Rating: 
Summary: One of the greatest leaders of the 20th century
Review: I first heard of Colonel Hackworth when I was a cadet at the United States Coast Guard Academy, where he came and gave a guest lecture during my sophomore year. After hearing him talk, I had to go out and get his book. "About Face" is, quite simply, the best book I've ever read...again and again. Colonel Hackworth's no-nonsense approach to leadership is tried-and-true, and what makes each point hit home is that he has learned everything through real life experience. The stories that he tells in this book are not just entertaining. They tell a lot about the life of a soldier; they tell a lot about a military hierarchy and how it should work (as opposed to how it works now); they tell us what really happened in Vietnam and how the U.S. Government "black balled" Colonel Hackworth in order to quell public disatisfaction with the war in Vietnam. He doesn't just make this book a bitch session....he offers his expert opinion as a soldier and a leader about how to correct what is happening to our fighting forces. He offers comparisons to leaders of the past and insight into the leaders of the future...and the future of our military leaders looks bleak. Lastly, this book isn't just about being a military leader and telling war stories. This book is a must read for anybody that is in charge of anything or anyone. Many of the points he makes in his book apply "across the board". Being a leader is a skill as well as a science. Learn from the best, because "those who fail to study history are doomed to repeat it".
Rating: 
Summary: Complex man, complex autobiography
Review: A fine book for many reasons, but IMO primarily as a character study of a complicated man. His ideas regarding the importance of hard training are hardly new, but are always worth repeating. His arguments about merging the Army and the Marine Corps, the top-heavy structure of the post-Vietnam era Army, and military awards are worth study. People unfamiliar with the values of a Cold War military officer find this book very insightful. The book is, most importantly, just pretty damned interesting. Hack is clearly passionate about all things infantry, but the man suffers from a number of self-admitted character flaws:
-Losing a weapon and covering it up (sorry, this was wrong)
-Tolerance of drug use
-Criticizing the Army while serving as an officer DURING WAR
-..and I've always been uncomfortable with his part in Admiral Boorda's NCM scandal given his personal situation regarding his own awards (Ranger Tab, Hack?). This aside, all Americans and allies are grateful for Hack's repeated combat valor. Read the book, but consider his actions in the context of the times. This man is a combat hero, not necessarily a role model.
Rating:
Summary: Eye Opener
Review: This book will show what really goes on in the army, it is an eye opener. Check out his web site: www.hackworth.com. A lot of good information.
Rating:
Summary: Best book ever written on Korean and Vietnam War
Review: This is the best book ever written about the Korean and Vietnam Wars. I have read about 20 books on these wars and this is the best. I couldn't put it down. Colonel Hackworth is an American hero. Written from the perspective of a front line combat Army soldier. I work at a military hospital and Colonel Hackworth is greatly admired by the soldiers and the staff. America asked these young men to fight for freedom and they did. Thank God they fought for us. Check out Colonel Hackworth's website at hackworth.com. It is full of good information.
Rating:
Summary: Telling the Truth!
Review: Hackworth is the warriors warrior. BTDT (been there done that) is his motto. I was so inspired by this book I could hardly put it down. At first glance you think, this is about a thousand pages too long. But as the story of Hacks life unfolds you find yourself wishing for more! His metal in combat is unequaled and his actions speak for themselves. His list of achievements says it all, over 110 military decorations. But his humility cannot be disputed. The man is not a braggart, he is a truth teller. He tells the story of an American soldier from the trenches, where the fighting and dying took place. His passion will bring tears to your eyes as he reveals himself cradling the lifeless bodies of the men who died under his command in the Korean War and then risking his own life years later in Vietnam to rescue young soldiers caught in a harrowing cross fire. Hack is a 100% genuine American Hero, without doubt one the best soldiers our country has ever produced. (Too bad he's not a Joint Chief) This book is definitely worth the read. I highly recommend it.
Rating:
Summary: A True Warrior
Review: Hackworth has produced a well written and provocative book concerning his time in the USA Army beginning with his enlistment at the end of WWII. His thoughts on the Vietnam War and the Army's command structure and bureaucracy created a lasting impression with me. Obviously he writes from his own perspective, but many of his ideas are worth discussing and giving more thought. A great book about one person's Vietnam experience.
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Summary: I should have read this in High School
Review: For those of you people who have read this, and more specifically the guys I went to Marmion Military Academy with; I never really understood who Walter Schroeder was (Good ol' Steady Schroeder- as Hack refers to him) until I read this book. Mother, Fathers, if your kids are thinking about ROTC scholarships or joining the military in any way at all you need to read this book and then make them read it before they sign on the line that is dotted! Raise your glasses to Colonel David Hackworth! Thank you, Sir.
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Summary: Engrossing and Insightful--But Disturbing
Review: About Face is an odessey to read. Like battle itself, it is full of pages of sheer terror separated by long passages of nervous boredom as Hackworth sought to find some identity apart from battle. The Army made him a man, and as long as there were wars to fight he honored "his mother" the military with an almost unbelieveable string of courageous achievements in battle. But when the time to kill was over, Hackworth lost himself, as he more or less admits. He candidly admits not only his many adultries but his fundamental inability to honor his wife and children. He admits constant theft, and tolerated any immorality that would help his unit. Through two thirds of the book you want to enlist to be a stud like Hack. In the last pages you want to slap him in the face for betraying the Army. He was a law unto himself (as the title to the penultimate chapter confesses), both as a maverick in the Pentagon or as the quasi-warlord of a fire base in Vietnam. Many, including Hack, have suggested that he was the model of Colonel Kurtz in Coppola's Apocalypse Now. Whether or not this is true, the comparison is chillingly apt, only Hackworth may be more frightening. Hackworth was genuinely patriotic, undeniably courageous and damn effective in killing Chinese in Korea and Vietcong. But this same warrior spirit refused to bow to any moral principal except his own concept of loyalty to and conern for his troops. "The horror, horror." He saw clearly that guerrilla warfare required a guerilla-style response from the Army (a lesson of continuing significance in modern political battles like Afganistan), and he clearly understood the political nature of the Vietnam War. But the moral relativism of his "platoon-as-tribe" principles could not be extended to a wider audience precisely because they were unprincipled. Hackworth's tactical advice is still needed, and his war stories are as good as they get. But he unwittingly embodies the horror and paradox of the modern warrior: To serve the highest principles of man, such as freedom and justice, while destroying men, and perhaps himself, in the process.
Rating:
Summary: A born warrior
Review: A juvenile delinquent, Hackworth, flees from his confinement and joins the Merchant Marine. Later, he pays off a wino to sign a fraudulent affidavit, as Hackworth's "father" (he was an orphan), that allows him to enter the Army at the age of fifteen. This is the beginning of this book, which ends with this man, now a Colonel, venting condemnation of America's tactics in Vietnam in the press, and his subsequent persecution by Army investigators, in a harrowing, white-knuckle ending.
A man is lucky to find his calling, and Hackworth was born to be a warrior. In a way, this book is an inspiration. It makes one want to be as good in one's profession as Hackworth was in his. And no matter what one's occupation is, one can identify with Hackworth's frustration with and anger at the "perfumed princes" who rose to the top in the Army he knew, and whos' equivalents exist in every field of endeavor. Don't you know people who don't give a grape-skin about the higher goals of their profession, and who live only to feed their ambition? Reading this book is like sitting down and listening to somebody who knows the score.
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Summary: Massengale Lives!
Review: Suprisingly enough I thought Courtney Massengale was a fictional character, but I find him in most of the characters unfavorably criticizing this book and David Hackworth.
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