Brette McKay here and welcome to another edition of the Art of Manliness Podcast.

So in American history and culture, we have our famous war heroes from the Civil War,

the Revolutionary War, World War I and World War II. These were men who were celebrated

for their acts of bravery in the battlefield, people like Sergeant York, George Washington, etc.

But it seems like these two most recent wars we've been involved in, the Afghanistan War

in the war in Iraq, we don't really have those sort of superstar heroes. But the thing is,

there's some really heroic things going on. There's some men who are doing just amazing things

and just dire situations. And our guests today wanted to find out why that is and he wanted to

correct that. His name is Mark Lee Greenblatt and he is the author of the book Valor Unsung Heroes

from Iraq, Afghanistan and the Home Front. And in today's podcast, Mark and I talk about like,

why don't we know more about some of these brave men who are fighting overseas in some of the

things that they've done. And then we talk about some of the men that he writes about in his book

and what they did and their acts of bravery and valor they displayed. And then we also talk about

what lessons we can learn from these men. So it's a fascinating podcast. I hope you tune in.

It's going to be a good one.

Mark Greenblatt, welcome to the show.

Well, thanks so much for having me on, Brett. I got to tell you before we start that I am such a huge,

huge fan of the Art of Manliness. I listen to podcasts all the time, Steve Pressfield,

interview was great about the turning pro and battle of thermopoli and everything like that.

It's just, this is great. This is one of my favorite things to listen to. So it's a real honor to

be on. Well, thank you very much. I'm very humbled. So your book is called Valor Unsung Heroes

from Iraq, Afghanistan and the Home Front. First off, what inspired you to write this book?

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