Slaight’s Israeli (Israeli?) girlfriend,nand, of course, the victim are heavednat the reader. Great gobs of verbiagenabout the “power structure” of “WoonPoo” are generated, bemoaning then”system” that builds men like GeneralnHedges and his accomplices, who rangenfrom the sadistic Major Grimshaw tonthe omnipotent Pentagon bureaucratnWilliam Beatty. Like all cover-ups lately,nthis one extends to the heart of ourngovernment, and, Truscott insists, tellsnus what manner of men we are.nTruscott dangles his string of slandersnof West Point through the novel on anseries of nearly independent vignettes,nwhich are at the same time digressions.nThey begin with small observations onnthe cruel life of the cadet: the brutalntreatment of Mr. Slaight by MajornGrimshaw; the pathological desperationnof cadets for female companionship. Thenformer is, of course, the time-honoredncomplaint of soldiers about squad leadersnand company commanders, and thenlatter, a rather conventional gripe ofnmale college students at isolated campuses.nThey are, nonetheless, ammunitionnfor Truscott in the rising crescendonof his anger at “the System.”nJr erhaps the most important of thenauthor’s staged obsessions is the WestnPoint honor code. He describes how thenmurder victim once used the code tonhound a fellow plebe out of the Academy.nIt is a grotesque caricature of thenpurpose of the code, but to Truscott,nhonor is not the end, but pusillanimity.nThe code is further used by GeneralnHedges and his henchmen in their attemptsnto crucify Slaight; like everythingnadmirable about West Point, it isntotally inverted in this book, twisted tonsymbolize not honor, but the grossestnvenality.nIn recent years “the honor code hasnbeen modified at West Point, and womennadmitted to the Academy. Thesenprofound renovations of life at the Pointnare irrelevant to the author of DressnGray; they would dilute the sensationalistnimpact of the book. To get aroundnthem, he sets the story back in the latensixties, at the old Academy, whenngraduating second lieutenants werenshipped routinely to Vietnam, and thenmyth of modern knighthood was morenplausible to the civilian world.nIt always was a myth, as the gravesnfinds in himself the ability to psychoanalyzenthe men who founded WestnPoint, and everyone who has attendednsince. To him, they live as a cult of fearnand dark compulsions.nWe read, in unnecessary capital letters,nabout the brusque treatment plebesn”.Mr. Tnisiott wishes o use his mncl rii siunv us w niiliiary establishnii-nindei’plv shaken ,iiid ciMTiipral. . . |hc| is LiKv;iys coriv inc’ing . . .'”n— Stir York- linws Bonk Revieirn. ill- ‘