I choose this book for several reasons. When I went to the library last year it covered the first book rack was recommended this book by several people working at the store. At the time, about a year ago, there was a lot of different perspectives and false information spread through media and other sources about the mission leading to the death of Osama Bin Laden. I wanted the information shared from a first person perspective of someone who was actually on the mission, because there’s nothing as close to the right information as a primary source. This is also extremely rare because so much of the information is classified and can’t be shared, so hopefully this book contained a lot of information I wouldn’t be able to get otherwise. I picked out this book a couple weeks after seeing the movie Zero Dark Thirty. This movie was about the investigation in his finding and everything that lead up to their mission to kill Bin Laden. I knew the book and movie would definitely have different information that’s presented and conflicting perspectives. It’s also interesting to see how someone a part of Seal Team Six would describe these events and their thoughts on how Special Operations would deal with the situation. I picked this book up recently because for some reason I never got to it. Finally reading the book after several years of the event would also be interesting to see what I knew about the mission from general media and comparing it to the actual event from the book.
I have interest in the military because of their varied ethics and their procedures for choosing soldiers and training and how they approach different missions. After reading the book “The Things They Carried” by Tim O’brien, I found that Mark Owen could relate to the similar burdens of being in war. It was different in that “No Easy Day” is written in modern day war so war is very different from the Vietnam War O’briens book was about. The mental burdens are similar although Owen focused more on the physical burdens and only have short reflections on his thoughts about the missions he went on. After reading about several of Owen’s missions including the one that lead to Bin Laden’s death, the missions are never perfect. Something always goes wrong. They underestimate the number of terrorists, a helicopter has a malfunction, someone gets shot. There are so many factors that affect how the mission is run and so many split second decisions that need to be made by the soldiers that could result in life or death. These decisions may have consequences that haunt the soldiers, in some situations where absolutely no good can come out of the situation. The militaries decisions cause a lot of controversy about the ethics between what is right and wrong and what should have and could have been done. I want to research the ethics behind the militaries decisions and how these decisions are made.
What are the differences between the movie's version and the book? There is an article that my husband read that detailed the differences. That might be an interesting study -- especially given what O'Brien and Vonnegut say about war stories.... Does the movie glorify too much or... You need to dig for some substance here. I don't want you lingering in conjecture and cliche.
ReplyDeleteI want to read this book. There are a lot of war stories we’ve covered in class, Ms. R’s right; but I can relate to this being different because it’s in the nonfiction section of the store and the events it covers are what we grew up with. I’ve read a lot of biographies of former soldiers, and some try to describe the feeling of it, but the best ones just state what the test was, but I think it’s something hard to explain to someone not involved in the military. Understanding the different motivations for writing war stories from Vonnegut and O’Brien, what do you think Mark Owen’s motivation was?
ReplyDeleteAnother thing that was brought up during the book’s release was the name of the author you provided. I’ll get to the point…it’s not his real name. Mark Owen is actually Matt Bissonnette. I think this might be a critical point to whatever theme you develop, because there are a couple of very different reasons why a Special Forces soldier wouldn’t give his name. Something to think about.
When reading your post, I saw the idea of war being unpredictable as something timeless, especially considering O’Brien’s stories. However, telling war stories has changed, A LOT. Maybe you already know this, but there is a strong stigma against soldiers (particularly SF) writing about their experiences. Team 6 carries the “silent professional” code and in the community of operators it’s social suicide to use your experiences to make some cash. I think the ethics of war is a very interesting topic to investigate, but I think it might be worth looking into the post-team lives of these guys. There is a lot of moral ambiguity, and we can talk in person, but to sum it up quickly: the primary job these guys take after serving in the teams is the private military (not renowned for ethics), and very few people are willing to talk about their experiences because of the stigma in the community, so there’s a bit of open water.