Basis for the well reviewed new movie, this second book in James Jones' WWII trilogy tells the story of C-for-Charlie company & their participation in the battle of Guadalcanal. It really reads more
like a Viet Nam precursor than like a novel of WWII. The men of C-for-Charlie are sodomites, drunkards, cowards, slackers, homosexuals, thieves, sadists & only occasionally heroes. Their war is a battle against tedium, the elements, each other & their officers as much as against the Japanese. In the end, we sense that the actual battle against the Japanese has been fairly meaningless; just a fight over "property" as one character says.

I find this grunt's eye view of war to be pretty obtuse & unsatisfying. I'm sure a soldiers life is difficult, it must have been especially so for those fighting in the South Pacific (see William Manchester's war memoir Goodbye Darkness).  However, one has to ask, so what? Is it really important that a grunt understand why he's fighting for Hill #517? Is it important whether he's bored & fungus ridden & sexually deprived? I think not. Wars are fought for national purposes, not to entertain the troops. Perhaps we shouldn't have had men fighting in the Pacific, but when we decided, as a nation, to fight the Japanese, their presence in that theater became inevitable. It seems petty &
selfish to complain about how little fun the troops had during the ensuing war.

Ultimately, the book offers an interesting picture of the daily life of soldiers, but it is devoid of the larger themes that made From Here to Eternity a great book.

(Reviewed:)

Grade: (C) Orrin C. Judd

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