Brutal. In one moment achingly heartbreaking and in another inspiring. ( )

this was a fantastic read. written by a journalist embedded with a ranger squadron for most of the Iraq war, it really gives a sense of what daily life in Iraq was life for infantry rangers. while remaining pretty neutral, politically it covers morale, mental health, and war, from both a leadership and subordinate point of view. this is very much not an account of a heroic battle, ala Black Hawk Down. This is the nitty gritty of the Iraq war. ( )

This book. This fucking book.

This is literary journalism at its finest. Finkel is lyrical at the darkest times, mining emotion and meaning from some of the most horrific and terrifying experiences humans have had to undergo in recent times. He’s spare sometimes and luxurious at others—surprisingly succinct when describing someone’s death, and then taking pages to illuminate mundane things. Uch. He’s just a great writer, trying to tell the story of great men, and it works.

For me, the experience of reading this book consisted of waiting. On the edge of my seat, for the next battle, the next encounter, the next explosion. The next death, most of all. When someone died I would skip to the page with the pictures of the dead at the end and sort of meditate on that person and think about how he died and try to see it. This is a powerful book. It’s fast and it’s scary. Explosive. It makes you understand why soldiers come back home and shoot themselves.
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Reading this felt like sitting in the dark and having a ten-ton weight slowly crush my chest. This account of soldiers during the surge in Iraq is forceful, beautifully written, and will make you break down into tears several times (at least). You want a modern day nonfictional account of wartime that doesn't take sides or pull punches? You've found it. ( )

I first heard about this book on This America Life where actors read excerpts from the book. Based on these excerpts I had thought the structure would be similar to “Dear America: Letters Home from Vietnam” which I had really liked. I downloaded the audio version and found that it was not written in this fashion at all, but in more of a linear narrative, focusing basically on one main character, Colonel Ralph Kauzlarich.

The narrative follows one battalion, the 2-16, during the surge in Iraq. Finkel covers a lot of ground: operations, strategy, politics, the home front, causalities, the wounded and their post care, and even gives background on an Iraqi National who is an interpreter for them. While he does touch on all of these subjects and more, he doesn’t focus on any one thing, other than the causalities, and since he didn’t spend a lot of time telling you about these individual soldiers they all become a blur.

I have to say that when I found out early in the book that Colonel Kauzlarich had been one of the investigators into the death of Pat Tillman (ex-football star killed by friendly fire), my whole attitude about him changed. While Finkel makes him a three dimensional character (shows us his good side, his blunt side, his frustrated side, his family side etc.), I couldn’t help thinking throughout the book that he knew about the massive cover-up of Pat Tillman’s death, but still went on a radio talk show after Tillman’s death and said that Tillman’s family couldn’t get over it because of their religious beliefs (they were atheists) and therefore couldn’t handle that he would just be worm dirt. Is that what a “Good Soldier” says about a family whose son’s death he knew to have been part of a massive cover-up? While I’m not saying he had to be PC about it (soldiers usually aren’t), why did he have to say anything at all which just added fuel to the fire when he very well knew why this family couldn’t get it over it; it makes me question his good judgment, and how much more he knew about the cover-up. Needless to say because Kauzlarich was such a major part of the storyline the whole book was a bit tainted for me.

The Tillman situation aside, I have to say I was not “blown away” by this book. For those who were, I must assume this is the first book about war they have ever read. War is War. There are some wars that have clearly defined Good Guys and Bad Guys (WWII), Winners and Losers (WWII), and then there are other wars like Vietnam where the objectives and enemies are less clearly defined. When I was reading this I felt like I was reading about the Vietnam war only set in the dessert. People lose their lives in wars, they lose body parts, they lose friends, they lose their sanity, and they lose their innocence. All of these things happened in this book, as it has in all of the wars we have been in--this is not new. The soldiers questioning “Why are we here?,” is not new (Vietnam all over again). The real question is, “Did we not learn anything from Vietnam?”

What this book does do, is it brings this war to the forefront of your conscious. It makes you think about it, instead of it just being another small news story that is quickly forgotten. And for that I would actually give it 3.5 stars.
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