No More Heroes: Madness and Psychiatry In War

New York: Hill and Wang - A Division of Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1988. Second Printing . Trade Paperback. Near Fine. 6" x 9. Harrison, Jack - Design. 179 Pages. No defects noted and interior text pages are flawless. Laid in is an interesting letter to the previous owner with an extensive review of this book. An astonishing report on combat's psychological tolls the author, an army intelligence officer-turned-academician sounds a startling note here. War has become an activity that has surpassed the ability of human beings to endure it. He arrays substantial and convincing evidence to support this assertion, beginning with a horrifying inventory of contemporary nonnuclear weaponry. driving home the point that conventional warfare is now 600 percent more destructive than during WWII. He goes on to examine the symptoms of psychological collapse in war, then looks at governments' strenuous but largely futile attempts to stave off these symptoms and their underlying causes. A frightening summary of on-going research into stress-preventive chemicals follows chemicals that transform soldiers into fighting machines, but at the sacrifice of their humanity. This powerful book deserves a wide audience. The author is professor of politics at St. Anselm College in Manchester, N.H., served twenty-two years as an active intelligence officer, much of it spent at the Directorate of Foreign Intelligence in the Pentagon. A consultant to the House and Senate Armed Services Committees, he is the author of numerous books on military subjects, including Operation Peace for Galilee, Military Incompetence, and Crisis in Command. Contents: Introduction, The Face of Modern War, War and Madness, War and the Limits of Human Endurance, Psychiatry in War, The Chemical Soldier, No More War, and Notes.