Portland, Oregon, is a place with magic, memory, and pain, all swirled in one. Initially we find ourselves in the shoes of a confused fellow named Luke, confused about the future, confused about the past, confused about who he is and what his purpose is. Many other folks find themselves in this pair of shoes often, but Luke takes a strange turn, setting the course for the rest of his life and the life of many others. An episodic narrative, spoken in fourteen verses. Each one with a slant and a talent, just like all humans, Dirty Peace will leave you guessing until the end.

The interplay between peace and justice plays an important role in any contemporary conflict. Peace can be described in a variety ways, as being 'negative' or 'positive', 'liberal' or 'democratic'. But what is it that makes a peace just? This book draws together leading scholars to study this concept of a 'just peace', analysing different elements of the transition from conflict to peace. The volume covers six core themes: conceptual approaches towards just peace, macro-principles, the nexus to security and stability, protection of persons and public goods, rule of law, and economic reform and accountability. Contributions engage with understudied issues, such as the pros and cons of robust UN mandates, the link between environmental protection and indigenous peoples, the treatment of illegal settlements, the feasibility of vetting practices, and the protection of labour rights in post-conflict economies. Overall, the book puts forward a case that just peace requires not only negotiation, agreement, and compromise, but contextual understandings of law, multiple dimensions of justice, and strategies of prevention. This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 International licence. It is offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations.

In the parable of the sower, Jesus foretold all the ways the world would try to reject God's Word. Rocks will be thrown at the righteous, dirty birds will try to steal your peace and assurance, and briars will try to choke out the clear truth with noise and confusion. Today, the rocks are hardened hearts that have turned from God, the dirty birds are enemies of the Gospel dispelling negative influences, and the briars are the media channels seeking to distract, confuse, and alarm. Satan uses these threats to scorch out, choke out, and steal away God's Word. Yet God is unchangeable and infallible. His Word is the seed that produces truthfulness, holiness, and obedience-and we are called to plant it, nurture it, and tend it in order to have a fruitful harvest.

James F. Dunnigan and Albert A. Nofi's Dirty Little Secrets of the Vietnam War allows us to see what really happened to American forces in Southeast Asia, separating popular myth from explosive reality in a clear, concise manner. Containing more than two hundred examinations of different aspects of the war, the book questions why the American military ignored the lessons taught by previous encounters with insurgency forces; probes the use of group think and mind control by the North Vietnamese; and explores the role technology played in shaping the way the war was fought. Of course, the book also reveals the "dirty little secrets," the truth behind such aspects of the conflict as the rise of the Montagnard mercenaries--the most feared group of soldiers participating in the secret war in Laos-and the details of the hidden struggle for the Ho Chi Minh Trail. With its unique and perceptive examination of the conflict, Dirty Little Secrets of the Vietnam War by James F. Dunnigan & Albert A. Nofi offers a critical addition to the library of Vietnam War history.

While deep in the mountains, FBI agent Richard Renault is suddenly ambushed by four men. The purpose is to stop revealing past drug trades to him. Having managed to escape death, he sets out to expose the drug ring. In addition to "Wild Hunt," which depicts the fierce struggle of the investigator, also included is "Ninja Spirit", which is set in Japan at the end of the Edo period.

After Ransom awakens in a hazy room with his hands and legs bound, he knows the voodoo witch he just met in New Orleans is now in control of his life. As he loudly proclaims he is ready to be her voodoo man, Patricia warns him to be careful what he wishes for. Moments later, the life is drained from his soul and Patricia has created her first zombie. In a collection of terrifying tales, Charles Keith Hardman once again invites others to step inside the minds of a diverse band of characters facing bizarre encounters. Lawrence knows he should be dead. The stainless steel table he lies on in the morgue is cold. All he remembers is shooting a bullet into his head. As he removes his toe tag and searches for clothes to wear, Lawrence realizes something strange is happening to him. But what will transpire once he opens the door to the morgue? After an alien spaceship crash lands in the New Mexico desert, weapons experts race to the site where they discover an alien has died. After rushing the corpse to a laboratory, the scientists take DNA samples. But what they do next is top secret. Let Me Tell You Another Story shares short tales that lead others down a frightening path lined with aliens, zombies, voodoo, and things that go bump in the night.

These original essays show how the US government repeatedly aided certain regimes as they planned and then carried out crimes against humanity and genocide. What makes the collection unique—and chilling—is the inclusion of declassified documents generated by the US government at the time: memoranda, telegrams, letters, talking points, cables, discussion papers, and situation reports. In his introduction, Totten offers a critical assessment of US foreign policy as it pertains to genocide and crimes against humanity, and discusses the differences between those two terms. In the chapters that follow, each author presents a detailed analysis of a particular case of crimes against humanity or genocide by a foreign government against its own citizens, and discusses why and how the United States government was complicit.

The third volume of the definitive political history of Northern Ireland.

‘Who is the enemy?’ This is the question most asked in modern warfare; gone are the set-piece conventional battles of the past. Once seen as secondary to more traditional conflicts, irregular warfare (as modified and refashioned since the 1990s) now presents a major challenge to the state and the bureaucratic institutions which have dominated the twentieth century, and to the politicians and civil servants who formulate policy.Twenty-first-century conflict is dominated by counterinsurgency operations, where the enemy is almost indistinguishable from innocent civilians. Battles are gunfights in jungles, deserts and streets; winning ‘hearts and minds’ is as important as holding territory. From struggles in South Africa, the Philippines and Ireland to operations in Iraq, Afghanistan and Chechnya, this book covers the strategy and doctrine of counterinsurgency, and the factors which ensure whether such operations are successful or not. Recent ignorance of central principles and the emergence of social media, which has shifted the odds in favour of the insurgent, have too often resulted in failure, leaving governments and their security forces embedded in a hostile population, immersed in costly and dangerous nation-building.