We Few: U.S. Special Forces in Vietnam

Description

On his second tour to Vietnam, Nick Brokhausen served in Recon Team Habu, CCN. This unit was part of MACV-SOG (Military Assistance Command Vietnam Studies and Observations Group), or Studies and Observations Group as it was innocuously called. The small recon companies that were the center of its activities conducted some of the most dangerous missions of the war, infiltrating areas controlled by the North Vietnamese in Laos, Vietnam, and Cambodia. The companies never exceeded more than 30 Americans, yet they were the best source for the enemy's disposition and were key to the US military being able to take the war to the enemy. This was accomplished by utilizing both new and innovative technology, and tactics dating back to the French and Indian Wars. This small unit racked up one of the most impressive records of awards for valor of any unit in the history of the United States Army. It came at a terrible price, however; the number of wounded and killed in action was incredibly high. Those missions today seem suicidal. In 1970 they seemed equally so, yet these men went out day after day with their indigenous allies - Montagnard tribesmen, Vietnamese, and Chinese Nungs - and faced the challenges with courage and resolve. This riveting memoir details the actions and experiences of a small group of Americans and their allies who were the backbone of ground reconnaissance in the Republic of Vietnam during the Vietnam War. It became a cult classic among the Special Forces community when first published over a decade ago.

I can see why this book soon became a cult classic on its first publication ten years ago - it is essential reading, and spectacularly well written and quite riveting, for anyone with an interest in the conflict that defined modern-day America. * Books Monthly * We Few pulls no punches. This book endlessly recounts the wanton thievery that Special Forces men routinely engaged in, their predilection for random acts of violence, and their many dust-ups with REMF authority. Brokhausen is as hard-boiled as they come, but this book is also replete with plenty of humor, even if it is obsidian black... an excellent and exceptionally raw look at the Vietnam War just at the apex of its unpopularity... this battle-scarred memoir is an excellent tribute to the generation that fought, laughed, and died in Southeast Asia. * New York Journal of Books *