‘Arrogance’: Mattis co-author Bing West says US efforts to transform Iraq and Afghanistan were doomed

“I saw Jim so often, so many different places, so many battlefields throughout Iraq and Afghanistan. I mean, it was almost constant that I’d be bumping into him,” West told the Washington Examiner. “So we’ve just been friends, and eventually, he decided well I must write a book about leadership in combat and in tough situations. It evolved over 20 years.”

Mattis has become a mythical figure throughout his career, which took him from humble beginnings and even jail time in Washington state to the Pentagon. West, 79, has had an unusual journey of his own, which took him from the jungles of Vietnam to the halls of Washington, D.C.

Born at the dawn of World War II in 1940, West seemed destined to be a Marine. Growing up in Boston’s Dorchester neighborhood, he was surrounded by the Corps from an early age. His uncles on his mother’s side had enlisted with the Marines following the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941. “When they came back from Guadalcanal, she thought they’d make great babysitters,” West quipped.

When West’s father allowed a local baseball team full of Marines to use the family home’s attic as a clubhouse, members of the Corps from across the neighborhood would come visit to talk about their experiences.

“They didn’t know how to speak to their own parents about what was happening, so they all stayed at our house,” West said. “I lived up in the attic with the Marines, and by the time I was seven, I was going to be a Marine.”

West joined as an infantry officer and led more than 100 combat patrols during the peak of the Vietnam War between 1966 and 1968. His experience in the field led his commanders to assign him to write Small Unit Action in Vietnam, a how-to guide on fighting in the country that was used throughout the Corps. West would also write The Village, a detailed account of the Combat Action Platoons who volunteered to live and fight with Vietnamese locals in some of the deadliest conditions seen in the war.

“Seven of the original 15 were killed, seven of the original 15 Marines,” West said. “But when I went back to that village in 2001, they still remembered us.” The book is still required reading in the Corps today. West believes some of the lessons learned then are applicable to modern conflicts.

“If you are going to try and change an entire society and government, you must stay for 30 to 60 years,” West explained, pointing to South Korea, Germany, and Japan as successful examples.

“But thinking you can go into Vietnam, Iraq, or Afghanistan and stay for five years and then leave and have transformed the society, it was arrogance. It was arrogant for our leaders to believe that,” he said.

Starting in 2003, West would travel to Iraq and Afghanistan around 40 times over the course of a decade, always embedding with troops. He first ran into Mattis in March 2003, as he was preparing to invade Iraq with the 1st Marine Division.

“And from that time on, I don’t think I ever went more than two months without seeing Jim Mattis somewhere,” West said.

The two men first discussed the book concept after Mattis retired from active duty in 2013. Kissinger had called Mattis shortly after his retirement, encouraging him to write about his experiences, and West was the obvious choice to serve as co-author. West believes their shared history as grunts in the infantry was a key reason he was chosen — it just wouldn’t have been the same for Mattis to choose someone who didn’t know where he was coming from.

“Jim really, really tries to craft the written word, look for the right word. So that was really enjoyable,” West said.

In the middle of the writing process, Vice President-elect Mike Pence invited him to meet with Trump to discuss the position of secretary of defense. The memoir was put on hold.

“This book began in 2013 and came out in 2019. That’s why you don’t want to make a living as a writer,” West said.