Black Hearts is a great example of the reality on how severe bad leadership skills can ripple throughout a unit and impact its overall mission. This book serves as a guide for future leaders of America and will set the examples of what not to do in leadership positions. The lessons we can take from these soldiers can help us as potential leaders to become more competent and effective. The fact that this book focused on the hardships, poor decisions and sound judgment of the soldiers it helped emphasize…

of the 101st Airborne Division. Black Hearts is a fictional book on soldiers in the 101st Airborne division in the 502 Infantry Regiment during deployment to Iraq in 2005. Black Hearts is a book which gives the reader the point of views the different types of stress a soldier goes through during a deployment both physically and especially mentally. The book goes in depth and paints realistic events throughout the deployment and the impact it had one specific company. In 2005, the Iraqi war was one…

public perceives its trusted guardians. In Black Hearts, Jim Frederick depicts a story of four 1st Platoon soldiers that commit one of the most heinous war crimes in U.S. history-the rape of a fourteen-year-old Iraqi girl and the cold-blooded execution of her and her family. It is hard to believe that such an abhorrent event could occur under the command of well-experienced and decorated leaders that so many soldiers have entrusted their lives with. Frederick does an excellent job depicting a well-rounded…

The story of the Black Hearts Brigade, told by Jim Frederick, starts out with the 1st Battalion of the 502nd Infantry Regiment of the 101st Airborne Division in the summer of 2005. The author starts with a brief chapter of the events that unfolded when four soldiers of this battalion went to a house, raped a girl and killed her and her family. In the first part of the book Frederick explains the grand strategy the US was taking in Iraq at the time, the history of the area named the triangle of death…

The book Black Hearts by Jim Frederick is an in-depth narrative about the 1st platoon, Bravo Company 1-502nd Infantry 101st Airborne Division deployed to Iraq in 2005. The leadership failures documented in this book range all the way from the general officer level down to the lowest private. LT general Ricardo Sanchez failed to understand the climate his command group was entering as they were deployed into Iraq. From then on the entire leadership failures continued to compound upon each other with…

The story of the Black Hearts Brigade is a dark and powerful one, but necessary for leaders to become familiar with. Army Leaders can benefit greatly by learning from the mistakes of their predecessors and thereby avoid making similar errors. In Jim Frederick’s book, Black Hearts, one of the most tragic moments of the war in Iraq is brought to light and discussed by soldiers firsthand. Their lessons could guide a future leader and help him or her prevent an atrocity like this…

The book Black Hearts begins by painting an awful picture of a crime scene that was reported to 1st platoon Bravo Company of the 1-502nd 101st Airborne Division. The soldiers that are sent to investigate find that an entire family has been murdered, the daughter had been raped, and someone attempted to set the house ablaze, the family had all been killed in a seemingly brutal execution, while investigating one of the NCOs found a shotgun shell which he thought was strange because most Iraqis do…

to rally his men when they were beaten and down. He demoralized his company commanders to the point where they were paralyzed with fear and could not lead their soldiers. Ultimately, Kunk failed to maintain positive command and control of his battalion leading to a failure in the overall mission they had been tasked with. The book Black Hearts is a narrative focused on telling the story of these failures. The author, Jim Fredericks, spent many months researching, interviewing soldiers and reading court…

The book Black Hearts is written by Jim Frederick and tells the story of all the controversial accounts one infantry unit ran into while on deployment in Baghdad, Iraq. The book is a documentation, captured accounts and events written down to tell the crazy story these soldiers went through. The specific unit Frederick writes about and what Black Hearts is about is 2nd brigade of the 101st airborne infantry division. “Black Hearts” was the unofficial insignia of 2nd brigade. Frederick covers one…

Black Hearts tells the story of a few bad soldiers from 1st platoon, Bravo company of the 1-502nd Infantry Battalion of the 101st Airborne Division, that was plagued with toxic leadership and lack of control over soldiers. The book documents the events that led to the ultimate demise of the soldiers involved in the horrific incident that occurred on March 12, 2006. Four soldiers were arrested in the brutal murder of an Iraqi family, which was a result of the lack of leadership and structure these…