Time in the Barrel
A Marine's Account of the Battle for Con Thien
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- $47.99
Publisher Description
A Marine’s highly personal memoir reliving the hellish days of a pivotal conflict of the Vietnam War
Con Thien, located only two miles from the demilitarized zone dividing North and South Vietnam, was a United States Marine Corps firebase that was the scene of fierce combat for months on end during 1967. Staving off attacks and ambushes while suffering from ineffectual leadership from Washington as well as media onslaughts, courageous American Marines protected this crucial piece of land at all costs. They would hold Con Thien, but many paid the ultimate price. By the end of the war, more than 1,400 Marines had died and more than 9,000 sustained injuries defending the “Hill of Angels.”
For eight months, James P. Coan’s five-tank platoon was assigned to Con Thien while attached to various Marine infantry battalions. A novice second lieutenant at the time, the author kept a diary recording the thoughts, fears, and frustrations that accompanied his life on “The Hill.” Time in the Barrel: A Marine’s Account of the Battle for Con Thien offers an authentic firsthand account of the daily nightmare that was Con Thien. An enticing and fascinating read featuring authentic depictions of combat, it allows readers to fully grasp the enormity of the fierce struggle for Con Thien.
The defenders of Con Thien were bombarded with hundreds of rounds of incoming rockets, mortars, and artillery that pounded the beleaguered outpost daily. Monsoon downpours turned the red laterite clay soil into a morass of oozing mud, flooded bunkers and trenches, and made Con Thien a living hell. .Being at Con Thien came to be ruefully referred to by the Marines stationed there as “time in the barrel” because they were targets as easy as fish in a barrel.
More than a retelling of military movements, Coan’s engrossing narratives focus on the sheer sacrifice and misery of one Marine’s experience in Vietnam. Through his eyes, we experience the abysmal conditions the Marines endured, from monsoon rainstorms to the constant threat of impending attack. Climatic moments in history are captured through the rare, personal perspective of one particularly astute and observant participant.
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As in his previous Vietnam War memoir, Con Thien: The Hill of Angels, Coan gives a reflective account concentrated on his time as a young U.S. Marine lieutenant commanding a five-tank platoon at an embattled firebase just below the DMZ in South Vietnam in 1967 1968. He straightforwardly describes the intense fighting that made life a "living hell" for him and his fellow Marines for much of the eight months he spent in the trenches there, making good use of a diary he kept at the time and recreating dialogue ("Sir, it's a gen-u-ine bitch!"). Coan, who led his family to believe he was in Okinawa so they wouldn't worry, takes a swipe at "Washington whiz kids" and "Pentagon planners" specifically Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara and Commanding General William Westmoreland for putting the Marines in an untenable position so close to North Vietnam. But the heart of the book is a recounting of battle action shrapnel wounds, supply interruptions, shelling, an attack on a bush mistaken for an intruder and praise for the men Coan fought with. "The Marine Corps had given us a difficult mission," he concludes; "we performed it well." This account will appeal most strongly to Vietnam War battle action buffs. Photos.
