The U S Coast Guard

Recounts the founding of the U.S. Coast Guard, looks at Coast Guard operations and functions, and looks at how it has changed over the last seventy years.

Since its original printing in 2002, Pub 1 has served as the Coast Guard's capstone doctrinal publication. It defines its principles and culture. It describes its history, missions, purpose, and ethos. It communicates who and what the Coast Guard is and how it accomplishes its missions. This May 2009 update includes data on roles and missions, forces, historic evolution, and values.

While the Coast Guard's many battles at sea in the War on Drugs are widely known, its participation in the ground offensive is not. Indeed, the Guard didn't just send its cutters to interdict narcotics-laden vessels attempting to bring their illicit cargo into Uncle Sam's territorial waters, it sent ground troops to foreign lands to train their forces and, when necessary, directly engage the enemy. But to create the type of force needed was no small task and would not be without tribulation, both from within and outside the organization. The road traveled to complete the mission was laden with obstacles. This is not a story about the Coast Guard you know, or think you know. Rather, this is a story about the other side, the side that history nearly forgot; not the standard, but the antithesis of standard. It is a story that will undoubtedly make even the most seasoned Coast Guardsmen question their understanding of the organization to which they belong. To be sure, "This is not your father's Coast Guard."

As part of the Wheel Book series, The U.S. Naval Institute on the U.S. Coast Guard provides professional sea service officers with insights into the roles, mission, and history of the U.S. Coast Guard. This service, the fifth and smallest branch of the U.S. military, plays a vital role in national defense and homeland security. The archives of the U.S. Naval Institute contain a treasure trove of information about the Coast Guard, with some important selections re-appearing in print for the first time in decades. This Wheel Book will serve as a timely guide to persons wanting a better understanding of the Coast Guard’s roles and missions. From protecting the homeland to providing forces to combatant commanders and every mission in between, all 11 of the Coast Guard’s statutory missions are highlighted. Each author featured is a subject matter expert on the topic and it will be a real treat for readers of the U.S. Coast Guard to have so much wisdom from some of the service’s best thinkers and senior leadership in one volume.

A history of the U.S. Coast Guard's activities on the Great Lakes.

The intimate view of the U.S. Coast Guard's dramatic World War II record has long been considered a classic. First published in 1957 and out of print for years, the book is now available in paperback. Handsomely illustrated with more than two hundred photographs, the book serves as a unique memento of one of the most illustrious periods in the Coast Guard's two hundred year history. The author offers a story replete with incidents of devotion far beyond the call of duty--daring rescues, adventurous high-sea missions, heroic combat action--to clearly demonstrate the vital role the service played in the Allied war effort. A seasoned World War I veteran who joined the Coast Guard Temporary Reserve in 1942, Malcolm Willoughby has covered every aspect of the Coast Guard's involvement in the war at sea, in the air, and at home. From the invasion of Normandy, where Coast Guardsmen landed thousands of Americans and rescued some 1,500 stranded in the surf, to Guadalcanal, where they rescued three companies of Marines trapped on the beach, this chronicle vividly recounts these well-documented operations and little-known stories of individual triumphs and tragedies as well.