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The Mission, The Men, And Me 1st (first) Edition Text Only (2000)

by Pete Blaber(Favorite Author)

4.26 of 5 Votes: 1

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review 1: A really good piece of work by former Delta Force Commander Pete Blaber who was one of the first americans to step foot on afghan soil right after 9/11. While most of the books I read in the military non-fiction/spec ops genre focused on operations,pain and toil of training and the emotions that run through during battle as well as the sacrifices,undaunted courage and heroism of soldiers..this one focuses on the lessons learnt by Blaber while he was in Delta Force right from hunting war criminals in the balkans during the mid and late 90s to being among the first team on the ground in Afghanistan right after 9/11 to being one of the key figures in the battle of Takur Ghar. Through his writing Blaber also throws light upon the incompetence of the "U.S. Military Decision Mak... moreing Process" in situations that require a highly unconventional approach to succeed and also the exasperating hierarchical compartmentalization in the U.S military's decision making bodies which eventually leads to some near misses and momentary failures that hampered progress and overlooked critical findings. Blaber also gives a blow-by-blow account of the battle of Takur Ghar a.k.a Operation Anaconda where U.S. forces cornered the Taliban and Al Qaeda terrorists in a massive assault in the shahi kot valley which resulted in heavy losses for the enemy and drove some of them across the border to Pakistan. It's a rock solid piece of work and an amazing read.I highly recommend it to all military buffs who spend as much time on military non-fiction,war stories and reports as much as I do.
review 2: I intensely relished this book, with its stories and life lessons. Originally, I'd picked it up to glean any analogous tactical tips on life and career (cybersecurity, incidentally), and was pleasantly hooked by his lessons and vivid examples. I appreciated the matter-of-factness in the way he presented the information, and the lessons he'd drawn from it all. The author has a love of history and human experience, and it shows; he draws not just from his own experience, but also through the stories of Lewis & Clark expedition, the Civil War, and even accounts from John Walker Lindh, Ali Mohamed, and known enemy leader Saif Rahman Mansoor.They serve to support his point about the importance of open communication and shared reality, listening to "the guy on the ground," being open to possibilities and "developing the situation," and of course: "The Mission, the Men, and Me," in that order specifically.And not that this was in my target area of interest, but I did appreciate his occasional fact-dropping on his overall fitness as a delta force commander:"Each of us has to be both a thinking warrior and an athlete warrior. On this day I was in touch with both sides. I was running strong and hard and my endorphin-saturated brain was spawning rapid-fire ideas and insights for future use. Spastic vibrations against my abdominal wall brought me back to real time as I recognized my pager’s code for a real-world mission. I made an immediate U-turn and headed back toward our compound. As my curiosity intensified, I shifted gears to a 5:30-per-mile pace."5:30/mi?! Please. I'm a breezy 10ish-per-mile, myself, and heaven forbid my body release endorphins along with its complaining!On the more serious note, the life-and-death nature of war probably makes for a much more dramatic backdrop to the lesson of what happens when someone decides -- whether by career ambition or ignorance -- to make a decision and not share that decision with people who could make a difference or correct an error. It's a larger life example to my miniature everyday struggles with sharing seemingly mundane information with leaders and coworkers.There are just so many good nuggets of information and advice, and much that can be taken to heart, that I still think I need time to absorb and engage them all. But I think that there's something for everyone in this book, and only wish I could convince more folks to read it.** As an aside, it seems to me that if more conflicts were resolved with these lessons in mind -- and without bad grandiose calls being made from management that's high up and far removed -- the military could save quite a bit of money. We have amazing folks who know what they're doing, and some who could use more fact-checking. less

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