In a couple of weeks or so we’re releasing the first novel I published. It’s about the counterintelligence war in Vietnam. Today not many people are even aware that battle was fought, much less the constancy and intensity of it. That underscores the fact that the Vietnam war is as misunderstood today as it was then. I’m convinced that historians of the future will look at the swamp that is our present-day state of the nation and trace it directly back to that debacle. The book, TARGETS, is a microcosm of the times and the actions of those caught up in them. I haven’t changed a word of it for this new release. It wouldn’t be fair to me, much less to the reader. I want people to read the book in order to know the thoughts of the participants of that time. For anyone who lived through all that worldwide tumult, our perception of everything, including ourselves, was forever changed. I hear constantly that America lost its innocence in WWI. Similarly, I’m told America became a world power in WWII. I believe the Vietnam War stripped America of its sense of community. The novel explores how the characters change, just as the culture that produced them was changing. We seem to have shifted from a nation of individuals proud of our ability to work together into a nation of factions determined to rule. In that sense, TARGETS may present a clearer image of the war and the times than would a novel of firefights and massed troop engagements. The thoughts of a man advancing through hostile fire do not linger long on (nor do they probe deeply into) mankind’s role in the universe. Stalking another human being, on the other hand, provides one far too much free time to consider not only that man’s dreams, but one’s own.

Essentially, that’s the goal of the work, an examination of how professionals and amateurs, Americans and Vietnamese, responded to the cauldron of the Vietnam experience. In reviewing it for this release I was surprised and excited to recognize several themes paralleling today’s political upheaval. The decisions made by our most recent leaders are almost perfect replications of the stupidity that created the Vietnam war and led to our eventual loss there. Perhaps someone will read the book, recognize that rather nasty coincidence, and do something about it. That’d be nice.