Overview
In the fall of 1965 West Point cadet Tom Carhart and five of his classmates from the U.S. Military Academy pulled off a feat of extraordinary ingenuity, precision, and raw guts: the theft of the billy goat mascot from their rival, the U.S. Naval Academy at Annapolis, just before the biggest football game of the year. The U.S. forces in Vietnam were then at two hundred thousand and growing, with casualties spiking, and the men in West Point’s class of 1966 were well aware that they would serve, and quite possibly die, in that far-off war. But West Point’s motto, “Duty, Honor, Country,” affirms that its graduates will always obey the decisions of our elected government, and the men of ’66 were dutiful: of the 579 who graduated, 30 died in Vietnam and roughly five times that number were wounded. Since this would be the men’s last Army-Navy football game as cadets, they wanted to go out with a bang, not a whimper. Carhart tells the incredible true story of how, in stealing that Navy goat, the cadets unknowingly reenacted the story of Jason and the Golden Fleece from Greek mythology. The caper is interwoven with an insider’s narrative about the private lives of six West Point cadets in the early 1960s, who, against all odds, hurled their last hurrah of triumph to America before flying off to fight its wretched war in Vietnam. For more information about The Golden Fleece visit carhartthegoldenfleece.com.
Full Product Details
Author: Tom Carhart ,
Wesley Clark
Publisher: Potomac Books Inc
Imprint: Potomac Books Inc
ISBN: 9781612349107
ISBN 10: 1612349102
Pages: 224
Publication Date: 01 September 2017
Audience:
General/trade
,
General
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active
Availability: In Print
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Reviews
Tom Carhart captures a great deal about the cadet cultures at the various military academies--the rigor and discipline of day-to-day cadet life, the lifelong friendships that develop through the sharing of difficult demands few young people ever experience, the culture of Duty, Honor, Country that undergirds the ethos of the profession of arms, and the humor that is also very much a part of the lives of young military academy cadets. --Gen. Ronald H. Griffith, U.S. Army (Ret.) and former vice chief of Staff Army --Gen. Ronald H. Griffith (03/20/2017)
"A high-spirited, poignant story of brotherhood, sacrifice, and eternal youth. Tom Carhart takes us to the lost world of West Point more than a half century ago, and brings it back to life."""" - Rick Atkinson, Pulitzer Prize winner and author of The Long Gray Line: The American Journey of West Point's Class of 1966 """"This lively account of the caper by six West Point cadets to nab the U.S. Naval Academy’s goat mascot before the Army-Navy football game in 1965 is infused with humor as well as drama. The book also offers acute insights into life at the U.S. Military Academy during the years that American forces were escalating their commitment to the Vietnam War."""" - James M. McPherson, Pulitzer Prize winner and author of The War That Forged a Nation: Why the Civil War Still Matters """"A true, bittersweet account of boys learning to be officers at West Point. Their immediate future is the war in Vietnam; their recreation is to steal the Navy’s goat just before the Army-Navy game. Required reading for those who wish to wear the Army’s gray."""" - Bruce Lee, coauthor of Pearl Harbor: Final Judgement"
A high-spirited, poignant story of brotherhood, sacrifice, and eternal youth. Tom Carhart takes us to the lost world of West Point more than a half century ago, and brings it back to life. - Rick Atkinson, Pulitzer Prize winner and author of The Long Gray Line: The American Journey of West Point's Class of 1966 This lively account of the caper by six West Point cadets to nab the U.S. Naval Academy's goat mascot before the Army-Navy football game in 1965 is infused with humor as well as drama. The book also offers acute insights into life at the U.S. Military Academy during the years that American forces were escalating their commitment to the Vietnam War. - James M. McPherson, Pulitzer Prize winner and author of The War That Forged a Nation: Why the Civil War Still Matters A true, bittersweet account of boys learning to be officers at West Point. Their immediate future is the war in Vietnam; their recreation is to steal the Navy's goat just before the Army-Navy game. Required reading for those who wish to wear the Army's gray. - Bruce Lee, coauthor of Pearl Harbor: Final Judgement
Author Information
Tom Carhart is a West Point graduate and a twice-wounded Vietnam veteran. He earned a law degree from the University of Michigan and a PhD in American and military history from Princeton University and has lived and worked in Paris, Amsterdam, Los Angeles, Brussels, and Washington DC. The author of eight previous books on military history, Carhart lives in Massachusetts with his wife, Jan. Wesley Clark is a retired U.S. Army four-star general, Vietnam War veteran, and valedictorian of the West Point class of ’66.
