The Raider: The Untold Story of a Renegade Marine and the Birth of U.S. Special Forces in World War II

Known as the black sheep of the U.S. Marine Corps, General Evans Carlson (1896–1947) pioneered the use of guerilla tactics and helped establish marine raider battalions. After a stint in the army, where he lied about his age to join and fight in World War I, he enlisted in the marine corps as a private and was later commissioned as a first lieutenant. Platt (history, Univ. of Massachusetts Amherst; Imperial Twilight) details the incredible story of Carlson’s life. In the 1930s, Carlson spent months living and marching with Chinese Communists as an observer regularly dispatching sympathetic reports directly to President Roosevelt. He took a deep interest in Chinese history, culture, and language to better understand his hosts. The lessons he learned from the lightly armed and highly mobile Chinese forces helped inform the tactics he implemented as a leader of a marine raider battalion in the Pacific. He was never a communist, but his reputation was attacked in the postwar years, and his contributions to the marines were largely forgotten.