Time in the Barrel: A Marine’s Account of the Battle for Con Thien

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. (Nov.)