Rick Holden Trilogy: The Coronado Conspiracy, For Duty and Honor
and Fire and Ice

For most of the last century, national security policymakers were
sanguine that the U.S. military had an intact process for envisioning
future warfare. Over the last few decades that process has shown
stress, and now the Pentagon looks outside the lifelines – often to
military fiction – to get a better sense of how wars might evolve and
be fought years hence. This process has been institutionalized as a
number of U.S. military commands and think tanks now sponsor fiction
writing contests to tease out potential future warfighting scenarios.

This has spawned a new genre of military-themed works of fiction.
Labeled FICINT – imagining future warfare scenarios based on the
realities of high-end combat and real-world intelligence, not fantasy
– the U.S. national security community has now embraced this genre
as a useful instrument to intuit how tomorrow’s wars will be fought.
Two well-known books in this genre are P.W. Singer and August Cole’s
Ghost Fleet and Elliot Ackerman and Admiral Jim Stavridis’ 2034
(reviewed in the previous issue of Surface SITREP).

This brings me to a recent entry in the FICINT genre – actually a
trilogy of entries – Captain (USN – retired) George Galdorisi’s Rick
Holden thrillers, The Coronado Conspiracy, For Duty and Honor and
Fire and Ice. Each is a good read by itself, and even better if read
in the order presented here. The chief protagonist, Rick Holden, is a
former CIA operative, now undercover as a U.S. Navy Chief Petty Officer.

In all three thrillers, Galdorisi not only provides us with a picture of
future warfare but examines what could go awry with issues like
civilian control of the military, near-absolute power in the hands
of senior military officers, and the ability of rogue nations to hold
allies hostage. I believe you will enjoy this trilogy, and I’m eagerly
looking forward to the next Rick Holden thriller.

Download this Review in PDF Format

Eight months into the war in Ukraine, Vladimir Putin is saber-rattling and threatening to use nuclear weapons, the world is under the specter of nuclear war not seen in sixty years since the Cuban Missile Crises. Given Putin’s losses in the Ukraine war, people are justifiably concerned that nuclear weapons will be used and are searching for ways to protect themselves and their loved ones.

While there is no sure way to fully protect oneself and those around you, there is help available. Former Navy SEAL and CIA operative, Dick Couch, has written the definitive book designed to help us cope with the threat of ALL weapons of mass destruction, The U.S. Armed Forces Nuclear, Biological and Chemical Survival Manual: Everything You Need to Know to Protect Yourself and Your Family.

Drawing on best-practices honed by the U.S. military over decades of experience, this book is essential reading in an era where a deranged autocrat, terrorists or others resort to weapons of mass destruction to further their deadly aims. Dick Couch delivers this important survival information in a “news you can use” format. Read it and be reassured that you will be prepared should the worst happen.

by Samantha Bey

Last summer, retired naval aviator Captain George Galdorisi, had just released two anticipated books: AI at War: How Big Data, Artificial Intelligence, and Machine Learning are Changing Naval Warfare (U.S. Naval Institute Press) and Fire and Ice (Braveship Books). Since both books – non-fiction and fiction, respectively – addressed the future of warfare, we decided to circle back a year later to see how the ideas he presented were playing out today.

The bottom line in AI at War, explained Galdorisi, is that “Our national, military and intelligence community efforts are synced up to leverage big data, artificial intelligence and machine learning to make our military weapons systems smarter and more effective and to also help our warfighters make better decisions faster than our adversaries.”

Read the entire article here! (PDF download)

Many commentators have accused the U.S. military of “preparing for the last war.” While there may be some truth to this criticism, there is a movement afoot to better prepare for the wars of tomorrow.

Throughout the 20^th Century, planning for tomorrow’s conflicts occurred almost exclusively within the walls of the Pentagon. With a known adversary – first the Soviet Union and then the threat of worldwide terrorism – this was an acceptable strategy. However, today, with substantially more-nuanced threats to the United States, this is no longer the case.

For years, a number of writers have envisioned future warfare and have expressed those ideas in novels and shorter works. Those U.S. officials responsible for the security and prosperity of America either disregarded these stories or criticized them as unhelpful to crafting a coherent national and military strategy.

This has changed in the 21^st Century with a new genre of military-themed works of fiction. Labeled FICINT – generally understood to be imagining future warfare scenarios based on the realities of high-end combat and real-world intelligence, not fantasy – the U.S. national security community has now embraced this new genre as a useful instrument to intuit how tomorrow’s wars will be fought.

As one indication of how FICINT is having an impact, a number of U.S. military commands and think tanks focused on military matters such as The U.S Army Training and Doctrine Command, the Marine Corps Warfighting Laboratory, the Joint Artificial Intelligence Center, the U.S. Naval War College, the U.S. Army War College, the Atlantic Council, the Center for International Maritime Security, the U.S. Naval Institute, and others, now sponsor fiction writing contests to tease out good ideas from FICINT writers.

There is a sea change in the way that the U.S. national security community, and especially the U.S. military, are embracing these changes. There have been several recent FICINT novels, Fire and Ice among them, as well as other works – many written by active or retired military officers – that are helping the U.S. plan for tomorrow’s wars, not yesterday’s.

Here is what one defense analyst had to say about Fire and Ice

Few writers are as successful as Francine Prose (and what a great name for a writer!) and few likely work harder at their craft (Prose typically does dozens of drafts of each novel).

Most of us who write would like to be as successful as Francine Prose. That is why I was drawn to a piece about her with the intriguing title of: “‘I’m Easily Bored by Books,’ Says Writer of 22 Novels.” Here is how it begins:

Francine Prose writes a lot.

During her nearly 50-year career, Prose has published 30 books along with reams of essays, reviews, columns and travelogues on subjects as diverse as Anne Frank, Peggy Guggenheim, Caravaggio and bacon. And while her work deals in weighty themes like truth, identity and power, even when she’s writing about breakfast foods, she is not precious about it.

“I hate the word process, I just can’t bear it,” Prose said in an interview. “People say, ‘What’s your process?’ My process is allowing my soul to leave my body and enter into the body of another human being. So try that!”

Her latest novel, “The Vixen,” which will be published on Tuesday by Harper, is a good example. It is about Ethel and Julius Rosenberg, the C.I.A. and book publishing. And it is often hilarious.

“We have to entertain ourselves somehow,” she said.

Want more? You can read the rest of the piece here

Originally From: The Greater Los Angles Writer’s Society 

Fire and Ice is a thriller focused on the political-military tensions created by a modern-day Russia at its vindictive worst. Vladimir Putin emerges as the central character who uses the fulcrum of Belarus to threaten western Europe through a series of lethal and effective attacks on US and European energy sources. Fire and Ice poses the plausible and highly realistic question: Can Putin and his rogue nation be thwarted through the combined efforts of EU and US and political and military might?

Rick Holden and Laura Peters, reunited after several years of being assigned to commands half a world apart, find themselves thrown together by their parent agencies—the CIA and the DoD’s European Command, respectively. Their mission to rescue a captured American is successful, but then they must turn on a dime and race against time to thwart the transfer of weapons of mass destruction to vengeful terrorists.

Fire and Ice is a new entry in the increasingly popular genre commonly known as “FICINT”—imaging future warfare scenarios based on the realities of high-end combat and real-world intelligence, not fantasy. It leaves the reader wondering not if, but when, such a cataclysmic scenario might play out in our lifetimes. Drawing on the cutting-edge military technology he discusses in his recent non-fiction work: AI at War: How Big Data, Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning Are Changing Naval Warfare, George Galdorisi injects a new level of future warfare reality into Fire and Ice.

George Galdorisi is a career naval aviator and writer, specializing in “FICINT,” combining fiction writing with current intelligence to envision future warfare. He began this journey almost a decade ago with the New York Times best seller, Tom Clancy Presents: Act of Valor (Penguin), the novelization of the Relativity Media number-one rated movie. This was followed in rapid succession by three more New York Times best sellers in the rebooted Tom Clancy’s Op-Center series: Out of the Ashes, Into the Fire, and Scorched Earth (St. Martins). Continuing in the FICINT tradition, his three most recent thrillers are The Coronado Conspiracy, For Duty and Honor and the just-released (March 2021) Fire and Ice (Braveship Books).

His FININT work—imaging future warfare scenarios based on the realities of high-end combat and real-world intelligence, not fantasy—is supported by his thirty years as a naval aviator, including four command tours and five years as a carrier strike group chief of staff, culminating in two combat tours in the Arabian Gulf.  During this final tour he also led the U.S. delegation for military-to-military talks with China’s People’s Liberation Army, Navy. Adding to his ability to harness all-source, open-source, intelligence to support these FICINT efforts, he is currently the Director of Strategic Assessments and Technical Futures at the Navy Information Warfare Center Pacific in San Diego, California.

Other than writing thrillers, George likes nothing more than connecting with readers. You can follow him on Facebook and Twitter, and learn more about his books, blogs and other writing on his website: http://georgegaldorisi.com/—especially his “Writing Tips,”—which offer useful advice for all writers from established authors to future best-selling writers.

In this episode I have the honor of sitting down with one of my mentors, Navy Captain George Galdorisi. George is a Leader, Mentor, Strategic Thinker, National Security expert, and author of 15 books. George discusses his latest Rick Holden thriller, Fire and Ice. It is fiction that experts claim helps to strategize the challenges Russia presents in the real world today.

Many writers write novels about warfare. Some of them write about the future of warfare. Sadly, most base what they write about on fantastical, made up scenarios that bear no connection with reality. Jeff Edwards is not one of them, His latest thriller follows a long line of riveting, and convincing military thrillers and are informed by his decades of service as U.S. Navy professional. The Damocles Agends is a book you won’t want to miss.