Hazardous Duty

In Hazardous Duty - a real life, nonfiction thriller set in the ruins of Bosnia and the sands of Saudi Arabia, the deadly alleys of Mogadishu and the teeming streets of Port-au-Prince - Colonel David Hackworth completes a second tour of battlefield duty, this time as a war correspondent. In his hard-hitting, inimitable style, he tells of the sacrifices of ordinary grunts in the Balkans, the Persian Gulf, Somalia, Korea, and Haiti, and offers a tough-love critique of American military leadership, explaining America's role in new post-Cold War conflicts.
Colonel David H. Hackworth is America's most decorated living soldier, with more than one hundred awards, including two Distinguished Service Crosses, nine Silver Stars, eight Bronze Stars for valor, and eight Purple Hearts, which he considers the most meaningful because, he says, "they can't be faked." More than any other military commentator, he has the trust and confidence of the millions of soldiers - from foreign armies as well as our own - who cheered every word of his widely acclaimed autobiography.
A wake-up call for military reform, Hazardous Duty pulls no punches in calling America's top political and military leaders to account for selling out duty, honor, and country. Colonel Hackworth returns from America's new battlefields to report that the Pentagon is wasting billions of dollars. He offers no-nonsense solutions for streamlining the military services and rationalizing their missions to confront the new face of war.

Hackworth (About Face) is the most highly decorated living U.S. soldier. He's also a take-no-prisoners critic of America's contemporary defense establishment. Here, he uses his experiences as a Newsweek correspondent in the Persian Gulf, Somalia, Haiti, Korea and the Balkans to illustrate and denounce a military-industrial-political system that, he charges, gives rank and power to "Perfumed Princes" at the expense of "warrior studs." A chapter detailing Hackworth's controversial investigation of Admiral Jeremy Boorda's alleged misappropriation of combat decorations?a scandal that ended in Boorda's suicide?serves as a case study of what Hackworth sees as the armed forces' continued devotion to appearance rather than performance. Hackworth's attacks on log-rolling and careerism seem like justified responses to the bureaucratization endemic to any complex organization. His repeated indictments of "politics over tactics," however, appears to reflect a fundamental misunderstanding of the customary role of armed force in national policy. Traditionally, as in Clausewitz's famous dictum, war is the continuation of diplomacy and politics?not their focal point. Hackworth's definition of a warrior is narrow; great captains come in many forms besides outspoken, down-home types happiest in the field with their troops. The author isn't shy about voicing his opinions. Of President Clinton's decision to order paratroopers into Haiti under the dangerous light of a full moon, he writes, "[Clinton} was so inexperienced he would have us grab a rattlesnake by the tail because that was where the noise was coming from." In contrast, Hackworth presents himself as one savvy, tough soldier (dressing down an "arrogant" Haitian police captain, "I just tore into his ass backward and forward"). While the author's grit is entertaining (and credible), it also melodramatizes the entire book, undermining the gravity of his more serious points. But this is a feisty, heads-up brief nonetheless, told with spirit by a warrior who now wields a pen instead of a sword. Author tour.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

An unsparing critique of the US military as well as its industrial and political allies, from a been-there/done-that warrior who sounds off with all the subtlety of an artillery barrage. A highly decorated veteran of the US Army, Hackworth wrote the 1989 bestseller About Face, detailing his experiences in the military and his outrage at America's blunders in Vietnam. The book launched the author on a new career as a military-affairs correspondent for Newsweek, a post that has enabled him to keep a close watch on the armed forces. Hackworth has been in the thick of the action in the Balkans, Haiti, the Persian Gulf, and Somalia. He has also taken unsentimental journeys to Korea and Vietnam, venues in which he earned eight Purple Hearts. The retired colonel's first-person accounts of these battleground sojourns feature hard- hitting observations on the capacities of the US military, plus recollections of his own time as a front-line commander. Proceeding from the premise that the primary responsibility of the armed services is to protect the nation against its enemies, Hackworth lights into political leaders who use the military for diplomatic rather than military purposes. The author also pounds away at the top brass who endorse such errors. Other targets include Pentagon contractors who produce immensely expensive weapons systems of little use in low-tech conflicts, lawmakers who support megabuck procurement programs that promise to create jobs in their electoral districts, and senior officers with a sharper eye for budgetary advantage than for eliminating wasteful duplication. By no coincidence, Hackworth has a thoroughgoing reform agenda, including amalgamating the National Guard with the Reserves, letting NATO die a natural death, gearing up for brushfire belligerencies, merging the USMC into the Army, and encouraging professionalism rather than careerism in the officer corps. Marching orders from an old soldier who's not about to fade away or close ranks. (Author tour) -- Copyright ©1996, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

The military-industrial complex is too big (sound familiar?) and doesn't care about the average "grunt," claims Hackworth, who investigates a number of recent foreign policy interventions (i.e., Bosnia, Iraq, Somalia) and concludes that the military has not improved since Vietnam. Many of these interventions have had more to do with a poor foreign policy than with an inept military, notes the author. They were often undertaken with good intentions but poor objectives and no consideration as to how the United States would complete its mission. The author's first book, About Face (S.& S., 1990), was easier reading and much more interesting. Most observers would agree there has always been some waste and poor decision-making regardless of the era. Recommended for military buffs only.?Mark E. Ellis, Albany State Univ., Leesburg, Ga.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Hackworth, a veteran of three wars, began covering armed conflicts for Newsweek in 1990, and his experiences as a soldier and a reporter led him to an inescapable conclusion: those in charge of the U.S. military establishment are doing a great disservice to the men and women serving their country. In a trenchant analysis, Hackworth offers many examples to buttress his conclusion: in the Gulf War, the troops were poorly supplied, relied on questionable weapons systems, and were closely watched by military censors, dubbed "the Thought Police" ; in Somalia, 18 soldiers died and nearly 100 were wounded trying to capture a Somali general in an operation that was almost criminal in its lack of planning and support; there were also numerous other breakdowns in equipment, leadership, and intelligence gathering that Hackworth uncovers. Irreverent and funny, this book is ultimately a forceful critique of a bloated system that is failing those it was meant to serve and protect. Brian McCombie