CRY HAVOC

The Vietnam War rages as American operatives conduct secret missions in this military thriller.

In 1968, Navy SEAL Tom Reece is part of Recon Team Havoc in the highly classified Military Assistance Command, Vietnam—Studies and Observations Group, or MACV-SOG. They fight America’s covert war in Cambodia, Laos, and North Vietnam. But too much is going wrong—too many people are getting killed in the ops—and Reece believes there’s a mole back at military headquarters. Indeed, the Soviets are using military intelligence to undermine the U.S. war effort. They get unwitting help from an American National Security Agency employee who thinks it’s safe to share secrets with his West German lover and from North Korea’s capture of the spy ship USS Pueblo. Moscow’s mission is to stall U.S. involvement in Vietnam. They want to capture Americans and interrogate them in Siberia. Targeting MACV-SOG, they send in serial killer Adrik Voronin, who finds his calling as a KGB assassin. He’s a vicious beast and is responsible for one of the most graphic scenes in the story. Of course, the whole year is horrible for both sides. The January Tet Lunar New Year offensive catches Americans and South Vietnamese completely by surprise. Despite inflicting heavy casualties, the North suffers a military defeat. It’s America’s first televised war, though, and the Soviets expect a big public relations victory in the U.S. They get it. The author, an ex-SEAL himself, writes that this is his most heavily researched book, and it shows. It is a tale of brotherhood, betrayal, and bloodshed. One senses the futility of it all, more so after Tet, where even body counts and bravery ultimately count for little. The U.S. will be ensnared in Vietnam for seven more years, plenty of time for Tom Reece to serve and to fight in a few sequels. He is a brave and decent man who takes pain and dishes it out. No spoiler here—he survives, as his son James is the protagonist of seven more thrillers such as True Believer (2019).

Powerful, violent, and engrossing.