Customer Reviews

Hornets Over Kuwait

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Don't turn to Hornets Over Kuwait for enlightenment on the "grand strategy" of the Gulf War; none is forthcoming--nor should it be. This is a is a first-person memoir of the war from the cockpit and the author's perspective is only as wide as his FA-18's windscreen. It's a lively narrative history told in the patois of the fighter pilot. The author, a USMC Captain at the time of the war, is not a dispassionate observer. Rather, he brings genuine enthusiasm to his story; enthusiasm for the Hornet, for Marine Corps aviation, and for his comrades-in-arms. He does, however, display the junior officer's typically irreverent attitude toward superiors and "the system." In the midst of his tale, he makes brief "detours" to take pot shots at the Navy, the Air Force, two-seat FA-18s, Harriers, women in the military, and assorted "boobs and doofs." His ebullience for the Hornet is understandable--like a cowboy's love of his horse--but his analysis of the Hornet's efficacy in delivering "dumb" bombs accurately in a modern high-threat environment should be balanced with less passionate opinion. The author can be forgiven his bursts of enthusiasm for as Winston Churchill once said "There is nothing so exhilarating in life as to be shot at without effect." Turn to other books for strategic analysis of the Gulf War air campaign, but read this one to get the view from the cockpit.

Its not a pretentious book, and its not a complete history of the region, but it gives a good feel for the problems and solutions faced by the F18 Hornets during the Gulf War. It illustrates everything that has to go on, to make the package work. Very good on tactics.

From my point of view, this is a very entertaining book about the Gulf War. The author share with us the life at the battle field on the gorund & up in the air flying. The author said all about what he & his team mates do when not flying any mission & this was really entertaining & fun. Further more, the most interesting part is about the missions that the author flew which most of them are bombing mission & telling us the danger that they faced & the enjoyment after hitting their targets. Actually, this book is just like the dairy of the author, telling us everything he had been doing during the Gulf War. Although there isn't any air to air combat, it's still very interesting because of the amazing bombing missions that he & his team mates flew together. Further more, they were using the FLIR(Forward looking infra-red) pod to find there targets in the dark. The author is flying the F/A-18A Hornet from VMFA-451 Worlords at that time. They were also join by others Marines fighter squadrons too & have been working together during the war. Surprisingly, the Marines perform more strike missions than the Navy did & that's very impressing. I may have said a lot of interesting stuff but you'll have to read it to find out for yourself & I'm sure whoever bought this book will enjoy it a lot, just like I did. You just got to read this book & that's all I can say.

Take a sunny 4th of July, hamburgers grilling in the backyard, a cold beer at hand. You sit down and chew the fat with a man who flew Hornets for the Marines during the Gulf war. He tells you his stories from an anecdotic point of view. Put that chat into a book and you get "Hornets over Kuwait". It does not put you "in the cockpit", not lay any literary claim. It dose leave you though with the pleasant feeling of a friendly Holiday chat.

"Hornets Over Kuwait" stands with the best first-person narratives of war in the air...a worthy companion to "Phantom Over Vietnam", "The Big Show", and "The Wind in the Wires". Jay Stout brings to life the technical and human facets of Desert Storm in way that is thoughtful, uncompromising, and often hilarious. The chapter on the Harrier Mafia is spot on (the airplane is a triumph of marketing over common sense). And then there's The Ether Bunny Inthident... Beyond that, he's a Marine to the core, and describes Marine culture so vividly - and with such implicit love - that many readers will reach for the yellow pages to find a recruiter. "Hornets Over Kuwait" is a gem.

The author details what it was like to fly combat missions during Desert Shield and Desert Storm in what is easily one of my favorite "been there" air warfare memoirs. I was surprised how many Combat Air Patrol (CAP) and interdiction missions the Marines flew during those days (as Close Air Support [CAS] is their primary reason for being). There is an unfortunate lack of books written from the Marine Corps aviation perspective and this helps to fill that gap nicely. Highly recommended!

There I was reading a teletype--- long after the F-16 delivery flights of 1980 that began in Fort Worth crossed the Atlantic and skirted the unfriendlies bordering the Med I found this book about flights from North Carolina to Bahrain. And that just raises the neck hairs a bit.