Victory Point: Operations Red Wings and Whalers - the Marine Corps' Battle for Freedom in Afghanistan

I bought this book for both the kindle and the paper back version. I Bought it because I was one of the Marines in 2nd plt Echo 2/3 during the deployment to Afghanistan and I participated in Operation Whalers and remember the tragedy of Red Wings first hand. Reading this book caused so many emotions because of the memories of the events that were taking place. But also because of how much I learned about the situations that were going on. As a brand new 19 year old grunt I was kept out of the loop on a lot of things. from the reasons behind the failed extraction of SEAL Team 10, (which had every single 2/3 grunt pissed that we were sitting there unable to do anything)to Scene behind the mission plannings and execution of some of the hardest things I've ever accomplished in my life.The only qualm that I have with this book is that Mr. Darak spent the whole Deployment with Fox company and although him being able to talk to grunts from Fox and get after action reports from them, I feel like the events of August 18th 2005 were just overlooked. CPL Cerinceon was the best squad leader I ever had the pleasure of knowing and LCPL George was an absolutely stellar Marine, Nothing could ever explain the shock we all felt that he was to be the one who gave his life that day. However the book did a little half page blurp on the battle of Taleban (the small village in which we were ambushed) and seemed like it was a freak shot that happened to hit George. However it didn't go into detail of How LCPL Gonzalez (who would be killed in Iraq a year later) and LCPL Torres danced around a rock trying to return fire and stay out of fire at the same time. (Torres got hit twice) and the ANA (afghan national army) commandos that died in that fight as well as their Commander being wounded. Also their are a few descrepencies of how the Ambush started. First of all the book says that there were two girls standing in the road, the reality is there were half a dozen children, boys and girls. none over the age of 11 or 12 if I had to make a guess. They were there as a distractoin to us. They were cheering us and smiling, we got distracted by them because we were handing them what little food and water we had left(we were only a short distance from the mouth of the Korengal and we didn't need them any more) we also handed them money and it made us extremely happy to see how well we were being recieved. However it took our attention off of the mountaintops and left us extremely vulnerable to attack. When the rounds started coming in one of the little girls tried to take cover next to the rock cliff we were trapped next to, CPL Cirencione instinctivly placed himself between her and the attackers he felt had the best chance of hitting her. There he stayed until the chos of Combat forced him to check on his Marines. Doc Auguon was the one who ran from the front of the platoon to the rear, down a completetly open road that was being riddled with bullets, to try his hardest to rescue George after helping save 3 ANA soldiers that were severely wounded. There Were many many other actions that this deserved the kind of attention that he gave the rest, I am not one of the Marines mentioned by me or Mr. Darak in the book and I don't care to be, and all of the Marines of 2/3 were faced with elements that we could never had trained for yet carried on regardless, never breaking in spirit. I guess no amount of pages could truly justify the sacrifices that The Military has made so far from home, I just felt that the Marines who suffered in the Korengal deserved a little more credit then what they got. Again my only qualm with this book was the short commings he gave Echo in their struggles for the 2 weeks in the mountiains of the Korengal in the 120+ degree weather culminating in a fight that would end the lives of a brother and mentor.The entire book was really well done and I really appreciate the knowledge that I gained from a behind the scenes look at the operations however I feel like he cut the story short by not speaking to the Echo Marines who were in a desperate fight for close to an hour at the bottom of a ravine stuck between a river and a cliff while bullets and RPG's poured down on them.-2/3 Echo "hardcore"

Victory Point is a good compliment to Lone Survivor just like Roberts' Ridge is complimented by The Mission, The Men and Me. However, all sides of a story are formed with bias and perception that may or may not be the whole truth. This isn't necessarily bad or good, it's just the way things are. As a Marine, I appreciate the praise the author gives the Marine Corps and the Marines involved in the situations discussed in the book. I do think it was a little too much though. No one, and nothing (especially organizations) is as perfect as the author describes the Marine Corps in the book. The Marine Corps, like all organizations and society as a whole is made up of people. People who make mistakes and fail, people who do everything correct and fail, and people who make mistakes and even everything wrong and still succeed. The Marine Corps' plan to capture the bad guy was solid. Well, so was the plan developed by the other units mentioned in the text. Mistakes were made, things went wrong, and people lost their lives, but that is the way this stuff goes down. The only thing the Marines had over the other units was, their plan never got put into action (tested). If they put theirs into action and the other guys were sitting on the bench it could have very easily been a whole list of different mistakes, different things going wrong, and a different list of guys who didn't make it home. Then it would have been a book written by a different embedded journalist writing about how, if the Marines had just listened to the N.S.W. guys and done a helo insert of the recon element versus allowing them to walk in. I can't make a valid comment about mistakes and decisions and what not without hearing the, "why" they did what they did, which the book never covered for whatever reason.Now with all that being said, this isn't the first time I have read, or heard about how convoluted the chain of command and communications in SOF can get. Not sure why that is, or if I could do any better if I were in that field, so I am not going to be too critical of it.I am going to say this. Spec-ops units are very capable and can do a lot of great stuff, but I keep hearing and reading about these spec-ops missions that really aren't that "special." In law enforcement we have a thing called mission creep. That is when SWAT teams suit up and serve low risk misdemeanor warrants just because there are no high risk work for them to do, despite the fact that detectives and uniformed patrol officers could have, and should have done the job. The mission described in the text as well as in Lone Survivor sounds very conventional to me. The bad guy was described as a low value guy with not too much support or resources and only operated in a certain area of the war zone. The mission was pretty straight forward (conventional). It sounds like when other units (spec-ops) heard about it they wanted a piece of the pie since they had nothing else going on. I have seen this before while on a deployment to the middle east prior to 9-11. In a perfect world if a unit develops the info. and circumstances for a certain op and the op falls within that units mission capability, then that unit should get the mission, regardless of who the supporting assets come from.Prior to MARSOC the Marine Corps use to pride itself on using conventional units for "special" missions. That is one major problem with the Army. There are units in that organization that get no love due to not being airborne this or ranger/special that. Some conventional missions for the Marine Corps are "special" missions for the other services. I believe the military's reliance on special units for non-special missions will result in more failures then victories. Sometimes you need a lot of guys with a lot of guns and a lot of bigger ORGANIC weapons to get something done. Special-ops are small and lite, most Army units are big and heavy. The Marine Corps and some Army units are medium and medium. These medium units should be getting these middle of the road missions and they should be allowed the resources, funding, and assets to accomplish them without begging other units and organizations, who in turn take their op.All in all, good book, but try and develop your opinion like one of the characters develops good intelligence. With an open mind and from multiple, corroborating, and verifiable sources.Semper Fi Marines, and God Speed to all those mentioned in this text who have made that journey.

A mais completa descrição da operação Red Wings, que ocorreu em 2005 no Afeganistão. O autor Ed Darack é um escritor e fotógrafo que ficou junto ao 2nd Battalion, 3rd Marine Regiment. O livro é excelente e repleto de informações não apenas sobre as operações militares conduzidas pelos Marines à época, mas também sobre a história do Afeganistão.No início do livro, o autor fornece um background histórico, cultural e político muito bom, que permite ao leitor entender o desenrolar dos acontecimentos num país tão complexo como o Afeganistão. Em seguida, descreve a Op. Red Wings sob o ponto de vista dos Marines. Trata-se de uma descrição cuidadosa do planejamento da operação e da sua execução. Em resumo, tudo o que o livro "Lone Survivor" tem de ruim, "Victory Point" tem de bom. Por fim, o autor descreve a Op. Whalers, conduzida pelos Marines, na qual a célula terrorista de Ahmad Shah foi neutralizada.Como pontos negativos, o autor muitas vezes exagera nos elogios aos Marines (como se estivessem acima das outras organizações), e tenta criar uma narrativa empolgante para algumas batalhas, mas não consegue. Entretanto, como aparentemente a parcialidade do autor não chega a distorcer os fatos, e a ação não é o foco do livro, são detalhes pequenos em uma obra muito interessante.

If, like myself, you like to know he kind of details you can't get on Wikipedia, concerning events like this, then this is the book for you. A sad event, depicting the ultimate deaths of 19 young men, keeps you reading, and keeps you engaged. It's hard to make any attempt to imagine yourself in a situation like these guys were in - thousands of miles from home and in a country where you simply are not wanted - and it's best not to try. What you can do though, is take off your hat - 19 times - to the kind of people who go out there, in harms way, to protect the freedom we all take so much for granted. RIP boys and thank you for your service.

Fast delivery, great book

Exceptional story. US Marines showing what they do the best. Privilege to read it.

Molto bello e avvincente descrive le operazioni di un battaglione di marines impegnati in operazioni anti talebani nella parte est dell' Afghanistan in zone molto impervie e montagnose. I racconti sono accompagnati anche da mappe molto dettagliate delle zone d'operazione.