“American Caesar,” Van Krief replied. “It’s the biography, more of a hagiography, of MacArthur and covers Korea in great detail. There’s things in it that only make sense if you know some of the details the writer left out, though.”

“My brain hurts,” Tao said, grabbing his head. “Who is MacArthur? Where in the hell is Myanmar? Why does any of this matter? How do you know what to study? In advance? Been getting some sideline tutoring?”

“Tao…” Destrang warned, angrily.

“Jesus,” Tao said, immediately, looking at Van Krief. “I didn’t mean it like that, you know that Mo.” He looked at the female ensign pleadingly.

“As far as I know, Captain Herrick has never even noticed me as a female,” Van Krief said, tightly. “I’ll assume that you’ve just managed to put your foot in your mouth, again. God knows it’s big enough.”

“I said I was sorry,” Tao said. “But, really, how do you know?”

Van Krief thought about that and then she shrugged.

“Captain Herrick is not much older than we are,” she said. “And while he’s far more experienced in war, he, from what I’ve gleaned, was not a scholar before he was assigned to the Academy. He hits particular areas and stays there for a while. He caught me out when he started talking about the communist war in Chin and the American defeat in Vietnam, but after that I realized he was concentrating on the twentieth century in Asia. From there I researched all the books related to that area and period and started reading them as fast as I could. There are only so many that survived the Fall. Captain Herrick has access to Duke Edmund’s library, as well, but he seems to be drawing on historical actions that are in books in the Academy library. Personally, I think he’s doing that so we can do the research he assigns and tries to limit himself to what he knows is available. So if you work at it, you can stay ahead of the assignments.”