Targeted: Beirut: The 1983 Marine Barracks Bombing and the Untold Origin Story of the War on Terror

by Jack Carr, James M. Scott

Overview

Notes From Your Bookseller

A devastating day for America and the Marine Corps, pulled apart piece by piece to examine how it happened and how it still affects the world today.

The first in a new in-depth nonfiction series examining the devastating terrorist attacks that changed the course of history from #1 New York Times bestselling author Jack Carr and Pulitzer Prize finalist James M. Scott, beginning with the 1983 Marine barracks bombing in Beirut.

1983: the United States Marine Corps experiences its greatest single-day loss of life since the Battle of Iwo Jima when a truck packed with explosives crashes into their headquarters and barracks in Beirut, Lebanon. This horrifying terrorist attack, which killed 241 servicemen, continues to influence US foreign policy and haunts the Marine Corps to this day.

Now, the full story is revealed as never before by Jack Carr and historian and Pulitzer Prize finalist James M. Scott. Based on comprehensive interviews with survivors, extensive military records, as well as personal letters, diaries, and photographs, this is the authoritative account of the deadly attack.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781668024355
Publisher:	Atria/Emily Bestler Books
Publication date:	09/24/2024
Pages:	464
Sales rank:	6,779
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 1.10(d)

About the Author

Jack Carr is a former Navy SEAL who led special operations teams as a team leader, platoon commander, troop commander, and task unit commander. Over his twenty years in Naval Special Warfare, he transitioned from an enlisted SEAL sniper to a junior officer leading assault and sniper teams in Iraq and Afghanistan, to a platoon commander practicing counterinsurgency in the southern Philippines, to commanding a special operations task unit in the most Iranian influenced section of southern Iraq throughout the tumultuous drawdown of US Forces. Jack retired from active duty in 2016 and lives with his wife and three children in Park City, Utah. He is the author of The Terminal List, True Believer, Savage Son, The Devil’s Hand, In the Blood, Only the Dead, Red Sky Mourning, and Targeted: Beirut. His debut novel, The Terminal List, was adapted into the #1 Prime Video series starring Chris Pratt. He is also the host of the top-rated Danger Close podcast. Follow Jack on Instagram, X, and Facebook @JackCarrUSA.

A Pulitzer Prize finalist and former Nieman Fellow at Harvard, James M. Scott is the author of Target Tokyo, Black Snow, Rampage, The War Below, and The Attack on the Liberty. In addition, Scott is a sought-after public speaker, who leads battlefield tours and lectures at institutions around the world. He lives with his wife and two children in Charleston, South Carolina, where he is the Scholar in Residence at The Citadel. Visit him at JamesMScott.com.

Editorial Reviews

"With TARGETED: BEIRUT, Carr and Scott take us straight back to a dreadful flashpoint in modern Middle Eastern history, showing us how it presaged so much of the geopolitical strife that would follow. Here, told with minute-by-minute immediacy, is the gripping tale of a military catastrophe, interlaced with stories of spectacular bravery, resourcefulness, and resilience. You’ll never think of the Beirut bombing in quite the same way again."

Hampton Sides

"TARGETED: BEIRUT is the definitive, behind-the-scenes account of a mission and a fight that changed America. I thought I knew what happened in Beirut, but not at this granular, visceral, and human level. In trademark style, Carr and Scott sharpen our understanding of the forces driving much of this drama and the effect is engrossing, making this book very hard to put down. TARGETED: BEIRUT is meticulously researched history that reads like a thriller."

Doug Stanton

"A masterwork of research and storytelling. A gripping account of failed leadership and the raw courage of America’s Marines."

Peter Schweizer

"Meticulously researched and packed with startling new information and profound conclusions, TARGETED: BEIRUT also reads like a page-turner novel. Events of forty years ago feel like yesterday. This fine book is a fitting memorial to the 241 people so brutally murdered that terrible day."

Andrew Roberts

"TARGETED: BEIRUT is a groundbreaking, utterly compulsive read, a heart-rending account of heroism and loss and the limits of American power."

Alex Kershaw

"TARGETED: BEIRUT offers an extraordinarily vivid and accurate account of events that transports the reader to that time and place by engaging all of their senses. Jack Carr, writing with James M. Scott, uses his masterful storytelling gift to deconstruct the time in a deeply personal, human and gripping fashion. We experience the episode through the eyes and emotions of the Marines, sailors and soldiers who were on the ground as well as the president, generals and policy makers back in Washington. The timely book comes during yet another chapter in the Middle East's centuries old internecine struggle among its inhabitants and highlights the price America pays for problematic policies despite history and its seemingly dismissed lessons owing as much to hubris as naivete. TARGETED: BEIRUT confronts the reader with the limitations of American power and the consequences of its misuse by policy makers for which real people lacking a voice in their decisions pay the ultimate price."

Douglas London

"At long last, this book masterfully paints the entire picture of mind-boggling events before, during and after the Beirut Bombing, from ancient history to present day. More importantly, the authors tell the story through voices of Marines, Sailors and Soldiers who endured the two-year “peacekeeping” operation. This timely book is fittingly the first in the series about terrorism in the modern age, because the Beirut Bombing was a watershed event. It should be required reading for leaders in government, the military, and the diplomatic corps to avoid a repeat of history."

Randy Gaddo

"TARGETED: BEIRUT is a tour de force born from the partnership of two of our generation's most outstanding writers and historians: Jack Carr and James M. Scott. . . . this incredible work of narrative non-fiction reads like a thriller novel I could not put down. . . . This book is not to be missed."

John Bruning

"Buckle up — here’s your front row seat to the deadly attack that ushered in the War on Terror. Authoritative, shocking, and completely inspiring. TARGETED: BEIRUT is a razor of a book, slicing through all the nonsense and getting right to what’s important. Carr and Scott kill it."

Brad Meltzer

"Jack Carr’s first non-fiction is riveting, startlingly detailed – a crucial step back in time to understand the roots of terrorism and the connection to today."

Katie Pavlich