Opening Salvo of the Terrorists
Reviewed by Maj Guy G. Berry
>Maj Berry is currently an instructor in history at the United States Naval Academy.
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PEACEKEEPERS AT WAR: Beirut 1983—The Marine Commander Tells His Story.
By Col Timothy J. Geraghty, USMC(Ret). Potomac Books Inc., Dulles, VA, 2009
ISBN 9781597974257, 272 pp.
$29.92 (Member $26.95)
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Peacekeepers at War is the personal account of the 24th MAU commander, Col Timothy J. Geraghty, following the events and circumstances that led to the bombing of the BLT 1/8 headquarters at Beirut International Airport on 23 October 1983, which took the lives of 299 servicemen including 220 U.S. Marines. Col Geraghty lays bare the world of a MAU commander tasked with a peacekeeping mission in Beirut, Lebanon. This is a world bereft with confusing command relationships, circuitous international and political interests, a volatile local population, and the constant frustrations of keeping peace among 3 domestic armies, 22 militias, 40 political parties, and the proxies of 2 interested foreign powers. Col Geraghty was simultaneously forced to navigate the complexities of operating alongside Italian, British, French, and Israeli peacekeepers in an area the size of Rhode Island. Geraghty and his Marines walked a thin line within this “eight-sided war” trying to maintain a sometimes transparent façade of neutrality.
The complex operating environment and elusive enemy combatants disguised the real enemy—mission creep. Circumstances slowly nudged Geraghty and his Marines away from their original peacekeeping mission and into a role as an ally of the Lebanese Military Forces in their war against the proxies of Iran and Syria operating in Lebanon. Geraghty recounts with heart-wrenching detail the events that constricted his options and left his Marines vulnerable to the vehicleborne improvised explosive device. It was this device and plan, conceived in Iran, that caused the largest single-day loss of life in the Marine Corps since the landing at Iwo Jima. The reader shares Geraghty’s frustration as he watched the forces align against his Marines and move toward tragedy with horrible precision. Although the use of an improvised fuel air explosive in a vehicle manned by a suicidal terrorist was new to the American experience of war, it foreshadowed a horrible new era of warfare.
Geraghty’s retelling of the horrible attack on the BLT headquarters at Beirut International Airport and the heroic actions taken by the Marines and sailors immediately after the bombing is concise and heartfelt. Marine officers should take special note of Geraghty’s strong leadership and personal anguish as he faced every Marine commander’s worst-case scenario. The account of the bombing is more than a memorial; there are lessons for Marine leaders of every rank.
In November 1942 Winston Churchill said, “Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.” Col Geraghty uses Churchill’s warning as the point of departure for his description of the events leading up to and after the bombing of the BLT 1/8 headquarters. Churchill’s phrase conveys Geraghty’s view that the bombing of the Marine barracks could be considered the beginning of the continuing American war against Islamic extremism. The attack marked an escalation of the proxy war between the United States, Israel, Syria, and Iran—a war that continues to the present day. Geraghty expertly lays out the actors, their motives, and the circumstances that moved the Marines in Beirut directly in opposition to the strategic objectives of Syria and Iran. One of the great strengths of the monograph is Geraghty’s ability to move between the tactical and strategic levels of the conflict and make the connections that often can only be experienced at the MAU command level. It is this movement between the levels of war that keeps the events of 23 October 1983 in a wider context without diminishing the singular importance of the attack.
Peacekeepers at War is a book written by a Marine officer, largely for Marine officers. Geraghty’s account occasionally reads like an after-action report or a lessons learned hotwash. The book is occasionally too detailed for those only casually interested in this event or the subsequent investigations. However, what this book lacks in polish, it more than makes up for in authenticity, candor, and grit. Geraghty offers the reader an unobstructed view of his decisionmaking process before, during, and after the bombing. Those immersed in the current counterinsurgency/counterterrorism discourse will recognize the many persistent themes—lack of human intelligence, a constricting political and command environment, and the frustration of fighting a largely invisible enemy hiding in plain sight among a fickle local population. This book works because of Col Geraghty’s personal stake in the events and his emotional investment that can be found on every page. If the United States is currently experiencing the “end of the beginning” of the long war, Peacekeepers at War offers an account of the genesis of modern warfare. |
