Review — Alpha

‘Alpha’ is the story of Navy SEAL Eddie Gallagher. You know, the one accused of murdering an ISIS prisoner in Iraq and was later acquitted when another SEAL took the stand and said he did it while having immunity. The book was written by David Philipps from the New York Times and it is pretty detailed and authoritative. That being said, I didn’t care for the book. I felt that Philipps didn’t leave it to the reader to decide if Gallagher was guilty or not. He makes the decision for you.

Philipps spares no expense in showing Gallagher’s flaws as a SEAL. In fact Philipps paints a picture that the SEALs, in general, have an overblown history and SEALs like Gallagher are from a so called pirate class where they believe they can do whatever they want when it comes to being in the theatre of war and that’s not ok. In this case, Gallagher disobeys orders and puts others at risk just to try and get into combat and gain medals.

The court case appears to have been mishandled by the prosecution from the start and there was undue influence from then President Trump to get Gallagher released. There were random other lawyers getting involved, immunity thrown around like rice at a wedding and what appears to be witness intimidation. That being said Gallagher was acquitted of the murder charge.

Philipps goes into a lot of detail about Gallagher and paints a picture that essentially makes him guilty for not only the murder of the prisoner but also of poor decisions and being a glory hunter. This is all before he even gets to the trial. I didn’t care for the perspective that Gallagher is a terrible person from page 1. I would have rather made my own decision on him and what he was accused of doing but Philipps kept pounding on the fact that Gallagher is terrible and guilty every single page to the point where it became annoying. I would have rather just had the facts, with some background and not the snide remarks from the author when he didn’t like something.

Bottom line is that this case didn’t make anything look good. Not the SEALs, not the chain of command, the military justice system and certainly not the thumb on the scale via Fox News and President Trump. It’s a sad story but one that could have been told better where the reader is left to make their own conclusions. I don’t recommend this book.