What is the main message of Call Sign Chaos?

The main message of Call Sign Chaos is the importance of leadership and the value of learning from mistakes.

Who is the author of Call Sign Chaos?

The authors of Call Sign Chaos are Jim Mattis and Bing West.

Management & Leadership

Call Sign Chaos Book Summary - Call Sign Chaos Book explained in key points

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Name: Call Sign Chaos
Rating: 4 (62 reviews)
Author: Jim Mattis, Bing West

Jim Mattis Bing West

Learning to Lead

4 (62 ratings)

25 mins

Brief summary

Call Sign Chaos is a memoir of Jim Mattis, retired US Marine Corps General and former Secretary of Defense, co-authored by Bing West. It gives an insight into his leadership philosophy and experiences in various important military and government positions.

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Call Sign Chaos
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What’s in it for me? An in-depth study of US military strategy.

The US has fought three major wars in the Middle East and Central Asia over the last 30 years. The first of these conflicts, the campaign to expel Iraqi forces from Kuwait in 1991, resulted in a decisive triumph. The second and third, the invasion of Afghanistan in 2001 and Iraq in 2003, weren’t nearly as clear-cut.

The US military didn’t want to repeat the mistake the Soviet Union made in Afghanistan in the 1980s, getting stuck in an endless guerilla war. Consequently, the Taliban regime was successfully overthrown, though Osama bin Laden was allowed to escape. In Iraq, a swift military victory was followed by years of bloodshed.

So what did the US get right in the first conflict, and what went wrong in its later campaigns? Few people are better placed to decipher American strategy than Jim Mattis, a general who commanded Marines in all three wars. In these blinks, we’ll follow Mattis through his career in the Marines and explore the thinking behind US military planning.

Along the way, you’ll find out

how Mattis used amphibious troops to establish a bridgehead in a landlocked country;
why disbanding the Iraqi army after the 2003 invasion was a huge mistake; and
how the withdrawal of American forces from Iraq in 2011 led to the formation of ISIS.

Jim Mattis was a carefree youth who found a sense of purpose in the Marines.

In the winter of 1971, a free-spirited history graduate named Jim Mattis had a brush with death. Fresh out of college and unsure what to do next, Mattis took to the hills of Washington state for a hiking trip. He was standing on an icy ridge looking down at the Columbia River when he slipped and tumbled down a ravine. The fall could have easily killed him. Amazingly, he escaped with just a few cracked ribs.

Mattis had spent the last two summers training at the Marine Officer Candidates School. As he dusted himself off in that icy ravine, he recalled a Vietnam veteran at the school who had said, “We don’t get to choose when we die, but we can choose how we meet death.” This was a life-changing moment. Mattis realized he wanted to spend his career around men like that wise soldier.

The Marines stood for two things – duty and adventure. Both gelled with Mattis’ upbringing. Born in 1950 in Richland, Washington, he grew up around soldiers and military engineers. They had come to the area to oversee the construction of the Hanford reactors – a nuclear production complex vital to the Manhattan Project, America’s plan to build an atomic bomb during World War II. Their civic-minded patriotism and dedication deeply influenced Richland.

Meanwhile, Mattis’ parents encouraged their son’s sense of adventure. As a boy, he hunted rabbits in the surrounding hills with an old .22 rifle. At 13, he began hitchhiking across America’s western states. When he was home, he devoured the books in his parents’ extensive library. Hemingway was a favorite, Faulkner a close second.

In 1968, Mattis enrolled at Central Washington State College. He was a mediocre student and spent more time partying than studying history. After one incident, a judge even ordered him to spend weekends in the local jail – a punishment for underage drinking.

The summer officer training program in Quantico, Virginia, provided something that university hadn’t – a sense of purpose. Led by sergeants who had just returned from Vietnam, the course pushed Mattis to his limits. But he was stubborn. When he was offered an airline ticket home, an invitation to take the easy way out, he refused. Over half the class was screened out each summer. Mattis stayed the course. As he later realized in that ravine, this was his calling.

Mattis learned the art of leadership during the turbulent years of the Vietnam War.

Mattis was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the Marines in early 1972. Unlike Army, Navy and Air Force officers, Marine officers begin their career with seven months of basic infantry training. The idea behind this is simple – every Marine, whatever his rank, is first and foremost a rifleman.

After completing his training in Quantico, Mattis joined the 2nd Battalion, 4th Marine regiment stationed in Okinawa, Japan. This was a turbulent time for the US military.

Mattis led the US assault on Iraqi troops in the First Gulf War.

By 1990, Mattis had spent 18 years in the military. That made him a “totus porcus” or “full hog” Marine – a military man through and through. Promoted to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel, he had recently been given command of the 1st Battalion of the 7th Marine regiment. It wouldn’t be long before he led its men into a new battle.

On August 2, 1990, the Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein invaded neighboring Kuwait, a small oil-rich state claimed by Iraq. Hussein believed that no one would come to Kuwait’s assistance. He was wrong. Three days after the Iraqi invasion, President George H.W. Bush told reporters that the US would not allow this act of aggression to stand.

Outdated strategic thinking meant that Mattis had to wait before joining the fight against Al Qaeda.

The morning of September 11, 2001, started like any other. Mattis had recently been promoted to deputy commander of I Marine Expeditionary Force, or 1 MEF. He was driving to his unit’s base in Camp Pendleton, California. That’s when radio stations started reporting that an airplane had hit the World Trade Center in New York.

Mattis instantly guessed what had happened. His first thought? They got through. His second thought? This was the handiwork of Al Qaeda – an Islamist terror group that declared war on America in the mid-1990s and orchestrated attacks on US targets across Africa and the Middle East.

Mattis helped topple the Taliban in Afghanistan but was denied permission to pursue bin Laden.

A few days after Thanksgiving in November 2001, Mattis was standing on the deck of a helicopter carrier in the Arabian Sea near the Pakistani coast. He watched as Marines test-fired their weapons into the water and loaded CH-53 helicopters. Centcom – US Central Command – had given the green light. The mission to establish a bridgehead in southern Afghanistan was a go.

The first troops landed at 9:00 p.m. on November 25. Within an hour, 170 grunts were in position to defend the landing site. By dawn the following day, 400 additional marines equipped with gun trucks had joined them. It was the deepest amphibious assault from the sea in history. The result was Camp Rhino, one of the war’s most important bases.

Mattis led his Marines into Iraq in 2003, despite his personal misgivings about the war.

By early 2002, Mattis was back in Pendleton, California. A freshly promoted two-star Major General, he now commanded the 1st Marine Division. There was little time to mull over the missed opportunity to pursue bin Laden in Tora Bora. The US was gearing up to take on another old foe – Saddam Hussein.

While he was honored to lead the 1st Marine Division, a storied unit which had served with distinction in Japan, Korea and Vietnam, Mattis was uneasy about the decision to invade Iraq. Sanctions had crippled the country’s economy, and the US controlled Iraqi airspace. Even if Hussein did possess chemical weapons – the government’s justification for the impending war – Iraq was boxed in. Was it really a threat?

Poor planning alienated Iraqi soldiers and civilians alike.

Chaos descended on Iraq as Saddam Hussein’s regime crumbled. Police officers disappeared from the streets, while water and electricity failed. Religious tensions between Iraq’s majority Shiites and minority Sunnis threatened to escalate into a civil war. The US had won the fight. Now, it would have to keep the peace.

The Iraqi army was the key piece in this puzzle. Why was that? Well, its defeat had left thousands of well-trained and battle-hardened young men at loose ends, with neither jobs nor prospects. Like many US commanders in the field, Mattis believed this was a disaster waiting to happen. If immediate action wasn’t taken, it was only a matter of time before someone turned this ready-made guerilla force against American troops.

Strategies of both force and de-escalation were abandoned prematurely in postwar Iraq.

In February 2004, Mattis wrote a letter to the men and women of the 1st Marine Division to tell them that “we are going back into the brawl.” Since his departure the previous fall, things had gone from bad to worse in Iraq. A new group calling itself Al Qaeda in Iraq – AQI – was at the heart of a growing insurgency in Anbar, a Sunni-dominated province west of Baghdad.

Led by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, AQI was based in Anbar’s two largest cities, Ramadi and Fallujah, and was waging a war against American troops and rival religious groups. A month before Mattis arrived in Anbar, one of Zarqawi’s suicide bombers killed 23 Iraqi police recruits in Fallujah. It was his job to put an end to these attacks.

The premature withdrawal of American forces from Iraq paved the way for ISIS.

After a two-year break from the front, Mattis returned to Iraq in early 2006 as the commander 1 Marine Expeditionary Force. The mood in Washington was souring, and politicians claimed that the Iraq war had been lost. Mattis was determined to prove them wrong.

AQI’s rule in Anbar not only threatened American soldiers but the tribes living in the province as well. Over the summer of 2006, Mattis and his fellow commanders cultivated ties with tribal leaders. Both parties wanted AQI gone, but neither was sure they could trust the other. Small gestures of friendship, like presenting sheiks with Marine officer dress swords when they went to the US side, took on huge symbolic importance.

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What is Call Sign Chaos about?

Call Sign Chaos (2019) examines US foreign policy through the eyes of one of America’s most formidable strategic thinkers – General Jim Mattis. These blinks span Mattis’ entire storied career, from his youthful decision to join the Marines to his leadership of US forces in Afghanistan and Iraq. They provide a deep and personal take on the American military.

Call Sign Chaos Review

Call Sign Chaos (2019) is an insightful memoir that takes readers inside the mind of one of America's most respected military leaders, Jim Mattis. Here's why this book is worth reading:

With its first-hand accounts of Mattis' experience on the battlefield and in the Pentagon, the book provides a unique perspective on military leadership and decision-making.
Rich in wisdom and lessons learned, the book offers valuable insights that can be applied to various areas of life, from leadership to personal growth.
Through its engaging storytelling and candid reflections, the book avoids being dry or dull, keeping readers captivated from start to finish.

Best quote from Call Sign Chaos

September 11 was fresh in our minds. We wanted to destroy Al Qaeda and the Taliban. Obliterate them, not sit on our asses.

—Jim Mattis, Bing West

Who should read Call Sign Chaos?

History buffs
Politically-inclined individuals
Leaders

About the Author

Jim Mattis is a native of the American Pacific Northwest. He has more than four decades as a Marine officer behind him. One of the most respected generals in the US, Mattis served as Commander of the US Joint Forces Command and Commander of the US Central Command. President Donald Trump appointed him as Secretary of Defense in 2017, a role he served for two years. He is now the Davies Family Distinguished Fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University.

Bing West is a retired Marine and former Assistant Secretary of Defence who has written ten books about warfare. He is a member of the Military History Working Group at the Hoover Institution.

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Management & Leadership Biography & Memoir

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