Let's discuss the Lone Survivor Movie (situation) scenario

[talisman]

I am confused about the ghostwriter comment. Ghostwriters are very common for stories considering most people have no clue how to write their own book. From what I have read the ghostwriter did the writing while Luttrell provided most of the content. Using a ghostwriter doesn't automatically mean it was written, content and all, by someone else.

If someone was writing a story about my life I'd kind of like to read it before it was published to clear up any.. "accidental" inaccuracies. Wouldn't you?

Tony: This book is classified as non-fiction.

edit:

Some opinions below. Read the first few 1 star reviews. I'm no expert in these matters, so I rely on others for their opinions. I do however know a lot about publishing, vanity publishing, writing, ghost writing, and what all it entails. From what I read below, this book is an embarrassment. Since Hollywood almost always destroys books in transfer, what do you think a shoddy written book is going to look like translated to the screen? And again, I'll reiterate. I WANTED to like this book, and was going to buy it before doing some research. My shelves are full enough with books I haven't read yet to put something sloppy into the que.

[ame]http://www.amazon.com/Lone-Survivor-Eyewitness-Account-Operation/dp/0316044695/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1389621411&sr=8-1&keywords=lone+survivor[/ame]

[Mach1Run]

This was an interesting link from arfcom about the differences in the movie and the real thing.

http://www.darack.com/sawtalosar/

[SSMAN]

I thought the movie looked good so I was going to buy the book. Then I found out it was ghost written in its entirety, without even having a final read and approval by the guy who survived. That means about 95% of it is bullshit that the author "imagined" happened. And that is where I lost any interest in it

To me, the entire thing is suspect, so I won't waste my time on "What ifs."

Thanks for the heads up, hate movies like that. Like the Perfect Storm.

[KBScobravert]

Thanks for the heads up, hate movies like that. Like the Perfect Storm.

Go watch it. You won't be disappointed. I have read the book and found the movie followed as well as they could have and still maintained the audience's attention.

[black2002ls]

Go watch it. You won't be disappointed. I have read the book and found the movie followed as well as they could have and still maintained the audience's attention.

Agreed. The inaccuracies are necessary for the audience to stay involved and to feel the emotion. Otherwise you end up with a documentary

[spankustang]

I have never been in the military, but I do know this. If I thought killing those kids would get me home, and it was between me or them.................I would think I could pull that trigger!

[KBScobravert]

I have never been in the military, but I do know this. If I thought killing those kids would get me home, and it was between me or them.................I would think I could pull that trigger!

In that sense you better get a new outlook on where your "home" is. It would not be the cozy place you have now. Quite the opposite in Leavenworth.

[Sean88gt]

If you get a goat wet after midnight, they'll spawn arabs.

[KBScobravert]

I have bit my tongue long enough.

That 4 man SEAL team made an ethical/moral and LEGAL choice. To kill those dudes to save their skin would have been tantamount to murder. Set the fact aside that you just watched a movie with some Producer artistic leniency. They were unarmed, herding goats, and had no pocket litter consistent with being taliban other than a radio. Should the radio have returned chatter consistent with the team's movement, movement of an enemy force or just plain "Ahmed, bring your fellow fighters more water from the stream", then my view would be tilting more towards this guy is a bad guy. Hell, he didn't even have a cell phone. DOMEX (Document and Media Exploitation) can quickly pull info and link it through the BATs (Biometric Automated Toolset) or the HIIDE (Handheld Interagency Identification Equipment) - tools that I am sure the team would have had since they had a laptop. A HIIDE is small and BATs and DOMEX is nothing more than software.

Remember, their mission was to PID (positive ID) a specific person, not to capture/kill the guy. They were a 4 man scout team, not there to take on a village alone.

Their other avenue would have been to ziptie, gag and tie the 4 together and walk them to their extraction point or until they could establish comms. I am sure that they considered this, I would hope, and still made the decision that was the right one in their present situation.

A few things that I found inaccurate that some here are making their statements on:
There is no way that either of those 4 could not communicate in Dari/Farsi enough to get a point across or to question the guy they ran across. Sit down, stand up, what is your name, come here, stop, are you taliban (a stupid question to ask though. the answer is always "no"), where is your village, come with me, etc. I am by no means an operator or spend anytime outside the wire anymore but I know enough Dari/Farsi to communicate with an Afghan and to also know if an Interpreter is telling me the truth or not.

These guys are the real fucking deal and to think they didn't take a language course for the region that was the hottest at the time is stupid. But the movie needed the language barrier.

In the book it was one dude, not 3. It may have been 2 but it was not 3. I hold the book to be the factual account of the event.

Marcus describes the multiple fractures, lacerations and just plain getting fucked up coming down off the mountain the hard way. Would someone have survived what you saw on the big screen? Maybe, likely not. But it was a movie you just watched. The key though is, that is the terrain they showed you. Not like they took Marcus back to the valley and said, let's throw these actors down that same one. He was so fucked up physically that it was amazing he could even stand as is described during the Ramp Ceremony on Bagram that he insisted on attending just a day or two after being found.

AC130 gun ships do not fly in the daylight. It was brought up a little bit in the movie when the pilots tell the team they are breaking off because the sun is coming up. Factual portrayal. They do not come back in the day like the final scene showed. Minor detail but had they had air support when the enemy force came on them, they would have fared so much better. IR is a lovely thing.

Again, you really need to read the book to fully appreciate what this man and his fallen comrades went through. The book brought more tears to my eyes than the movie did. I remember finishing it up on a dark plane a few years ago heading back to Afghanistan thinking those guys went through absolute hell. I have no reason to think that Marcus lied or embellished in his account of the events.

Now to the part that might ruffle feathers here. Y'all have to remember that we are not and never have been at war with the Afghan people. I sometimes have to remind myself of this when I get pissed and think "fuck these fucks and just drop a couple big ones". We are there to allow the willing Afghan people to establish a government and to provide security for that process as we help them rebuild themselves out of the dark ages. Remember that. It was not some dumbass farmer that thinks Moses built the Ark 150 years ago that flew planes into our skyscrapers. Hell, it wasn't even the Taliban. But the Taliban insisted on protecting OBL and that combined with they human rights issues, they became our target. Most Afghans I meet just want to work. Joining the Taliban sometimes is the only job around that pays.

Rant off. I have to pack so I can fly back to Afghanistan on Wednesday again.

[Mychael101]

The crazy thing is that there is footage from the other side of things on this. It's about 30 minutes long and shows the two deceased Seals, and their gear, weapons, laptop, ect. They also show that the Seal team was up against 10 men 2 of which where filming things. It's certainly not the dozens or hundreds that many are being led to believe.

Kinda reminds me of the Pat Tillman story where they portrayed him as being ambushed and killed in action. Only to have to backtrack and say he was actually killed by friendly fire.

[KBScobravert]

The crazy thing is that there is footage from the other side of things on this. It's about 30 minutes long and shows the two deceased Seals, and their gear, weapons, laptop, ect. They also show that the Seal team was up against 10 men 2 of which where filming things. It's certainly not the dozens or hundreds that many are being led to believe.

Kinda reminds me of the Pat Tillman story where they portrayed him as being ambushed and killed in action. Only to have to backtrack and say he was actually killed by friendly fire.

Got a link?

[Probie]

Got a link?

NSFW. And I would seriously think twice before watching.

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=c62091316c

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=059_1314303135&comments=1

[Forever_frost]

I have bit my tongue long enough.

That 4 man SEAL team made an ethical/moral and LEGAL choice. To kill those dudes to save their skin would have been tantamount to murder. Set the fact aside that you just watched a movie with some Producer artistic leniency. They were unarmed, herding goats, and had no pocket litter consistent with being taliban other than a radio. Should the radio have returned chatter consistent with the team's movement, movement of an enemy force or just plain "Ahmed, bring your fellow fighters more water from the stream", then my view would be tilting more towards this guy is a bad guy. Hell, he didn't even have a cell phone. DOMEX (Document and Media Exploitation) can quickly pull info and link it through the BATs (Biometric Automated Toolset) or the HIIDE (Handheld Interagency Identification Equipment) - tools that I am sure the team would have had since they had a laptop. A HIIDE is small and BATs and DOMEX is nothing more than software.

Remember, their mission was to PID (positive ID) a specific person, not to capture/kill the guy. They were a 4 man scout team, not there to take on a village alone.

Their other avenue would have been to ziptie, gag and tie the 4 together and walk them to their extraction point or until they could establish comms. I am sure that they considered this, I would hope, and still made the decision that was the right one in their present situation.

A few things that I found inaccurate that some here are making their statements on:
There is no way that either of those 4 could not communicate in Dari/Farsi enough to get a point across or to question the guy they ran across. Sit down, stand up, what is your name, come here, stop, are you taliban (a stupid question to ask though. the answer is always "no"), where is your village, come with me, etc. I am by no means an operator or spend anytime outside the wire anymore but I know enough Dari/Farsi to communicate with an Afghan and to also know if an Interpreter is telling me the truth or not.

These guys are the real fucking deal and to think they didn't take a language course for the region that was the hottest at the time is stupid. But the movie needed the language barrier.

In the book it was one dude, not 3. It may have been 2 but it was not 3. I hold the book to be the factual account of the event.

Marcus describes the multiple fractures, lacerations and just plain getting fucked up coming down off the mountain the hard way. Would someone have survived what you saw on the big screen? Maybe, likely not. But it was a movie you just watched. The key though is, that is the terrain they showed you. Not like they took Marcus back to the valley and said, let's throw these actors down that same one. He was so fucked up physically that it was amazing he could even stand as is described during the Ramp Ceremony on Bagram that he insisted on attending just a day or two after being found.

AC130 gun ships do not fly in the daylight. It was brought up a little bit in the movie when the pilots tell the team they are breaking off because the sun is coming up. Factual portrayal. They do not come back in the day like the final scene showed. Minor detail but had they had air support when the enemy force came on them, they would have fared so much better. IR is a lovely thing.

Again, you really need to read the book to fully appreciate what this man and his fallen comrades went through. The book brought more tears to my eyes than the movie did. I remember finishing it up on a dark plane a few years ago heading back to Afghanistan thinking those guys went through absolute hell. I have no reason to think that Marcus lied or embellished in his account of the events.

Now to the part that might ruffle feathers here. Y'all have to remember that we are not and never have been at war with the Afghan people. I sometimes have to remind myself of this when I get pissed and think "fuck these fucks and just drop a couple big ones". We are there to allow the willing Afghan people to establish a government and to provide security for that process as we help them rebuild themselves out of the dark ages. Remember that. It was not some dumbass farmer that thinks Moses built the Ark 150 years ago that flew planes into our skyscrapers. Hell, it wasn't even the Taliban. But the Taliban insisted on protecting OBL and that combined with they human rights issues, they became our target. Most Afghans I meet just want to work. Joining the Taliban sometimes is the only job around that pays.

Rant off. I have to pack so I can fly back to Afghanistan on Wednesday again.

Hooah

[dmh165638]

If someone was writing a story about my life I'd kind of like to read it before it was published to clear up any.. "accidental" inaccuracies. Wouldn't you?

Tony: This book is classified as non-fiction.

edit:

Some opinions below. Read the first few 1 star reviews. I'm no expert in these matters, so I rely on others for their opinions. I do however know a lot about publishing, vanity publishing, writing, ghost writing, and what all it entails. From what I read below, this book is an embarrassment. Since Hollywood almost always destroys books in transfer, what do you think a shoddy written book is going to look like translated to the screen? And again, I'll reiterate. I WANTED to like this book, and was going to buy it before doing some research. My shelves are full enough with books I haven't read yet to put something sloppy into the que.

http://www.amazon.com/Lone-Survivor-...=lone+survivor

I totally agree but where is the info that stated this happened? Everything I have read including interviews with Luttrell says he worked directly with the ghost writer to provide all the details for the book.

[talisman]

I totally agree but where is the info that stated this happened? Everything I have read including interviews with Luttrell says he worked directly with the ghost writer to provide all the details for the book.

I'm not going to go digging for it. It was one of those nights where you end up following 18 links when you were just intending to toss something in your amazon cart. From what I read, they met before he starting writing the book, and that was the end of his involvement.