A SNIPER IN THE ARIZONA
2nd Battalion, 5th Marines,
in the Arizona Territory, 1967
John J. Culbertson
NEW copy. Hardcover with dust jacket.
(NY: Ivy Books, 1999).
Frontispiece map, photographs, appendix,
278 pages.
"Morning was always a welcome sight to us. It meant two things. The first was
that we were still alive. . . ."
In 1967, death was the constant
companion of the Marines of Hotel Company, 2/5, as they patrolled the paddy
dikes, mud, and mountains of the Arizona Territory southwest of Da Nang. But
John Culbertson and most of the rest of Hotel Company were the same lean,
fighting Marines who had survived the carnage of Operation Tuscaloosa. Hotel's
grunts walked over the enemy, not around him.
In graphic terms, John
Culbertson describes the daily, dangerous life of a soldier fighting in a
country where the enemy was frequently indistinguishable from the allies, fought
tenaciously, and thought nothing of using civilians as a shield. Though he was
one of the top marksmen in 1st Marine Division Sniper School in Da Nang in March
1967—a class of just eighteen, chosen from the division's twenty thousand
Marines—Culbertson knew that against the VC and the NVA, good training and
experience could carry you just so far. But his company's mission was to find
and engage the enemy, whatever the price. This riveting, bloody first-person
account offers a stark testimony to the stuff U.S. Marines are made of.
Hardcover currently OUT OF PRINT.
$25.00
 |
|
| |
|
