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390 reviews for:
Lone Survivor: The Eyewitness Account of Operation Redwing and the Lost Heroes of Seal Team 10
Marcus Luttrell
4.08 AVERAGE
390 reviews for:
Lone Survivor: The Eyewitness Account of Operation Redwing and the Lost Heroes of Seal Team 10
Marcus Luttrell
4.08 AVERAGE
I just couldn't get into it. I know it's an amazing story but just not something I can read
This is one book I believe everyone should read.
This book is a great look into what its like to become a Navy SEAL and the kind of dedication and determination it takes to attain that status. It's also a harrowing tale of Luttrell's escape from the Taliban and the people who helped him survive. My main complaint: the refrain of politics that runs throughout. I understand this is his story and his views are part of that story. I even understand how his views are almost certainly shaped by his experiences, ones that I cannot hope to comprehend. What I object to is the need for "owning the libs" in every chapter, especially when that involves somewhat misrepresenting the stance 'liberals' were taken when they objected to certain abuses perpetrated during the Afghanistan and Iraq Wars. That said, it was still worth a read.
There's no doubt that the Navy SEAL acceptance (physical) exam and then their training, is tough. Very, very tough. The people who pass it, are without doubt extremely tough and determined, both physically and mentally. They have to be to become a Navy SEAL and judging by what he goes through here, they have to be every day whilst they are a Navy SEAL. So his credentials - and those of his colleagues - for the job are in place and never in doubt.
Of course, with these type of books - like the one I'm reading currently about the Bengazi attack, called '13 Hours' - a pure description of the incident, even with some observation points mixed in, wouldn't make for a very long book. So, here, there is a lot about his background, and a lot about his training and the week long 'final' test SEALs have to go through to become a SEAL, called 'Hell Week.' It sounds a lot and it sometimes sounds too much, but I can fully see the logic and why they make them do it. It's storing up mental and needless to say physical, toughness to survive in the environments they will be ordered to survive in.
Then there's thing with modern-day soldiers. It is a job. A job they wanted to do. They know, or really should know, what is involved in getting in, and they will soon find out what is required once they qualify. It is a job, that they wanted to do. No one has forced them to join, no one is keeping them in if they want to get out. And they get paid. People in the First World War, were conscripted. People in the Vietnam War were drafted (unless they had Heel Spurs). They had no choice but to put their life on the line. They deserve all the praise and help and remembrances they can be given. These soldiers today, can not be compared. They volunteer for this. They know they might die in the job. When they do, they get brought back, televised, with a flag draped over their coffin. The guy that will fall off some scaffolding tomorrow and die, not so much. Even though he is just as dead after just doing his job, he won't be remembered on the 11th November. That's my problem with the flag-waving and nationalistic 'pride' in the armed forces.
The guys he is surrounded with, have been through the same as him and presumably, if not exactly, then think 75% the same as him. They are true professionals, who can and want to do this job. If I'm right, and I'm going from what they say, then they see themselves as defending their country. By attacking a land barely out the stone-age, 7,420 miles (as the crow flies) away. There's a discussion to be had there. Attacking Afghanistan was an easy option for Bush. An easy way to be seen to be retaliating for the 11th of September attacks (the attacks on Afghanistan began 7 October, 2001). Don't try and pretend it wasn't. It was a "we got to do something!" For 'do,' read 'attack.'
Then the problems start.
As a piece about the incident, it would be outstanding. The battle where his co-SEALs are killed, is an incredible piece of survival and of description, fully justifying the "one of the most powerful narratives ever written about modern warfare" line on the back of the book. However, much of my sympathy has already been shown the door by that point, and the rest is pushed out, with the door firmly locked behind it, by his irrational hatred for "the liberal media." There is never a media without a liberal in front of it in his blinkered world.
And it is irrational, as this is well before Trump made it easier for these jerks to rationalise it. For the first, he’s crediting the 'liberal media' with much more power than they actually have. As surely, if they were as powerful in shaping public opinion and Government policy after the shooting has started, as he says, then there wouldn't have been a war on Afghanistan in the first place, would there?
For a second, who is he thinking is influenced by ‘the liberal media’? Politicians? Aren’t they the people who sent him out there? The people? Isn’t he supposedly out there to protect them? Including the families of those working in ‘the liberal media’? Is he saying he should have carte blanche to do whatever he sees fit?
Surely his experiences by the end of the book will at least have taught him the value of waiting to make sure who it actually is you’re shooting? I suppose he would be too young to remember Mỹ Lai. I'm not.
It seems to be the rules he has to abide by while out there, doing his job, doing the job The Powers That Be have ordered him to, that really seem to raise his ire. He's clearly in the shoot them first, let God ask the questions later, camp.
And to add irony to the whole sorry bonfire, he talks about his own ‘faith’ remaining unshaken (it is, after all, God who places his (Luttrell's) rifle near to him after every hair-raising escapade - so he can shoot other (bad) people who believe in the self same deity), but he doesn't once stop to consider that it might be his hated ‘liberals,’ with their damned turn the other cheek, engage them in dialogue, make sure they're actually combatants before blowing them to pieces attitude, who are closer to his god’s message.
Yes, he’s really got it in for them ‘Liberals’ They aren’t patriotic. Not as patriotic as him and the rest of his mates and the fighting forces anyway. Liberals aren’t even American in his eyes, I’d say. All they do is try to make his job more difficult. He’s one who’d love to see The Geneva Convention rules torn up. A bit like Hitler did. He does agree with me that War is actually the absence of rules, or when rules have broken down, but the Liberal Media’s sole objective is to cause him grief and stop him defending the USA the American flag, the constitution, the home of the brave *music swells*, land of the free - and probably Apple Pie as well. For all the courses in this, that and the other he’s taken, he really hasn’t actually learned a thing.
To be fair (!), though he does kept it hidden a little, his experiences with the Afghans who help him, maybe - just maybe - have taught him something about seeing the bigger picture. Though it's probably safer to say that he picks the parts from their moral codes that reinforce his views on life, rather than having anything approaching an epiphany.
If you've seen the film, or wondered that the guy in the book may just be the guy whose name is on the book, you know he survives. He is sheltered and, unknowingly at the outset, protected by the Afghan code of hospitality, even unto death. But there's still a final pathetic dig at the liberal press “And I am left feeling that no matter how much the drip-drip-drip of hostility towards us (SEALs/Armed Forces) is perpetrated by the liberal press...” We're, of course, not presented with anything approaching hard evidence to support this, apart from “Some members of the media might think they can brainwash the public any time they like, but I know they can’t. Not here. Not in the United States of America.”
That’s where I stopped.
Of course, if he wasn’t a Yank, he’d know what irony was.
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Of course, with these type of books - like the one I'm reading currently about the Bengazi attack, called '13 Hours' - a pure description of the incident, even with some observation points mixed in, wouldn't make for a very long book. So, here, there is a lot about his background, and a lot about his training and the week long 'final' test SEALs have to go through to become a SEAL, called 'Hell Week.' It sounds a lot and it sometimes sounds too much, but I can fully see the logic and why they make them do it. It's storing up mental and needless to say physical, toughness to survive in the environments they will be ordered to survive in.
Then there's thing with modern-day soldiers. It is a job. A job they wanted to do. They know, or really should know, what is involved in getting in, and they will soon find out what is required once they qualify. It is a job, that they wanted to do. No one has forced them to join, no one is keeping them in if they want to get out. And they get paid. People in the First World War, were conscripted. People in the Vietnam War were drafted (unless they had Heel Spurs). They had no choice but to put their life on the line. They deserve all the praise and help and remembrances they can be given. These soldiers today, can not be compared. They volunteer for this. They know they might die in the job. When they do, they get brought back, televised, with a flag draped over their coffin. The guy that will fall off some scaffolding tomorrow and die, not so much. Even though he is just as dead after just doing his job, he won't be remembered on the 11th November. That's my problem with the flag-waving and nationalistic 'pride' in the armed forces.
The guys he is surrounded with, have been through the same as him and presumably, if not exactly, then think 75% the same as him. They are true professionals, who can and want to do this job. If I'm right, and I'm going from what they say, then they see themselves as defending their country. By attacking a land barely out the stone-age, 7,420 miles (as the crow flies) away. There's a discussion to be had there. Attacking Afghanistan was an easy option for Bush. An easy way to be seen to be retaliating for the 11th of September attacks (the attacks on Afghanistan began 7 October, 2001). Don't try and pretend it wasn't. It was a "we got to do something!" For 'do,' read 'attack.'
Then the problems start.
As a piece about the incident, it would be outstanding. The battle where his co-SEALs are killed, is an incredible piece of survival and of description, fully justifying the "one of the most powerful narratives ever written about modern warfare" line on the back of the book. However, much of my sympathy has already been shown the door by that point, and the rest is pushed out, with the door firmly locked behind it, by his irrational hatred for "the liberal media." There is never a media without a liberal in front of it in his blinkered world.
And it is irrational, as this is well before Trump made it easier for these jerks to rationalise it. For the first, he’s crediting the 'liberal media' with much more power than they actually have. As surely, if they were as powerful in shaping public opinion and Government policy after the shooting has started, as he says, then there wouldn't have been a war on Afghanistan in the first place, would there?
For a second, who is he thinking is influenced by ‘the liberal media’? Politicians? Aren’t they the people who sent him out there? The people? Isn’t he supposedly out there to protect them? Including the families of those working in ‘the liberal media’? Is he saying he should have carte blanche to do whatever he sees fit?
Surely his experiences by the end of the book will at least have taught him the value of waiting to make sure who it actually is you’re shooting? I suppose he would be too young to remember Mỹ Lai. I'm not.
It seems to be the rules he has to abide by while out there, doing his job, doing the job The Powers That Be have ordered him to, that really seem to raise his ire. He's clearly in the shoot them first, let God ask the questions later, camp.
And to add irony to the whole sorry bonfire, he talks about his own ‘faith’ remaining unshaken (it is, after all, God who places his (Luttrell's) rifle near to him after every hair-raising escapade - so he can shoot other (bad) people who believe in the self same deity), but he doesn't once stop to consider that it might be his hated ‘liberals,’ with their damned turn the other cheek, engage them in dialogue, make sure they're actually combatants before blowing them to pieces attitude, who are closer to his god’s message.
Yes, he’s really got it in for them ‘Liberals’ They aren’t patriotic. Not as patriotic as him and the rest of his mates and the fighting forces anyway. Liberals aren’t even American in his eyes, I’d say. All they do is try to make his job more difficult. He’s one who’d love to see The Geneva Convention rules torn up. A bit like Hitler did. He does agree with me that War is actually the absence of rules, or when rules have broken down, but the Liberal Media’s sole objective is to cause him grief and stop him defending the USA the American flag, the constitution, the home of the brave *music swells*, land of the free - and probably Apple Pie as well. For all the courses in this, that and the other he’s taken, he really hasn’t actually learned a thing.
To be fair (!), though he does kept it hidden a little, his experiences with the Afghans who help him, maybe - just maybe - have taught him something about seeing the bigger picture. Though it's probably safer to say that he picks the parts from their moral codes that reinforce his views on life, rather than having anything approaching an epiphany.
If you've seen the film, or wondered that the guy in the book may just be the guy whose name is on the book, you know he survives. He is sheltered and, unknowingly at the outset, protected by the Afghan code of hospitality, even unto death. But there's still a final pathetic dig at the liberal press “And I am left feeling that no matter how much the drip-drip-drip of hostility towards us (SEALs/Armed Forces) is perpetrated by the liberal press...” We're, of course, not presented with anything approaching hard evidence to support this, apart from “Some members of the media might think they can brainwash the public any time they like, but I know they can’t. Not here. Not in the United States of America.”
That’s where I stopped.
Of course, if he wasn’t a Yank, he’d know what irony was.
Blog: Speesh Reads
Facebook: Speesh Reads
Pinterest: Speesh Reads
emotional
informative
inspiring
fast-paced
emotional
informative
inspiring
reflective
sad
tense
fast-paced
This is an amazing and remarkable story of Marc Luttrel, a Navy Seal caught behind enemy lines in the war on terror. It is an amazing story of courage and faith. He is a Navy Seal sent on a recon mission to find a Taliban leader in Afghanistan. Things go horribly wrong as the four seals are discovered by an army of over 200 Taliban. The amazing story of how his team fought to the last man and his harrowing escape. Alone in a foreign land severely injured and tracked by Taliban forces, he must find a way to survive to tell his story and to honor the brave men who were killed in battle.
The story is told in an honest straightforward voice. He knows how to tell a story that conveys every detail and feeling. Reading it, you have the "you are there" narrative. The storytelling is supplemented by the facts provided by Patrick Robinson. Some of the information may not have been available to Marc (such as what happened in his hometown as they awaited news on whether he was dead or alive, details in his training, and cultural facts that become significant in the story.)
The story is told in an honest straightforward voice. He knows how to tell a story that conveys every detail and feeling. Reading it, you have the "you are there" narrative. The storytelling is supplemented by the facts provided by Patrick Robinson. Some of the information may not have been available to Marc (such as what happened in his hometown as they awaited news on whether he was dead or alive, details in his training, and cultural facts that become significant in the story.)
All I can say what this man went through and survived over there, boggles the mind. That he got into the situation because of beliefs/opinons back here and how he survived it with his dignity and honor in tact, is an amazing story that must be read by any one that likes storys of human strength and endurance.