrieve a chopper pilot that was shot down coming to the aid of one of the brigade's units preventing it from being overrun.
The battle sequences of the book are described adequately in good detail and keep you engaged although it's probably not the best I've ever read in comparison to the likes of Clancy and Coyle. The book doesn't bog down in a lot of behind the scene plot lines in Washington D.C. or Baghdad and keeps moving along at a good clip.
Having read so many other books like this already, there really isn't much new in the overall plot that I haven't seen before, but it's a entertaining book to read and well worth the time, if you have the time.
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Post by Keith Heitmann on Feb 6, 2005 10:01:09 GMT -5
I finished Tin Soldiers last night. The book was a quick read for me. Usually a book that size might take me a week to finish since I tend to only read about 30 pages or a chapter per session.
Needless to say, the Americans win. The story does seem to come to a rather abrupt end just as I was getting into it. Still it was worth the time taken to read it.
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Post by Keith Heitmann on Feb 7, 2005 9:16:50 GMT -5
Well, for the price of paperbacks it was worth what I paid for it.
I'm a couple of chapters into the sequel "Iron Tigers" now.
In "Iron Tigers" the Saudis have kicked the U.S. out and have allied themselves with the Russians which are now a member of Opec and in the process of restoring old Soviet institutions and government. The U.S. is allied with the democratic Islamic goverment of Iraq and Kuwait.
So far its mostly been review for people that hadn't read "Tin Soldiers" and the introduction of the major characters.
The Brigade is now armed with M1A2-SEPs instead of their old M1A1s and as a result it has been downsized by a platoon to 44 tanks on the theory that the new tanks can make up for the fewer numbers.
Tensions along the Iraqi-Sauid border on the rise as both the US/IRAQ and Saudis/Russia hold "maneuvers" near each other along the border.
That's about it for now.
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! On my "old dinosaur" computer, being a Commodore 64, I HAD the game Red Storm Rising so that "what if" era is of interest to me too!!!
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