copyright 1965; Crown Publishers, New York; hardbound; Book Club Edition; very good condition with unmarked pages; dust jacket very good with minimal fading and very minor edge wear.
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Moore, a Harvard classmate of Robert F. Kennedy, wanted to write about the United States Army Special Forces. It was Special Forces founder General William P. Yarborough who insisted that Moore go through the "Q Course" in order to better understand what made Special Forces "special." Moore trained with the soldiers at Fort Benning and Fort Bragg for nearly a year, becoming airborne qualified. He then accompanied them on a deployment to South Vietnam in 1963.
Moore's account included several controversial facts about Special Forces missions that were classified at the time, prompting Moore to publish his book as "fiction". One Special Forces officer in the opening chapter is "Captain Steve (Sven) Kornie", who was based on the Finnish expatriate Larry Thorne.[2] The chapter depicted a fierce battle in real life when Special Forces Detachment A-734, stationed in the Tịnh Biên District, was attacked; all members of the detachment were later awarded the Purple Heart for injuries sustained in the fighting.