The city of Hue, South Vietnam, was the site of one of the fiercest battles of the Vietnam War. Three understrength U.S. Marine battalions, consisting of fewer than 2,500 men, attacked and soundly defeated overwhelming, entrenched enemy troops.
In December of 1944, the seemingly defeated Germans secretly mustered 600,000 battle-hardened troops, including whole SS Panzer Divisions, into an all out offensive to capture Antwerp, the heart of the Allied supply chain.
Everything went wrong in America's first test of whether the Japanese-held islands of the Pacific, the key steppingstones to the doorstep of Japan, could be captured by across-the-beach infantry assaults.
When Col. MacFarland arrived in Iraq's deadliest city, the odds could not have been worse. Al-Qaeda has arrogantly declared Ramadi, capital of a new caliphate. The boys of MacFarland's Ready First Combat Team would fight to give America a clear victory.