"On September 9, 1965, I flew at 500 knots right into a flak trap, at tree-top level, in a little A-4 airplanet—the cockpit walls not even three feet apart—which I couldn't steer after it was on fire, its control system shot out. After ejection I had about thirty seconds to make my last statement in freedom before I landed in the main street of a little village right ahead. And so help me, I whispered to myself: 'five years down there, at least. I'm leaving the world of technology and entering the world of Epictetus' "What Epictetus [told] his students was that there can be no such thing as being the 'victim' of another. You can only be a 'victim' of yourself. It's all how you discipline your mind."

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The decade that followed James Stockdale's seven and a half years in a North Vietnamese prison saw his life take a number of different turns, from a stay in a navy hospital in San Diego to president of a civilian college to his appointment as a senior research fellow at the Hoover Institution. In this collection of essays he offers his thoughts on his imprisonment. Describing the horrors of his treatment as a prisoner of war, Stockdale tells how he discovered firsthand the capabilities and limitations of the human spirit in such a situation. As the senior officer in confinement he had what he humbly describes as "the easiest leadership job in the world: to maintain the organization, resistance, and spirit of ten of the finest men I have ever known."

His reflections on his wartime prison experience and the reasons for his survival form the basis of the writings reprinted here. In subject matter ranging from methods of communication in prison to military ethics to the principles of leadership, the thirty-four selections contained in this volume are a unique record of what Stockdale calls a "melting experience"--a pressure-packed existence that forces one to grow....