Eleven Bravo (LRRP Rangers Vietnam)

Eleven Bravo (LRRP Rangers Vietnam) Review

**PROWL: All five volumes of this series are now available in one book entitled PROWL. What is more, these Vietnam short stories are now available in paperback as well as eBook. Buy PROWL and get all five short stories and save (eBook .99 paperback .95).**

A short story about the Vietnam War.

From the opening scene in Tiger Village of Fort Polk to the drunken celebration at the conclusion of a torturous "hump" through the jungle of the central highlands, "Eleven Bravo" chronicles the life of the Vietnam infantryman.  Fresh from training as an 11B, the MOS for the combat infantry, a young soldier arrives in-country as astronaut Neil Armstrong walks on the surface of the moon, and a month later he is a grizzled veteran who celebrates life listening to Jimi Hendrix' Purple Haze, even as the rock star performs it live at Woodstock.

"Eleven Bravo" is the first volume of a series entitled LRRP Rangers Vietnam.  The LRRPs of Vietnam (Long Range Reconnaissance Patrol) were the cavalry scouts of their war, traveling by helicopter rather than mustangs into remote and unfriendly territory.  The mountainous jungles of the central highlands were especially inhospitable, filled with snakes and wild animals, and criss crossed with the tributaries of the Ho Chi Minh trail that lay hidden beneath the thick, triple-canopy jungle foliage.  It was the job of small teams of LRRPs to penetrate the ridges and valleys of the rainforest to track and identify enemy activity.

This short story is less about patriotism and heroism than it is about the gut-wrenching reality for the Vietnam combat soldier.  If you're looking for action-adventure, this series is not for you.  Combat soldiers are celebrated for simply doing their best to get by, not as superheroes, but as young men who often acted heroically but sometimes foolishly in circumstances not of their own choosing.  One reviewer commented "the bond and the folly of immortal combat ring loud and clear from the page, and the story's told with all the realism, language and pathos of experience."  The mood of the stories is dark and somber rather than triumphalistic: a hauntingly honest and brutally true retelling rather than a glorification of the Vietnam experience.

Volumes I, II, III, and IV have been published and may be purchased here.  The opening installment is entitled "Eleven Bravo" and tells the story of a newbie grunt infantryman on a torturous twenty-three day hump through the jungle.  "Here Comes Charlie" is the second installment of the series and begins with a helicopter insertion into remote territory and ends with a LRRP team encounter with NVA.  "Cat Quiet" is the third installment.  With striped face paint and tiger fatigues, four LRRPs creep through the jungle. Cat quiet stealth is their only ally, but with a pair of surprises.  The fourth installment is "Chasing After Wind" and explores twists of fate in the context of a barracks poker game, a wind that blows where it will, and a malevolent joker in the deck. 
 
The author refers to the series as "autobiographical fiction".  They are based on true incidents, but the stories are told with literary embellishment.  The author served with K Company, 75th Infantry (Rangers) in the central highlands of Vietnam in 1969-70, and he was twice awarded a bronze star for valor in combat.