The Russian Elite; Inside Spetsnaz and the Airborne Forces

London, England: Greenhill Books, 1993. Presumed First Edition, First printing. Hardcover. Very good/Very good. 288 pages. Includes Acknowledgments, Appendices, Index, 3 black and white maps, 27 black and white illustrations. Topics covered include A World-Class Fighting Force; The Spearhead of Soviet Military Power; Intervention in Afghanistan; New Blood in Afghanistan; The Making of a Modern Elite; In Action Within a Crumbling Empire; The Coup and After; and The Russian Army Reborn. Includes many firsthand accounts from the officers and men, and includes valuable reference material, including orders of battle and biographies of key figures. Carey Schofield has done it again with The Russian Elite. This book is a classic on Russia's first line of warfighting, the airborne troops and the Russian special forces or spetsnaz. Her previous book on the Russian armed forces was also terrific. Carey Schofield OBE (born 1953) is the British principal of Langlands School and College in Pakistan, noted for its academic excellence. She had a previous career as a journalist and writer, particularly on military affairs. With the support of the President of Pakistan Pervez Musharraf, Schofield spent five years embedded with the Pakistan Armed Forces, interviewing all ranks for Inside the Pakistan Army (2011)[3] One of her informants was Special Forces commander Ameer Faisal Alavi, assassinated in 2008.[4] During these years, she reported for the Sunday Times. For the first time, the fabled "Blue Berets"--the Russian Airborne and Special Forces--have allowed a westerner to study them in detail. No writer has ever been given such access to the Airborne Forces, and no foreigner has ever been granted access to the "Spetsnaz" brigades before. The author describes the lives of the officers and soldiers in these units, places them in their context, and gives an overview of their development and of operations in which they took part. The Airborne Forces played a key role in the war in Afghanistan and in the tumultuous years following it, in maintaining order when Gorbachev's reforms led to instability, in the 'coup' of August 1991, and in peacekeeping operations as the Soviet Union began to collapse. The book includes valuable reference material, including orders of battle and biographies of key figures, as well as many firsthand accounts from the officers and men.