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So you don't want to get stuck just in one pattern. But you have to be I think, almost omnivorous in your writing. And I very much envy today Cormac McCarthy, and the splendor with which he can describe a scene. And Hemingway was the same way, he was very careful with his craft. But it's still, every single sentence was crafted. Scott Fitzgerald, with the Great Gatsby, wrote the classic novel for the 20th century. So what were you reading all the way back then? There's no easy cut to becoming a writer. I have to start all over again.' There's no substitute just for being willing to do the hard work. You just have to put the hours of grinding in and then you look at those sentences the next day and say, 'Oh, my gosh, they're terrible.
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And there have been many stories about it. And at the same time, you have to read, read, read. And as you know from your own writing, you're trying for a certain amount of output on a blank piece of paper, day after day after day, no matter what you feel emotionally, you just have to do it. I think the secret to, to being a good writer is to have an iron ass, that is, no matter what you do, it's like a long distance runner, you have to do it every day. So how did you develop that skill - when you're in the battlefield, that presents a lot of challenge to writing thoughtfully - and developing the skills and the techniques that it takes to be a good communicator? Most writers do not have that kind of start in their craft. So my first start in writing was with the Marine Corps writing about combat.
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I wrote, my first book was called Small Unit Action Vietnam, where the commandant and, who was in charge of our forces in Vietnam, sent me as a captain to different battlefields, to report from the battlefields as a training manual for the other lieutenants coming over, so they'd have an idea what the combat was like. But I was writing then, I wrote in Vietnam. But I didn't, you know, I had no idea that I would end up doing this. Well, I think the commandant says he doesn't let you off active duty until you're 100. When you were a grunt officer in Vietnam, did you ever think you'd be going on patrols with Marines 40-plus years later? So you saw combat in Vietnam as a Marine, you were a RAND Corporation analyst and then a Pentagon official, and then you started writing these incredible books about combat. You have one of the most interesting careers of any figure I follow in the military community.
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I'm eager to learn more about how this book came to be, and how its insights relate to where we find ourselves right now as a nation in transition. It follows a Marine Corps platoon deployed to the most violent province of Afghanistan as it battles internal conflicts while fighting an untiring enemy on its own terrain. Now he's followed those works with a new novel, The Last Platoon. He told their stories in places like Fallujah and Helmand Province in gritty and candid nonfiction books, capturing service and heroism, and the triumphs and shortfalls of military leadership in the war zone. He committed to bearing witness to the nation's conflicts, traveling to Iraq and Afghanistan for lengthy embeds with U.S. But after formally ending his public service, Bing decided he had more to offer. His son Owen followed in his footsteps, becoming a Marine officer, and then a Pentagon official overseeing special operations. He served in Vietnam as an infantry officer and wrote training manuals, then later went on to become an assistant secretary of defense at the Pentagon, addressing, among other things, insurgencies in El Salvador. I'm your host, Hope Hodge Seck By any metric, Bing West has faithfully rendered more than his fair share of service to his country. The following is an edited transcript of this episode of Left of Boom: ITunes | Google Podcasts | Spotify | TuneIn | Stitcher His new novel, The Last Platoon, is a cautionary tale about America's "Forever War." He joins Left of Boom to talk about co-writing Jim Mattis' memoir, the real people who inspired characters in his book, and speaking truth to power at the Pentagon.
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Bing West has been called "The Grunt's Homer." After serving as a Marine Corps infantry officer in Vietnam and then going on to be an assistant secretary of defense at the Pentagon, he has devoted his time to long embeds with troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, telling their stories and bearing witness to the wars in a series of nonfiction books.