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Black Hearts: One Platoon's Descent Into Madness In Iraq's Triangle Of Death (2010)

by Jim Frederick(Favorite Author)

4.18 of 5 Votes: 1

ISBN

0307450759 (ISBN13: 9780307450753)

languge

English

genre

History & Biography

publisher

Crown

review 1: A really well written and researched book on a harrowing subject.It's true account of an American Platoon in Iraq. And the simple terror of their day to day lives that led to them de-humanising the people they were there to help. It ultimately ends with a rape and four murders of an innocent family. It's time for America to stop causing conflict around the world and sending young men to die for ill-defined poorly thought out causes.
review 2: I have to rate this as only 3 stars for the following reasons: the author was a poor writer (2 stars); the atrocities made me so mad, but I was glad they were reported (5 stars); the poor leadership from Brigade Commander down made me so incredibly mad that I did not want to read any more (1 star); the fact that some justi... morece was served (4 stars); demonstrating how to NOT be a leader (5 stars). So you see, I had difficulties with rating the book, as well as with reading the book.This book clearly exemplifies how to NOT lead Soldiers in combat. LTC Kunk's behavior and performance should have been cause for relief, but instead, he came through unscathed. The way the Army's Active Component treats the National Guard sometimes is appalling; they say we are unprofessional. Yet this book oozes unprofessionalism at all levels, and it winds up being tolerated, condoned and even rewarded. The 101st's comments about the 48th BCT (Georgia National Guard) are extremely critical, yet the 101st went on to do the exact same things, and then took them to an all time low! I served with the 48th BCT during this rotation in Iraq; my National Guard unit deployed as part of their brigade, although we were from a separate state. I fought alongside them, and while I did not agree with everything they did, I know that they never did anything like these Soldiers and leaders did, and did NOT do. My unit made mistakes too; we're human and therefore are incapable of being "zero defect." But together we made incredible differences in our work over there, only to have those works desecrated and destroyed by our follow-on units. Yet all along, WE were the ones being called unprofessional, untrained, and incompetent.I think my opinion of this book was somewhat biased, prejudiced, and jaded, only because of the personal attachment to the beginning of the story. This story NEEDS to be told; it NEEDS to be understood and prevented from ever happening again. There are bad people in every organization; there is no escaping that. But we have to work hard at mitigating and preventing actions like these from ever happening again. less

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