Generation Kill

Generation Kill
by Evan Wright

Generation Kill
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Book Summary Information

Author: Evan Wright
Edition: Paperback
Format: Bargain Price
Published: 2005-02-01
ISBN: N/A
Number of pages: 368
Publisher: Back Bay Books

Book Reviews of Generation Kill

Book Review: Epitomizes the strengths and weaknesses of the US Military
Summary: 5 Stars

Reading this book was an intense experience. As an ex-military person (non-US, but spent a few years in the New Zealand Army), I could empathize strongly with the Marines Wright writes about. Nothing like having bullets flying around you to add a little adrenaline to your morning.

That said, I've been on exercise (years ago now, but nothing seems to have changed) where we acted as enemy for the Marines and I've got a lot of respect for the Marines, and Recon Marines in particular (I was a Recce myself). But they do have their flaws, common to all the US Military. An over-reliance on technology and firepower, a gung-ho attitude to expending their troopies lives, weak fire-discipline and officers who (generalization I admit, but this was my limited experience), at anything above the junior level, tend to be bureaucrats rather than true combat leaders.

This book illustrates all the above flaws, but over all of that the strength, resilience, skill and fighting spirit of the US Marines shine through. This is despite the total misuse of a Recon Unit (and what an indictment of Marine senior leadership that is...), generally poor leadership and a total failure to communicate the true nature of the mission to the guys doing the job - and a greater indictment of military leadership I cannot think of - the guys out on the sharp end shouold always know their mission and objective - always...).

I walked away from reading this book full of admiration for the individual Marines, and shaking my head in despair over the US Military's senior leadership. Great at conventional fighting, but still sadly inept in counter-insurgency, appropriate use of firepower on civilian targets (a crticism leveled at the US by the British military leadership incidentally, not just my opinion) and totally unprepared for the ramifications of victory.

Well worth the read.

Summary of Generation Kill

Read Evan Wright's posts on the Penguin Blog.

Read about the Penguin Group (USA) partnership with HBO in support of the Generation Kill Troop Drive here.

They were called a generation without heroes.
Then they were called upon to be heroes.

Within hours of 9/11, America?s war on terrorism fell to those like the twenty-three Marines of the First Recon Battalion, the first generation dispatched into open-ended combat since Vietnam. They were a new pop-culture breed of American warrior unrecognizable to their forebears?soldiers raised on hip hop, video games and The Real World. Cocky, brave, headstrong, wary and mostly unprepared for the physical, emotional and moral horrors ahead, the ?First Suicide Battalion? would spearhead the blitzkrieg on Iraq, and fight against the hardest resistance Saddam had to offer.

Now a major HBO event, Generation Kill is the national bestselling book based on the National Magazine Award- winning story in Rolling Stone. It is the funny, frightening, and profane firsthand account of these remarkable men, of the personal toll of victory, and of the randomness, brutality and camaraderie of a new American War.

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