We Were Soldiers Once . . . and Young: Ia Drang-The Battle That Changed the War in Vietnam

by Harold G. Moore

I had no business getting involved with the actions of only one company; I might get pinned down and become simply another rifleman. My duty was to lead riflemen.

The attractive mistake of an inexperienced leader.

Dulce bellum inexpertis. (“War is delightful to those who have no experience of it.”) —ERASMUS

Nothing except a battle lost can be half so melancholy as a battle won. —THE DUKE OF WELLINGTON, in a dispatch from Waterloo, 1815