Guts 'N Gunships: What it was Really Like to Fly Combat Helicopters in Vietnam

Guts N' Gunships is one mans story taking you through basic training, pilot training and his year in Vietnam starting as a slick pilot and moving onto gunships. It is a story of war, friendships, personal struggle and losses. Rather than tell a long drawn out and ultimately something that would be boring tale, Mark Garrison has split the novel into over 60 very manageable chapters. I like this format as you can pick up the book for 10 minutes, read a chapter or two and put it back down again when that is all the time you have. Each chapter tells a tale and each story is engrossing, giving the details of what it was like to be a helicopter pilot in Vietnam. Mark really pulls you in and his story telling abilities are second to none. This is perhaps the best book I have read yet on Vietnam helicopter pilots due to manner in which the author has written his memoirs. Mark has injected a lot of humor into something that is really very stark and this pays off in buckets. You can be in the middle of an extraction with the bird taking hits left and right and suddenly you will burst out laughing due to a small comment here or observation there. Absolutely excellent and very highly recommended.

As a Vietnam era Army vet and a wannabe Gunship pilot of the era, I thoroughly enjoyed the book. Kinda' profane in places, but the times were the worst of times and life was lived hour-to-hour by these guys. I was spared the trauma that these pilots and aircrews endured because I never left the U.S.A. I remember having waited month after month for a levy with my name on it and having tried my best to prepare for duty over there (in ATC). That fateful levy never came and I ETS'd a free man early in '71, frustrated that my aviation dreams were not to be. Now I realize just how close to death I'd ventured. Over 30% of those heroes never came home and their number could quite easily have included me. The emotional scars still carried by so many of those survivors is a lifelong cross. The open betrayal of their own countrymen upon return from 'Nam only doubled their suffering. The author covers that with the eloquence of simplicity. I was blessed and I didn't know it. So, yeah, a worthwhile read, especially for us of the era. It's cathartic and it's history well told.

For a guy who never intended to be an author, this is a well written and edited collection of stories from a year in country. Had circumstances turned out just a little bit differently, I would have followed the author's road into aerial combat in Vietnam. My only other preferred option would have been PBR operations, but the Huey personifies "our" war. The reconstructed dialogue in this book is strained, but it was reconstructed, after all. As a health insurance pro and a Medicare expert ("Medicare for the Lazy Man, 2022...") I am sorry to hear about the turn to the dark side but it apparently served the author well in spite of it's voodoo, bone casting & tree worshiping nature. I hope he was able to help some people along the way. All-in-all, a thoroughly enjoyable read. Thanks!

You can imagine that you are there with the author. I bought a copy for myself and for my father-in-law who was Army and worked on the helicopters as a mechanic.

I really commend the author for his service and appreciate his writing this book. It's a fun and entertaining read. He doesn't really put his war experiences in context with any battles or how the war progresses, its mainly stories focusing on his missions, and they are told well. For a "bigger picture" book, I highly recommend "Chickenhawk" by Robert Mason, that book also discusses his mission and experiences but he puts it in context of the war and various battles. Again, thank you to the author for his service and writing a fun and interesting book.

This book is the memoir of a very young warrant officer pilot of his year in an Assault Helicopter Company during the middle stage of the Vietnam War. It was written many years after his service there, but it is a compelling and exciting story of dozens of small scale engagements where heroism and death were common and often unrecognized. Veterans and students of the Vietnam War will especially appreciate this book for its description of the US Army of the time in training (on OH23's) and in combat. I did not find any exaggerations or anomalies, but did find it hard to put down this book. I would have given it five stars, but for the somewhat flat literary style and the tendency to slow the story with insertions of personal opinions, not always relevant to the incident. Even so, this is a good book for anyone interested on how the Vietnam War was fought by Army Aviation and without aviation it probably could not have been fought at all.

Since we have the COVID 19 stay at home edict I decided to buy some books from Amazon to pass the time. Since I was a crew chief on the H-34 with the 82nd Airborne Division I got a bunch of books by Veitnam era chopper pilots. This book is a great read. It differs from the other chopper pilot books by describing an actual IFR flight after a combat mission through mountain terrain to An Khe after sunset. The rotary wing fraternity can certainly appreciate this chapter if you ever lived through an IFR in mountain terrain through a heavy cloud overcast in darkness. Another description of the thanks by LRRPs seeking out the pilots who saved them from certain death is likewise special. Garrison also drives home the point of the universal opinion by all those on the line in Vietnam that politicians were losing the war by imposing boundary restrictions - - it was stupid for sure. Finally, coming home to be greeted unceremoniously by war protesters after survinving Vietnam is a description that still angers veterans. Thank you for your service Mark.

Gran libro. Desde la primera página te hace ver lo increiblemente duro que fue volar por los cielos de Vietnam con el caballo de batalla del ejercito americano.

Heutzutage ist der Vietnam-Krieg mehr oder weniger in Vergessenheit geraten, kaum ein Mensch weiß noch etwas davon. Die Deutschen hatten damit ja auch nichts zu tun. Was die Sichtweise amerikanischer Soldaten betrifft - hier ist die Beschreibung eines Hubschrauberpiloten eines sog. Gun-Ships. Wer bis dahin noch Illusionen über diesen Krieg hatte - hier erledigen sie sich. Es geht an dieser Stelle auch darum, dass niemand gern dort hin ging, weil das Risiko, verletzt oder getötet zu werden, unabweisbar war - und wer will das mit 20 Jahren? - Eine Frage, die jeden Krieg bewegt. - Es wird aber auch gezeigt, wie die Soldaten sich für das, was sie gut fanden, einsetzten. Kurz und gut: kein Buch für eine Gute-Nacht-Geschichte, aber wer etwas über den Vietnam-Krieg erfahren will, kommt hier weiter.

Libro davvero molto interessante, scritto bene, in un inglese semplice e comprensibile. Gli acronimi sono sempre spiegati ed i modi di dire comprensibilissimi. Un libro di memorie dove la guerra è sempre presente, ma il focus è sull'amicizia e sull'esperienza di piloti poco più di vent'anni. Una lettura davvero consigliata

Very realistic descriptions of Helicopter flight training and gun shop action. Told sensibly and credibly; as per the headline, a very good read indeed.

Traz um relato cativante não somente sobre como foi ser piloto durante a guerra, mas também sobre como as relações humanas são moldadas em situações de fazer intenso stress e perigo.