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The Jonathan Dolhenty Archive |
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A Chronicle of Combat by Rick Atkinson Henry Holt - March 2004 Reviewed by Dr. Jonathan Dolhenty
If you are a military history buff, you will
love this book. If not, it might be the right time
to take a plunge into the subject. This account of
military history is about Operation Iraqi Freedom.
While justifications for the recent war between the
American-British coalition forces and Saddam
Hussein's Iraqi regime are still being debated
among politicos and the general public, the facts
are that it did occur, American and British
soldiers died and were wounded, a brutal dictator
was toppled, and we watched the whole event play
itself out on live television. Now the Iraqi people
have been given the opportunity to rebuild a
country in their own image and likeness. |
In
the Company of
Soldiers: |
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Rick Atkinson, a former staff writer and senior editor at The Washington Post and a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and author, has written a journal of his experiences in the Iraqi conflict, beginning on the morning of February 26, 2003 at Fort Campbell, Kentucky, home of the famous "Screaming Eagles," the 101st Airborne Division of the United States Army. After a couple of days of orientation, Atkinson and dozens of other journalists were flown to the Middle East. Thereafter, he lived with the 101st Airborne Division from their preparations in Kuwait to the occupation of Baghdad -- a period of almost two months -- and was granted complete access to the commanders and troops. In the Company of Soldiers is Atkinson's very up-close and personal story of the war, in which he details every aspect of the conflict from planning and debriefings with the commanders, to his accounts of the battles the soldiers fought, to his sometimes intimate stories about the soldiers involved. It is an eyewitness account, occasionally laced with sadness and disappointment, occasionally with joy and pride. But more than that, it is also the story of one man, Major General David H. Petraeus, commander of the 101st Airborne Division, a modern warrior who was described once by a colleague as "the most competitive man on the planet." The author spent much of his time in Iraq alongside Petraeus, who finished near the top of his 1974 class at West Point, and was known then as a "striver to the max." No ordinary soldier by any means, Petraeus had received a doctorate in international relations from Princeton University and for twenty-five years had been through various command and staff assignments, including tours in Haiti and Bosnia. Now he was commanding the "Screaming Eagles," a force of 17,000 troops, in a war in a forlorn and desolate desert environment, testing both his physical and mental skills. Atkinson, sitting in on the daily briefings as the division's attacks were planned, watches as Petraeus wrestles with numerous tactical enigmas and observes as the general instructs, motivates, and leads his soldiers and subordinate commanders in several intense engagements. While describing this stressful and anxious journey into and during war, Atkinson introduces the reader to many other heroes of the combat, from Lt. General William Wallace, commander of V Corps, to Brig. Generals Ben Freakley and Edward Sinclair, assistant division commanders respectively for operations and support, Col. Mike Linnington of the 3rd Brigade, a number of CWOs who pilot the helicopters used in the battles, and, of course, that ordinary brave soldier on the ground whose job it is to do the job and often be irreverent when speaking about it. Our nation should be proud of them. Even though I was on a deadline to complete another project, I read the entire book in two days because I had difficulty putting it aside. This is a firsthand account of war. It is a vivid picture of a remarkable group of soldiers and commanders. It reads more like a suspense novel than a nonfiction work narrating actual events. Atkinson's writing-style is what I call "facile and friendly," that is, easy on the eye and the mind, so much so that the story stays in the forefront rather than the sentence structure. And yet the details he provides are worthy of a scholarly work. In fact, the writing is so well done it's like a "motion picture in the mind," something I don't say about many books. There are other things I really like about the book besides the writing style. One is the presentation of two maps at the front of the book (The Iraqi Battleground and Route of the 101st Airborne Division) which allows the reader to follow the movements of the 101st Airborne Division in Iraq; the maps are particularly helpful for those of us unfamiliar with the geography of that part of the world. I found myself constantly referring to them as the story unfolded, in fact so much so that I finally put a paper clip on the page so I could access them faster. Also valuable are the schematic which helps to identify the command structure of V Corps and the glossary of military jargon. Without the latter, I wouldn't have known an OGA from a DCU from an ASR. Still another plus is that the index of topics is very detailed. I highly recommend this book to you whether you are interested in military history or not. You will not be disappointed. This is still ongoing history and a knowledge of how we got to this point in the situation seems to me to be important. Many of us watched this story unfold on television. Now we have the chance to read the book. True, this is the reverse of the usual situation -- read the book, then see the movie -- but television coverage, in retrospect, did not really provide us with the up-close and personal experience that Rick Atkinson provides us in this superbly written account of a most significant contemporary military conflict.
by Rick Atkinson
Enrich your life with a book about politics and current events... Enrich your political & social life with a politics or news magazine... |
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