4th Field Regiment 'Old Boys' Association Newsletter

I recently finished a book by General David Petraeus (former CIA Director and commander of US-led coalitions in Iraq and Afghanistan) and Andrew Roberts (prize- winning historian) titled “Conflict – The Evolution of Warfare from 1945 to Ukraine”. A comprehensive look at various conflicts from the Chinese Civil War to the war in Ukraine. The book highlights lessons learnt and perhaps more importantly, the fact that some don’t seem to learn from previous mistakes. A bit of a hard slog at times but overall, a very interesting read. From David Anderson “Forging the Will to Fight” written by Heston Russell. Russell served with the ADF and was in Afghanistan with 2 Commando Regiment. He has been in the news over recent years following a claim by the ABC (since withdrawn after a lengthy court battle) that he was guilty of killing unarmed Afghans. He was also instrumental in achieving majority approval through the Senate and Lower House to call for a Royal Commission into Defence and Veteran Suicide - no mean feat. Russell’s story is extraordinary and, for me at least, full of unexpected revelations. Make sure you read it to the end. I thoroughly recommend the book. As an aside, I picked up a book from our local RSL Sub-branch the other day and inside was a piece of paper with information some previous reader had been searching on line. The question was how many religions are there in the world? The answer seems to be that they don’t know but the nearest estimate is about 4,300.