Rating: 
Summary: Of Men and Egos...
Review: Interesting book about a former Navy seal. The author talks about what it was like to be a seal, talks a little bit about his Vietnam experience, including a section in which he describes how he killed somebody. The rest of the book is about some counterterrorist unit that he created and commanded, whose purpose was to wreak havoc on the military to determine its readiness. Mr. Marcinko obviously has an enormous ego and he loves relaying how his counterterrorism unit outsmarted the military. The author wrote numerous sequels to this book that were "fictionalized" accounts of his experience as a counterterrorism expert. A good read, but obviously not great, because I've never had the desire to read one of his sequels.
I will now conclude with my signature hiaku:
Richard Marcinko
Big Beard, Big Arms, Bigger Ego
Can Seals Really Write?
Rating: 
Summary: Things You Have To UNDERSTAND About Marcinko
Review: Alright listen. All you people who are saying things about Marcinko just being a helpless drunk who kills people in his free time need to take another view real fast. Marcinko is not an idiot. He many times uses guises to trick his enemy to believe what he wants them to believe. He has class as well. Richard Marcinko cares for our country more than about 90% of the population, and has put his life on the line for it more times than almost everyone in this country. His autobiography and novels reveal that even though he is a vulgar, violent, and fornicating behemoth of a man he would gladly die for his country and his men. If he were more like the people that wrote bad reviews for him and people who look down on him we would have lost many more soldiers in Vietnam because he would be skulking around in Canada. And the statements about Marcinko's rank aren't right either. Marcinko did not WANT to be a paper-pushing man, he wanted to be in command of his men. That's all. He wanted combat, he wanted to help his country as much as he could. As for his books, they are among the best I have ever read, and I have read many many books. They are a real eye opener, and will tell you many things about the country you live in. Anyone interested in foreign policy, the military, or just the way the world works needs to read this book.
Rating:
Summary: Blunt talk from a guy who was SOF before it was hip
Review: I read this book not long after Marckinko's interview with 60 Minutes. At the time, I was very impressed with Marcinko's testosterone filled prose. However, as time went by I began to see Marcinko more as sort of a loud mouth alcoholic than as a guy to be taken seriously. Marcinko definitely went "rogue" after his SEAL Team Six command was up and he created Red cell.Personally, I believe Marcinko would have gone much further in the Navy chain of command had he stopped drinking. Had the guy had the sense to cut the boozing out, he probably would have made Admiral. I seriously doubt he would have ended up in prison had he cut out the booze. Its obvious the guy lives for booze and is a hardcore alcoholic. Because of his boozing, I dont see Marcinko as someone to look up to, like say I would look up to Colonel Charlie Beckwith or Dick Meadows. As for the book itself, its basically a more flamboyant, testosterone filled version of Charlie Beckwith's "Delta Force." Marckinko describes basically the same exact problems in establishing SEAL Team Six that Beckwith encountered in establishing Delta Force. Principle among these problems were intense disagreements over the SEAL Team Six chain of command. Marcinko describes how he was oftentimes more at war with the conventional Navy bureaucracy and the established SEAL community of the early eighties era than with international terrorists. Marckinko describes how conventional SEAL officers of the early eighties era fought vigorously to keep SEAL Team Six in the east coast SEAL chain of command. Basically keeping it regular Navy and having total Navy control. Whereas Marcinko wanted Team Six in the brand new, "high speed" JSOC chain of command that Delta Force was part of. Marcinko wanted Team Six as part of the JSOC, whereas the east coast SEAL Headquarters and conventional Navy resisted this severely. It was only thru repeated bypassing of the normal chain of command that Marcinko got his way. And he obviously made a ton of enemies within the regular Navy and even the conventional SEAL community doing this. Marcinko was an independent officer who did his own thing, rather than bowing down to the conventional Navy and the conventional SEAL officers of the late seventies and early eighties. Again, many of his problems are exactly what Charlie Beckwith describes in his own book "Delta Force," written in the early eighties. In addition, some of the things Marcinko mentions in his book are pure bull. Such as his claim that his men had to be able to bench press 500 lbs to climb special ladders to clandestinely board ships underway. Being able to bench press 500 lbs has little to nothing to do with being able to climb ladders or ropes. In fact, the muscle groups used in these activities are totally different. Again, much of this book is testosterone filled bull, from someone who is obviously a megalomaniac. Despite this, its still a good read and Id recommend it to anyone interested in SEALs or SOF. One thing I admired about Marcinko was his total lack of respect for bureaucracy and conventional thinking. Its my personal opinion that had he stopped drinking in the late seventies or early eighties, Marcinko probably would have made Admiral and might have ended up commanding the SEAL community when USSOCOM was formed. Or he might have been able to have become the second or third in command officer at JSOC. Instead, he ended up going to federal prison. After reading this book and Marcinko's other books the basic message Ive gotten is threefold and simple. First, you cant have a real SOF unit without a clean, direct, bureaucracy free SAS type chain of command. Secondly, in the real world the SEALs take a backseat to Delta. And thirdly, booze destroys good men.
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