American Sniper ( a very brief book review)

So I just finished reading American Sniper by the late American war hero Navy SEAL Chief Chris Kyle.  The subtitle is "The Autobiography of the Most Lethal Sniper in U.S. Military History."  Highly recommended!

I loved Chief Kyle's story.  He made me laugh, made me cry, and made me proud.  For the most part, the book is a simple collection of vignettes but through them he paints a gruesome story of his multiple tours in Iraq--killing the enemy in the streets of Sadr City, Fallujah, and Ramadi.  He killed with ease and with pleasure to protect and defend his fellow servicemen--Marines, Army, Air Force, Navy--and his country.  He made no bones about it that in his mind he was killing "savages" who were bent on killing Americans.  

As you can imagine, he does not exactly come across as Mr. Warm but I, for one, am damn glad he and his brothers in arms are on our side.  

Having the most "confirmed kills" as an American Sniper, he points out several times that every kill had at least one witness and was documented with a written follow-up report.  For a few he had to go before the Judge Advocate General where he successfully defended himself against allegations of impropriety.  In addition to his confirmed kills he had an indescribable number of combat kills in the course of ground battle and clearing houses.

"We broke into one house with a large front room.  We'd caught the inhabitants completely by surprise.  But I was surprised as well--as I burst in, I saw a whole bunch of guys standing there in desert camouflage--the old brown chocolate-chip stuff from Desert Storm, the First Gulf War. They were all wearing gear.  They were all Caucasian, including one or two with blond hair, obviously not Iraqis or Arabs...We looked at each other.  Something flicked in my brain, and I flicked the trigger on the M-16, mowing them down.  A half-second's more hesitation, and I would have been the one bleeding out on the floor.  They turned out to be Chechens..."

He also describes saving lives:

"I jumped up and laid down fire as they ran.  The final Marine tapped me on the shoulder as he passed, signaling that he was the last man out.  Ready to follow, I glanced to my right, checking my flank.  Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a body sprawled on the ground.  He had Marine camis.  Where he came from, whether he'd been there when I arrived or crawled there from somewhere else, I have no idea.  I ran over to him, saw that he'd been shot in both legs.  I slapped a new mag into my gun, then grabbed the back of his body armor and pulled him with me as I retreated."

And he describes some of our fallen:

"...He was lying on his back some yards away, crying in pain...I saw he was in pretty bad shape...I dropped and got an arm under each of his, then started hauling him backward.  Somehow I managed to slip as I went.  I fell backward, with him on top of me...I was so tired and winded I just lay there for a few minutes...as bullets flew by.  The kid was about 18 years old...I could tell he was going to die. 'Please don't tell my momma I died in pain,' he muttered...'Okay, okay,' I said. 'Don't worry.  Don't worry. Everybody will make it sound great.  Real great.' He died right then...A bunch of Marines came.  They lifted him off of me and put him in the back of a Hummer.  We called in a bomb strike and took out the shooting positions where the fire had come from..."

So once again, highly recommended.  I'll end with one last excerpt:

"...we were in an exhausting firefight.  Ten of us spent roughly 48 hours in the second story of an old, abandoned brick building, fighting in hundred degree-plus heat wearing full armor...the only break we took was to reload.  When the Marines came to relieve us, they found every man in the room either slumped against a wall or collapsed on the floor, dressing wounds or just soaking in the situation.  One of the Marines outside took an American flag and hoisted it over the position.  Someone else played the National Anthem--I have no idea where the music came from...every battle-weary man rose, went to the window, and saluted...the reminder of what we were fighting for caused tears as well as blood and sweat to run freely from all of us."