ONnly OK | Call of Duty: My Life Before, During and After the Band of Brothers

A fine American, a Rashomon-like story, and a "poor man's Rush Limbaugh" | Call of Duty: My Life Before, During and After the Band of Brothers | Lt. Lynn "Buck" Compton, Marcus Brotherton

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	• Call of Duty: My Life Before, During and After the Band of Brothers Lt. Lynn "Buck" Compton, Marcus Brotherton Berkley Hardcover, 2008 - 288 pages average customer review:based on 22 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

Great Book

Really good book by a guy who has experienced a very full and interesting life. As a fan of Band of Brothers I have gone back and read all of the books by the E-company soldiers, Winters, Webster, Malarkey, Guarnere and Heffron. Compton had an amazing life and his book is a great read.

ONnly OK

This is a good biography, but it had very little in regards to the "Band of Brothers". I was disappointed from that perspective.
Dave

A fine American, a Rashomon-like story, and a "poor man's Rush Limbaugh"

Since the success of the HBO series "Band of Brothers" (BoB), several other books have come out about some of the key members of that story.

So far, these books have included autobiographies by Dick Winters in "Beyond Band of Brothers", Bill Guarnere and Babe Heffron in "Brothers in Battle", Donald Malarkey in "Easy Company Soldier" , and Lynn "Buck " Compton in "Call of Duty". David Kenyon Webster had earlier written his war autobiography in the 1950's, and this was finally published in 1994 with help from Stephen Ambrose as "Parachute Infantry". In addition, a separate biography of Dick Winters - "Biggest Brother" - was written by Larry Alexander.

Reading all of these books and re-watching the HBO movie series on DVD has a Rashomon-like quality. Details of how things happened in E Company's WWII campaign change from one storyteller to the next. Like Rashomon, from the differences in the stories, it is possible to glean insights into the characters of each of these men and how they wanted to remember themselves.

As mentioned by other reviewers, of all of these books, this one by Buck Compton actually has the least amount of information about E Company's actions during WWII. It does turn out to be an excellent study in the life and times of the Los Angeles area from the Depression all the way through the 1980's. In particular, the section on Compton's career as an LAPD policemen and then district attorney read like something out of "LA Confidential".

Buck Compton lived an incredibly full life - he was a child actor in Hollywood, a UCLA baseball player and a lineman for the UCLA football team that won the Pac-10 and went to the Rose Bowl for the first time in 1943, a paratrooper in the 101st Airborne during WWII who won a Silver Star for his role in destroying a German artillery battery in Normandy, a plainclothes policeman for the LAPD, and an LA district attorney who prosecuted Sirhan Sirhan for the assassination of Robert Kennedy. He was appointed by Ronald Reagan to be a judge on the California State Court of Appeals. Finally retiring to the San Juan Islands off the coast of Seattle, he would become a "poor man's Rush Limbaugh" (in the words of one of his daughters) as a conservative radio talk show host.

Ultimately, though, it was Compton's brief time with E Company that made him famous enough to get his autobiography published.

An analysis of Compton's time with E Company:

The discrepancy between Compton's recollections of the battle at Carenton and the accounts of others in E Company is easily explained. It is clear from Compton's book that, after the Brecourt assault, he somehow became separated from the rest of E Company in the general confusion of Army maneuvers as the soldiers moved to attack Carenton. Thus, he arrived late to Carenton, after the battle was over, and his account describes only the post-combat scenes of destruction and carnage. Compton's account does jive with all of the other BoB accounts - Compton's name never appears in any of the other descriptions of the attack on Carenton, as it is now clear that he simply wasn't there.

The attack at Brecourt would be the highlight of Compton's combat efforts. His only other contributions to E Company consisted of getting shot in the buttocks almost immediately when the shooting started in the Holland campaign, and then getting caught in the hell of Bastogne as E Company was sent out to hold the perimeter against a constant German artillery fire.

Which brings us to the uncomfortable topic of Buck Compton's moment of "combat fatigue" at Bastogne.

Although Compton firmly denies that he suffered a PTSD-type breakdown at Bastogne, there's a lot of evidence in his own account in this book that after the successful assault on the German guns at Brecourt, he rapidly lost his taste for fierce combat. Ambrose, in fact, states in his book that none of the original E Company men would ever charge as recklessly into battle as they did at Brecourt. Their initial enthusiasm for combat would rapidly be replaced by a general sense of self-preservation as they saw how many of their buddies were getting killed.

Compton's own version of the event at Bastogne puts the blame on Lieutenant Dike, E Company's useless replacement lieutenant during Bastogne. He states that he ran off the line to find Dike, and later raged about Dike's absence. Despite his explanation, the weight of the evidence from the other BoB accounts is that, yes, he did suffer a PTSD breakdown, becoming unable to function in his role as a second lieutenant for his unit after witnessing the carnage inflicted by the German shelling. The whole purpose of the military command structure is so that there is always someone to step in to take over in another soldier's absence. Other survivors of the shelling such as Carwood Lipton and Donald Malarkey would step in to hold E Company together.

Compton was not an original Toccoa man, having joined E Company in England. He had not suffered through Captain Sobel as the others did. And so his level of bonding with the rest of E Company was not as tight, something that becomes clear from a close reading of this book. After his best friends Guarnere and Toye were mangled in the German shelling, it appears that he lost his closest ties to E Company.

Contrary to the "happy ending" depiction in the HBO series, Compton did not return to E Company at the end of WWII. Officially recovered from trench foot, he was given orders to go back to E Company, but, on his way, stopped in Paris, and there met an old friend who transferred him to another unit that was engaged mostly in playing Army baseball and football.

He states that in hindsight, he should have gone back to E Company, just to set the record straight about his character, but I think the reality at the time was that he knew that his closest friends in E Company were gone by then - dead, wounded, or transferred - and that E Company was now filled with replacement soldiers.

And, unlike Ambrose's description of E Company as a tight brotherhood of friends, Compton would later, at an E Company reunion, be accused by a drunken Lewis Nixon of being a coward. Malarkey would come to Compton's defense (an identical account of this event appears in Malarkey's book).

And so, like all Hollywood movies, like most of history, like Rashomon, the truth is far, far more complex than it seems at first. This has been true for the story of E Company as well.

It is not for us, noncombatants, to judge Compton's character - his service in WWII required far more bravery than most of us could ever muster. Compton is a fine American, who did more than his share in WWII, and then later accomplished even more as a public servant for the state of California. His many other accomplishments in life may in fact have encouraged him to forget about his brief moment in WWII with E Company (he was with them for only for about one year).

The book ends, somewhat jarringly, with Compton's career as a "poor man's Rush Limbaugh", and his fierce diatribe against socialism. As this review is already far too long, I will just say this - he definitely got this part wrong. Socialism and free market capitalism are merely opposite ends of an eternal struggle between doing what is best for all people in society (including the poor and incompetent), versus the need to reward individual initiative and drive. Societies that run to the extremes of one or the other have always been terrible societies. Our goal as Americans should be to find the best balance between the two.

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thank you veterans

My uncle got me a copy of this book. I wasn't sure what to make of it at first, but then I started reading and was done in 3 days. Wow! I just didn't know about so much of this stuff.

The cool thing about men like Buck Compton was that they didn't brag about they're accomplishements. They just did stuff, even if it was hard. Like volunteer to be a paratrooper. I was raised watching reruns of MASH, where it sounds like everybody always wants to get out of the Army all the time. But it was surprising to learn that not everyone throughout America's history has felt like that. Buck wanted to be in the Army--and so did most of his generation. If you were found on the street without a uninform on, people would look at you like you weren't doing your duty. I think we could all learen a lesson from that.

Thank you Buck Compton, and all the veterans who have served us so well.

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Buck Compton is All-American

When i purchased this book, my impression was that it was going to be about the celebrated "Band of Brothers" ... I've read several a couple of books about Dick Winters, as well as Ambrose's "Band of Brothers". I was actually surprised how little time was spent on that period ... mainly because that part of Buck Compton's life only represented a few pixels of the much larger picture.

What is enjoyable about the book is that Compton does not put himself on a pedestal for anything ... actually, most of the book is spent downplaying anything that could ever be interpreted as grand, heroic or egotistical ... he doesn't want accolades (as his daughters didn't even know he earned medals for valor in World War II until the "Band of Brothers" premier). This is a story of a humble and decent man with a strong sense of duty, self-pride, work-ethic, integrity and honesty.

I think the point of him writing this book was less a tale of being one of the Band of Brothers than using that role to prove to people that being an American is a greatt blessing if one is willing to work hard and make sacrifices when necessary.

There are several surprises in the book. He is quick to point out innacuracies in the Band of Brother book and movie, but does so in a manner that is not accusatory. He is also quick to marginalize, to some degree, the grand stature bestowed upon him as "Lt. Buck Compton" ... to him, his war service was nothing more than fulfilling a duty to his nation along with millions of other young men.

He completes the book with a chapter about his politcal views and I am sure it will offend or annoy some ... too bad, he's earned the right to state them and his life experiences have obviously shaped them (not newspapers or newsanchors).

Bottom line ... the man has led a very impressive life ... it was an enjoyable read and when i was finished i couldn't help but thinking how lucky we are to have people like him among us.

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FOREWARD BY SENATOR JOHN MCCAIN:
?The ?Band of Brothers? story rightly took America by storm. In telling of that remarkable generation of men who risked everything ? everything ? to defeat the evils of fascism, the tale of Easy Company?s bravery and valor has inspired its own, new generation of Americans.

As rightly it should. America has relied throughout its history on the courage and honor of extraordinary citizens who, though they may come from the most ordinary of situations, stand up when duty calls them to act. The ?Band of Brothers,? that company of citizen- soldiers who helped our country wage and win World War II, represented that timeless virtue, the unselfish determination to serve a cause greater than our self-interest. In choosing this course, no matter its cost, an entire generation of men and women helped save the world from the evils of Nazism. We today, and all who follow, are in their debt.

Men and women, no matter how meager their origins or difficult their circumstances, possess within them the potential to alter the course of history. Buck Compton knew this, and this understanding shaped his life and destiny. He knew that there is no greatness without courage, no faith in country without devotion to fellows, no commitment to duty without service to others. Through his life and his words, we can find much to admire in men like him.

Second Lieutenant Compton commanded the second platoon of Easy Company in the 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment, part of the famed 101st Airborne Division about which so many tales are told. In an episode familiar to any viewer of the ?Band of Brothers? series, in 1944 Buck Compton and others assaulted a German battery operating four 105 mm howitzers directed at Utah Beach, disabling the guns and routing the enemy. Buck was awarded the Silver Star for that action. Later, after being wounded in an operation aimed at seizing bridges in the Netherlands, Buck returned to his unit in time for the month-long siege that would in time become known as the Battle of the Bulge.

In the course of my military service, I have learned what it?s like to fight on foreign soil. When bullets begin flying and fighting grows thick, the ability of any individual to make correct decisions is sorely tested. Indecisiveness can be costly; poor judgment deadly. As this memoir so ably details, Buck Compton?s performance in battle demonstrates that firmness and strategic thinking can save lives. In critical moments on the World War II battlefront, Buck Compton was there: fighting, persevering, and never relenting.

Yet Buck?s story doesn?t end there. He returned from war to a life of public service, measuring success not only by victories on the battlefield but also through his conduct during seasons of peace. Turning down an offer to play minor league baseball, he focused on a career in law, became a detective with the Los Angeles Police Department and, ultimately, an Associate Justice on the California Appeals Court. In reaching a level of success in civilian life commensurate with his victories in battle, Buck Compton showed us the many ways in which Americans fight for justice.

This memoir does his story the service it deserves. This book is the next best thing to having this courageous, thoughtful, and exceedingly modest hero relate in person the adventures and exploits of Easy Company, the prosecution of Sirhan Sirhan, and other tales from the life of an extraordinary American called to duty in an extraordinary time. In understanding the life of honor and service Buck Compton has bestowed upon his country, we glimpse anew the greatness that is America.
?US Senator John McCain
Phoenix, Arizona
January, 2008

The true story of an American hero?in his own words.

As part of the elite 101st Airborne paratroopers, Lt. Lynn ?Buck? Compton fought in critical battles of World War II as a member of Easy Company, immortalized as the Band of Brothers.

Here, Buck Compton tells his own story for the first time. From his years as a two-sport UCLA star who played baseball with Jackie Robinson and football in the 1943 Rose Bowl, through his legendary post- World War II legal career as a prosecutor, in which he helped convict Sirhan Sirhan for the murder of Robert F. Kennedy, Buck Compton truly embodies the American Dream: college sports star, esteemed combat veteran, detective, attorney, judge.

This is the true story of a real-life hero who traveled to a faraway place and put his life on the line for the cause of freedom?and an insightful memoir about courage, leadership, camaraderie, compassion, and the opportunities for success that can only happen in America.

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