This novel is set in the very center of the time of most difficult combat experienced by a United States Marine Corps rifle company. A second lieutenant, only days from training back in the states is ordered, under fire, to assume command of a company of cast off Marines, all out in the brutal bloody jungle because of the either the worst of luck or the most minor of offenses or infringement. The outnumbered and little supported company is at constant war with vicious units of the North Vietnamese Army while at the same time tearing itself apart every night in deadly encounters between its racially mixed elements.