Review of The Captains by W. E. B. Griffin

I came to The Captains with a somewhat different perspective than the average reader. I had a 21-year career in the Field Artillery, serving in the Regular Army, Army National Guard, and Army Reserve. I enlisted in the South Carolina Army National Guard at the age of 17 and attended Basic Training and Advanced Individual Training at Fort Sill, Oklahoma, before entering The Citadel as a cadet in 1984. Upon graduation, I was commissioned through ROTC into the Regular Army as a Distinguished Military Graduate.

My active-duty career took me to Germany, where I served with VII Corps during the closing years of the Cold War and the period surrounding the First Gulf War, and later to the 24th Infantry Division at Fort Stewart, Georgia. I eventually returned to the Army National Guard, where I commanded two Field Artillery batteries. After promotion to field-grade officer, I completed my military career in the Army Reserve in Birmingham, Alabama.

I mention this background because it inevitably shaped the way I read and evaluated The Captains. I have experienced the Army from several different perspectives: as an enlisted soldier and commissioned officer, in both the Regular Army and reserve components, overseas and stateside, during the Cold War and First Gulf War era, and as a graduate of The Citadel, a military college whose culture provided its own introduction to the traditions, hierarchy, and peculiarities of military life.

From that perspective, one of the things I can attest to is that W. E. B. Griffin gets the details right.

The Captains, the second novel in Griffin's Brotherhood of War series, follows a group of professional Army officers as their careers and personal lives unfold during the years surrounding the Korean War. Like much of Griffin's military fiction, the real strength of the novel is not simply combat. It is his portrayal of the institution itself and, more importantly, the people who inhabit it.

Griffin understands that an Army is much more than soldiers fighting battles. It is an enormous institution with its own culture, traditions, bureaucracy, politics, friendships, rivalries, ambitions, and unwritten rules. Officers worry about assignments, promotions, efficiency reports, command opportunities, senior officers, careers, families, and reputations. Decisions that appear insignificant to an outsider can have enormous consequences inside the military system. Griffin captures that world remarkably well.

His characters also feel like soldiers rather than fictional stereotypes of soldiers. They have strengths and weaknesses. Some are exceptional officers; others are mediocre. Some are ambitious, some are courageous, some are politically astute, and some simply find themselves in the right—or wrong—place at the right time. Their conversations, relationships, humor, frustrations, and interactions with the chain of command have an authenticity that anyone who has spent significant time in the Army will recognize.

That is particularly important because The Captains is as much a novel about being in the Army as it is a novel about war.

Griffin is very good at depicting the distinction between the Army as it exists on paper and the Army as it actually functions. Regulations and organizational charts tell only part of the story. Personal relationships, reputations, mentorship, personalities, and the judgment of commanders often determine how things actually get accomplished. Griffin seems to understand this instinctively.

The military details are equally convincing. The terminology, rank structure, customs, relationships between officers and enlisted soldiers, staff procedures, command dynamics, and general atmosphere rarely feel forced. Griffin does not appear to be inserting military terminology simply to demonstrate that he knows it. Instead, those details form the natural background of the characters' lives.

Having served in both the Regular Army and reserve components, I also appreciate Griffin's understanding that the Army is not a monolithic institution. Different units develop different personalities. Active-duty soldiers can view reservists differently, combat veterans view inexperienced officers differently, and career officers inevitably learn how to navigate an institution in which professional competence and institutional politics sometimes coexist uneasily.

Another strength is Griffin's character development. The men in The Captains are not frozen in place. Their experiences change them, and their careers evolve in ways that will be familiar to anyone who has watched officers progress through the Army. Responsibility increases, relationships change, youthful assumptions disappear, and the consequences of decisions become greater as rank increases.

Readers looking exclusively for nonstop battlefield action may occasionally find Griffin's attention to assignments, promotions, relationships, administrative matters, and Army politics excessive. I would argue, however, that this is precisely what makes the book so convincing. Military service consists of relatively brief periods of extraordinary intensity surrounded by much longer periods of training, preparation, administration, waiting, traveling, planning, and dealing with people. Griffin understands that reality.

There is also something timeless about his portrayal of the officer corps. The Army depicted in The Captains belongs to another generation, and many of its customs and social conventions have changed considerably. The underlying institution, however, remains remarkably recognizable. The personalities, career concerns, command relationships, friendships, rivalries, and absurdities of military bureaucracy transcend generations.

For me, that authenticity is what separates The Captains from much military fiction. Griffin does not simply write about soldiers; he writes as though he understands how soldiers think and how the Army actually works.

Having spent 21 years wearing the uniform, I frequently found myself recognizing situations, personalities, conversations, and institutional behaviors from my own experience. The era was different, the wars were different, and the Army itself has changed, but the fundamental culture Griffin describes was immediately familiar.

That is perhaps the highest compliment I can give the book.

W. E. B. Griffin's The Captains is not merely an entertaining military novel. It is an unusually perceptive portrayal of the profession of arms and of the complicated institution in which professional soldiers spend their careers. His attention to detail is excellent, his character development is compelling, and his depiction of military life and the Army system is remarkably accurate.

For readers with military experience, much of it will feel familiar. For readers without that background, Griffin provides something even more valuable: a convincing look behind the curtain at what life inside the Army is actually like.

Highly recommended, particularly for anyone interested in Army history, the professional officer corps, or realistic military fiction.