Review: Looking Forward to a Fleshed out Second Part
Rating: 3 out of 5
Date: 01 4, 2014
Collateral Damage – Red Flag by Gerald GreeneA love story and a war story all wrapped into one neat, well-written package describes Collateral Damage-Red Flag. Greene offers detailed, knowledgeable accounts of both military hardware used and civilian devastation involved in a potential near-future attack by China on Taiwan in about 2020.A down-trodden ex-serviceman and a wealthy Taiwanese beauty meet while the veteran of Afghanistan is making a stab at bettering himself in college after his honorable discharge from the military. They fall for each other despite large social differences in a testimony to the power of love. I would have liked to learn more about how each of them felt about falling in love. Their dialogues stated the reality, but left me wondering about feelings. Just after they move to Taiwan and witness the wholesale destruction of the island country from the mountain tops, they watch their relationship from a distance, commenting like broadcasters about both their feelings and the destruction around them.Surrounded by deeply researched knowledge of military hardware, the death knell of US sea power clangs after a carrier group is defenseless to stop a ballistic missile attack.  What is the US response? In a phone call, the Chinese leader apologizes and tones down the rhetoric and opens an inclusion zone around Taiwan and the US President acquiesces because he is afraid of confronting a China with a second strike capability. Maybe true, but wouldn’t a hint of a covert war have been more probable and interesting to read about.On a structural level, though I think serializing stories is a smart publishing strategy, it should be more clear that the short book is part of a series. The author introduced me to several interesting worlds, including detailed knowledge of the lives of American servicemen and women, and life in Taiwan under siege, but left me hanging. The facts are there to read, but the story left me wanting more depth.