Billy Waugh (1929–2023)

A biting satire, showing the perfect soldier, devoid of any conscience or doubt. All he wants to do by his own admission is to kill people and wherever the government sends him he will happily go - whatever the circumstances. It shows the unreal cruelty of the American army in case you thought 3rd world dictators had the monopoly on pointless slaughter of innocent people.

But, as the main character would have it, we all know that America has never done anything wrong and all the history books are written by limp-wristed academics who frankly don't understand that what is important in life is to do what the general tells you to and not to question anything ever, in case your brain experiences a thought that does not involve imagining killing another human being (with a smile on your face). Otherwise the pinkos win.

Parts of the book made me ill. The deranged glee the author exhibits describing blowing up sleeping soldiers with grenades or killing a woman in case she woke them up with her screaming was just vomit inducing.… (altro)

Billy Waugh’s fifty year military and para-military career makes for some good reading. It also does a service by illustrating the high human cost of war, but also the price we pay for lapsed vigilance.

Although filled with equal parts braggadocio “I developed a propensity for attracting gunshots and shrapnel; I possess eight Purple Hearts to commemorate these occasions” and false modesty “Let me be clear: I am not a hero,” this is a compelling book.

Waugh details his seven years in Vietnam, most as a Master Sergeant attached to the Special Operations Group. He retired after the war and worked at a series of unsatisfying civilian jobs until he was hired to train soldiers in Libya. He later became a CIA contractor, hired to keep tabs Osama Bin Laden in Khartoum, Sudan in the early 1990s. (This book was published in 2004. In it Waugh says he believes Bin Laden was killed by a smart bomb on 2/4/02).

Waugh was later instrumental in the tracking and surveillance of Carlos the Jackal (Ilich Ramirez-Sanchez) in Khartoum, which led to his capture by the French. This may be the most gripping part of the book.

Waugh finishes out his career – in his seventies - with two months in Afghanistan at the beginning of the war there.… (altro)