Military Historian and Author
Michael F. Dilley
Great Raids in History
This is the second anthology to which Michael contributed. One afternoon he received a call from Sam Southworth asking if he would be interested in contributing to this work. Michael sent Sam two articles that he thought fit his description; Sam used one of them. When Sam asked Michael to recommend other authors who might be interested, Michael mentioned Lance Zedric and George Cholewczynski. In the end, George contributed the article dealing with the first Chindit expedition behind Japanese lines in Burma. Great Raids was an Alternate Selection of the Military Book Club in the Summer of 1997. It was published by Sarpedon Publishers in New York and by Spellmount Ltd. in Kent, UK. It was also later published in a translated version in Poland.
​Great Raids in History -
From Drake to Desert One
ISBN: 1-885119-42-9 (US hardcover); 1-873376-78-2 (UK hardcover)
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This work examines decisive small-unit actions over the course of the past four centuries, illuminating examples of reckless, bravery, horrific combat, and dynamic leadership - all cases where a courageous few chose to attack into enemy territory, accepting the risk of their own annhilation. This entirely new work by modern historians describes raids, both successful and not, beginning with the Elizabethan era and continuing to the present. To mention just a few examples: Charles Whiting tells the tragic story of the brave Canadians who were slaughtered at Dieppe; Brent Nosworthy relates the audacious capture of a Union general in the dead of night by John Mosby; Michael F. Dilley covers the raid on Son Tay by American special forces who blasted their way into a POW installation near Hanoi; George F. Nafziger recounts the Cossacks' rampages into Germany behind Napoleon's Grand Armee; Steven Hartov writes of Israeli naval commandos demolishing the Egyptian installation on Green Island; Steven Smith follows Morgan's valiant but doomed incursion into Indiana and Ohio; Robert Krott describes the dramatic drop of Belgian ParaCommandos in the Congo; Samuel A. Southworth tells of the British Commando raid on the French port and dry-dock of St. Nazaire; and Richard Kiper analyzes the complex raid that ended in a fireball at Desert One in Iran.
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"...a remarkable collection of authors...the project is large in scale and scope...the book delivers..."
Army magazine
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"...a fresh and entertaining collection of narratives about operations that required the highest level of human daring, ingenuity, heroism, and often sacrifice."
Military History magazine
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"...this collection of dramatic small-unit actions covers a fascinating cross-section of military history...the brightest minds in military history have contributed to this collection..."
Military Book Club
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"...should be in every public library in the country and should have an honored place in every private military book collection."
Behind The Lines magazine
"Very good book. Good mix of well-known and little known events in history. Great collection!"
Mike (five out of five stars)
amazon.com
"Overall this is a very good book and worth the read."
Troy A. Lettieri (four out of five stars)
amazon.com
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