Meyer, Dakota. Into the Fire. Random House: New York, NY, 2012.
Character List: Dakota Meyer | Dakota Meyer is the protagonist, narrator and author of “Into the Fire”. He’s Team Monti’s sniper and is in charge of everything that has to do with combat. He is a Medal of Honor recipient for the courageous acts he demonstrated in Afghanistan. | Cpt. William Swenson | Swenson, a long-haired, quiet, border police advisor, is one of the main characters in the book. He and Meyer become very close and fight beside one another at during the events at Ganjigal. | Lt. Mike Johnson | Mike was the leader of Team Monti. He specialized in communications and was and advisor to improve leadership procedures of Afghan officers. He was stranded in a house in Ganjigal and killed. | Sgt. Aaron Kenefick | Kenefick was the staff NCO of Team Monti. There was some tension between him and Meyers until they spent some time in Dangham. Kenefick’s job was to bring order to the Afghan personnel and pay records. He was stranded in a house in Ganjigal and killed. | Doc Layton | Hospital man 3rd class Layton, was a laid back Navy corpsman. His job was to provide medical assistance to Team Monti. He was stranded in a house and killed. | Hafez | Hafez is the lead interpreter at Team Monti. He is the best warning system that they have. He is the unofficial 5th member if the Team and is loyal to the US. He has yet to find a way to America. |

Setting:
The story takes place along the Afghan-Pakistan border during the summer of 2009. On September 9th of 2009 part of Team Monti was ambushed and trapped in a house. The story takes place during the duration of the day and the challenges they faced throughout it. It is a dangerous place to be in especially for Americans during this time period. Hafez knows what it’s like in Ganjigal and says this to his team, “Ganjigal is a bad place full of bad people.” (Hafez pg. 74) Needless to say not many soldiers enjoy being there and want to get out during this time frame but Dakota thinks otherwise. He is willing and ready to fight. He says, “The others were looking to do their jobs and return home. I was looking for a fight.” (Dakota pg. 5)
Afghanistan is a very rocky, mountainous country with hot summers and fairly cold winters. It is one of the driest regions in the world. These conditions are pretty hard to live with on a day to day basis. On the first page of the book Lt. Johnson says, “Look at those mountains! Pretty heavy stuff.” From this quote we get a pretty good image of how big and rough the Afghanistan Mountains are, especially if a Marine thinks that they are heavy.
Plot Summary: “Into the Fire”, is a firsthand account of the most extraordinary Afghan war. It focuses primarily on the tragedies that befell Team Monti in the fall of 2009. Dakota Meyer was raised in a small town in Kentucky and was trained as a sniper for the Marine Corps. He’s eager to fight and is sent to Afghanistan to train the Afghan warriors. He becomes close to his team, Team Monti. His team is sent on a routine mission to patrol the Ganjigal. Meyer is replaced on this mission by Gunny Johnson because he irritated his commanding officer. He promises to come for them if things go bad. In Ganjigal Taliban members ambush the Americans and Askars trapping them in a small village. Meyer calls for air support and back up but they are told to stay put. Eventually they receive permission to retrieve the wounded and dead. He manages to save several members of his team but is devastated to find some of his best friends dead in the aftermath. Meyer is depressed and feels guilty for the loss of his teammates. He attempted suicide but forgot to load the gun. He and Swenson were nominated for Medals of Honor but still has to live with the guilt of losing members of his Team. He feels as if he was rewarded for the greatest failure of all time because he wasn’t able to save more of his men or die trying in the process.
Themes:
One of the most important themes in this book is the lack of military support received by the troops in Ganjigal. After Meyers realizes that his team is not pulling back from enemy fire, he tells Rod to request for permission to enter the village. Valdez answers the call after a while and denies his request telling him to sit tight. This does not make any sense because Meyers is ready to go and provide support to his Team, but Rod insists they wait longer, because they will be sent home for disobeying orders. The attacks continue and Monti is getting pinned down. Fabayo is infuriated by the lack of support and he moves the team into a small house in the village. Swenson fears they will be surrounded and calls for support. Twenty minutes into the fight he calls for an evacuation and is told it will arrive in fifteen minutes. Meyers doesn’t get a response for their position and is devastated. He says, “That broke it for me. I had promised my team that I would be there. As far as I was concerned, my command element wasn’t in command.” (Meyers Pg. 105) Guilt and Failure is an important theme in this book. Meyers is haunted by his guilt after not being able to save Team Monti. He can’t believe it ended that way. He is too tired to be angry or sad. As he leaves the bodies of Team Monti nearby the villagers begin to point and laugh. It takes all that Meyers has to not draw his weapon on them. He cleans his Team’s bodies and takes care of their belongings in order to be shipped back to their families. He gets home and is dead inside. He feels like he can’t protect anyone and is exposed. He goes to therapy for months and nothing really seems to change. He starts drinking a lot and laughs about how he is a failure. He hits rock bottom in 2010 and sends a message to his family saying that he can’t do this anymore. He puts the gun to his head and pulls the trigger. Luckily someone had unloaded it beforehand. He knows Team Monti is disappointed and knows that quitting isn’t right. Dakota flies out to meet Obama and receive his Medal of Honor. He tells the president that he doesn’t know what to do with his life. Obama says to keep his head up and represent those that died with dignity. He doesn’t smile during the ceremony because “my country was recognizing me for being a failure and the worst day of his life.” (Meyers Pg. 190) He focuses on the fact that he didn’t save anyone rather than all of the people that he saved. Nature drove him into the fire just like the spirit of the American Soldier. This event really played a hard role on Dakota’s life. Though he had to suffer a lot on that day and the many days ahead of him, it was a real wake up call for our military and the support it needs to start offering to their troops instead of hanging them out to dry. It shows us how traumatic war can be and how hard people can be on themselves. It shows the bond and brotherhood between the Teams that are out fighting for us every day. It influences the way we look at our military and gives us even more ways to appreciate those who are out there fighting for our rights.
Tone
Dakota Meyers war story was written in a very argumentative, and disappointed tone as he describes the events that took place at Ganjigal and his guilt that he feels afterwards. He provides good details about the failure at Ganjigal. Meyer’s guilt is obvious throughout the novel. He says that, “You either get them out alive, or you die trying. If you didn’t die trying then you didn’t try hard enough.” (Meyers Pg. 204) He is also mad about the lack of support that the troops received when they were trapped in the building. Meyers argues about how the battle was handled and how he thought Swenson should have received a Medal of Honor. The deaths could have been easily avoidable. Meyers is harsh about the failures at Ganjigal concerning the military and his own efforts. With all of this knowledge that you gain from reading the, the reader should feel grateful for those who fight for us and maybe feel mad that they died when they could have been easily saved.
Symbols:
A symbol in this book, to me, was Ganjigal itself. It had a really bad reputation before the events that happened in September transpired. Ganjigal represented everything bad to me. It represented death, bad people, sorrow, and especially failure. We failed to support each other in GAnjigal. So many lives could have been saved if we would have had the support. I believe Swenson said it best when he said, “Ganjigal conveyed the wrong message: failure to support advisors, failure to provide artillery support, failure to deliver air timely support, etc.” The word Team symbolizes a brotherhood. They considered themselves to be brothers. They were all willing to have each other’s back. I believe this is why Meyers feels so much pain. He let his brothers down. That would be a hard thing to cope with. Knowing that even though you gave a lot it wasn’t enough to save everyone. You can feel Meyer’s pain when he says, “I didn’t want to talk to my dad. What was I supposed to say? That my brothers were dead and I’m alive.” (Meyers Pg. 161) The Team bond was a brotherhood made by them. It was something that was really special and it is hard to see it ruined.
Significance of the Title “Into the Fire” is a very fitting title for this book. Meyer’s jumped right into the action to help his Team out. He didn’t care if he died. He wanted to save them all no matter what the situation was. That’s all that Ganjigal was on that day. A really big fire and Meyer’s was brave enough to jump right into it.
Other Quotes A quote that stuck out to me in this book was when Meyers said, “We lost today? I don’t know about you but my day isn’t over yet.” (Meyers Pg. 148) This quote shows Meyers determination to always come out on top. To never give up. It’s hard to see him almost give up on himself. I wish he would listen to his own words and fight through his own pain.
Overall Statement This book was really good! It reminded me a lot of “The Lone Survivor”. It shows a lot about one man’s mission. It was really touching. I would recommend it to anyone. This was a really amazing book.