Brute: The Life of Victor Krulak, U.S. Marine

The United States Marine Corps has faced various institutional threats to its existence throughout its history from enemies abroad and within the American military establishment. Powerful leaders have repeatedly emerged from the Marine meritocracy to overcome these various challenges; at least thus far. In the book Brute: The life of Victor Krulak U.S. Marine, author Robert Coram uses the life of LtGen Victor H. Krulak to personify both the best, and sometimes the unsavory nature of the American military. Krulak is portrayed as a man of overwhelming dynamism, a skilled fighter and the consummate bureacratic warrior who combined proven and prophetic proactivity with an ironic self-assurance. Today the military leadership example of Victor Krulak is needed more than ever. Krulak's contributions in the last century included his tireless attempts to help implement the doctrine of the amphibious assault, the eventual codification into law of the USMC mission in the 1947 NSA, and the development of the helicopter as a platform of vertical development. Perhaps most important are the contributions to the civil-military relationship Krulak embodied during the Vietnam War when the "Tuesday Lunch Bunch" made operational decisions bypassing somewhat feckless military leaders. To the contrary, Krulak willingly sacrificed his own chances at becoming the Marine Corps commandant by speaking directly and with candor to an inexperienced and arrogant President. Today in a time of unprecedented military challenges the example of Victor H. Krulak stands out like a lighthouse through time. The author of this fine work, Robert Coram, seems to believe the modern challenges to the Marines' existence started in World War I with the large amount of press coverage of the "Devil Dog's" successes in Belleau Wood. Surviving institutional struggles and in-fighting, men with ideas still emerged like Andrew Jackson Higgins whose amphibious creations are reported to have won the war; quoted in this book as the words of none other than Ike himself! Krulak's imaginative and proactive planning achieved the implementation of the helicopter as a combat platform and its concurrent contribution to the emerging concept of vertical envelopment. This book explores the first use of the helicopter during the Korean War rescuing it from the high-flying and sometimes over shadowing image of the Vietnam War. Krulak's contributions to the recognition of the war in Vietnam as a counterinsurgency came as early as 1962 in a Naval War College Speech. Though the strategic hamlet program failed (using in many ways the successful techniques of the Phillipines Insurrection), the recognition of earlier works by the Marines-largely forgotten during WWII did not escape the brilliant mind of Krulak. While General David Petraeus has rightly received credit for the accomplishment of conducting a seemingly successful surge in the recent counterinsurgency in Iraq; Robert Coram points to Krulak's understanding of the seminal Marine document, the Small Wars Manual, published on the eve of World War II. The life of Victor Krulak additionally demonstrated the historic American propensity to reward diligence and the improtance of a proactive approach to military planning. A fascinating read. Mr. Coram's somewhat consistently slavish admiration of the Corps is balanced by his criticisms of the Marines' choice to limit the actions of Jewish worship on Iwo Jima. Likewise Mr. Coram falls into the trap of judging the past from a present perspective by pointing out the sometimes racist nature of what was essentially a "white man's Marine Corps" through World War II. Nevertheless, this well-written narrative seems to ultimately vindicate the basic fairness of a system whereby a jeweler's son could rise almost to the top of the Marines-limited only by his own professional integrity. The author struggles with Krulak's personal inconsistencies and unfortunately seems unaware of the psychological toll needed to suborn one's own desires and self-identity to accomplish essentially the superhuman, particularly over a lifetime of total service. Imperfect as it may be and has been, the American military system has allowed men and women who are willing to give their all in an inherently loyal and fair system. When the system's leaders fail to adequately plan or when civilian leadership fails to provide clear objectives, the system eventually fails its members. By this definition of leadership, Lt Gen Krulak succeeded and the Marines under his command were rewarded with victory. The question emerging today is, will current military leaders continue to speak the truth as forthrightly as LtGen Krulak did during the Vietnam War, and if so will America's political leaders possess the wisdom to listen to them when they do? Perhaps more importantly can an ultimate definition of victory be articulated by civilian leadership in a manner the military will embrace with imagination and zeal in an atmosphere conducive to honesty? The innovative legacy of Victor H. Krulak continued with his son Charles. As the thirty-first commandant of the Marine Corps, Gen Charles Krulak personified moral decency and pushed the Marine Corps into the intertwining concept of "three block warfare" whereby with a city block a Marine may be expected to engage in fighting, peacekeeping and an ability to conduct humanitarian operations. The Krulak tradition of innovation and moral courage has continued with recent statements by the Marine Corps Commandant regarding the recent revocation of "don't ask-don't tell." It is encouraging to believe current Marine Corps leadership is willing to speak with candor when asked regardless of the political consequences. This terrific book provides a wonderful insight into both the machinations of an iconic military leader and is a metaphor of both the frailties and potential strength of an American military system essentially based on integrity. This book is an excellent addition to one's personal library and serves as a ground breaking and aide to a modern military history curriculum often dominated by an Army perspective.

A Marine myself, I take pride in knowing all the rich history of my Corps. This was an eye opener. Learned so much more about the General and my Corps than I ever knew. Made me even prouder knowing I am part of something so rich and integral in our country's history. If you want to learn more about the Corps history from another perspective, you'll love this. Great leader. Great General, Great Marine. Ooh rah Brute!

I downloaded the Kindle version since I'd previously purchased and then loaned out the paperback version of THE BRUTE and I was taking a long-distance flight and wanted to re-read the book.However, I found the Kindle version was missing certain parts of chapters or things I recalled reading in the paperback version that were quite interesting. if this were the only version of the book, I'd not know what I was missing but I believe the innovations of and actions taken by Marines General Krulak worked with in solving logistical, tactical and practical issues needs to be included in any future version to truly given the reader a full sense of this man's contributions to the United States Marine Corps.

[...] This book is a brutally (no pun intended) honest biography of a Marine Corps legend, Victor Krulak. The only thing missing might be the General's sexual peccadilloes, if he had any. Before I continue, I must explain that I have some first hand knowledge of General Krulak's policies during the Vietnam War: from November of 1967 to December of 1968 I was a member of the Marine Aircraft Group 12 Civic Action Team, located in Chu Lai, RVN. If you haven't read this book, Chu Lai is Krulak's name in Chinese. I never had the honor of meeting the General but I served with his son when I was assigned to Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps for 3 years in Washington, D.C. As Mr. Coram pointed out in his book, "the apple doesn't fall far from the tree." Mr. Coram does an outstanding job of not only relating the facts of Krulak's early life but also explaining how these shaped his life and career. I learned some of his military history from Marine Corps history classes and then in later years, I read Krulak's book,"First to Fight," a must-read for any Marine. I have read many other books on Marine Corps history and I studied history at Pepperdine University while I was on active duty. This book ranks amongst the best of those. I have nothing else to say about Mr. Coram than to thank him for writing this definitive book that will be read and studied by future generations of United States Marines. On a personal note, I am a student,researcher and author of 2 books on the Vietnam War or more specifically the Marine Corps Civic Action Program of which I was a participant. "Brute" validated many thoughts and opinions I have about Vietnam. One fact that has not been reported or has been forgotten is that General Krulak had the prescience of mind to issue the order that 10 percent of all Marines sent to Vietnam would receive Vietnamese language training prior to departure regardless of MOS (job specialty). I was one of those selected and I received the training at Defense Language Institute at Monterey. CA. That fateful decision for me enabled me to join an off-shoot of General Krulak's Combined Action Platoon program, Civic Action. I have written a book about it. One note that neither Mr. Coram or General Krulak knew at the time: in the JFK secret recordings just recently published, the conversation between JFK, Krulak and Mendenhall related by General Krulak to Mr. Coram was "spot-on" proving that the General's memory was indeed excellent. In conclusion, much that I have learned over the years about WW II, Korea and Vietnam, the bitter rivalry between the Marine Corps and other services and the attempts to either downplay or even eliminate the Marine Corps were all validated in this book. More importantly to me, this book documents the biggest reason that Westmoreland lost this war for all of us that served: Westmoreland(and LBJ) would not accept Krulak's strategy of pacification and opted for the losing strategy of fighting a war of attrition. I firmly believe that it might have made some difference to the families of 15 of my classmates killed in action as well as the families of those represented on the Wall. I thought that it might make a difference in Iraq and Afghanistan, but once again history was ignored until near the end. We, the Marines, will continue the fight for the privilige to serve the American people, as General Krulak observed in his own writings: we will continue to exist as long as the American people want us. Semper Fidelis, Gene Hays MSgt, USMC Retired Not as lean, not as mean, but still 100% Marine

manque d'intérêt et pas très bien écrit, je ne suis pas arrivé au bout