Not Going Home Alone; A Marine's Story

New York, N.Y.: Ballantine Books, 2001. Presumed book club edition (smaller format, no price on DJ). Hardcover. Very good/Very good. xi, [7], 250, [4] pages. Illustrations. Includes Introduction, Author's Note, and a full page black and white map of North and South Vietnam, as well as a Glossary and an Index. Topics covered include Leave-Taking; Training; 3d Battalion, 5th Marines; Special Landing Force and In-Country; 2d Battalion, 5th Marines: Operation Prairie; 2d Battalion, 5th Marines: An Hoa; Clark Air Force Base; and Going Home. In 1966-67, the author commanded the mortar platoon of the 3rd Battalion, 5th Marines and a rifle platoon in Hotel Company, 2nd Battalion, 5th Marines. While leading his platoon through a mined area southwest of Da Nang, he was critically wounded. Kirschke was medically retired from the Marines in 1968, and then taught English at Villanova University. The author wrote that Not Going Home Alone: A Marine's Story was motivated primarily by my desire to bear witness to the numerous good deeds and heroic actions of the Marines and the Corpsmen with whom I served in Vietnam. All the members of 1st Lt. James J. Kirschke's mortar platoon and then rifle platoon knew the stakes: the Marines are America's military elite, expected to train harder, fight longer, sacrifice more. Kirschke led by example in the hotly contested zone just south of the DMZ and in the dangerous An Hoa region southwest of Da Nang. There Kirschke's units, with resources stretched to the limit, saw combat almost daily in some of the fiercest fighting of 1966. Sustained through the toughest firefights and bloodiest ambushes, the men's morale proved a testament to Kirschke's leadership and his dedication to what the U.S. Marines stand for. Those beliefs, and the faith of his men, in turn helped Kirschke through his long recovery after he was wounded by the triple explosion of a box mine rigged to an anti-tank rocket round and a frag grenade. The Marines' legend and reputation are based on the blood, courage, and discipline of warriors like Jim Kirschke. Sparing no one, he has written a powerful chronicle of the deadly war his Marines fought with valor.