A review by rseelig
Redeployment by Phil Klay

4.0

I checked this book out waiting for some other books that are more up my alley to become available at the library. I chose this one because a few friends have read it and ranked it highly. I would agree with their assessments that this is an important book for people in my circle, a circle that does not contain many veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. It’s important because this is for the most part a nonpolitical opportunity to learn some of the stories of some of the people who have been deployed in these two wars. This is for me something that usually lives far away. Although a few people that I knew from high school or college or law school have served in the military, far more of the people that I know, like me, oppose(d) the wars. This book does not try and take a position on whether the wars were right or wrong, justified or not, although some of the men wrestle with these questions . It simply seeks to tell the stories of some of those who were there, whose voices we don’t usually hear, who weren’t high-ranking officials on the news. This is not a perspective I see often in my own life, or my consumption of news or literature. These days I feel particularly obligated to try and understand the perspective of people who don’t see the world the way that I do (but not by watching the reboot of Roseanne). This book is helpful in that ongoing effort.