Going to the Wars

Description

'His memoirs have ... honesty, pace and readability.' Jeremy PaxmanMax Hastings grew up with romantic dreams of a life amongst warriors. But after his failure as a parachute soldier in Cyprus in 1963, he became a journalist instead. Before he was 30 he had reported conflicts in Northern Ireland, Biafra, Vietnam, Cambodia, the Middle East, Cyprus, Rhodesia, India and a string of other trouble spots. His final effort was as a war correspondent during the Falklands War. Going to the Wars is a story of his experiences reporting from these battlefields. It is also the story of a self-confessed coward: a writer with heroic ambitions who found himself recording the acts of heroes.

Sir Max Hastings, author of numerous books including Armageddon, Going to the Wars, and Das Reich, was editor of the Daily Telegraph for almost a decade, then for six years he edited the Evening Standard. In his youth he was a foreign correspondent for newspapers and BBC television. He learned his trade as a correspondent in race riots in America and amid Northern Ireland's first big clashes in 1969. He first visited Vietnam and Cambodia for BBC TV in 1970, and then went again and again, until he left Saigon for the last time by helicopter out of the American Embassy as the city fell in April 1975. In the 1973 Middle East war, he reported from the Golan Heights and the Suez front as Israel fought for its life. In Rhodesia in the early 1970s, he masqueraded as a game hunter to seek out the secrets of the Rhodesian guerrilla war, and almost retired from war corresponding after he came close to being shot in cold blood by marauding Turkish soldiers during the invasion of Cyprus in 1974.In 1982, the Falklands crises lured him back and he sailed from Southampton with the South Atlantic Task Force. He landed at San Carlos with 40 Commando, joined the SAS for a night helicopter landing on Mount Kent, reported from the Royal Navy's ships during the air battles, and romped across the island with the land force. On 14 June, he walked alone into Port Stanley ahead of the British land force in pursuit of a last great scoop. He has won many awards for his books and journalism, particularly his work in the South Atlantic in 1982. He was knighted in 2002 for services to journalism.

Max Hastings is one of the greatest living war correspondents. * John Keegan * A wonderful account of the wars of our times. -- William Shawcross * Literary Review * His memoirs have ... honesty, pace and readability. -- Jeremy Paxman The chapters on the Falklands War are ... one of the best things written about warfare in half a century. -- John Simpson * Daily Telegraph * This memoir is a first-class piece of reportage. -- Jon Swain * Sunday Times *