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At What Cost II: Voices from the Battlefield of Afghanistan

What is the price of freedom in the Land of the Free?Between 9/11 and the 2021 US withdrawal from Afghanistan, more than 1.9 million American troops served around 3 million tours of duty as part of Operation Enduring Freedom. Beyond this staggering statistic are stories of real men and women who became embroiled in a complex conflict that would change their lives forever.In At What Cost II: Voices from the Battlefield of Afghanistan, veteran J.J. Ainsworth gives voice to these troops while reexamining the effects of what has been infamously known as America's longest war.This second volume of a 2-book series offers an incisive look into the War in Afghanistan through the lens of a diverse group of soldiers who lived through it all. Spanning 2 decades, it is a collection of interviews and firsthand accounts, including the author's own, which ultimately paints a vivid and nuanced portrait of life and service in the so-called Graveyard of Empires.While Book I walked readers through key moments of the 20-year war, this second volume is more personal and layered. Here, the narrators take us through the rigors of pre-deployment, the crossfires of battle, the heartbreak of loss, and the bittersweet taste of coming home irrevocably changed by their combat experience.Ainsworth writes with clarity and does not give her own indictment of the conflict. Rather, she leaves it to the readers to reflect upon the war's objectives, challenges, gains, and eventual outcome. She sticks to the facts, providing rare glimpses into an embattled, politically convoluted landscape. All the while, she touches on universal themes of courage, sacrifice, duty, fellowship, and loss.At What Cost II: Voices from the Battlefield of Afghanistan is an eye-opening and essential account of a war that defined the beginning of the 21st century.Read more

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