INDCJournal: Book Review: "In the Company of Heroes"

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April 03, 2006

Book Review: "In the Company of Heroes"

Posted by Bill

I recently finished In the Company of Heroes, the autobiography of CW4 Mike Durant, the Army Special Forces pilot who was shot down, beaten, captured, shot and held captive for two weeks by Somalian warlords during the famous series of events covered in the book and movie Black Hawk Down. Highly recommended, chiefly for its detailed account of what goes through a man's mind as he's held prisoner by an impoverished and angered enemy that doesn't recognize the Geneva Conventions, as well as an interestingly structured narrative that flips back-and-forth between Mogadishu and flashbacks of Durant's career, which culminated in the Army Special Forces' elite 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment ("Night Stalkers").

Highlights from the book include an account of intense combat operations during the invasion of Panama, harrowing descriptions of inclement weather MediVac duty near Korea's DMZ and the experience of getting shot down and desperately fighting to defend his crash site with posthumus Medal of Honor winners Gary Gordan and Randy Schughart, two Delta Force operators who volunteered to set down, alone, to defend him from thousands of angry Somalis. The event is capped by Durant's surreal terror at running out of ammunition and being swarmed by the seething mob that had just killed and dismembered his compatriots.

A passage at the end of the book stands out, as Durant recounts a special speaking engagement:

I try to say "yes" to as many of these invitations as I can, because if my experiences can help just one man, woman or child, then I feel it's well worth my time and effort. With young people in particular, I try to emphasize the fact that we must never give up, regardless of what happens to us. My point is that life is ten percent circumstance and ninety percent how we deal with it. In other words, it's all about attitude. If we make positive decisions on the parts of our lives that we can influence, then the rest will fall into place. I use these personal experiences as an example, and of course, these experiences give me the opportunity to honor my fallen comrades.
In honoring these men, I always remind my listeners that I probably would not have survived if not for a soldier named Gary Gordan and his friend Randy Schughart, who were both posthumously awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor for their heroic actions in Mogadishu. In 1994, I myself was reminded that such men are not just born with these qualities of courage but are at times inspired to emulate them. I had been invited to Gary Gordon's hometown of Lincoln, Maine, to participate in honoring his memory with a ceremony and monument to his courage and professionalism. In order to prepare some remarks for my statement, I got a book on the Medal of Honor from the local library. The book was full of interesting historical facts, and its record of heroic deeds was quite overwhelming. But when I got to the back of the book, what I found truly astounded me. There, located in a small pocket, was the library checkout card. Apparently, the book had been checked out only a few times since its publication, and the last reader had taken it home almost twenty years before. The last person to sign out that book on the Congressional Medal of Honor would in fact become the next recipient of our nation's highest military award, a young teenager named Gary Gordan.

Inspiring indeed. A brief interview with Durant can be found here.

Posted by Bill at April 3, 2006 08:52 AM | TrackBack (1)

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Comments

They were from the same home town?

Posted by: Dean Esmay at April 3, 2006 01:53 PM

Gary Gordan checked out a book on Medal of Honor winners when he was a teenager, only to win the medal 2 decades later.

Michael Durant was in Gary Gordan's hometown to speak at a ceremony honoring his sacrifice, when he went to the library and checked out the very same book, discovering that Gordan had checked it out as a teen.

Posted by: Bill from INDC at April 3, 2006 01:57 PM

Okay, sorry, my eyes glazed over the fact that he went to the local library while visiting the guy's home town. Somehow I got it in my head he meant HIS OWN local library. Not reading carefully, obviously.

Posted by: Dean Esmay at April 3, 2006 01:59 PM

"Inspiring" ... an accurate term that just doesn't cover how much this story impacts one.

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