What It Is Like to Go to War
Categories: Biographies & Memoirs, History
In 1968, at twenty-three, Karl Marlantes arrived in Vietnam as a Marine lieutenant commanding forty men. Drawing on that tour, he examines what combat does to those who fight and how poorly they are prepared for it. Chapters on killing, guilt, numbness, lying, loyalty, heroism and coming home weave his experiences with myth, religion and psychology, starting from what he calls the Temple of Mars. He argues that nations must prepare warriors spiritually and welcome them home properly.
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- Ryan Holiday: “The other great books in this vein, "My War Gone By, I Miss It So" and "War Is a Force that Gives Us Meaning," cover the same topics but they are not written by soldiers.”