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Nolan augments his reputation as a Vietnam combat chronicler with the story of the two weeks of intense fighting near Dong Ha in 1968. Involving a marine battalion, an army infantry battalion, and their supporting units, the fighting was the most basic and bloody sort of ground combat. For their deeds in it, two men won Medals of Honor, but scores of others won no more than body bags. Nolan has thoroughly researched the battle, largely through primary source documents and interviews with participants, and has produced a book that, though it requires some background knowledge of the Vietnam war in order to be fully appreciated, for serious readers will stand very high among accounts of the infantryman's war. Roland Green

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On April 29, 1968, the North Vietnamese Army is spotted less than four miles from the U.S. Marines’ Dong Ha Combat Base. Intense fighting develops in nearby Dai Do as the 2d Battalion, 4th Marines, known as “the Magnificent Bastards,” struggles to eject NVA forces from this strategic position.

Yet the BLT 2/4 Marines defy the brutal onslaught. Pressing forward, America’s finest warriors rout the NVA from their fortress-hamlets–often in deadly hand-to-hand combat. At the end of two weeks of desperate, grinding battles, the Marines and the infantry battalion supporting them are torn to shreds. But against all odds, they beat back their savage adversary. The Magnificent Bastards captures that gripping conflict in all its horror, hell, and heroism.

“Superb . . . among the best writing on the Vietnam War . . . Nolan has skillfully woven operational records and oral history into a fascinating narrative that puts the reader in the thick of the action.”
–Jon T. Hoffman, author of Chesty

“Real and gripping . . . combat with all the warts on.”
–Lieutenant General Victor H. Krulak, USMC (Ret.)