BLACK HEARTS: ONE PLATOON’S DESCENT INTO MADNESS IN IRAQ’S TRIANGLE OF DEATH

Book ID/图书代码： 03540010B35536

English Summary/英文概要： This is the story of a small group of soldiers from the 101st Airborne Division’s fabled 502nd Infantry Regiment—a unit known as “the Black Heart Brigade.” Deployed in late 2005 to Iraq’s so-called Triangle of Death, a veritable meat grinder just south of Baghdad, the Black Hearts found themselves in arguably the country’s most dangerous location at its most dangerous time.

Hit by near-daily mortars, gunfire, and roadside bomb attacks, suffering from a particularly heavy death toll, and enduring a chronic breakdown in leadership, members of one Black Heart platoon—1st Platoon, Bravo Company, 1st Battalion—descended, over their year-long tour of duty, into a tailspin of poor discipline, substance abuse, and brutality.

Four 1st Platoon soldiers would perpetrate one of the most heinous war crimes U.S. forces have committed during the Iraq War—the rape of a fourteen-year-old Iraqi girl and the cold-blooded execution of her and her family. Three other 1st Platoon soldiers would be overrun at a remote outpost—one killed immediately and two taken from the scene, their mutilated corpses found days later booby-trapped with explosives.

Black Hearts is an unflinching account of the epic, tragic deployment of 1st Platoon. Drawing on hundreds of hours of in-depth interviews with Black Heart soldiers and first-hand reporting from the Triangle of Death, Black Hearts is a timeless story about men in combat and the fragility of character in the savage crucible of warfare. But it is also a timely warning of new dangers emerging in the way American soldiers are led on the battlefields of the twenty-first century.

Chinese Summary/中文概要： p.s. 這本書讓我想到Iris Chang那本南京大屠殺著作中的日本士兵。這些士兵原本可能是如你我ㄧ般的平凡市井小民，但當被放逐在殘酷戰場上，良善的本性開始一點一滴地流失，最後成為無法掌控與超乎常人想像的野獸。
Black Hearts事件發生在遙遠的中東戰場，ㄧ批原隸屬於美國傳說中第502步兵團空降部隊〈別稱Black Heart 連〉的優秀隊排〈1st Platoon〉，被派駐到巴格達南端被暱稱為「死亡三角」的作戰地點，每天遭受密集的迫擊炮、槍戰、路面炸彈攻擊，造成美軍在當地格外慘重的死傷人數；另ㄧ方面，這一隻先遣部隊的領導指揮卻又逐步走向潰散與失序。
ㄧ年時間過去，這一排部隊〈1st Platoon〉從原本的精銳變得毫無紀律、散漫與殘暴。1st Platoon當中一名士兵，最後還犯下美軍在伊拉克的最嚴重罪行─在強暴一名14歲伊拉克少女後，並殺害了女孩的家人。
時代雜誌倫敦版前任資深編輯〈這之前擔任東京版總編〉，取材自與Black Hearts 士兵們的數百小時訪談資料與死亡三角的第一手報導，完成這部經典紀實之作，揭示在面對戰爭死亡的極端處境下，人性與良知的脆弱面。(KC)

Awards/获奖情况：紐約時報書評： extraordinary book to the ease with which Ordinary men, under certain conditions, can transform into Monsters…
時代雜誌資深總編執筆，揭示人性良知脆弱面的經典紀實之作
Amazon ★★★★★ 評價 http://www.amazon.com/Black-Hearts-Platoons-Descent-Triangle/dp/0307450759

Review
"[A] narrative that combines elements of ’In Cold Blood’ and ’Black Hawk Down’ with a touch of ’Apocalypse Now’ as it builds toward its terrible climax....Frederick’s extraordinary book is a testament to a misconceived war, and to the ease with which ordinary men, under certain conditions, can transform into monsters."---The New York Times Book Review

This painstaking and balanced book studies the experience of one airborne platoon in Iraq’s deadly “Black Triangle,” where U.S. forces have racked up a larger number of casualties than in any other area of the country. The stress of combat on the platoon eventually led to what can be described only as a war crime, in which rape and murder overtook an entire Iraqi family. Frederick’s thorough research makes this a dense book, one not for the novice in studying the Iraq War or any other, but his compassion for all parties involved has enabled him to get an amount of cooperation from all of them that makes the book an exceptionally rich and valuable document of an aspect of the war the coverage of which is not always free from political bias or just plain sloppiness. Although not for the beginner, this is a valuable addition to any serious study of this war.---Roland Green, From Booklist

Every military leader should read Black Hearts. With empathy and clear-eyed understanding, Frederick reveals why some men fail in battle, and how others struggle to redeem themselves. An absorbing, honest and instructive investigation into the nature of leadership under stress.---Bing West, author of The Village and The Strongest Tribe

About the Author/作者介绍： JIM FREDERICK is a contributing editor at Time magazine. He was previously a Time senior editor in London and, before that, the magazine’s Tokyo bureau chief. He is coauthor, with former Army Sergeant Charles Robert Jenkins, of The Reluctant Communist: My Desertion, Court-Martial, and Forty-Year Imprisonment in North Korea. He lives in New York City.

Format:照片

Rights Status/版权销售情况：Simplified Chinese/简体中文：AVAILABLE

Complex/Traditional Chinese/繁体中文：AVAILABLE

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