Published: 1 December 2008
Air & Space Power
Journal - Winter 2008
Tempered Steel: The Three Wars of Triple Air Force Cross Winner Jim Kasler
by Perry D. Luckett and Charles L. Byler. Potomac Books (http://www.potomacbooksinc.com),
22841 Quicksilver Drive, Dulles, Virginia 20166, 2005, 320 pages, $22.36
(hardcover), $15.16 (softcover) (2006).
I’ve never known of another book’s title and subtitle that described its
protagonist so well. Tempered Steel: The Three Wars of Triple Air Force Cross
Winner Jim Kasler chronicles the heroic life of this Air Force colonel, a
jet-fighter ace during the Korean War and the only Airman in history to receive
three Air Force Crosses. This biography is a gripping account of a man whose
unparalleled commitment to “service before self” is something we should all
emulate.
Written by biographers Perry D. Luckett, a retired Air Force communications officer, and Charles L. Byler, an Air Force veteran who served under Kasler in 1965, Tempered Steel reads more like a Hollywood thriller than an ordinary biography. The authors’ extensive research of Kasler’s life is very apparent, and their powerful writing thrusts the reader into the tail-gun turret of a B-29 with the 18-year-old two-striper over Japan and, later, into the torture chambers of North Vietnam’s Hanoi Hilton with the now-40-year-old lieutenant colonel.
Luckett and Byler take the reader on a journey through Jim Kasler’s life, from his humble birth to an ordinary family in a small Midwestern town, through his amazing frontline battle experiences in Japan, Korea, and Vietnam. By delving deeply into Kasler’s life, showing the reader where the man behind the three Air Force Crosses came from, they successfully avoid writing a typical military biography that chronicles only the defining moments of a war hero’s life on the battlefield. For example, the authors explore the relationship with his wife, Martha, from the time that she “didn’t want to date a little guy” (p. 17) through their happy marriage, which produced three children, to those times when his family followed him around the country as he serves his nation wherever he is needed. Luckett and Byler also expose the reader to major turning points, such as the moment the nineteen-year-old Kasler realized his calling in life, sitting in the blister gunner’s seat of a B-29 Superfortress, returning to base after a successful bombing mission in Japan: “[He was] looking out over Saipan as they cruised home, when a P-51 fighter came swooping up and popped right in beside them. The pilot waved at him, then peeled off in a roll. Jim thought, Now that’s the way to fly! From that moment, Jim knew he wanted to be a fighter pilot” (p. 13).
If ever there was an Air Force equivalent to Saving Private Ryan, this is it. The book describes every moment in such minute detail that the reader can almost feel Kasler’s excitement and adrenaline rush as he destroys his fifth MiG over Korea and shouts over his radio, “Casey, I’m an Ace!” (p. 36). The writing is so convincing and powerful that we can almost feel the intense pain that Kasler felt, cringing as he endures literally hundreds of hours of torture, be it by shackling, whipping, starvation, or physical beatings for refusing to sell out his country by participating in North Vietnamese propaganda. The agony he endures is evident as he writes to his beloved wife while broken and battered, huddled in a jail cell in North Vietnam, praying that he would someday see her again: “What I do or what I am would mean nothing without you to share it with me. I have relived our life step by step in my daydreams and found it a wonderful experience to look back on our years together. I know we are going to have just as many more” (p. 121).
I imagine that Luckett and Byler were at least somewhat apprehensive when they took on this project. After all, it isn’t every day that a writer attempts to tell the story of a one-man Air Force or a man who went to Korea as an obscure lieutenant but left with considerable renown.
Kasler received praise from other notable Vietnam War heroes such as Senator John McCain, who stated in an interview, “I mean this with the utmost sincerity. I was no hero. I was privileged to serve in the company of heroes . . . like Jim Kasler. They were the ones who sustained me . . . who will always be my heroes” (p. 180). I believe that the authors have done a commendable job, and, judging by Colonel Kasler’s own contributions in an appendix (“Personal Reflection”), where he speaks on everything from the antiwar movement to future aircraft development, so has he. I only wish that the book had appeared before 2005. Such a powerful and compelling life story deserved to be told much sooner.
Tempered Steel is an absolutely riveting account of Jim Kasler, a true American hero. I enthusiastically recommend it to anyone, young and old, military or civilian. Any American with a pulse will have a hard time putting this book down, so pick a Saturday and clear your schedule because once you start reading, you won’t stop until you are sure that Colonel Kasler makes it out of Vietnam alive.
Cadet David L. Morgan, USAF
Air Force ROTC, University of Houston
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