One Bullet Away, The Making Of A Marine Officer

[harry hackedoff]

Written by Nathaniel Fick (I`d`ve used a nom de plume, meself mate ) this is the story of a young lad joining Uncle Sam’s Misguided Children as an LT and follows his two deployments to Afghanistan and Iraq. Very incitefull glimpses into the modern US Corps in general and Fleet Recon in particular, how Recon work/are employed, what kit they play with etc. When Fick was attempting “selection” for Recon they had a Booty Colour Stripey for phys! Dunno what he thought was meant by "Come on you W4nkers"
Fick was fortunate to have some very good Gunnies to help steer him on the correct course. They and the Sgts, Cpls and average Gravs come over as fully committed professional Soldiers, well the Recon guys do at least.
His story is interesting in itself, but I suggest you look beyond his tale and see the way Elmer goes to work.
After becoming one of USMC`s most combat experienced Officers and with promotion to Captain, Fick decides he`s had enough and goes outside for reasons that left me unconvinced. It seemed to me that he`d done the hard yards, and with leading a Platoon through Iraq he had shown he had the right stuff and then just thinned when he should`ve stayed to put something back.
Always a big fan of our Cuzz so maybe I`m biased, I commend this book to the house.
Here`s to the Second Best Corps on the planet
Sempers
Oooraggghhh

[harry hackedoff]

Here`s a review from the States, bit ott but hey, that`s Elmer,


If the Marines are “the few, the proud,” Recon Marines are the fewest and the proudest. Only one Marine in a hundred qualifies for the Reconnaissance Battalion, charged with working clandestinely, often behind enemy lines. Fick’s training begins with a hellish summer at Quantico, after his junior year at Dartmouth, and advances to the pinnacle—Recon—four years later, on the eve of war with Iraq. Along the way, he learns to shoot a man a mile away, stays awake for seventy-two hours straight, endures interrogation and torture at the secretive SERE course, learns to swim with Navy SEALs, masters the Eleven Principles of Leadership, and much more.

His vast skill set puts him in front of the front lines, leading twenty-two Marines into the deadliest conflict since Vietnam. He vows he will bring all his men home safely, and to do so he’ll need more than his top-flight education. He’ll need luck and an increasingly clear vision of the limitations of his superiors and the missions they assign him. Fick unveils the process that makes Marine officers such legendary leaders and shares his hard-won insights into the differences between the military ideals he learned and military practice, which can mock those ideals. One Bullet Away never shrinks from blunt truths, but it is an ultimately inspiring account of mastering the art of war.


Nate Fick writes in an engaging style and with good humour, too. Here`s what he thought of areswipe, sorry Jarhead. Jarhead was not well received by the Grunts over on Leatherneck, One Bullet Away was, and that tells this callsign much

"Welcome to the Suck." That was the tagline of Anthony Swofford's best-selling Gulf War memoir, Jarhead, but it also neatly summed up my opinion of the book. I bought the audio version after two combat tours as a Marine in Afghanistan and Iraq and settled in to listen on a cross-country drive from California to Virginia. By the time I hit Nevada, I was ready to throw the CDs from my car window. Swofford struck me as an ax-grinder who blamed the Corps for his own failures. He hadn't seen enough combat to justify his angst, and conduct like his—at one point, he points a gun at another Marine and threatens to kill him—would have landed my Marines in jail. His story felt all the more insidious since his venom was cloaked in fine writing. It seemed fitting that "jarhead" isn't even a term most Marines use.
I never see movies made from books I like. But, I thought, why not try Hollywood's spin on Jarhead, a book I (and nearly every Marine I know) despised? It could only be better.
And it was. To be sure, those who know the Corps will doubt many of the movie's details: Could a Marine really be shot and killed in training without any fallout whatsoever? Would dozens of Marines celebrate the end of the war by dancing around a bonfire, gleefully firing their rifles into the night sky? Could Swofford's sniper team actually get abandoned on the battlefield, alone and forgotten?



Not in my Marine Corps.

Unquote

Buy it, you`ll get something about Marines that is actuall worth reading. For a change

Oooorrraaaagggghhhhh

[harry hackedoff]

Fick`s book that is
Not Jarhead

[Andrew]

I'm half way through reading this book and i have to agree that so far so good. There's nothing more i can add to what Harry's already said except that i've previously read a book called 'Generation kill' which was written by the journalist mentioned in Fick's account of the second gulf war.
It gives an interesting outside perspective of life within the Recon unit and the conflict itself.
Some of the information/discriptions regarding actions witnessed by both authors differ slightly between books but thats obviously going to happen, which isn't a critisism just an observation.
Andy

[harry hackedoff]

Saw a vid with Nate doing a short "piece to camera" about his book today.
With that fugwit Swofford bringing out another masterpiece I thought it was time to give One Bullet Away another chuck-up
Watch this http://shock.military.com/Shock/videos. ... 821&page=1

Oooooorrrraaaaaaaggghhhh
Sempers

[Chas]

Our cousins the USMC are a fine body of men.
Had to do security for Brig. 'Brute' Victor Krulak USMC.
He was all of 5'4" and retired as a Lt.Gen.His son became
Cdt. USMC. My boss was the late Capt. Rod Tuck.
Our Mnes wound up our cousins by stating that the R in RM
stood for 'REAL' Marines.
And of course that's true- after all we are older and copying
our formation was the sincerest form of flattery.

[harry hackedoff]

Rod Tuck what a guy, I wish I knew him, may he rest easy.
I have a lot of time for the Cuzz, their re-con boys are actually pretty good blokes.
They`ve nicked loads off us over the years, Chas, woolly pully, rank of Cpl, rank of Sarn`t Maj. Blues, Lovats, the Globe etc etc. Some of their average Gravs are a bit thick but so what? It`s good to see our bonds with them are as strong as ever, to the point where Gen Tommy Franks asks for Zulu to give him a hand in the mountains in 02 when he has the pick of the whole of NATO
Read the book Chas

Here`s to those misguided children, can`t take their ale mind
Sempers and Per Mare

[Chas]

Harry,

As you know you should never have joined if you can't take a joke.
My first mess night I had a clip on bow tie with elastic round the
neck under the a starched wing collar .Rod at 6'2" nipped behind
me real 'skin' and a tad under 5'7" releasing it. It zoomed round
like a demented dragon fly just missing the Colonel Tich Houghton.
I was ordered to go back to my cabin and learn from my MOA how
to tie a bow tie. When I came down full of chagrin the Colonel then
insisted I sat down next to him and took great care of me. I had my
Xmas lunch with him a few months later and Sgt Jekins DL insisted
I had Boxing day with him. They all took pity on me.
On board ship the RN officers always took the piss by hiding my cap
just prior to the Captain's rounds- saying have you lost something
Soldier ?I got my revenge when I instructed them in weapon training.
Their weapons were in bloody awful condition and I was a marksman.
Finally Rod made up a Lotus from kit for and zoomed around in it.
Happy days-
Chas.

[owdun]

Chas, I served with Tich Houghton when he was C.O. of 40 Cdo in 1948, Palestine and various other spots. Olly Patch was his 2IC, both men well respected by all ranks.


Aye Owdun.

[AJtothemax]

Andrew I've read about this bloke before too in the same book. Not bad reading to be honest. It does however tell you towards the end (when the americans took baghdad) that there really was no planning what so ever of what to do with the country after they have smashed the crap out of them.

[MilitaryHistorian]

Fascinating book - read it twice...

John
Former USAF
www.realmilitaryflix.com

[London Boy]

When Fick was attempting “selection” for Recon they had a Booty Colour Stripey for phys! Dunno what he thought was meant by "Come on you W4nkers"

Once we had a Captain from the USAF Combat Security Police and I didn't understand half the slang he was using. Now this was back in 1980, long before I even owned or started watching TV, so his American slang
might just as well have been Greek for all I understood of it!


BTW, bought my first TV in 85, because my wife wanted one. Even in 85 I still didn't want or feel the need for a TV.

[London Boy]

John
Former USAF
www.realmilitaryflix.com

Now that ties nicely in with my response John, perhaps you can tell me,do the USAF CSP still exist as a unit?

[harry hackedoff]

Geezer, they had those blokes on Upper Heyford till it closed early ninetys. Nice blokes, meant well
They used to do snap vcp`s in the lanes round the base to check on their people. Locals played along with it, ususally
One Friday arvo and I`m not best pleased to find meself in a queue of cars as Elmer gets his rocks off When I got to the front a nice young lad with the sharpest creases I`ve ever seen says,"Sir! Do you have any I.D.,Sir!"
To which I reply, "Fcuk off out of my way. You have no authority in my country"
He didn`t know what to do and he called over an officer who started giving me the verbals "Listen, cnut, this road is the Queens Highway and you are a foreign person causing an obstruction on it. In England, that`s still a capitol offence. Now fcuk off out of my way before I call a real policeman"
Well, you should`ve seen the panic How oi larfed
We had American neighbours from Heyford for seven or eight years then, great lads mostly. Apart from the born again christian mongs

[London Boy]

LOL! Thanks for the giggle Aitch!

We used to do exercises with them sometimes. But they never seemed to grasp the concept of taping things down for silent movment or the meaning of the word silent itself.

0600 - lying in shellscrape me & me oppo - "what's that noise?"

oppo pointing says - "look"

And here comes a USAF CSP officer through the woods towards our position using a battery shaver......pillock!

You could hear it for miles cos every other bugger in the woods - a whole rifle section - were stock still and deadly quiet.

Yanks hey


Also had a similar event once when in full uniform chasing a suspect.Suspect dives into Harrods we go after him to be stopped...would you believe... by a uniformed Harrods security officer, who shuts the door in our faces and says "you can't come in here in unfiorm" My response was "you are about 2 seconds away from getting nicked for obstructing police, now shift yer bleedin arse" Which we followed with pushing him and the door out of our way.

Caught the suspect, who'd done a dipping on the tube.