Hasford's book has an insider's salute of sorts to the others in his Marine unit who reported on the war and, on more than one occasion, joined it.  They're in the novel as characters, all grunts.
    Guys like Bob Bayer, now a copy editor for The Times, as Mr. Short-round, a platoon leader.  And Mike Stokey, now writing Tet, a screenplay.  He's Stoke the Supergrunt.
    The best-known of the cast:  Dale Dye, adviser and actor in the Oscar-winning Platoon.  Dye also is author of Run Between the Raindrops, which, like Hasford's book and Stokey's script, centers on the Marines' costly month-long battle for Hue after the Communist command's Tet Offensive in January, 1968.
    He's Daddy D.A. in The Short-Timers.