Carrier: A Guided Tour of an Aircraft Carrier (Tom Clancy's Military Reference)

The Barnes & Noble ReviewClancy on Deck ''This is 4.5 acres of sovereign U.S. territory.'' — Rear Admiral Michael Mullen, Commander, George Washington Battle Group Admiral Mullen's quote, which introduces one of Tom Clancy's chapters, captures in a short, quick phrase the essence of the aircraft carrier, both its form and its function. Its 4.5-acre flight deck (the equivalent of more than four football fields) overwhelms the imagination and impresses upon the reader what a massive war machine a carrier is. And by asserting the ''sovereignty'' of the carrier, it calls to mind the absolute resolve of the U.S. military mission. A carrier takes no crap. To help those interested cope with the scale of a carrier's operation, Carrier takes the reader on a detailed tour of the ship and goes in great depth into the role of the carrier in the armed forces. The standard awe-inspiring information is all there (a carrier is as tall as a 24-story building, has a combined ship and air crew of more than 6,000, and can carry and launch 80 aircraft), but Clancy's tour is aimed at the fan who wants much, much greater depth and much, much more jargon. The 13-page glossary at the back of the book (from ''A-12'' to ''XO,'' with more arcane and colloquial entries along the way, such as ''GBU-29/30/31/32 JDAM'' and ''pucker factor'') is an essential guide for the novice, though even with that help, CARRIER can be a dense, technical read: ''Joint Task Force Exercise (JTFEX) 97-3 — Run over three weeks in late August and early September of 1997, JTFEX 97-3 was a 'final exam' for the combinedGWCVBG/CVW/ARG/MEU (SOC) team.'' But whereas a casual fan may lose interest, a military buff will revel. Clancy spends almost 70 pages detailing the aircraft you find aboard a carrier and their armaments. He includes a fascinating 50-page chapter on ''Building the Boats,'' a process that makes the Hoover Dam's construction seem like an afternoon of Lego play. Here, mercifully, Clancy opts more for a detail of the process than a rundown of the engineering specs, a flood of numbers that would surely drown all but the most qualified technician. And, of course, because this is Tom Clancy, the text flows smoothly and quickly. Clancy's interview with Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Jay Johnson reads like the novelist's research notes for one of his thrillers. The final chapter is an informed but fictionalized projection of what a carrier's job will be in 2016. This chapter is one of Clancy's thrillers. —Greg Sewell— Barnesandnoble.com

tom Clancy, The Bestselling Author Of Fiction Thrillers Such As rainbow Six And Nonfiction Military Tales Like into The Storm, Takes The Reader On A Richly Detailed Tour Of The Largest, Most Powerful Weapon In The World: A United States Aircraft Carrier.

publishers Weekly

hot On The Heels Of His Most Recent Fiction Bestseller, Rainbow Six, Comes This Latest Addition To Clancy's Hardware Series (submarine, fighter Wing, Etc.). This Time, The Man In The Hat Shows Readers Around The Modern Navy Aircraft Carrier. Part Tutorial, Part Journal, With A Short Story Thrown In For Good Measure, This Is Something Of A Boy's Own Album To Be Read And Savored At Leisure. Clancy's Softball Interview Of The Chief Of Naval Operations, Admiral Jay Johnson, Is A Skimmer, But Clancy Fans Will Relish Much Else In This Heavily Illustrated Guide. There's A Military Officer Rank Table To Help Neophytes Wade Through The Difficult Navy Ranks, Which Differ From Those Of The Other Services; A Guide To Carrier Battle Group Departments And Their Mind-muddling Acronyms; And Gorgeous Diagrams Of Such Staples As The F-14d Tomcat Fighter-bomber. The Highlight Is A Journal Recording Events Of August 1997, When Clancy And His Researcher And Project Partner Accompany The Navy On An Exercise Modeled After The 1990 Invasion Of Kuwait By Iraq. From This Vantage, Clancy Reports On Hair-raising Games Of Chicken Between Ships And On The Impact Of E-mail On Crew Members' Morale. Noting That, Since The End Of The Cold War, U.s. Navy Surface Forces Have Not Had A Serious Enemy, Clancy Candidly Describes His Own Initial Misgivings About U.s. Naval Capabilities. But What He Sees While Watching The Exercise Changes His Mind: Our Surface Navy Still Has 'the Right Stuff.' Designed For Readers Who Agree Wholeheartedly With That Assessment, Carrier Will Be Pure Candy To The Large Corps Of Clancy Devotees.
fyi: The Broadcast On Abc Of Clancy's New Miniseries, Net Force, Coincides With Publication Of This Book.

The latest entry in The New York Times best-selling series of Clancy nonfiction. An in-depth look at life aboard the greatest weapon ever constructed -- an aircraft carrier. Annotation. They are floating cities with crews of thousands. They are the linchpins of any military strategy, for they provide what has become the key to every battle fought since World War I: air superiority. The mere presence of a U.S. naval carrier in a region is an automatic display of strength that sends a message no potential enemy can ignore. Now, Tom Clancy welcomes you aboard for a detailed look at how these floating behemoths function. With his trademark style and eye for detail, Clancy brings you naval combat strategy like no one else can. Carrier includes: Takeoffs and landings: flying into the danger zone. The aircraft onboard: their range, their power, their weaponry. The role of the carrier in modern naval warfare. Exclusive photographs, illustrations and diagrams Plus: An interview with the U.S. Navy's Chief of Naval Operations, Admiral Jay Johnson Naval Aviation 101 Hands on the helm: an interview with Admiral Jay Johnson Wings of gold: a naval aviator's life Building the boats Tools of the trade: birds and bombs Carrier battle group: putting it all together Final examination: JTFEX 97-3 Aircraft carriers in the real world.