A truly brutal book. This is not a story of glory or honor or even victory. This is a story of danger, deception, terror, bloodshed, hardship, and loss. Alexander the Great had defeated armies and empires, but he would find in the mountains of Afghanistan his greatest challenge. Fighting an unseen enemy who knew the treacherous terrain from centuries surviving in it, Alexander the Great was forced to fight on the Afghan clans terms, and it had devastating results. The bloodbath that last nearly three years left the area depleted and ravaged with little changed except for the number of lives lost. Fighting in terrain that has stopped great armies throughout history and fighting a culture that was steeped in deception and brutality, Alexander's armies fought through tremendous hardship to wring a tentative peace with the native clans. The culture difference is truly staggering. It reminds me of Gurney Halleck's line in Dune when speaking of the Harkonnens, "They're not human, they're brutal!" The deception, violence, and brutality taught by their culture makes you realize why the region has been so difficult to either conquer or change. This book does an amazing job showing you the terrible struggle that took place in those mountains, and the consequences of a war like that to an individual soldier.

Read this book in 2007, and its a standalone book about Alexander the Great's campaign in Afghanistan.

This tale is set in the years 330 until 327 BC, and in this tale the highlight will be Matthias, a young man who has volunteered for this campaign in Afghanistan.

Matthias and the rest of the Macedonian army will meet in this Afghan Campaign an enemy who's fighting is so unorthodox that at first it will confuse the Macedonians.

An enemy who will die for their held beliefs and thus a fervent willingness to die for their cause, and in this new kind of war Matthias and his comrades will come into their own as long as the war continues.

In this tale is wonderfully pictured the Afghan landscape, and the dangers that will arise from all sides that the Macedonian of Alexander the Great have to deal with, and all these actions against and negotiating with a ferocious enemy are superbly brought to us by the author.

Highly recommended, for this is a marvellous book about the Afghan Campaign by Alexander the Great, and that's why I like to call this book: "An Awesome Afghan Campaign"!

What else can I say about Steven Pressfield that I have not already. Militarily as historical fiction goes he is hands down the greatest writer of his time. The Afghan Campaign is exactly on par with all his other masterpieces. A book you will not want to put down, one you wake up thinking about, and when you finish you automatically want another of his books to read. The story is of Alexander The Greats battles in Afghanistan told by Matthias, an young infantryman in his army. The stories told parallel today’s quagmire and if any in their service we’re alive today they’d probably say “we’ve already done that” right alongside the British and the Soviets. Pressfield’s writing is so detailed, so so descriptive, and writing so fluid you tend to feel as if your right there in it with these soldiers of antiquity. This is true of the four other books I’ve read of his. I guarantee you will feel the same. Tides Of War, Gates Of Fire, The Virtues Of War (Alexander’s quest from Greece to his death), and Last Of The Amazons. All of which I thought started slow and were difficult to read at first (because of the names and slang he uses) but after an hour or so you begin to realize the depth of his genius. If you enjoy military books of any era, fiction or not, from foot soldiers view to generals perspective, take the time to read Steven Pressfields books. You will not be let down.

I loved Pressfield's Gates of Fire, but this wasn't anywhere near as good. It's a (highly fictionalized, often very anachronistic) historical account of a new soldier joining Alexander the Great's invasion and conquest of Afghanistan. There are a lot of areas where the story is force-fit to make parallels with British and US (and maybe Russian?) campaigns in Afghanistan, but also a lot of places where the anachronisms (extensive literacy? paper letters and mail for soldiers?) just seemed gratuitous.

The description of combat was suitably gory and disgusting, the bravery of selected characters well highlighted, etc., but really nothing unexpected or exceptional -- this was a decent novel in the genre but not interesting outside of historical military fiction. As someone who is interested in Afghanistan/Afghanistan invasion history, as well as Alexander, I'd still probably skip this in favor of a different classical military account (perhaps the Anabasis of Xenophon? Into the Land of Bones?). If you like Pressfield, just read Gates of Fire.

Novela histórica con mensaje crítico intemporal.-

Género. Novela histórica.

Lo que nos cuenta. Durante la noche de bodas de Alejandro con la hija de Oxiartes, que traerá paz a una zona en la que entraron los macedonios para una campaña de tres meses y llevan tres años de combates y escaramuzas, Matías y sus compañeros van a llevar a cabo un crimen para evitar más derramamiento de sangre debido a costumbres tribales locales. Matías es un soldado bisoño que se incorporó a las fuerzas de Alejandro como parte de un contingente de reemplazo y fue descubriendo que la guerra es más horrible de lo que podía suponer.

¿Quiere saber más de este libro, sin spoilers? Visite:

http://librosdeolethros.blogspot.com/...

The use of modern idiom dilutes the story's impact.

Many writers can tell a good story, teach you a bit of history and even make you like their protagonist. Only a special few can re-create a world, breathe life into it, and have you marching next to the hero and his comrades, sharing their dreams and weeping with them when disaster strikes.

Steven Pressfield does more than just tell the story of Alexander's Afghan Campaign; he uses it as a backdrop for studying the psychological makeup that soldiers trained for conventional warfare must develop when forced to fight a long guerrilla war. The concepts of self-sacrifice, camaraderie, and duty are the thematic core of this historic novel.

The Afghan Campaign is written from the point of view of a new soldier. During the war against the Persians, Matthias joins the Macedonian army hoping to emulate the exploits of his brothers. However, he is too late to join in the glorious battles against the Persians. Instead he arrives in the Hindu Kush, after the Darius's main armies have been destroyed. But the war is far from over for the the Bactrians, Dahae and Scythians refuse to roll over. They won't allow Alexander free passage through their lands to invade India. Thus the Macedonians are forced to subdue the resistance, and they have to do it the hard way because this enemy will not stand still to be flattened by the phalanx.

Over the course of the campaign, Matthias matures from a naive rookie to a cynical veteran. He sees hardship, victory and loss. Friends are killed in barbaric ways and he takes part in atrocities that make him sick. And at the end, when he is ready to go home with the riches and bonuses he has earned, tragedy strikes and...

Just check it out for yourself.

If you want to know what a soldier thinks, lives, and feels, read this book. The times and technologies have changed, but the principles have really not.

As I was reading this I kept being pulled forward into the present-day and the current conflict in Afghanistan. Someone once said that all wars are the same... maybe all wars in Afghanistan are identical?

I enjoyed this novel.

This historical novel is about Alexander the Great's invasion of Afghanistan in 330 B.C. It's the one place where Alexander's army met with less than total success. More than once they invaded an area only to learn that their enemy had mysteriously appeared in their rear. This was frustrating to an army that knew they were the best in the world and were used to conquering any force that confronted them. This book is an amplification of one of the chapters of the book, The Virtues of War: A Novel of Alexander the Great by the same author. The narrative of this book is told in first person from the point of view of a corporal in Alexander's cavalry (he's a foot soldier part of the time).

It's interesting to try to find parallels with more recent occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan by a foreign power. See if you and detect some similarities.
1. Alexander's forces were a western undefeated super power that was relatively high tech for their time. (Think shock and awe.)
2. Alexander's campaign arrogantly invaded the country, ignorant of its culture. (Think Bush-Cheney-Rumsfeld's world view.)
3. Alexander prematurely declared victory. (Think "Mission Accomplished" on the aircraft carrier.)
4. Soon after the invasion, an insurgency popped up. (Think Iraq for the past seven years and Taliban more recently.)
5. Spitamenes, the leader of the resistance, was an educated son of a wealthy Persian, not a native to the country. (Think Osama bin Laden.)
6. Alexander responded with conventional military force. (Think Marines sacking Fallujah.)
7. Alexander tried sealing the borders. (Think Syrian or Pakistan borders.)
8. Alexander then called in additional reinforcements. (Think surge in deployments.)
9. In desperation Alexander began hiring the militias and the tribes who had been fighting him. (Think Anbar awakening.)
10. Part of Alexander's exit strategy was to marry a tribal chief's daughter. (Not sure that option will work today.)
11. One tactic used by Alexander's forces was to kill off the native population, women and children included. (I hope we're civilized enough to not try that tactic in today's global environment.)
12. The unconventional nature of the war hurt the morale of Alexander's forces. (Could the Abu Ghraib prison be a parallel here?)
13. In the negotiations to end the conflict it was important to reach an agreement in which both sides could claim victory. (Suggestions of negotiating with the Taliban?)

(Note to strict historians: I know a few things were stretched and conflated to make the above parallels.) It should be noted here that it was common for Alexander to incorporate former foes into his army. This particular book tells of action taken to repress the spread of the knowledge of certain atrocities in order to allow the hiring of former enemy tribesmen who had committed the atrocities. I don't know if the author had a historical basis for including that incident. Nevertheless, it created another modern parallel; propaganda and control of news coverage.

The following quote from the book explains in Alexander's words why it is time to cut and run (i.e. declare victory and leave):

"This is what war is," says Alexander. "Glory has fled. One searches in vain for honor. We've all done things we're ashamed of. Even Victory, as Aeschylus says, "in whose august glow all felonies are effaced," is not the same in this war. What remains? To prevent the needless waste of lives. Too many good men have perished without cause. More will join them if we don't make this peace now."

Other powers have invaded Afghanistan since the time of Alexander, and they all have had their problems. Over the past couple hundred years that included the British (two times) and the Soviets. If Alexander were still with us he'd probably say that it's the same o' same o'.

There's a love story of sorts woven into the plot as well. It turns into a parable of war. Romantics will be disappointed. The book ends with these words:

"Though blind, God sees; though deaf, He hears. ...
...Afghanistan's deity gives up nothing. One appeals to him in vain. Yet he sustains those who call themselves his children, who wring a living from this stony and sterile land."
I have come to fear this god of the Afghans. And that has made me a fighting man, as they are."

A really interesting book by Steven Pressfield. This is the second book of his that I have read and am hooked. He has been called an expert on ancient warfare and I believe it. This also reads like a history book. He does great character study and development while weaving in historical movements and happenings. I sometimes get caught up in wondering if things were as advanced as he makes them seem in that time but then remember that he has done far more research than me on the subject.

The obvious and intentional parallels to modern day warfare in Afghanistan this book seems to accurately portray the very reasons we will never fully subdue Afghans. There strategies and customs fit their region and culture so effectively that they have not had to change things much. I think this would be an excellent book for anyone who has interest in the current conflict there to read as well as people who just like well written historical fiction.

I am going to stick with Pressfield through a few more books as he is a very good author with a unique subject matter and specialty.

Its a bit of an oddity this, by adopting the narration voice of an almost 'universal soldier' it works given we have recent ongoing experience of what Afghanistan is like and the shift across the centuries to his narrator with the same tone as you could pick up I guess in any counterinsurgency. Thus it works and the language and delivery can catch you slipping into numerous other hostile campaigns where the soldiers have their own culture and dialect. Some of it seems meticulously researched and really resonates. However its too long - and the reason i think is because at one stage the author decides to go a bit crazy and imbue his narrator and partner with immortality effectively. At this point it becomes just laughable. He does pull it back later, but for me the damage was done - we did not need that interlude with the enemy.