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Green Berets in the Vanguard: Inside Special Forces, 1953-1963 (Naval Institute Special Warfare Series) Hardcover – January 1, 2001

by Chalmers Archer (Author)

3.6 9 ratings

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The author of an award-winning memoir about growing up black in Mississippi, Chalmers Archer turns his attention in this book to his experiences as one of the first members of the U.S. Army's Special Forces. His perspective is unique, not only as one of the first to wear the Green Beret but as a black man in the early days of armed forces integration. Archer participated in some of the earliest forays into Laos, long before Southeast Asia was in American headlines, and he was a member of the first U.S. unit to go into Vietnam. He trained the first Special Forces teams of the South Vietnamese army and participated in some of their earliest operations, many of them unknown until now because of their highly classified nature. He saved the lives of the first American and Vietnamese soldiers injured in war and also witnessed the first American combat death in Vietnam, holding the man in his arms as he died. His unit operated alongside the Central Intelligence Agency and helped influence American foreign policy. A self-described soldier-teacher, he developed and spread the early gospel of special warfare while serving in the Philippines, Hawaii, Korea, Taiwan, and Panama, as well as in Southeast Asia. All of these activities are fully chronicled in this book, but Archer's perspective as an African American in an elite unit of the U.S. armed forces in the 1950s gives his memoir additional depth and insight. It is an uplifting-though sometimes harrowing--story of struggle in unfamiliar environments and an eye-opening account of events little known today.

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From Publishers Weekly

The Green Berets the Army's Special Forces conducted civilian-clothes, clandestine operations in 1956 in Thailand, in 1957 in Taiwan and South Vietnam and in 1959 and 1961 in Laos. Archer (Growing Up Black in Mississippi) gives a first-person account of those early and pivotal missions in this instructive memoir. Archer earned the nickname "Sergeant Special Forces" because he was there at the birth of the Green Berets, and his outfit, the 14th Special Forces Operational Detachment, was the first American combat unit deployed to Vietnam, taking part in a series of hazardous missions he describes in evocative detail. Their mission was to train the South Vietnamese in special forces warfare, as well as to seek out and engage the Viet Cong guerrillas. Archer clearly shows that he and his fellow Green Berets were highly motivated and extremely proficient in finding methods that worked. They concentrated on working with and respecting the people they trained and eschewed large-scale, conventional warfare they practiced winning "hearts and minds." Archer writes with wit and delicacy of his experiences in the jungle (his "snake eater" company often surviving on a plethora of seeming non-foods), and with unsparing clarity of the racism he sometimes encountered. He insists that if the tactics his team developed had been adopted by Washington something they repeatedly advocated the course of the war would have been different. (Mar. 26) Forecast: This is a book mainly for the Vietnam War academic industry in its military and civilian incarnations not a negligible market. And Archer's experiences as a black Green Beret, coming during a key period of post-WWII integration of the armed forces, will be of interest to historians of the period in general.

About the Author

Chalmers Archer is an accomplished writer and educator who recently retired as a professor and administrator at Northern Virginia Community College. He is the recipient of several awards, including the Mississippi Institute of Arts and Letters Award for Nonfiction.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Naval Inst Pr; Second Edition (January 1, 2001)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 139 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1557500231
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1557500236
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 12.8 ounces
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6.25 x 0.75 x 9.25 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #2,189,144 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #5,037 in Naval Military History
- #6,349 in Black & African American Biographies
- #46,533 in Engineering (Books)

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3.6 9 ratings

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3.6 out of 5

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Tony

but very good so far

Reviewed in the United States on September 28, 2015

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Still Reading, but very good so far.

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Reed Newman

His version of reality

Reviewed in the United States on June 1, 2014

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According to my Uncle Bob Newman (pictured in photo in the book and member of Archer's outfit) it's a somewhat accurate account of what transpired in those years. However, some accounts are exaggerated. not entirely accurate or understated. Granted, it's his opinion and recollection of those events and that's a given. Otherwise a good read on some very professional soldiers. I would recommend it to anyone interested in learning about the early days of Army Special Forces and the events of those years.
Reed Newman

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Rob Krott

Early Days of SF in Vietnam

Reviewed in the United States on January 4, 2011

The author of the award winning Growing Up Black in Mississippi has written Green Berets in the Vanguard: Inside Special Forces, 1953-1963. Archer was one of the first operational SF NCOs in U.S. Army Special Forces and details the early missions of U.S. Army Special Forces in South East Asia. His narrative includes details on the planning and operations of the earliest missions into Laos, Thailand, and South Vietnam, which until recently were shrouded in secrecy. His perspective is unique, not only one of the first to wear a green beret but also as one of the first African-Americans to serve in the elite unit. Chalmers Archer witnessed the first actual American combat death in Vietnam and as a medic and trainer with the Vietnamese Special Forces at Nha Trang, treated the first wounded in the war. This is a fascinating book about the early days of SF and chronicles the complete history of the 14th Special Forces Operational Detachment that set the standard for foreign training missions. Green Berets in the Vanguard also details the changes in Special Forces doctrine from unconventional warfare to counterinsurgency.

Rob Krott is the author of Save the Last Bullet for Yourself, a war memoir of Somalia and the Balkans.

2 people found this helpful

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fastreader

how the Green Berets got to Vietnam

Reviewed in the United States on May 9, 2001

Chalmers Archer must have been a remarkable soldier, for he was a black Green Beret at a time when the U.S. Army Special Forces was almost entirely a lily-white outfit. His book belongs on the shelf of every student of the Green Berets.
It's not a knock-you-dead combat yarn like Jim Morris's "War Story"--Archer didn't really serve what you could call a combat tour in Vietnam. He was there much earlier, knocking about Southeast Asia in the years before there was a Vietnam War (or American War, as the Vietnamese prefer to call it). He was in Laos, Thailand, the Philippines, and of course Vietnam when the Green Berets were first staking out their claim to fame, and when men like Archer created the jungle-training practices that would make Special Forces the most effective American combat arm in South Vietnam.
To me, the most interesting anecdote is the account of the American training mission that was attacked by the Viet Cong as it graduated its first class of Vietnamese Special Forces. Officially, Captain Harry Cramer died of an accidental explosion, and he wasn't even listed on The Wall (the Vietnam war memorial in Washington, D.C.) until 1983. In fact, as Archer recalls, Crame died in a mortar attack, and he was the first American to be killed in that long war--21 October 1957.
This is a slight book--just 138 pages. How it can be priced at more than forty bucks is beyond me, so I'm glad to see that there are cut-rate copies available from the vendors of new-used books on this site.

6 people found this helpful

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Karsten

Rather boring!

Reviewed in the United States on June 5, 2006

I found a used copy of the book in a bookstore and I am happy that I didn't pay the full price for it. From reading the title I expected something more exciting.

The book starts interestingly but becomes boring after the first half due to constant repetition of details and self-glorification by the author. He also put a lot of advertising for his first work into the book's contents.

It might be interesting for other readers but for me it was rather disappointing.

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Green Berets in the Vanguard: Inside Special Forces, 1953-1963 (Naval Institute Special Warfare Series) Hardcover – January 1, 2001

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