Brethren: An Epic Adventure of the Knights Templar (published in 2006) - Historical fiction, authored by Robyn Young

The time of the Crusades were a fascinating period for history buffs and historians, because of the sheer changes that happened in the Holy Land during the time period of the Crusades. Getting control of the Holy Lands in the Middle East was decreed as a holy duty, and participating in this holy duty was seen important for most European rulers and noblemen. Getting control of the holiest city of Jerusalem was the top mission, but it was not just this city. The area around the city and numerous strategic points had to be controlled as well; on the other side were some elements of the Mongols and more important, there were the Egyptians who saw the Holy Land as their territory and saw it as their holy duty to rid the land of these Christian invaders who were coming in from Europe and trying to set foot in their territory.
During these periods, there were some very impressive warriors who were involved in the crusades and the fight by the Egyptians, with names such as Richard the Lionheart, Saladin, and others. Among the others were the Marmaluk dynasty from Egypt, with many of their Sultans seeing it as their duty to follow in the footsteps of Saladin and remove these foreign fighters from these lands. And in the midst of all this were the people of these cities, forts and of the overall area, who wanted to make a living and were forever in danger. For anybody who has done some amount of historical readings, the Crusades were a very bloody time period. Overall, war itself involved huge casualties, and not only of the soldiers, but also of the citizens who were in grave danger of being killed, or at the minimum, looted or sent into slavery. But these battles during the Crusades had religious sanction for the blood-letting, and it was not uncommon for a victorious army to kill not only the opposing army but even all citizens of the conquered city.




This book is set in such a time period. It takes some real historical characters, and some fictional, tracking their lives during a specific period of the Crusades. And of course, it also makes extensive use of a historical society, the Knights Templar, who became incredibly powerful and were answerable only to the pope. On the one side, you have a young boy, William Campbell, who has been admitted to the Knights as a young sergeant, hoping to become a Knight here. His father is already in the Holy Lands along with the Knights. On the other side is the young slave, Baybars, who became a commander to the various Sultans; he was extremely ambitious and when the Sultan would not give him what he wanted, he was ready to get rid of the Sultan and finally take the power to himself.
And in the middle of all this is a book. This is where the story takes a meander, since the Book is about an inner council of the Knights Templar, and in a land where the very sniff of heresy could get you burnt at the stake, the Book talks in terms of a Grail Romance, and could very easily be used by a rival to destroy the Knights. And along with their power, the Knights had a number of enemies, since royal dynasties typically did not like power centers in their kingdom that reported only to the Pope (and also, the Knights would have lent money to the King and were not above demanding their money, acting as an equal to the King). So, there are multiple people hunting for this book, including the future king of England (Edward, known in history as Edward Longshanks) and the action slowly moves to the Holy Land where Baybars is being ruthless in his desire to rid the whole place of the corrupting influence of the Franks, and vows to defeat all the Crusaders.
The book is well researched and moves between the different characters, taking a short time period of history that was clearly significant (the rise and rule of Baybars was significant). The book also does not shirk from showing the brutality of war, although it does tend to depict Baybars as ruthless and cruel, while he is seen as a hero in the entire Middle East. And of course, the Crusaders were equally likely to be ruthless and murdering entire cities when they took them. Somehow, the end is a bit of a let down since the story becomes flat near the end. The end is an interesting anti-climax situation, but overall, the book was interesting.

Clear and Present Danger (Published in 1989) - Fight the drug menace, authored by Tom Clancy

Most citizens of the US would not have heard of Colombia, or if they have heard of Colombia, they would have associated it wither some great coffee, or also for being the source of a large proportion of the drugs that enter the US. These drugs enter the US through many different transport sources, and it has been the long standing wish of the US enforcement agencies to detect and block such routes in order to stop the inflow of drugs into the country. And with this drug money, the powerful drug barons in Colombia grow richer and more powerful, in many ways, being able to defy the government of Colombia as well. From time to time, there would have been the thought of many of the Presidents of the US and other high-ranking officials to take the powerful US military and intelligence agencies, and use it to hunt down these drub barons and somehow stop this inflow of drugs into the USA.
Tom Clancy has written a number of novels that go into great detail into the politics, administration, intelligence agencies and military of the US and spun novels around them. These books get into great detail and are fascinating to read as well. When you get into such detail, you also realize that the powers of the US military are not that over-whelming (they are in terms of their reach and lethal powers, but following all the rules and legal regulations ensures the constraints on possible actions of the military); Tom Clancy spins a web about the use of US military force to break the powers of the drug barons, and how this is not so easy as it sounds.




The book was published in 1989, and was a bestseller on release, and was soon made into a major movie starring Harrison Ford. The book takes a single starting point, where a friend of the President had been executed by the drug barons for stealing from them, and the President, deeming the import of drugs into the country as a 'Clear and Present Danger' to the country, decides to take action against the drug barons and their vast drug producing areas. However, in a clear indicator about the President not having unquestioned powers, this action by the President is cloaked under secrecy, with Congress not aware of this, and there being no statement by the military that they would start acting against the drug lords in a covert manner (and since this is part of the geographic territory of the country of Colombia, with which the US has had friendly relations, there cannot be an overt action of invading the country to fight against the drug barons).
A plan is setup where US troops are sent into the country, sent in through the direction of the US National Security Advisor (James Cutter) and the Deputy Director of Operations in the CIA (Robert Ritter). Jack Ryan, now a senior official in the CIA and one who also talks to Congress, is out of the loop. The plan first starts out smashingly, with flights being intercepted and troops inside Colombia. But, things start to go haywire soon. Then of course there is the attack on a visiting group of officials, including the head of the FBI and Ryan, when they are visiting Colombia.
And then the ex-Cuban guy advising one of the cartel members starts investigating further, and discovers that the US military has been blowing off bombs in the area and they have boots on the ground. And in the worse possible course of action, the Cuban, Cortez decides that he could use this attack to take over the cartel, and also blackmails Cutter to abandon the US soldiers. Ryan learns of all this and flies into Colombia to save the soldiers, acting without official authority; entering a foreign country to get your own soldiers out under hostile fire without a great plan is not exactly what most people would try to do. What happens next ? It is a masterful and thrilling tale, well worth the reading.

Red Rabbit (published in 2002) - Authored by Tom Clancy, but a disappointment

When a best-selling author publishes a book that is not as good as the books that he typically writes, it can still be successful, but dedicated fans tend to be disappointed at such an effort. Red Rabbit is one such book. It was a book written far after the fall of the Soviet Union (which happened in 1991), but this book was published in 2002. So, even when you go to the Amazon page of the book, it is nowhere near being a top-seller and in fact, reviews of the book are more negative than positive.
However, overall Tom Clancy was an accomplished writer, having turned out a number of topseller books, starting with The Hunt for Red October, which was a bestseller when it came out. The level of detail of military equipment, and the storytelling of intelligence operations as if from an insider made these books great reading for his fans, and at one point of time, even the then US President had handed out praise for Tom Clancy. After this, he turned out a number of books, dealing with the military, intelligence operations and politics, dealing with conflicts of the US with the Soviet Union, with Islamic terrorists, and with China. These were thick books, with a lot of detail, but they were interesting reading. The level of detail provided of a thermonuclear weapon as it started exploding was very detailed (even if it would not be fully accurate) in the novel, The Sum of All Fears.




Red Rabbit was a novel written way past all these, but dwelt on a chapter of history which was very controversial. There was an attack by a Turk called Mehmet Ali Agca on a Polish Pope, a Pope who was seeming to challenge the Soviet Rule over Poland and the rest of East Europe. Even though the Soviets were dismissive of the Pope, many sections of East Europe were catholics, and susceptible to calls from a Pope to fight communism. At such a stage, what would happen if the Pope were to invoke an open call to defeat communism, at least in his native country, Poland. What would happen if the Pope were to say that he would step down from the papacy and come back to his country to fight against communism. This would be a battle that the Communists would find it hard to win easily, and so something to avoid at all costs.
The warped solution ? Get rid of the Pope by assassination. And how to prevent this ? A KGB agent, armed with this knowledge, defects since he wants no part of this plan, and Ryan, along with the husband and wife intelligence officer duo of Ed and Mary Pat Foley have to get involved to stop this assassination.
In reality, the pope did not resign, but he did inspire a lot of effort against the Soviet domination of East Europe. There was an assassination attempt on him, but whether the effort was inspired by the Bulgarian intelligence agency is not something that is said with 100% accuracy right now.