The Mission, the Men, and Me: Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander

This is an extremely worthwhile book, especially if you are of a more cerebral type. All too many special operator memoirs suffer from an excess of rah-rah me-tough-guy braggadocio. Blaber's book is very different. Here is a professional warrior who can both fight and think, and then produce intelligent writing about it. His book is not just descriptive, but reflective. Now don't misunderstand: this is not some philosophical treatise. There are plenty of good, well told recountings of adventures and operations from his decades-long career in special ops, many of which, especially his perspectives on the battle of Sha-hi-Kot, I found very illuminating, having read the other books about it. But what sets this book apart from other memoirs is the fact that his stories always serve to illustrate a point, a broader principle that can be applied not just to military life, but life in general. Other reviewers have detailed those lessons, so I won't go into details, but I highly recommend this book. I guarantee that you will finish it with a feeling of not just having read an interesting story, but having learned some lessons that you will remember.

When the dust has finally settled from our involvement in combat in Iraq and Afghanistan, one of the engagements that I believe will occupy the time of many prognosticators for generations to come will be "Operation Anaconda" that took place in the Shahi Khot Valley of Afghanistan in the winter of 2002. Several fine books have already been written describing what happened during those fateful hours in the frigid February and March air high in the mountains near the Pakistan border. Sean Naylor gives a gripping account of his part of the story in "Not a Good Day to Die." (See below for the link to my review from February, 2007.) Nate Self's recent book, "Two Wars" (to be reviewed here soon) adds another important perspective on what happened in Afghanistan and beyond. Pete Blaber, the Delta Force commander who was in charge of the AFO (Advanced Force Operations) involved in Operation Anaconda, has written a compelling book that is a welcome addition to the ongoing dialogue about what we can all learn from the events of those days. Adding valuable insight into this engagement, Blaber's book also takes a broad look at lessons he has learned along the way that are practical and applicable not just to military operations but to any situations that presents leadership challenges. The title of the book, "Mission, the Men, and Me - Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander ," refers to the three priorities and three questions that Blaber set for himself in making decisions in the heat of battle: "What is best for the Mission; what is best for my men; what is best for me?" Any leader would be well served to adapt these priorities at decisive moments in responding to challenges and opportunities. Let me share just a few of the nuggets that I found in reading with rapt attention Blaber's thoughts and conclusions. For a more thorough understanding of the depth of his insights, I recommend that you read the book - even if you have no military background or proclivities. This is - above all else - a book about leadership. "The 3Ms is a guiding principle that I learned early in my career, which had provided direction and context for me ever since. In 1985, when I was a brand-new second lieutenant reporting for duty in Korea, my battalion commander, a soft-spoken Vietnam veteran and Marlboro Man lookalike, called me into his office and asked me if I had ever heard of the 3Ms. 'No-sir,' I replied sheepishly (I was sure it was something I was supposed to have learned during basic officer training). He sauntered over to the chalkboard and drew three capital Ms, one on top of the other in a column. Then he turned to me and explained. 'The 3Ms are the keys to being successful in life. The stand for the mission, the men, and me.' He then drew a line from the top M through the middle M, down to the bottom M. 'They're all connected,' he continued. 'So if you neglect one, you'll screw up the others. The first M stands for the mission; it's the purpose for which

What I expected was a good book about really cool missions, what I got was a great book about really cool missions and a new way of thinking about the world, which has radically altered the way I understand and think about problems and opportunities, as well as the way leaders can lead and manage organizations and other human social systems to solve those problems. After the first two chapters I realized that I wasn't just reading some amazing never-berore-heard stories from the front lines, but I was learning life lessons that I could directly translate to my personal and professional life. My brother and my best friend also read the book and all of us have our own personal Pete Blaber take-aways--here are mine: 1) Make and take time to think, our minds work in three elementary phases, saturate, incubate, and illuminate. It's ok to not know what to do when first exposed to something, we need to immerse ourselves in the situation, we need to 'Develop the Situation'. 2) To succeed in our personal and professional lives we must consider the impossible, the improbable, and the unlikely as a matter of course. We must Imagine! But to make sure we set ourselves up for success, we have to create an environment where our imaginative juices can flow full throttle. Humor and outrageousness are the fertile fields where the seeds of imagination are planted grown and harvested. Never again will I tell my team 'let's get serious", or 'knock off the joking'. As Pete Blaber so adeptly conveys in his chapter on Gorilla warfare, if you want to come up with truely innovative ideas, you have to laugh! This book is outstanding, everyone should read it!

This book is fast moving and immediately draws the reader in with great anecdotes and chronicles of the enigmatic world of the "Unit", its members, and life "behind the fence" at Fort Bragg. Pete's principles about leadership and management are universal, transcendent, and are just pure commonsense. Moreover,they are eminently practical and stay with you long after you put the book down. He schools us in the Die Gestalt of leadership -- learn well. Blaber's book should be on the "must read" list at the SOF University, Command and General Staff College and the War College. Make it essential reading for every officer basic course on the Nine Principles of War, in particular, in a study on "Mission". On second thought, the principles Blaber lays out here cover the eight remaining axioms with equal aplomb. Even Wharton's Business School and Havard's Kennedy School of Government would likewise, do well to make this book mandatory reading - it is that good!

Finally a warrior writes about what really happened and the key life lessons we can all take away: `Always listen to the guy on the ground', `When in doubt, develop the situation', and my favorite, `It's not reality unless it's shared' are all embedded in these amazing real-world mission story's. His underlying premise is that the key to understanding the complex world around us is our ability to recognize, understand, and adapt to the underlying patterns that drive the behavior of everything around us, which I wholeheartedly agree with. But what really amazed about this book about patterns, is how many patterns there are in the book itself. Just about everything he writes about--from his childhood 'bombing cars' to his walk across the Gettysburg battlefield is linked to some other event, mission, or lesson somewhere else in the book. I read this book over the weekend, and I wrote so many notes in the margins on the patterns that I discovered, that I'm now going back through for the third time. He says things like `don't charge the machine-gun nest, go around it', and 'treat life like a movie, not a snapshot', that I have always believed in myself, but had never been able to put in words or phrases before. Pete writes about Iraq, Afghanistan, Bosnia, and yes, Montana, with a fresh narrative that makes each mission come to life in a unique never before heard way, while also making what actually happened much easier to understand. The chapter on Gorrilla (not a spelling error) Warfare in Bosnia is magnificent, as was his short story on what we should really have learned from John Walker Lindh--why wasn't this ever covered in the press? The chapter on Ali Mohamed (the wayward terrorist) should be read by our new President, so he doesn't get burned like his predecessors did. Finally, I want to point out that the maps in this book set a whole new standard for battlefield maps. Google earth technology was used to create maps that make you feel like you are flying over the battlefield with a birds-eye view of everything going on below. This may be the best book I've ever read.