Battle Cry Mass Market Paperback – June 28, 2005

Leon Uris was a master storyteller.

The Marine Corps has always been an enigma to civilians and soldiers alike. A marine who has graduated from basic training will honestly tell you that a graduate of either the Army Ranger program or the Navy Seal program could hold his own fighting a wounded Marine. While he tells you this with a smile on his face he speaks with absolute conviction. At its best the Marine Corps is a phenomenal fighting machine. At its worst the Marine Corps is a phenomenal fighting machine. "Battle Cry" tells the story of a part of this machine. While many of the individuals in this story shine as human beings they have lost a part of their humanity. The uniqueness of the individual, while not gone, is indeed suppressed. They are indeed Marines. You can feel the sadness when these men say good bye to their wives and their girl friends before going off to the battle ground. But even during those sad moments of departure, one sees the collectivity of the group to which they are bound. It is indeed binding. More than one Marine has said their wives are like their mistress but they are married to the Corp and divorce is not an option. There is one very telling and graphic chapter shortly before the final battle of this book when their commanding officer pushed them through a horrible forced march. They march through heat and rain so intense the skin between their toes is sluicing away. Their rashes join with the trivial aggravation of prickly heat to merge into horribly pocked skin disease. Yet, while they curse the Sergeant, and they threaten to bayonet the Lieutenant, they literally sing the praises of their CO. He can do no wrong. Even as he drives them thru horrible conditions, thru sheer exhaustion, subsisting only on wet and soggy field rations, the CO is their God and they will love him until their last breath. It is a realization that once grasped and understood inspires both admiration and sheer horror.In the opening scene of "Saving Private Ryan " soldiers were desperately trying to land on the beaches of Normandy. People were being slaughtered indiscriminately. Some were machine gunned as they reached the beach. Others were casualties of mortar fire. A large number survived. But it was the magnitude of the horror and its absolute randomness that effected most people. People thought this could be shown only in the movies. The final chapter of Battle Cry deals with the taking of a small atoll in the South Pacific theater. People who you have become attached to, who you identify with, die horribly in this chapter. And the horror is not so much in bullets and shrapnel but the utter randomness of who dies, when and who can be saved, and how many will die trying to rescue the wounded. Uris paints a picture of people and the horror they experience to safeguard the pursuit of this countries ideals. More than that it is the story of the esprit de corps that unites each and every Marine to his unit, his company, and to the Corps.E

This isn't the first time that I have read Battle Cry, it was the summer of 1978. The summer between my junior and senior year of high school. I was stumbling through school, not sure about what to do when I graduated the next year. Then I read this book, and everything changed. My Father was in the Air Force, so I was familiar with military life, or so I thought. Battle Cry introduced me to a side of it that was unimaginable. The story that Mr. Uris tells is one that can only be told by someone that experienced it first hand. Upon finishing the book I went to see the Marine recruiter. Little did I know, my journey through the Corps would take a route similar to the one taken by Danny Forrester, one of the main characters in the book. Struggling, yet thriving through Recruit Training. Radio School, though the equipment had changed. Landing in the Second Marine Division, though Danny stayed in the "Pogey Bait" Sixth Marine Regiment, I did time in the Second and Eight Marines. No fancy fourragère for me. But the most important part of the Corps that Mr. Uris impressed upon me was the levels of friendship that you have with your fellow Marines. Some you love like brothers, some you can't stand to be around. All of them you would die for. And that's how it worked. Thirty one years ago this coming Thursday, October 23rd, the building that was being used in Beirut Lebanon as the headquarters and barracks for the Marines that were sent over there as "Peacekeepers" was attacked by a suicide bomber. In that building were a bunch of Marines from Comm Platoon, H&S Company 1st Battalion, 8th Marines. My Brothers and my buddies. I just re-read Battle Cry on a whim, not sure why I haven't read it since 1978, but I'm glad that I picked it back up. It was like running into an old Marine buddy of mine, though most of them are dead. Like in the book. A friend of mine's son is in the delayed enlistment program like I was, he leaves next year to go into the Corps. I'm going to get a hard copy of Battle Cry and give to him. Some day, he'll understand. If Mr. Uris was still alive, I would try to reach out to him and tell him how much his book meant to me, how much it changed my life, but he passed away a few years back. If I could, I would shake his hand, look him in the eye and give him a hardy "Semper Fi Marine". He would know what I meant. Semper Fi, Mr. Uris.

This is a story about a platoon of Marine radiomen in WWII, told from the viewpoint of a grizzled sergeant, a career NCO named Mac, who is in charge of training a group of young men in boot camp near San Diego at the outset of the war and later leads them into combat in the South Pacific. Interestingly, though it is a war novel, actual combat scenes make up a small proportion of the novel. The book is about the young men themselves, their lives before enlisting, their training, their lives and loves as they go through boot camp and later stage and train in New Zealand, and their interactions with one another. This approach to the novel is excellent, because the reader not only experiences the young men binding with one another, but also binds with them himself and glimpses the sadness the men feel when not so good things happen to their buddies in combat. Leon Uris builds on his own experiences in the Marines in WWII in the Pacific. Perhaps the greatest strength of this novel is the dialogue, which is beautifully done and music to the ears of anyone who appreciates a well-turned phrase. There are many incidental vignettes scattered throughout the book, which I also liked. In terms of war books, I would rank it with "With the Old Breed" by E.B. Sledge and "Matterhorn" by Karl Mariantes. These are three very different books all written by Marine combat veterans; Sledge's book is non-fiction, whereas the other two are fiction. All of them converge in the impressions the reader receives about the Marines. "Battle Cry" gives perhaps the best insight into the training that goes into making a Marine. I thoroughly enjoyed this book; while it is slow-paced, I found it interesting at all times.

An interesting read....I once heard of war being described as long periods of inactivity followed by short periods of bloody mayhem.I think this in some ways does sum up this book......long spells where the story tends to fall away, followed by bursts of action that's both brutal and bloody........It's not until you are reaching the end of the journey in the train with Mac, that you start to appreciate the journey you have been on.There have been many books written about the bravery of the Marine Corp and I don't think many people will argue the question of their gutsy tenacity, what I think LU has achieved here is taking the reader on a journey, where we get to be a " fly on the wall " We get to be the silent observer on the journey, all the while we are being quietly drawn in to the everyday lives of the squad...Did I have a lump in my throat on the train journey, where Mac was visiting the relatives of fallen comrades or when Speedy tells him that he will go to see Pedro's folks.........Damn right I did.........an interesting book, did I love it.....No.... but certainly, yes I LIKED it...... a lot .

I read this book a long time ago. Even though I have read many more books about the Pacific Campaign, this one still resonates with me. Fiction, yes, but Uris writes from the heart of his own experience.

What a shame it’s out of print in the U.K. A truly great story of war told through the eyes of those who were there. But it’s so much more than the battles, a truly great book even 60 years since being written.

there is nothing really I would have wanted to know prior to the purchase; I knew the author from later books (Armageddon, Exodus, Mila18, etc, and I wanted to read his first book.The book's alright, but employes too much military jargon, and in my humble opinion it shows the hand of as yet an inexperienced writer( I suppose it couldn't be otherwise).I find Uris at it's best in 'Armageddon', and 'Exodus.

I first read this book about 50 years ago and now I am reading it and enjoying it again. It still remains one of the best 2nd world war stories to come out of America. brilliantly written. I strongly urge you to read it. Excellent service from the seller.