Rating: 
Summary: Not up to Rick Atkinson's excellent standard
Review: Rick Atkinson (Pulitzer prize winner for Army at Dawn) was an embedded reporter in the 101 airborne during our most recent Iraqi war. He spends his time with General Petraeus and the story is from the perspective of someone following around the general. The result of this is a very readable account of this general's personality, command issues and combat encounters at the general's level. What is missing is a more complete view and account of this division's war experience. I found myself looking for a clearer overall picture and a better idea of the unit tactics.
While I am a fan of Rick Atkinson's books, this point of view account of the war left a bad taste for reading any others. I don't care to piece together a conflict by reading a dozen point of view books from various embedded reporters.
Rating: 
Summary: Lightweight and Biased, but Readable
Review: Rick Atkinson invites you to ride along as he gets to know the top brass of the 101st Airborne and watches them call the shots in Iraq. The result is a disappointment but not a total loss.
Readers of his previous work will be shocked at the utter lack of depth here. Discussions of tactics and strategy are strictly superficial, and the enlisted soldiers doing the actual shooting are ignored completely. He describes listening to radio communications while companies of men manoeuver under fire , but somehow never finds the time to ask them about the experience. Atkinson repeatedly allows his dislike of the Bush administration to get the best of him, which results in a few really awful cheap shots. At one point he flatly refers to Saddam's WMD as nonexistent. Not unproven, or as-yet undiscovered, or even doubtful, but nonexistent. If, as UN inspectors believe, Saddam did move chemical weapons to Syria before the war, Atkinson has seriously compromised his integrity here. He also recycles the false claim that Bush painted Iraq as "an imminent, existential danger...". Actually, the President urged action against Iraq BEFORE the threat became imminent. Where's a fact checker when you need one? Atkinson catalogues the losses suffered by American forces during the occupation of Iraq, carefully sending the message that these deaths constitute an indictment of Bush policy. He neglects to mention that many of the terrorists are non-Iraqis fighting to prevent Iraq from becoming a successful democracy. Mr. Atkinson evidently prefers to leave the reader with the impression that the general population of Iraq has rejected the American presence there. This is in keeping with the view of many in the media, but is sharply at odds with the firsthand reports of many American soldiers serving in Iraq. Atkinson's writing skills are quite good, and he paints an interesting portrait of the talented, driven Major General David Petraeus. There is also a fairly good "you are there" quality as he describes his own experiences and reactions. Don't pay full price for this book. If you can borrow one or find a cheap used copy it's a decent light read. Just hold your nose when he goes into BBC mode.
Rating: 
Summary: OUTSTANDING!!!!
Review: This book is an outstanding read and worth every penny. Mr. Atkinson writes in detail about the deployment and combat the 101st Airborne Division was involved in during Operation Iraqi Freedom. A majority of the book is focused on the commanding general and his staff, but the author does write about those at the lower levels of command and the problems they faced. His writing is very detailed and makes the reader feel as if he is actually getting pounded with sand during shamals or seeing comrades die during combat. The writing draws you in and keeps you there. Mr. Atkinson is brutally honest in showing how politician's views and soldier's views of how the war should have been waged are vastly different. Mr. Atkinson is not complimentary toward Bush and Rumsfeld. He writes about their trying to go to war "on a shoestring" and how they got upset when the V Corps commander stated his opinion of how the war was going. Recent events in Iraq has proven once again that politicians who weasled their way out of serving their country do not have a clue what it takes to wage and win a war.
Rating:
Summary: Reasonably good read but Wash.Post biases peek out
Review: This book is reasonably well-written and describes the Iraq invasion from Division and Brigade command staff position exclusively. According to my 101st ABN son, who was there, it is factually accurate.
It is thin on soldier's perspective.
He just has to gratuitously insert typical Washington Post-reporter biases against the Bush administration. Where they are snuck in make no sense whatsoever in context but reflect that he apparently felt he had to do it to keep his credentials as a liberal reporter intact.
He is advertised as a military historian.
I've read John Keegan and he ain't no John Keegan.
Rating:
Summary: i was there also, very good depiction of the truth
Review: This book is the best i've read on the war. I was with Rick almost every step of the way. A couple times I was ahead of him but he caught up. I think Rick gives it to you straight not filled with "media hype". This is the kind of book movie are made from. Excellent book! ~Tim
Rating: 
Summary: Eagle's eye view of battle
Review: This is a superior piece of embed reportage from the second Iraq war. Atkinson has been connected with things military since childhood, so thankfully there is no arrogant media ignorance on display, as in some books by other reporters I've read recently. There are no "on location from under the Humvee" dispatches, as mocked by warbloggers at the time.
He keeps his own firmly inside-the-beltway liberal opinions mostly to himself throughout. Here and there he does imply that the U.S. is to blame for the suffering of the Iraqi people under the fraudulent UN Oil-For-Food program; he baldly labels the pretexts for the war a "delusion"; and he hints that the war is all just about oil. Of course, if that were the case, we could have imitated the French and just cut similarly lucrative and shameful deals with Saddam, instead of going to war for it. But as I said, his professionalism is foremost in these pages. It's a work of solid reportage, not polemic.
Atkinson focuses on the top command of the division. This is not as thrilling as a troopers-eye-view account might be, but it is actually more illuminating. Like good commanders, the leaders of the 101st Airborne Division plan their logistics carefully, so we get a lot of background information on the battle. Thus, the narrative lingers over the mini-quagmire of that spring, whereas the onrushing offensive operations seem to come to us from a distance. The whole division itself is seldom present in this book, except in a couple of panorama scenes, viewed from the air or the side of the road.
The central figure, Major General David Petraeus is drawn as a squared-away natural leader who thinks out loud a lot, solicitous of the welfare of the troops, nudging his officers along with an even but no-nonsense manner, and driving himself unsparingly. Atkinson at times comes across as Petraeus's amanuensis. His staff is expertly portrayed, from the bluff General Sinclair to the go-getter Col. Joseph Anderson.
Special Forces soldiers make cameo appearances throughout the book. With their beards and bill caps, they project a grungy, Joe Cool nonchalance. Whenever Atkinson encounters them, they are lounging in intersections with their Toyota technicals, their secret work unseen.
Atkinson relays a few of his own pratfalls, portraying himself as the FNG tenderfoot in the camp. In one instance he can't find his gas mask until a soldier finds it at Atkinson's feet, whereupon the all clear sounds.
At the end, Baghdad falls with a whimper, the 101st goes into occupation mode, and many of the principals rotate out. Atkinson confesses to the emotional attachment that has grown up between him and the Screaming Eagles. He feels capable of writing about the men and their experiences objectively, but knows that he will be heartbroken whenever he hears of fatalities from the 101st. His objectivity is admirable; his reportage is enriching; and his esteem for these men is infectious. Mission accomplished.
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