Infantry Combat: The Rifle Platoon: An Interactive Exercise in Small-Unit Tactics and Leadership [Paperback]

John Antal (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 1, 1995

You are the neophyte platoon leader in this informative and entertaining, interactive work from the author of Armor Attacks.

Product Details

• Paperback: 384 pages
• Publisher: Presidio Press (June 1, 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 089141536X
• ISBN-13: 978-0891415367
• Product Dimensions: 6 x 0.8 x 9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (17 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #383,511 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Interactive teaching tool, June 19, 2000

By 

Emery E. Nelson (Sonora, Ca. United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Infantry Combat: The Rifle Platoon: An Interactive Exercise in Small-Unit Tactics and Leadership (Paperback)

I started this book late one night and continued until early in the morning. It is truely "An Interactive Exercise In Small unit Tactics and leadership." As a voracious reader of military history, I've become accustomed to knowing the outcome before I begin reading. This has made me see all the actions of the men who were "there", through the lens of hindsight. At my first attempt to accomplish the assigned mission, I made several assumptions that got me killed only a few chapters into the book. My (false) confidence was shaken. This is the way it works. You play the part of a 2nd Lieutenant, recently graduated from the Miliatry Academy. He's commanding his first Platoon and he faces the same challenges that all small unit leaders face. At the end of each chapter, it gives you several choices to make and you go to the chapter that matches your choice. The choices are not always easy or clear cut. In some chapters you roll dice too decide what course of action to follow. This added element of chance more than once led me in a direction I would not have chosen to go in. I suffered the frustration of having to carry on even though information and options were limited. Just like in real life, I still had too make decisions and preperations in spite of the limitations. As every small unit leader knows, this is normal but very difficult to train for. The book is a great tool for understanding infantry combat and the stresses that a leader faces. It is not just for the novice, I would recommend it too anyone, even field grade officers who have forgotten how combat works at the company level.

20 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Good basic primer, but heavily weighted to "proper" response, February 21, 2002

By 

David L. Finley "MarineVet" (Albuquerque, NM) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Infantry Combat: The Rifle Platoon: An Interactive Exercise in Small-Unit Tactics and Leadership (Paperback)

The reader jumps into the boots of a green platoon leader taking command of a platoon on the eve of battle, with the assignment to lead his platoon in protecting his company's flank in an imminant battle, and the reader given choices as the story progresses, with these choices altering the story's path by sending him to different sections of the book that show the results of his decisions as the story progresses.

It's a good basic tactical primer, though there are flaws in the storyline that make no sense. The three main flaws are as follows...

The personalities of the characters shift depending on whether the reader makes choices that agree with what the author has deemed to be the best choice. If he makes choices that the author disagrees with, the platoon leader, (the reader's role,) is portrayed as a weak and indecisive leader, bullied by an overbearing and obstinate platoon sergeant who leads him down the wrong paths at every turn. On the other hand, if he chooses as the author thinks best, the platoon leader magically becomes strong and forceful in personality while the platoon sergeant becomes almost sycophantic in nature at times, confirming his decisions to be wise. I found these personality shifts to be distracting to the basic concept of the book, which is to examine the probable results of the various choices offered, and implying that the only leaders who make mistakes are weak willed and indecisive.

The second major flaw is that identical events, unrelated to the previous choices made and completely outside the platoon leaders ability to affect in any way, have different results depending on the reader's agreement with the author's preferred choices, with them being more detrimental if he has made choices the author has deemed to be inferior to others, and more beneficial if the reader has chosen what the author has deemed to be the best course of action. (I went through and tried every available path through the story line out of curiosity.)

In one example, if the reader chooses as the author has deemed unwise, the enemy makes a counterattack that never appears under nearly identical circumstances if the reader chooses in agreement with what the author thinks best.

These slant the book in favor of the authors viewpoint rather than letting the results themselves teach the reader what would or would not be the best choice in an impartial fashion. The end results of these choices are not always consistant either with one set of choices, for example, resulting in the platoon taking very heavy casualties, but the rest of the company's casualties being very light, and this being deemed inferior in the authors eyes to the platoon itself taking relatively light casualties, but the company as a whole taking -very- heavy casualties in far greater numbers than the platoons first example losses, though it is the job of the platoon to protect the flank of the company. This seems backwards to me, though in both scenarios, the platoon did ultimately accomplish it's mission.

A third flaw is that the choices given are not always clear as to what is being chosen. What may appear, when reviewing the choices, to be a decision to seek defensible ground will, every so often, turn into the platoon being ordered to try to defend in the open, and what may initially appear to be a decision to defend in the open that appears ill advised will occasionally end up having been a choice to find good, defensible terrain to occupy.

Even with what are, in my opinion, these flaws in the book, it is as I said, a good basic primer in small unit tactics on the modern battlefield, and an entertaining and informative read.

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars a must read --- highly recommended, April 3, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: Infantry Combat: The Rifle Platoon: An Interactive Exercise in Small-Unit Tactics and Leadership (Paperback)

Being a contracted ROTC cadet,I recently bought this book after it caught my eye. As it turned out, one of my cadre, a Mil. Intel. Cpt. had already read the book and he and I talked of its subject matter. This is a very stripped down book introducing the moral and physical dilemmas faced by many junior officers as they enter the Army. At the core, it is designed to use basic decision making skills as well as play with light infantry tactics. Each decision leads to a new section where the consequences are meted out. Will you be successful or not??? Luck does have a marginal role as well as some sections are chosen by dice rolls(I found this out the hard way). In all, this is a recommended reading for ROTC cadets and junior officers(as stated by my Cpt.), and for those non-military readers, this is an entertaining war game with a glimpse of what it is like on our side of the fence.