Red Platoon

Starred review from April 4, 2016
Former SSG Romesha, a Medal of Honor recipient for his actions in the 2009 battle for Outpost Keating in Afghanistan, viscerally describes the dirt, danger, and chaos of that battle. This ranks among the best combat narratives written in recent decades, revealing Romesha as a brave and skilled soldier as well as a gifted writer. He supports his own memories with hours of interviews and official reports to describe the battle and its context. Romesha offers some personal history and a rundown of the precarious nature of life at the remote American outpost before launching into his minute-by-minute account of its defense, from the moments prior to the attack at 5:58 a.m. until the first medevac helicopter arrived to remove the wounded and dead at 8:11 p.m. At the end of the battle, of the 50 soldiers at Keating, eight were dead and 27 were wounded. The soldiers were not hardened Special Forces operators, but rather ordinary young Americans “cut from a more ragged grade of cloth.” Romesha remains humble and self-effacing throughout, in a contrast with many other first-person battle accounts, and his powerful, action-packed book is likely to stand as a classic of the genre. Photos. Agent: Jennifer Joel, ICM.

April 1, 2016
An account of the horrendous October 2009 attack on the American Combat Outpost Keating in Afghanistan, told in a frank, engaging vernacular by the staff sergeant and Medal of Honor winner. The attack by the Taliban on Keating took the lives of eight Americans and countless Afghans, and it rendered numerous wounded. However, as Romesha notes in his character-driven narrative, it was hardly a surprise enemy move. Having joined the Army from his graduating class in Lake City, California, in 1999, following his two older brothers, Romesha became a commander of the Black Knight Troop's Red Platoon, which was eventually sent to the most remote and dangerous outpost in Nuristan, less than 20 miles from the Pakistan border. The location of the fort defied tactical logic: rather than firing down at the enemy from the top of the hill, Keating was a target at the base of steep mountains whose ridgelines concealed attack points behind thick trees and boulders. It was the spectacularly ill-planned layout of the fort--"so breathtakingly open to plunging fire that massive amounts of artillery and airpower would be required to defend it"--that allowed the Taliban to observe in detail the movements and patterns of the American scouts, young men who were trained in reconnaissance, countersurveillance, and navigation. Romesha lovingly describes this cohort as "exceptionally ordinary men who were put to an extraordinary test." The author devotes the narrative to building character studies of his troop, which he carefully "stacked" with the most determined, steely, physically fit, and battle-tested soldiers, headed by the very capable Lt. Andrew Bundermann. When the assault came at dawn, the soldiers took up their weapons and positions dutifully and with fervor, though they were stunningly outnumbered and nearly overrun until air support arrived hours later. The book is riveting in its authentic detail, right down to the determined attempts to recover American bodies before the Taliban could. Romesha ably captures the daily dangers faced by these courageous American soldiers in Afghanistan.

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April 15, 2016

On an early October morning in 2009, an army platoon in the Nuristan province of Afghanistan, near the Pakistan border, came under attack from Taliban forces. Outpost Keating was intended to be a temporary settlement to be abandoned a few days later. Fifty U.S. soldiers resisted a well-armed and well-informed assault by at least 300 Taliban. This firsthand account by former U.S. Army staff sergeant Romesha, who earned the Medal of Honor for his actions during this battle, expertly disentangles the complicated threads of the effort, accounting for the actions (and deaths) of every participant, including the massive air support, medical care, and command decisions related to the action. Romesha's personal narrative of the Battle of Kamdesh is a companion to the much broader story told in Jake Tapper's The Outpost: An Untold Story of American Valor, which adds geopolitical context. VERDICT A clear and expertly crafted account of an iconic fight during the Afghan War, this work is sure to be popular with readers of military history. [See Prepub Alert, 11/2/15.].--Edwin Burgess, U.S. Army Combined Arms Research Lib., Fort Leavenworth, KS

Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

May 1, 2016
On October 3, 2009, the U.S. military endured some of the bloodiest fighting against Taliban forces since American forces entered Afghanistan, in late 2001. Eight U.S. soldiers were killed and 27 wounded while more than 150 Taliban died in what is now referred to as the Battle of Keating. One of the battle's key combatants, Romesha, received a Medal of Honor for his heroism and now gives a full report here of a conflict that was ill-fated from the very beginning, especially given Outpost Keating's almost defenseless placement in a remote part of Afghanistan's mountainous Hindu Kush region. Compounding the base's vulnerability was a recent draw-down of supplies after the base was slated for closure as soon as other nearby operations ended. Romesha follows the skirmish's complete time line, from the first early morning shots to the enemy's infiltration to his unit's reclamation of the base 14 hours later. His account displays all the hallmarks of superlative wartime reporting: unflinching honesty; vivid, in-the-trenches description; and deeper reflections on the pathos of battle.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2016, American Library Association.)