Victory Point: Operations Red Wings and WhalersThe Marine Corps' Battle for Freedom in Afghanistan
Ed Darack. New York: Berkley, 2009. Maps. Appen. Index. 336 pp. $25.95.
Reviewed by David J. Danelo
In June 2005 the officers, staff, and Marines of the Second Battalion, Third Marine Regiment (2/3) stationed at Kaneohe Bay, Hawaii, deployed to Afghanistan to conduct the unit's first combat mission in 35 years. Days after their arrival, officers from 2/3, working with at least two other joint commands, conceived a counterinsurgency action they called Operation Red Wings. The plan called for a four-man Navy SEAL team to capture or kill aspiring Taliban insurgent leader Ahmad Shah. The Marines from 2/3 were supposed to follow with a knockout punch.
The first attempt of Operation Red Wings, which author Ed Darack ably details in Victory Point, was a failure. Nineteen Navy SEALs died. Marcus Luttrell, the lone survivor from the SEAL team, wrote a best-selling memoir of the event. Darack's book is the first to detail the Marines' view of Operation Red Wings, the tragedies of which might have been prevented with better planning, coordination, and unity of command.
The strength of Victory Point is in its combat scenes. An alpinist, photographer, and adventurer, Darack's style might best be described as Bernard Fall meets Michael Yon. Darack spent several months with 2/3's Marines before, during, and after their deployment and is clearly devoted to telling their story. His prose comes alive when Marines are in the thick of the action, particularly during the grueling climax of Operation Whalers (for peculiar reasons, battalion planners named all operations after hockey teams). The ascent to ambush Ahmad Shah's fighters is a feat of endurance and hilarity—particularly when the donkeys, who had been carting supplies for Marines, interrupt the march and amorously pursue one another.
The book's weakness lies in the analysis. Victory Point works best as a companion to Luttrell's Lone Survivor. Unfortunately, the author barely discusses Luttrell and does not mention the book as a source. When Darack does address Luttrell's narrative, he corrects or amplifies portions of the SEAL account with a voice that forcefully and clearly defends the Marine point of view. Non-sequiturs, such as a heated conflict between the operations officer and SEAL staff, litter the prose like demolition cord on a poorly constructed explosive. Events on the battlefield's peripheries are not framed in any coherent strategic context beyond rushed, clipped explanations that praise 2/3 and condemn anyone who challenges their right to fight as they saw fit.
Judging from only Darack's account, the reader would be left thinking the Marines brilliantly conducted the planning of Operation Red Wings, and SEAL planners (along with everyone from higher headquarters) were wrong. The author implies that the joint special operations command in Afghanistan should have turned its assets over to the Marines—whose full complement of officers and Marines had just arrived in Afghanistan—without allowing the reader to consider the potential ramifications or consequences. The truth is likely more nuanced, but both sides are not fleshed out.
Finally, the reader receives no comparison with successful coalition partnerships between conventional and special forces. In The Sheriff of Ramadi, Dick Couch skillfully narrates the process and evolution of an Army command bringing Navy SEALs and Iraqi police forces under its operational umbrella. Victory Point rightfully praises the courage and resolve of the Marines, but fails to probe the deeper questions of doctrine, capacity, and force structure in America's 21st-century national security establishment.
Given the paucity of book-length reporting from the front lines of Afghanistan, Victory Point is worth reading for the combat narrative alone. Company commanders and below should pore over the account of Operation Whalers and mine it for tactical nuggets of wisdom as if it were their own unit's after action report. Military historians and Afghanistan veterans will find additional value in Darack's account. Most civilians, however, will find it a confusing and challenging read.
Loon: A Marine Story
Jack McLean. New York: Presidio, 2009. Fwd. Illus. 256 pp. $25.
By Brigadier General Thomas A. Draude, U.S. Marine Corps (Retired)
Serendipity is defined as "the faculty of making providential discoveries by accident." Reading Loon was serendipity for me.
I was uncertain at first about this story by Jack McLean. The title, Loon: A Marine Story, caused me to wonder if this was another anti-war screed by a "war-crazed Vietnam Marine veteran." It is not.
Instead, Loon, so-named for a hot landing zone near Laos, is a delight to read. McLean has a number of unique elements to the story he shares. One is the fact that a classmate for three years at Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts, was a young George W. Bush. McLean was also the first Vietnam veteran to enter Harvard University, despite having had a checkered academic record at Phillips. These and other touchstones with history are understated, and McLean allows the reader to sort out their significance.
McLean grew up in a close family and provides a young boy's view of American history: the Korean War, the challenges presented by the Soviet Union in the 1950s and 1960s, President John F. Kennedy's exhortation and appeal to America's youth, and all that led to Vietnam and McLean's part in it.
When he was rejected by the last of five colleges, his mother mentioned the military as his only other option. He was of an age, during the late 1950s, that remembered military service as an honorable profession and that had role models from World War II. He chose the Marines.
McLean's account of training at Parris Island is vivid but not overblown. He was struck by his drill instructor, but does not dwell on it nor parody it. He was better prepared than most of his fellow recruits because of a letter written to him from a distant cousin, a Marine colonel. (It's one I wish I'd written, and it's worth the price of the book to read.)
His descriptions of his tour in Vietnam are clear and without attempts at gratuitous explanation or elaboration. He describes the boredom accurately, including the strange mixture of relief from combat and the often eager anticipation of the next contact. His descriptions of life in a rifle company are as I remembered them, from the least-favored C-Ration ("Ham and Mother's") to the burning of the field head contents, to the shock of combat combining confusion with intense clarity and blurring of events with slow-motion precision. There is no self-aggrandizement—just the narrative of a Marine scared and confused but doing his job well and faithfully. Nothing more could be expected, and it is its own reward.
McLean's technical terms are for the most part accurate. I can forgive the 106mm recoilless rifle being called "artillery" and even the Hollywood-inspired "over and out" radio transmission. (Will they ever get that right)
I was moved by the descriptions of his company commander, Captain Bill Negron. He is remembered with awe and reverence for his competence and humanity. Most of the other leaders, officers and enlisted, come off well. This is not a discourse on Marine leadership—far from it. These are the honest perceptions of a lance corporal.
One of the most appealing aspects of McLean's book is the fact that he links historic events in the United States with his tour in Vietnam. It is a concise, accurate narration of the challenges, heartaches, and heartbreaks of 1968, from the seizure of the USS Pueblo (AGER-2) by North Korea, to the assassinations of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Senator Robert F. Kennedy, to the riots at the Democratic convention in Chicago. In fact, he covers even more, from post World War II to his discharge in 1972 in an evenhanded, objective way. For those seeking an easy guide to U.S. history during the period, I would recommend this book without hesitation.
But the best part of Loon, by far, is McLean's description of his relationships with his fellow Marines, which continue to this day. How difficult to describe the relief at having survived your tour, but the feeling of guilt over leaving behind your comrades as you head home. His recitation of the names of buddies killed or maimed would move anyone who has served in any war. He shares experience without shame; how can you be a Marine without emotion I may not always remember McLean's exact words, but I'll always remember how they made me feel: lucky to have found his book.
Standing By
Alison Buckholtz. New York: Tarcher, 2009. Intro. Bib. 320 pp. $24.95.
Reviewed by Joanne M. Steen
In Standing By, Alison Buckholtz, a Washington, D.C. writer who, before her marriage to an active-duty Navy pilot, freelanced for the New York Times, the Washington Post, and Salon.com, has penned the reality of military marriage: marry a service member, and you marry into the culture and lifestyle of his service branch. As Buckholtz describes her evolution from civilian career woman to ID-card-carrying Navy spouse and mother, we discover how real military spouses are made: not by a marriage license, manual, or set of orders, but by surviving, adapting, and flourishing in a culture that can sometimes feel akin to living in a foreign country.
As the wife of the commanding officer of an EA-6B Prowler squadron at NAS Whidbey Island, Buckholtz gives us honest glimpses of squadron life from the spouse's viewpoint. These include the close bonds forged from shared circumstances with other wives, the strain placed on marriages by frequent absences for work-ups and deployments, and the often mundane and overwhelming responsibilities of raising well-adjusted children while Dad flies into harm's way.
Buckholtz has a strong sense of her own identity and easily brings us into her world. She discusses her mission to imbue her young children with a deep sense of their Jewish heritage, her quest to maintain some semblance of a writing career while raising her family, and the challenges involved in keeping her marriage solid while her husband comes and goes in the demanding, post-9/11 environment.
The story of the military spouse during war or peacetime is not necessarily a new one. Yet in Standing By Buckholtz gives this perennial tale a fresh perspective and a healthy dose of historical grounding, highlighting the significant role of military spouses throughout America's history, beginning with Martha Washington and the camp-followers of the Revolutionary War. Buckholtz also provides us with historical depth and insight into Navy traditions and practices, making the book educational for even the most seasoned military spouse.
Standing By is both honest and compelling reading. With her civilian roots and candidly naive perspective of military life, Buckholtz evolves into an admittedly proud Navy wife on its pages. Her book will make veteran military spouses nod their heads in agreement and will mesmerize many civilian readers who want to learn more about the sacrifices, upheavals, and surprising pleasures in the daily life of the naval aviator's spouse.
Pearl Harbor Countdown: Admiral James O. Richardson
Skipper Steely. Gretna, LA: Pelican Publishing, 2008. Notes. Index. 544 pp. $35.
Reviewed by Colonel John McKay, U.S. Marine Corps (Retired)
A man of the accomplishments of Admiral James O. Richardson deserves a biography that treats of his last days and the honors rendered on his final farewell. Skipper Steely's book, inexplicably, does not deliver this.
Steely, a former newspaperman-turned-full-time writer, has chosen a fascinating subject in Richardson. Pearl Harbor Countdown makes clear that the admiral had extraordinary talent and professional acumen, although his reputation was ultimately tainted by his early relief as commander-in-chief, U.S. Fleet, by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and by the subsequent attack on Pearl Harbor.
Graduating fifth in the Class of 1902 from the U.S. Naval Academy, Richardson saw duty first on the Asiatic Station. His career progression was not unusual for that period, but Steely's book makes it difficult to follow. His narrative is marred by historical inaccuracies and weak geographical references.
For example, Steely states that "The successful surprise Japanese attack on the Russian fleet at Tsushima on May 27, 1904, influenced Richardson's thinking for a lifetime." The Battle of (the Strait of) Tsushima occurred on 27 May 1905. It was hardly a "surprise attack." Richardson was more likely shocked by the Japanese surprise attack, without the formality of a declaration of war, on Port Arthur on 4 February 1904. Furthermore, details on the Washington Naval Conference of 1921-22, the Three-Power Geneva Naval Conference of 1927, the London Naval Conference of 1930, and the Second London Naval Disarmament Conference of 1935 would have been useful.
Steely does not elucidate the U.S. naval operational force organization and clear geographical disposition of these forces and how they evolved in the march-up to 7 December 1941. Discussion of the U.S. Navy's logistics support groups, particularly in light of Richardson's concern for proper support if ordered to base the Fleet in Hawaiian waters, also would have assisted the reader. Likewise, the inclusion of charts and maps depicting strategic developments in both Europe and the Pacific would have been invaluable. I could go on about the need for more elucidation, particularly with regard to war plans, for example the several Orange Plans, and the Rainbow Series (1-5). Clarity is lacking in this work.
Richardson was "detached" early because he had run afoul of President Roosevelt over the positioning of the U.S. Fleet. As Steely writes, "In reality, Richardson was not in real tune with the Navy thought pattern coming from Washington, which was influenced so heavily from the constant daily pressure of European news."
He was relieved just over a year into his tour by Admiral Husband E. Kimmel in February 1941. How the "detachment" actually came to fruition and ultimately culminated he does not clearly explain. Through too much irrelevancy, poor grammar, and the absence of careful editing, the true story of the countdown to Pearl Harbor and the myriad consequences that followed that fateful event are lost. That is unfortunate, because it is a story well worth telling. Richardson deserves better.
With regard to editing, while the footnote format is generally good, there are some glaring inaccuracies. Web citations should have been used more judiciously or not at all. Such citations are subject to frequent changes, generally are not subject to peer review, and are difficult to verify.
As an appropriate description of the admiral's final farewell is lacking, so, too, is a compelling analysis of his role in naval history. This, like the ultimate resolution of the entire Pearl Harbor controversy, almost 70 years after the fact, will have to await another day.