Someone ought to stick 5 gold stars on the author's forehead!!

Chris Hobson has managed to compile a great amount of very valuable information into a well laid out and easily accessed format. With this book in hand the reader will be able to play "Historical Trivial Pursuit" with style. Examples?

How many F-104s were lost in SEA? On what day did the USAF lose
THREE F-104s? Or - How many KB-50s did the USAF lose in Vietnam?

Although the book appears to be a mass of gray type with a sparse
selection of B&W pictures, there is enough information here to give a dedicated aerophile hours & hours of interesting reading.

Besides the date and type of aircraft lost, most entries also include the airframe serial number, names of the pilot and/or crewmembers, and salient notes of interest such as what nose art was worn by the aircraft. The author uses an abbreviated but
entertaining writing style to describe how the loss occurred, Search and Rescue efforts, and in some cases the subsequent careers of select individuals. Those cases where remains were recovered at a later date are also recorded.

The personnel index provided is exemplary. Using it, I finally
found out how and where a pilot I had known had perished. Other
entries brought back old memories from my time spent in SEA.

If you are a minor air historian or a modeler, GET THIS BOOK!~
I guarantee that it will become one of your most valuable assets when researching the Vietnam Air War.

Was loaned a copy and am ordering my own because of the tremndous amount of research that Hobson put into this book. It is well laid out and logical. The summaries at the end are worth the price.

cheers, Boom

Wow, let me say that again, wow! The original data has been kicking around for years (I have seen it myself), but it was unwieldy and hard to find for most. My hat is off to the author and publisher for taking on this project and going beyond the mere typesetting the listing of aircraft losses during the Vietnam conflict. The addition of well researched photographs and well written captions is a definite bonus. The author obviously did his homework and produced a true classic reference for any student of the Vietnamese conflict. Well done!

Charlene Edwards has put together a wonderfully deverse and mosaic puzzle that refects the human side of the Vietnam War. She has captured the spiritual and emotional energies of those she interviewed and photographed in her book. The book not only has wonderful photos but the text bleeds with heart felt stories.

Her 10 year quest to share the feelings and images of those personal experiences was a gift to the rest of us. I found myself moved to tears at times, by the images and stories she has introduced us to in her book. I am richer for having had the experience of reading this book.

Voices from Vietnam is a brilliant and riveting collection of images and essays that brought the Vietnam war alive to someone who was born at its conclusion. It is a must-read for anyone who served in the war or had loved ones who did. As the daughter of a Vietnam veteran, the stories in this book have been instrumental in helping me to understand some of the things my father experienced as a soldier in this war. This compelling book shares stories from every possible perspective, yet the themes of pain, suffering, survival and triumph are very much the same. This is a very personal, very human look at the affects of war. I highly recommend it as a tool for healing and for understanding.

Voices From Vietnam was written by someone who was very young when this war took place, but who was drawn to it and remained dedicated to the understanding of it for the rest of her life.This book is very special because it humanizes both sides and helps us to realize that it was a tragic mistake from the very beginning. Misguided but well-meaning Americans went into the abyss that was left behind by the French colonizers.The people of Vietnam were devastated by over 11 long years of fighting with the Americans .The most powerful nation in the world could not ultimately overpower the determination and tremendous courage of this tiny and poor country.One of the greatest and most profound lessons as demonstrated in this book is that the Vietnamese have forgiven us for the utter decimation of their country and are willing to help us heal the terrible wounds inflicted on both sides.The author introduces us to many people and their stories and shows us that it is possible to embrace your former enemies and work together towards a better future for all.For many Vietnamese the legacy of the war is saddness-the loss of time and place ,of family and friends ,of youth and innocence. If you turn the coin over you find once-young Americans burdened with those same loses.In the end we are a mirror image of each other. Perhaps we will never be able to fully make sense of what we endured on both sides for eleven years.The Vietnamese know they won the war but there was no real winner.The author shows us some of these people and how they have rebuilt their country and extended a hand to us in forgivness and friendship.The many beautiful photographs and interviews tell this story perfectly and for every one of us to understand perfectly.This is an outstanding testimony to the good we all have in us-if only we would try to remember it.

I ordered APO 96490 and received it yesterday at 2 P.M. I immediately started reading (recalling, digesting) and you guessed it .... at 10 p.m. I finished (I'm a slow and thorough reader). So many of the accounts paralleled my year (1970) in Nam. The main differences were: (1) I was drafted from graduate school and spent 1970 in Nam, (2) I was married, (3) I had a one year old son, (4) I was with the 4th Infantry, (5) I took an R&R to Hawaii in August to see my wife and son, (6) I was actually stationed at An Khe, (7) most of my friends attended Sunday chapel with me, and (8) I was welcomed back from Nam (from family, friends and my church family) with open arms and thanked for a job well done. Your accounts brought back many "new" memories, which I thought I had forgotten. I have been able to locate my best buddy in Nam and unfortunately he has never been able to "put it behind". I definitely will suggest he read this wonderfully written book and try drawing on its content. Even though it is just 212 pages, it is packed with volumes of information that only the vet will be able to fully appreciate. Looking forward to your next book.

On at personal note: Richard Stahl and I graduated from Sandwich High School together in 1963. We both attended the 40th class reunion this year (2003). Ed (from the book) also graduated with us and was at the reunion. Richard was one of the most popular and most liked kids in the class; he was a "brain", not a "nerd", and very athletic. He had great family roots in Sandwich (his parents were wonderful, common, down to earth people- his dad was known and loved by everyone in Sandwich- about 3000 people in 1963). God bless you, your wife and family.

As a reader of APO 96490 I must say Stahl held my interest throughtout the entire book. I found myself feeling somewhat guilty all snuggled up on my couch with the fireplace burning, while Stahl vividly describes being shot at while in a bunker.
Stahl does an excellent job of educating the reader in regards to military terminology and jargon which provides insight into how the military functions and operates.
I especially enjoyed Stahl's ability to recreate the sights, sounds, smells, and feel for the surroundings he was placed in. As one reads, the mind can capture the very situation being described.
APO 96490 takes the reader on a journey through the life of Stahl as he experienced Vietnam. One rides the roller coaster of emotion as you experience the highs and lows of military life during war.
After reading APO 96490 I have a much healthier respect for all of our servicemen and women who have served our country and fought during wartime.
GOD BLESS AMERICA !!!!!!!!!

From page one through the entire book I felt like I was on an adverture with the arthur. I felt like I got to know him as a person and to appreciate the experience of being in the army. The vets got a raw deal coming out of the war and he portrayed that very well. It is both entertaining and and informative. Good fast read.

Michael Rodriguez' "Humidity Moon" tells the world how we lived, how we felt and how our buddies were closer to us than our own parents, brothers or sisters. It is a must to read, will take you back 30 yrs to a place that cost America a war and the Vietnamese their Nation

IT WAS MY HONOR TO HAVE SERVED WITH THIS ANGRY YOUNG MAN,A PROFESSIONAL IN EVERY SENSE OF THE WORD.A GIFTED PERSONALITY AND GREAT MARINE SEMPER FI SGT. I.D.PADILLA tpidp@pacent.com

Go with the Marines of Charlie Co. as they search the paddies and treelines of Vietnam for the feared, hated, respected and elusive enemy whom they refer to as the "little people". Experience the gut-twisting tension of moving through rain, fog, and night, or the smothering heat of day with every pore jittering on edge, listening, looking. From out of the things that could happen and the things that do happen, between the mistakes and the breaks, and from his memories of the men who die and the ones who live, Rodriguez has written a collection of short stories that ranks at the top, among the very best of writings about the Vietnam War. This book is a must-read for anyone who wants to know what the War was for the men who fought it.

Offers a wealth of information about traditional Vietnamese culture and society...essential reading

Stories that American have been reluctant to listen to-non-American participants' stories of the horrors of the Vietnam War itself, of escape from new but undemocratic countries, of conflict-ridden adjustment...personal details about the effects of the war...Scott's collection is prefaced by a dramatic frontispiece, a painting by a Vietnamese artist that depicts boat people on the high seas, titles "A people forced to go a dangerous drama across feats of darkness and turbulent seas in favor of freedom." Collected from Cambodians, Laotians, and Vietnamese in Philippine refugee camps in October 1985 [through] May 1 1986, these twenty-five stories are the testimonies closest in time to many of the events they describes. Scott identifies empathetically with the refugees' search for "the freedom land," as well as with those who failed to come here. In lengthy appendices, she provides maps of the Laotian reeducation camps and memorializing lists of those who have disappeared in them. Pictures of the refugees in the Philippine camps supplement the written stories. Some narratives are told by camp advisors; some are presented by "Name Withheld." While one story was given to Scott "in perfect English," others were told only through an interpreter. Scott presents her subjects' narratives entire, occasionally segmented by asterisks, with provocative titles ("The Hope of Ho Chi Minh Is Fallen Now") and with brief headnotes characterizing the individual or the historical situation. The narratives are occasionally quite long; almost all are organized chronologically... Here is Khamsamong Somvong, a former first lieutenant in the Royal Lao army: "In the seminar camp there were a few men who were Communists. They were there to execute the policy of the Politburo. And it was they who decided who should be killed in the camp. We were supposed to respect the Party only. If one of the Communists said, 'This is red,' we had to say, 'Yes, this is red.' If we said, 'No, this is black,' we would be killed. So I lived a very hard life in there. I saw many people killed before me."--Oral History Review 21/2 (Winter, 1993)

Indochina's refugees, who in jungle death camps felt the chill of the heart or saw life turn cold in crowded boats, give their harrowing stories in this collection

I have read "Mobile Guerilla Force", "BlackJack 33", and "BlackJack 34" All three of the books are an amazing read, not the typical blood, mud and tears, hovever there is unfortunately a historically real amount of that as well. Not only do you get a sence of what life was like as a special operations operator in VietNam, but the laughs as well as the sorrows of day to day life in VietNam. The author also opened a porthole into the relationship that was built with the indiginous peoples that fought along side the Mobile Geurilla Force whose heroism is nothing short of legondary. As a reader, one can see the author settle into a comfortable writing niche' and progressively make each page seemingly more personal and real ("in the first person" if you will) to the reader. More stories like these need to be told of the triumphs of American Gi's in VietNam.
POW, MIA, VFW, Thankyou, you are not forgotten!
Sincerely Jc

I have read at least 2 dozen books on combat in Vietnam and this is one of the best. The book is very well written. The author really makes you feel as if you are walking in the jungle of Vietnam side by side members of the mobile guerrilla force.

This is one of the most exciting books that I've read about the war in Vietnam. Donahue puts you right there amongst the brave and loyal Khmer soldiers and the cunning and equally committed Viet Cong. Having spent some time in the area written about, I can attest to the accuracy of his brilliantly portrayed environment. This book is going into my permanent collection along with Blackjack-33 and Blackjack-34. Well written book that you can't put down until the end.

Having heard of Heinie Aderholt for years, I was looking forward to reading his autobiography. While the book is very informative, I was somewhat disappointed in the overall content. Maybe it's due to his age, but there were some assertions made that don't jive with the facts. He states that the Air Force misused the C-130s in Vietnam by limiting their gross weight. In reality, C-130s in Southeast Asia operated at their maximum allowable normal gross weights and payloads throughout the war - I was a C-130 loadmaster on two SEA tours and know the limitations. There is also quite a bit of personal horn-blowing, which is common with autobiographies. I found it rather ironic that Heinie's comments related to special operations are almost identical to those made by his former boss, General William Tunner, about how airlift was misused and should be a command of its own. There's also the constant refrain of "if they had left it up to us, we'd have won the war" but now that the facts are coming out, it is becoming pretty apparent that there was no way we were going to win it. Air Commando One is a good book for the military historian's bookshelf.

Sam McGowan, Vietnam Vet and author, The CAVE, a novel of the Vietnam War

During the Vietnam era, Heinie Aderholt was U.S. air force's patron saint of low-cost, bare-knuckled, unconventional warfare. He was one of two men -- the other being his longtime friend, the CIA's Bill Lair -- to put his personal stamp on the huge covert program in Laos, and had there been more Aderholts and Lairs, events might have turned out differently. As it was, Aderholt had to labor during his entire career under a military system that was not flexible enough, or responsive enough, for a man of his remarkable talents. But he did his duty, and then some. The Air Force historian Warren Trest has done Aderholt justice with this book; and there's some especially interesting material on Aderholt's loyal opposition, from within, to the way the Vietnam war was run.

Heinie is a legend but not from others tales of his exploits. Heine is leader respected for his legendary achievements; some of which yet remain classified. A leader formost who undertood his men because he always remained one of them. No matter how severe the circumstance Heinie created success by unique applications in unconventional operations.

At Nakhon Phanom for example, on the border of Laos, Heinie founded and commanded the 56th Air commando Wing into a unique force to interdict the flow of men and materials down the trails in Laos. Making the rounds nightly he remained close with his troops of all rank in a bond seldom seen where thoughts were exchanged because of mutual respect. Heinie slept less than most and almost always in his fatigues or flightsuit.

General Aderholt's life story is compelling and well written and he continues today to make a difference in Southeast Asia. In October 2002 returning to Nakhon Phanom, Heinie procured a container of medical and school supplies with the Thailand Laos Cambodia Brotherhood and to dedicate a monument being built to honor the fallen American and Thai forces in the Vietnam War.

The Legend Continues... read it.

John Sweet
56th Special Operations Wing
Tactical Units Operations Center
Nakhon Phanom
Air Commando # 2924

As the war in Vietnam escalated in 1994 and 95, I was a young naïve supporter of the war simply because I believed that whatever it took to stop and fight communism was justified. My first doubts about the justification of this war came when I would hear the causality figures at the end of each week on the nightly news. I can remember these figures e.g. 946 VC killed in the fighting this week; 94 Americans died. I simply did not believe that anyone knew how many VC were killed, and questioned the figures reported including those of American causalities. As things developed, I began to reassess my thoughts about the American involvement in this war. I read McNamara's "In Retrospect," Neil Sheehan's "A Bright Shining Lie," Stanley Karnow's "Vietnam: A History," But it was Fredrik Logevall's "Choosing War," that really gave me the insight to this conflict. It's the most enlightening account of the American involvement in Vietnam I've read to date. Last year I visted Ho Chi Minh City (formally Saigon). This is in itself was more of education than any of the books. It's my recommendation to all who are interested in the American involvement in Vietnam, to read this detailed and comprehensive account.

Not only is Professor Logevall an excellent historian...he is an excellent teacher as well! I have taken one of his classes at UC Santa Barbara; they are the best and most popular classes on campus.

This fascinating, extremely readable, and carefully researched book by historian Frederik Logevall has an intriguing thesis closely paralleling that of several other emerging scholars regarding the origins and prosecution of the Vietnam War. Like David Kaiser's provocative indictment in "American Tragedy; Kennedy, Johnson, & The Origins Of The Vietnam War" of both the military and civilian advisors to Presidents Eisenhower, Kennedy, and Johnson, the author presents a damning and quite convincing stream of evidence proving that it was in fact a series of individuals like Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara, Secretary of Defense Dean Rusk, and General William Westmoreland who arrogantly chose to pursue a war that many around them actively questioned and discouraged. The author's careful research shows a flood of documentary evidence indicating that these people and a number of like-minded others, deliberately chose to prosecute a war for which they had good reason to believe would not likely succeed.

Unlike Kaiser in his excellent book, Professor Logevall chooses to concentrate impressively on a critical eighteen-month period spanning from the summer of 1963 to the early winter of 1965, and the fateful steps taken during that period toward a policy of escalation and direct involvement of American combat units. The author contends that any one of a number of important opportunities to step aside were deliberately ignored, often based on important information provided by key insiders such as McNamara. As the record also shows, this information was anything but the disinterested and objective assessment of the political, economic, and military situation on the ground in South Vietnam it was presented as. In this sense both President Kennedy and President Johnson were victims of a quite deliberate campaign of misinformation and self-serving worst-case analysis by Rusk, McNamara, and Westmoreland.

It was in such a poisonous and duplicitous environment that Lyndon Johnson made a fateful series of decisions to escalate the war by "Americanizing" it, something Kennedy before him had quite insistently denied permission to do. The author also argues quite persuasively that both Kennedy and Johnson had stepped away from opportunities for disengaging from the involvement in Vietnam for domestic political reasons, including a concern with being seen as "soft" on communism in the period preceding the coming national elections of 1964. This is substantiated by Johnson's actions after Kennedy's assassination; while secretly initiating actions to escalate the war, Johnson self-consciously campaigned saying exactly the opposite. He understood the potential firestorm American involvement could have for both liberal and conservative criticism, and was therefore careful to mitigate his vulnerability by neutralizing it as a political factor until after the Presidential elections of 1964.

Likewise, once committed to a policy of massive American participation in the war, Johnson feared the personal consequences both domestically and internationally were he to decide to withdraw and admit defeat. Yet world leaders almost uniformly distanced themselves from American involvement, and privately counseled Johnson to "cut and run". In addition, Johnson's own lack of appreciation for the potential damage our involvement in Vietnam might have on international relations resulted in a number of lost opportunities for détente and improvement in relations with both the Soviet Union and China. Based on his own personal frailties and the bad counsel of both his military and civilian advisors, he pursued the single most disastrous course imaginable; further escalation, condemning not only his own domestic program but nearly 60,000 American soldiers to untimely (and absolutely unnecessary) death.

This is am intriguing, insightful, and important book, and the author writes both in an entertaining and accessible style. He mirrors the evidence presented in other recent books such as the aforementioned Kaiser tome, and also in Major H.R. McMaster's absorbing recent book, "Dereliction Of Duty; Lyndon Johnson, Robert McNamara, The Joint Chiefs Of Staff, And The Lies That Led to Vietnam", and handily helps to put the lie to the kind of neo-revisionist saber-rattling of armchair conservatives like Michael Lind ( one wonders if Lind was ever in the military; or if he is a "George W. Bush" kind of born-again macho clebrant of combat who has never had a shot fired at him, an armchair enthusiast who cheered from the sidelines as a passive noncombatant member of the Texas Air National Guard). Gee, let's fly planes over the vacant Texas tundra and we can call ourselves patriots! Lind would have us believe this was all God's work in his silly and wrong-headed narrative "The Necessary War". Since he was likely still in his nappies when the firestorm was raining all over the heads of the more than half million uneducated, largely blue-collar men and women we deployed at any one time to Vietnam, I wonder how he would know. Did he read about it at Yale? "Choosing War", on the other hand, is an excellent and carefully crafted work of scholarship, and one that helps to nail together a much more comprehensive understanding of how it was we were so badly and quite unnecessarily led into this most unfortunate of American wars.

Edward F. Murphy, Dak To: America's Sky Soldiers in South Vietnam's Central Highlands (1993, New York: Pocket Books edn., 1995)

The appearance of this marvelous little book is deceptive. Its pocket-book format might suggest a brief regimental history or narrow personal account, but author Edward Murphy's text is, in fact, a captivating and relatively sophisticated narrative of the 173d Airborne Brigade's five-month campaign in 1967 in the dense jungle of South Vietnam's Central Highlands. The fighting around a small hamlet called Dak To proved to be especially hard for two reasons: the first concerned the physical conditions and the second was in the nature of the enemy. Daytime temperatures were in the upper 90s, with humidity in excess of 90 percent, and the moisture brought out mosquitoes and leeches. At times, it rained hard practically every day. According to Murphy, "frequently [the American paratroopers'] clothes rotted in the damp jungle," so, about once a month, fresh fatigues were delivered by supply helicopter to the field. The jungle was so thick that visibility often was limited to a few meters, and nearly every foot of ground was covered by vegetation. Sometimes the paratroopers had to carry chain saws to cut through the jungle and to make landing zones for their supply helicopters. (It could take two hours of hard work to hack a landing zone out of the jungle.) Enlisted men carried their weapons, ammunition, and personal gear on their backs in rucksacks which weighed from 75 to 90 pounds. During the rainy season, marching 1,000 meters through the jungle in a day was considered "good progress."

The physical conditions often negated the United States' vast superiority in weapons technology. For instance, according to Murphy: "Artillery [could] be ineffective in the jungle...[because] shells [had] the tendency to burst in the tops of tall trees, scattering shrapnel harmlessly about." "Too often, airstrikes and gunships could not effectively penetrate the thick jungle canopy." Furthermore, according to Murphy: "To prevent U.S. air strikes and artillery from decimating its ranks, the [North Vietnamese and Viet Cong] 'hugged' the Sky Soldiers, closing to within ten to twenty meters of their perimeter." In addition to the difficult conditions, and in contrast to the combat farther south, which was mostly against Viet Cong irregulars, the paratroopers, many of whom were still teenagers, battled elements of the North Vietnamese Army, "professionals who [knew] how to fight." The fighting often was brutal. One of the favored weapons of the North Vietnamese was the RPG, a Soviet-manufactured antitank rocket used as an antipersonnel weapon against American infantry. Furthermore, there was nothing chivalrous about the war at Dak To. After one fierce firefight, Murphy reports, a medical specialist "could hear the wounded screaming for mercy as the NVA walked among them, executing those paratroopers still alive." On another occasion, when the paratroopers returned to the site of one battle to recover their dead, they found that "corpses had been mutilated, their features destroyed, ring fingers cut off, and ears removed." Early in the book, Murphy writes that the "173d possessed great morale. All its men were volunteers for airborne training and most had volunteered for South Vietnam." During the Dak To campaign, however, the paratroopers' frustrations mounted. At one moment, when a "friendly" artillery round landed too close for comfort to an American captain, he grabbed his company's radio handset and screamed: "Send another round this way and I'll kill the son of a bitch who fires it." One of Murphy's clearest themes is the gradual erosion of the paratroopers' confidence in their superior officers. According to the author, the generals' "grand plans meant little to the average Sky Soldier. All he knew was that he was out in the boonies, humping day after day in the monotonous mountains and valleys of the Central Highlands." Furthermore, Murphy writes that when Gen. William Westmoreland, the American commander in Vietnam, flew to Dak To on June 23, 1967 to talk with the survivors of one fierce battle, "You took on a tough NVA unit and whipped their asses," a sergeant whispered to a buddy, "Wonder what he's been smoking?" Murphy offers many glimpses of the cruel ironies and inequities of war. In one instance, after a Marine jet dropped a 500-lb. bomb directly on an aid station for wounded American paratrooper, an American officer on the ground pleaded into a radio: "No more f------ planes. Please no more planes. You're killing us up here. Stop it." The bomb wounded over 80 men badly enough to be brought to the aid station, but nearly all the medics were dead. Meanwhile, the pilot returned "to his base at Da Nang with its air-conditioned officers' club, ice-cold beers, hot showers, and clean sheets," The ongoing controversy about the accuracy of "body counts" is on display here. At one point during the Dak To campaign, when North Vietnamese dead were reported as 1,644, Gen. Westmoreland stated in a press conference: "I think [the battle was] the beginning of a great defeat for the enemy." According to Murphy, however, "these figures are suspect,"and the actual number probably was closer to 1,000. (After one battle, the 173d's after-action report stated that 513 NVA had been killed even though the best estimate of men engaged in the battle was that the number of enemy of killed in action actually was 50 to 75.)

One veteran master sergeant, who fought in three wars, told the Murphy that, in 25 years as a paratrooper, he had never seen anything approaching the death and destruction at Dak To. The author leaves no doubt about the paratroopers' bravery or the 173d Airborne Brigade richly-deserved reputation as one of the elite units of the United States' armed forces. But the answer to the larger question - What were American fighting men doing in the jungles of Vietnam in the first place? - remains unanswered.

This book was fabulous, my brother was the FNG written about. It was the first I ever knew about his experiences in Vietnam and I knew he was wonderful, but I never imagined the experience he and the other soldiers had. For whatever reason, he never discussed his tour with us and after reading this book I know why. It is just so much to bear for so many, so young. They really were heroes. A must read for anyone interested in the Vietnam war.

This is one of the best volumes about a desperate, bloody battle during the Vietnam War. Fought between the veteran paratroopers of the 173d Airborne Brigade and North Vietnamese Regulars in the Central Highlands of Vietnam in late 1967, the author demonstrates through graphic prose and primary evidence just how savage and vicious the fighting in Vietnam was. This legendary fight took place almost immediately before the TET offensive of January 1968 and ruined some of the NVA units that were to take part in that offensive and helped ruin the chances for the Comminists to gain victory. Victory in this fight came at a heavy cost, and this book chronicles just how savage and desperate, and how heart-breaking the American losses were.

For me personally, this book means much, as my brother was a company commander in the 2d Battalion of the 503d infantry, one of the four infantry battalions of the 173d Airborne Brigade, and he was killed in action leading his company on Hill 875.

This book is as good as We Were Soldiers Once And Young, and it is one of the best books I have read on the war in Vietnam. It shows the courage and skill of outnumbered Americans who fought, died, and never quit-something that never really came out of the general media coverage of that unpopular war.

This volume is highly recommended and the author is to be congratulated for he has told a story of high valor and much suffering, and of the ongoing skill of the American soldier doing his duty, appreciated or not, in foreign lands fighting and defeating a skilled and determined enemy.

Virtute et Valore

Leonard B. Scott writes another excellent book probably relating much of his own personal experience in Viet Nam. Again he sets up his main characters detailing what they left behind only to have everything they knew and understood here in the U.S. tested and in many instances left in some far off jungle in Viet Nam. Mr. Scott, though he was an officer, describes Army life among the enlisted troops with great clarity and understanding. He may be a Mustang (enlisted later becoming an

officer) whatever, I have enjoyed reading all of his Viet Nam Era Army books and would rate this one just as good as The Expendables. The vocabulary he uses is of that era and adds in his effort to recreate life back in the late 1960's. A Must Read if you like Scott's writings.

Ironically, I picked this book up at the bargin bin in a St. Petersburg, Russia. Starting out in Oklahoma, it shows the progression from state college football, to OCS, through Ranger and Airborne training to the jungles of Vietnam. Two brothers, taking different paths through the Army.

The way that Scott writes the story to the hill is extravagant. Not only do you see the one side perspective from the Brothers you also get to see it from the Vietnamese side. As one knows you need to know the two sides of the coin in order to get the real truth. This book like SCott's others is truly something else.