Hmmm...

Normally, in a war themed novel, they start one of two ways.  Either it starts out at the beginning where the troops reach the destination or are being debriefed or sometimes even before that.  The other is when the author starts the story right in the middle of the action and in this case, Going After Cacciato, we jumped right into the middle.  Cacciato has left for Paris as it is rumored and we don't know why and the Third Squad is sent after him.

My initial reaction to the first couple pages were overwhelming due to the fact of all of the name dropping and the several names of characters that will most likely be important throughout the novel.  I attempted to distinguish them now rather than later before it gets confusing. 

Usually in a novel, the opening scene has a deeper meaning or a significance that is picked up towards the end of the novel.  Knowing there might be some significance, I analyzed the first couple pages and pulled out that death and names are a reoccurring theme or motif.  Everybody was dead and if you weren't, you probably had a disease or infection, specifically dysentery.  

Personally, I wanna know from the get-go why Cacciato has gone AWOL and why the hell any human being would ever deem that walking from Vietnam to Paris is even remotely possible.  Now, I know that Cacciato was referred to as Stupid in almost all ways imaginable, but my favorite was Doc simply stating "He's dumb, that's all." (6)