What real heroes are made of, both good and bad

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WARRIORS: PORTRAITS FROM THE BATTLIEFIELD

By Max Hastings

Knopf, $27.50, 384 pages

REVIEWED BY MURIEL DOBBIN

This is a book about heroism that the author kicks off with a caution that it is unlikely to be of interest to "modern warlords" like Donald Rumsfeld, secretary of defense, or Robert McNamara, one of his predecessors.

The book, Max Hastings emphasizes, is about "aspects of conflict they do not comprehend, creatures of flesh and blood rather than systems of steel and electronics." It is a reminder that heroes are human.

Tartly, Mr. Hastings recalls that an American admiral in the 1960s expressed doubt that McNamara and his crew "have any morale settings on their computers."

Yet in writing about warriors over the past 200 years, Mr. Hastings makes clear his awareness of their flaws as well as their valor, emphasizing that without war, they were indeed fish out of water.

He recalls English poet Rudyard Kipling's lines, "It's Tommy this an' Tommy that, an' "Tommy, fall be'ind," But it's "please to walk in front, sir, when there's trouble in the wind."