Living with Honor

Starred review from January 28, 2013
It wasn't 9/11 or love of country, but a free Army t-shirt that sealed the deal for a gung-ho 18-year-old Iowan who embarked on a life-altering deployment to Korengal, the "Valley of Death" and Afghanistan's most perilous region. In October 2007, ambushed by a unit of professional fighters more disciplined and vicious than the solider-farmers they usually fought, Giunta saves two wounded comrades, one of whom was almost abducted by the enemy. Through these actions he became the first living solider since the Vietnam War to receive the Medal of Honor. Giunta displays a grim candor about war: "It's blood, it's gross and it's gruesome; it's always sick and mean." His frank take on the fighting is more than a montage of battlefield gore; an adept observer of human nature, Giunta's portraits of his comrades-in-arms are full of wit and warmth about their foibles and admiration for their combat skills. He downplays his political views though finds it difficult to absorb the cluelessness American civilians display about war and soldiers' sacrifices. With clarity and maturity, Giunta shows he understands the complexities of contemporary Afghan society and displays a healthy amount of skepticism about the US mission there.

November 15, 2012
The first living Medal of Honor winner since the Vietnam War tells his story. For his conspicuous gallantry on October 25th, 2007, in Afghanistan's dangerous Korengal Valley, 22-year-old Giunta received the military's highest award for bravery. To hear him tell it, he did only what he was trained to do, no more than many others who behaved so courageously that day. With an assist from Layden (co-author, with Ace Frehley: No Regrets: A Rock 'n' Roll Memoir, 2011, etc.), Giunta's conversational narrative builds to the ambush on Honcho Hill that slaughtered two buddies and marked him as a hero. But then: "How can I be so great if I allowed two of my friends to get killed?" An indifferent Iowa schoolboy, Giunta was sitting in his high school chemistry class on 9/11. Two years later, at loggerheads with his father, he joined the Army looking for excitement. After two tours in Afghanistan, he found plenty, but he also acquired a well-earned, cruel brand of wisdom. Self-effacing throughout, unstinting in his praise of his fellow warriors, Giunta remarks on the difference between the exhilaration of combat and the tedium of war. He comments on the effects of adrenaline in battle, the underappreciated role of luck and timing, the emotional distance required to fight effectively, the shocking disposability of life and the decidedly atypical character traits that mark the combat soldier. Candid, confessional, sometimes politically incorrect, Giunta's tale is at once mundane and remarkable. He has come to terms with the Medal of Honor, largely because he recognizes its inspirational effect on others, but he cannot recall the day he earned it without feeling sadness and loss, without shame that he somehow let down his brothers in battle. A simply told account that reminds us of the awesome weight accompanying this signal honor.

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