The Long Gray Line: The American Journey of West Point's Class of 1966
by Rick Atkinson
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Book Summary Information
Author: Rick AtkinsonEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 1999-10-15
ISBN: 0805062912
Number of pages: 624
Publisher: Holt Paperbacks
Book Reviews of The Long Gray Line: The American Journey of West Point's Class of 1966
Book Review: Brilliantly Recounts the Vietnam Experience
Summary: 5 Stars
This book is a great complement to Sheehan's "A Bright Shining Lie." Both tell the story of Vietnam through the prism of a few individuals, though Atkinson has a somewhat larger class of protagonists to work with by virtue of following the exploits of an entire class of West Point graduates. Atkinson comes from a military family, and his perspective is more right of center than Sheehan's. He provides a much-needed reminder of the idealism, patriotism, and heroism of the young men who served. One can best appreciate the Vietnam experience by reading both books, as well as Karnow's masterly narrative history, "Vietnam: A History."
Given the more conservative perspective of Atkinson and his protagonists, their criticisms of the military are compelling. The American military in Vietnam failed at the strategic level, as Sheehan and others have made clear. We could not win a war of attrition against a numerous enemy fighting on his home turf who was far more committed than we to the battle. And on a tactical level, Westmoreland's search-and-destroy methods, which involved abandoning territory after horrific bloodletting, were insane. Abrams' clear-and-hold methods made a lot more sense and the great irony is that the war was going better, at least tactically, when we pulled out than when we were escalating. But given the strategic reality, Abrams was hardly in a position to "win" the war. The enemy would regroup and would continue to bleed Americans for decades until we left. This was not a winnable war, at least so long as we were not prepared to use massive infusions of millions of troops and billions more dollars of resources.
Atkinson is critical of the careerism of the officer corps. Officers punched their tickets on tours as opposed to staying at a job for the long haul and making a difference. In addition, the West Point system and attitude of the officer corps was more conducive to sliding by as opposed to encouraging a corps of creative, risk-taking, and accountable junior officers.
By following the class after Vietnman into the 1980s, Atkinson is able to show the ways in which the military has changed for the better in reaction to Vietnam. The gender integration of West Point and move away from some of sadistic dysfunction of the old West Point seems a positive step in the direction of attracting the best and the brightest and encouraging them to be creative leaders.
The tragedy of the young officers who died is heartbreaking, as is the callous treatment of returning veterans. Atkinson's approach allows him to tell the story not just of a changing military, but the story of the evolution in attitudes toward the military by Americans in general. The combat scenes in this book are mesmerizing, and Atkinson seems to have been able to capture the true horror and exhiliration of combat.
Atkinson did an extraordinary amount of interviewing and hard work in preparing this narrative, and he tells the story in an engrossing manner.
This is a magnificent book.
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Summary of The Long Gray Line: The American Journey of West Point's Class of 1966
The first trade paperback edition of the New York Times best-seller about West Point's Class of 1966, by Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Rick Atkinson.
This is the story of the twenty-five-year adventure of the generation of officers who fought in Vietnam. With novelistic detail, Atkinson tells the story of West Point's Class of 1966 primarily through the experiences of three classmates and the women they loved--from the boisterous cadet years and youthful romances to the fires of Vietnam, where dozens of their classmates died and hundreds more grew disillusioned, to the hard peace and family adjustments that followed. The rich cast of characters includes Douglas MacArthur, William Westmoreland, and a score of other memorable figures. The West Point Class of 1966 straddled a fault line in American history, and Rick Atkinson's masterly book speaks for a generation of American men and women about innocence, patriotism, and the price we pay for our dreams.
This is the story of the twenty-five-year adventure of the generation of officers who fought in Vietnam. With novelistic detail, Atkinson tells the story of West Point's Class of 1966 primarily through the experiences of three classmates and the women they loved--from the boisterous cadet years and youthful romances to the fires of Vietnam, where dozens of their classmates died and hundreds more grew disillusioned, to the hard peace and family adjustments that followed. The rich cast of characters includes Douglas MacArthur, William Westmoreland, and a score of other memorable figures. The West Point Class of 1966 straddled a fault line in American history, and Rick Atkinson's masterly book speaks for a generation of American men and women about innocence, patriotism, and the price we pay for our dreams.
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