“A cosmic war is a religious war.”

“A cosmic war is a conflict in which God is believed to be directly engaged on one side over the other. Unlike a holy war–an earthly battle between rival religious groups–a cosmic war is like a ritual drama in which participants act out on earth a battle they believe is actually taking place in the heavens . . . the conflict may be real and the carnage material, but the war itself is being waged on a spiritual planes; we humans are merely actors in a divine script written by God.”

“A cosmic war transforms those who should be considered butchers and thugs into soldiers with no ethical concerns sanctioned by God. Instead, they are transformed, above all ethics and sanctioned by God who is directing the actions of these soldiers.”

“A cosmic war is not won through artifice or strategy but rather through the power of faith. Cosmic warriors need not be burdened by tactical concerns . . . It is enough to align one’s will with the will of God, to strike at the enemy with the full force of God’s wrath, confident that the end rests not in the hands of men.”

“. . . there is no middle ground; everyone must choose sides . . . if you are not us, you must be them. If you are them, you are the enemy and must be destroyed.”

Cosmic war has “no settlement, no negotiation and no surrender.”

Reza feels “it is time to strip this ideological conflicts of its religious connotations, to reject the religiously polarizing rhetoric of our leaders and theirs . . . and to address  the earthly issues that always lie behind the cosmic impulse.”

With eloquence and balance, Reza presents an understandable analysis of the confusing and frightening forces that confront us. He points out the need for democracy in the Middle East in order to enhance personal and religious freedom for the ultimate goal of world peace.

Reza’s Cosmic War is brilliant, timely and important. I encourage all my customers to consider reading this fine book and talk about it with your friends and share these positive concepts.

There are a lot of great WWII memoirs and histories, but the last time I was browsing the section, the book that caught my attention was an illustrated catalog of U. S. Army equipment. There are plenty of books that cover particular aspects of Army equipment — WWII planes, WWII small arms, WWII tanks, and so on. This, however, is a fully illustrated guide to essentially every piece of equipment the Army used during WWII, complete with technical specifications, from Howitzers to bicycles. Want to compare the internal mechanisms of the various artillery fuzes? Check pages 338 through 353 — there’s descriptions and specifications for each fuze, plus cutaway drawings.

Sadly, this book is no longer in print. This may be your last chance to get a new copy — but even if you miss this opportunity, come check out the rest of our WWII books.

In May of this year I had the good fortune of getting an early reading galley of The Forever War. I was taken back by its reality- “eyes on the ground”.

The Forever War is non-judgmental. It is journalism brought forth from the eyes and mind of a soul I could believe. I felt what Dexter saw and I could see what he felt for others in their situation. Not since Dispatches and Loyd’s My War Gone By has war journalism struck me so powerfully.

Another pal Robert Stone wrote a brilliant front page New York Times essay about war journalism praising Dexter’s work and stating in an explaining way Forever War’s place in American war literary history.

I passed by this book several times before I finally picked it up and started reading through it. The market is saturated with personal memoirs and political critiques of the Bush Administration’s handling of the Afghanistan and Iraq wars, and unfortunately a lot of those books aren’t terribly unique, well-written, or interesting. I don’t think John Agresto’s Mugged by Reality is going to be THE book about Iraq, but I think it’s well ahead of the field and deserves to be read.

Agresto has several points about Iraq, but the central theme that resonated with me was the assertion that, contrary to popular opinion, our failure was not that we did not carefully consider the cultural and religious differences of the Iraqi people — our failure is that we focused too much on those issues, and didn’t recognize the basic human reality of the situation. In an effort to respect their “Iraqi-ness”, we lost sight of their basic humanity and the needs of a people suffering under a tyrant. As time passes and we gain perspective on the war, I can’t help but think that this may well prove to be one of the biggest failures of the war effort.