Rating: 
Summary: Good! But be prepared.
Review: This book by Tom Clancy is great. It gives an in depth view into command, tactical and strategic. Yet it is very hard to read if you do not read it carefully. If you are a person who reads quickly and does not take the time to absorb some of the lingo then you will hate it. If you are into the Military and have the time and patience to absorb the terms in the beggining than this book is a great read.
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Summary: A must for soldiers and officers.
Review: As An junior officer in the Swedish Armed Force, the Army. I really enjoyed this book. It's very interesting to read about such a great leader, as Gen. Fredrick Franks, Jr. With his experience and conviction, he gives you an opportunity to follow his career. From his earlier years as a junior officer, his tour to Vietnam, the accident and the hard way back. Finally you learn that all this knowledge and experience put together, makes an officer ready to face yet another battle. To lead the VII Armoured Corps in Desert Storm. It's a joy to read about his commitment to his family, his soldiers and his country - which should set a standard for fellow officers and soldiers.
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Summary: Outstanding, very insightful.
Review: This book gives a great look into what it takes to lead soldiers in war. As a soldier myself, I feel that it is essential for all officers and entertaining for all.
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Summary: A tough technical slog for civilians
Review: Clancy does a superb job of researching the techo wiz factors for his excellent works of fiction. Then he trys to turn the research notes into books. For the military uninitiated they can be a tough read. INTO THE STORM is the rebuttal to the Schwartzkof book "It doesn't Take a Hero"(?) Far too technical. I was looking foward to Clancys treatise on Desert Storm in his usual style but was very disappointed with this Military Manual.
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Summary: Lessons for managers in Army's re-birth after Vietnam
Review: I am a baby-boomer who came of age in the Vietnam era, so my interest in things military is slight and my general opinion of military organization, I'm ashamed to say, came more from Catch-22 and MASH than reality. Yet, the U.S. Army has done some huge and useful things, so I was willing to take a fresh look with this book. I was moderating a conference of business owners recently as they lamented the poor work habits and other failings of "Gen-Xers." Finally, I'd had enough so I said, "Say what you will about body piercing and Starbucks, I don't think that's the key issue. It looks to me that our generation's contributions were the drug culture and Vietnam while the present generation has given us the Internet and Desert Storm." The question becomes, how did this happen? Into the Storm provides part of the answer. In the aftermath of Vietnam, "the Army began a revolution in training and leader development that touched every aspect of the ! ! way the Army prepared for war." This revolution, covered mostly in Chapter 5 of the book, is an object lesson for corporations seeking to develop the most effective workforce. The two keys to the Army's new training methods were "train as you fight" and "performance-oriented training." Train as you fight mean realistic combat practice with the same people, equipment, and terrain you expect to have in battle. When "asked how his troop had been able to do so well in their first time in combat, he [Captain Sartiano] answered that this hadn't been their first time; he and others in his troop had been in combat before -- at the National Training Center."{p. 559} Seems obvious, but how much customer service training is just reading from a manual? Management training done with lectures and slides? Skills training done with photos and prose descriptions? Why hasn't industry begun to "train as it works?" The second pincer of the revol! ! ution is performance-oriented training. That simply means y! ou train until a standard of competence is met, not just until the training time is exhausted. If you don't meet the standard, you don't go on the line. Isn't most business training conducted with no measure of actual learning: no tests, no trials, no demonstrations? Few corporations have any idea of what they are getting for their training dollar. (Their unhappy customers do!) Another shift in the Army's leadership style with relevance to industry is the recognition of the central importance of human nature. My favorite example is General Franks's first criteria of leadership: "mental courage (the courage to be who you really are.)" Music to my ears, of course, as the founder of a company dedicated to making people successful by helping them be genuine: MayoGenuine. My second example is the wonderfully descriptive term "friction." Friction is the tendency of orders and instructions to be altered, misdirected, and diffused as they are passed along an! ! d implemented by various layers of management and staff. The way to deal with friction, once you have done all you can with communication and monitoring, is to adapt. The key is to make your orders simpler, clearer and less ambiguous. Nimble as his forces were, General Franks knew that at a certain point he had to shut-up and let them go with the instructions they had. Better to go with an inferior plan well communicated and understood that a perfect plan poorly communicated. A lesson for "micro-managers" in every organization. Another capsule lesson for managers is the example of "'terrain walks': Once every three months [the General] required all commanders and leaders to go out on the actual ground where they anticipated they would fight. There they would explain in detail to their next-higher commander just how they intended to conduct the fight." How many senior business managers would be willing to walk a mile with their frontline people, then def! ! end their strategies to a panel of more experienced manager! s? What kinds of changes to their strategies would ensue from such an exercise? Into the Storm is too long; it needed a ruthless editor. I admit to skipping pages of poorly presented, unnecessary detail on minute-by-minute battle operations. I must still recommend it to anyone willing to look at their own management through the lens of a potent organization which plays only for the highest stakes.
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Summary: A book that belongs only in a Army Tactical Command library.
Review: This tome should be credited to General Fred Franks with commentary by Tom Clancy. I found it difficult to distinguish who wrote what. And a credit it is to Fred Franks for a brilliant career of personal perserverance and an outstanding performance of service to his country. But to an average reader of history, the book would have benifitted form a glossary of military abbreviations. Frankly, I got lost and eventually gave up trying to keep up. It was written by a military man for the military. As the subtitle states "A Study in Command". I'll think twice before spending money on a book with Mr. Clancy's name in the future.
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Summary: Review of "Into the Storm: A Study in Command"
Review: This was a good book. It was a fancinating account of what a combat commander has to consider in all his deliberations while planning an attack or defense. The book follows Fred Frank's career from Vietnam, a VA hospital, to Desert Storm. It may bog down for some readers (like me at times) in the mechanics of tactics and strategy but it generally holds one's attention very well. One other point some may see as a detraction from the book is the Authors' tendancy to spend time rebutting what was written in General Scharzkopf's autobiography. The General was critical in some respects of General Frank's attack on the Republican Guard during Desert Storm. There is some obvious frayed feelings over this and it creeps into General Frank's writing. He makes a good case however. I would say it was well worth the price.
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Summary: A good view of the Army in Gulf War, but slow at times.
Review: The first part of the book has interesting details about the Army's transition from the problems of the 1970's to the professional force of the 1990's. Once the focus turns to Desert Shield/Storm, the book moves at a slower pace; almost too slow. Gen Franks spends too much time giving us the minute details of his planning and execution steps. Although it gives the reader a good perspective of what a general's life was like in this type of operation, I often found myself getting lost in the details (and I was there!). This is not a Clancy-type book, as we have normally encountered in the past. Also, Gen Franks too often defends past criticisms from members of his chain-of-command (Gen Schwarzkopf, etc) that may have occurred during and after the operation. An OK book if you're interested in the Gulf War or the Army of the 1990's. Not a thriller.
Rating:
Summary: Well worth the effort to read!
Review: While not the average "Clancy" novel, this novel is insightful and an informative read. General Franks is a bonafide hero and served his country with honor and courage. His story and the story of the VII Corps needed to be told. Americans need to remember the debt we owe to the men and women who risk their lives so we can continue to enjoy our freedoms.
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Summary: An ILLUSTRATION of command
Review: If you are interested in what the awesome responsibilities of military comand are and what makes a great military commander, this book is a must. Granted, understanding the military's lanquage- such as acronyms, terms, and slang-helps when reading this book. I even found myself, a U.S. Army vet, skimming some portions. What struck me after reading the book however, is how it intimately llustrates Gen. Franks' thought process-how he overcame a severe leg wound in Vietnam, the lessons he learned there, his commitment to troops under his command, and more importantly, the mental abilty required to command 50,000 plus mult-national troops in combat. You come to realize just how awesome "burden of command" is. This book could also serve as a warning to our current civilian and military leadership-most notably our current commander-in-chief-as to the dire consequences of returning to a "hollow" Army and commtiting our troops to ill-defined missions abroad. After reading the book I felt tremendous respect for Gen. Franks-not only as a military commander-but as a human being as well. I am sure that he will go down in history as one of the unsung heroes of Desert Storm.
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