Danger Forward

On August 27, 1966, the men of 1st Battalion, 26th Infantry were holding their ground after thirty-six hours of repeated enemy assaults. The fighting had begun two days earlier, when the Viet Cong ambushed an American patrol on Highway 16 near Bong Trang. The clash grew so fierce that three US infantry battalions were drawn into it, and historians now call it the Battle of Bong Trang. On the second day, the battalion's commander, Lieutenant Colonel Paul F. Gorman, kept calling for artillery and close air support until the enemy withdrew. A misplaced napalm strike badly burned him, but he kept his composure and stayed in command. For this leadership and courage under fire, he received the Distinguished Service Cross, the nation's second-highest award for valor.

Gorman graduated from West Point in 1950 and began his career as an officer in the early years of the Cold War. Like many of his classmates, he fought in Korea, serving with the 32d Infantry Regiment and earning a valor decoration for his conduct in the hilltop battles of 1952. After the Korean Conflict, he commanded an infantry company in West Germany, where his daily work centered on defending NATO against the Soviet bloc.

Between his two combat tours in Vietnam, Gorman served as the principal architect of the Pentagon Papers and sat on the US delegation to the Paris Peace Talks. In the difficult years after Vietnam, he helped rebuild the US Army's training methods as the force shifted to an all-volunteer model.

His final assignment was as Commander-in-Chief of US Southern Command, a post he held during Operation Urgent Fury in Grenada and while the United States was actively supporting the Contras in Nicaragua. He retired as a four-star general in 1985. Drawing on many hours of interviews and archival research, author Mike Guardia traces the life and legacy of Gorman, a figure he considers overlooked by history.