Don't Bunch Up: One Marine's Story and Some Notable Exceptions

As a first lieutenant, Bill van Zanten was a company executive officer in the first stateside Marine unit committed to combat in 1965. A year later, Captain van Zanten was one of the 'Magnificent Bastards' of the 2nd Battalion, 4th Marines, fighting in the boonies near hill 69, outside of Chu Lai. Van Zanten's experience in Vietnam is very different from the pictures made in Hollywood. It had a soldierly professionalism built on sound and rigorous training. Dedication and boot camp forged the volunteer Marines of the early war years, so that when the stakes went through the roof in Vietnam, commitment of man to man and man to unit was total. There was a soldier's intimacy, and a soldier's humour. Together they meant survival, and that is what this memoir is about.

Inspired by Battle Cry, Leon Uris's novel about WW II Marines, Van Zanten joined the Corps in 1957, made it through San Diego boot camp and the even tougher officers' school at Quantico, then saw action in 1965-1966 as an executive officer and company commander in Vietnam. His sojourn there was for the most part a positive and rewarding one, though he had some frustrating experiences, such as getting lost on patrol and dealing with an officer whose quest for medals threatened to endanger his men. Van Zanten's upbeat memoir mostly reflects how impressed he was by the decency, courage and unselfishness displayed by his fellow Marines. Readers will find no brutality here, no bitterness, no drugs, no fraggings or racial confrontations. The memoir is a modest, well-written account of the author's coming-to-manhood during the earlier phase of the Vietnam era (i.e., pre-Tet) when life was simple. Marines will enjoy the book; others may find it naive and sentimental.

Copyright 1992 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

Any number of authors and filmmakers have glorified or mythologized the U.S. Marine Corps: Van Zanten's memoir of his military service details the processes by which the Marines took a young man, molded him into an infantry officer, and sent him to Vietnam to fight. Basic training, Officers' Candidate School, Basic Infantry Officers' School, and combat experiences are described and demythologized. Van Zanten's current nonmilitary life is only mentioned in passing; we are aware that he has a wife, for example, but she is not really part of the story. Macho, chauvinistic, ultrapatriotic: these are terms that might be applied to Van Zanten's story, but they are also characteristics deliberately sought and inculcated by the Marines. These are memoirs of Vietnam in 1965-66, while it was still a relatively "clean" war. Recommended for Vietnam War collections.-- Stanley Planton, Ohio Univ.
Chillicothe Lib.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.