From Publishers Weekly
Haney, a founding member of Delta Force who retired a command sergeant major, was a career army man, having served in the elite Rangers; his memoir covers his experiences during the formation and early operations of 1st Special Forces Operational Detachment-Delta. In the fall of 1978, Haney was recruited and ordered to report to a secret corner of expansive Fort Bragg, N.C., where he underwent a rigorous selection process familiar from similar memoirs. In the second section of three, Haney describes advanced work with explosives and weapons, studying airplanes to plan hostage rescues, and the "final exam," in which the class was sent to the nation's capital, given precise assignments and had to evade the FBI. (The result a red-faced FBI.) Haney then relates his assignments: he served three times in Beirut guarding the American ambassador, participated in the invasion of Grenada, served in several Central American countries and narrowly escaped death during the abortive rescue attempt of the American hostages in Iran. Will he and a partner successfully eliminate a sniper harassing the Marines in Beirut? Will his unit rescue hostages aboard a hijacked plane without losing any hostages? Readers of other special forces memoirs will find this one distinctive for Haney's attention to interservice rivalries (he has a lot of negative things to say about the CIA) that he believes compromised several missions, as well as for Haney's nuanced, often disgusted descriptions of the human cost of war.
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc. --Ce texte fait référence à une édition épuisée ou non disponible de ce titre.
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc. --Ce texte fait référence à une édition épuisée ou non disponible de ce titre.
Booklist
Retired army command sergeant-major Haney paints a vivid portrait of the first decade of the elite U.S. counterterrorist unit, Delta Force, which has never had more than a few hundred men on its roster. An early volunteer for the force, he became one of the handful who survived dauntingly rigorous physical and psychological tests to join its initial cadre of men who then were dedicated to special-operations warfare. Haney does the special-ops soldier full justice as he depicts himself and his comrades in training and in action. Notable among the actions he reports is the abortive 1980 Iranian hostage rescue, which left Haney with an acute distaste for the U.S. Navy and more than a few suspicions about the intestinal fortitude and ethics of the U.S. government. He grants, however, that the fiasco led to major reforms within Delta Force and U.S. special warfare service generally. Adding considerably to public knowledge about basic and sophisticated security and antiterrorism issues, his valuable book is also, after 9-11, a compellingly timely one. Roland Green
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --Ce texte fait référence à une édition épuisée ou non disponible de ce titre.
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --Ce texte fait référence à une édition épuisée ou non disponible de ce titre.
