Doorgunner (Soldier of Fortune)

Review Written By Bernie Weisz Historian, Vietnam War May 10, 2009 Contact: [email protected] Pembroke Pines, Florida USA Title of Review: "A Huey Door-Gunner's Participation in The 4/1970 Cambodian Invasion" This refreshing "fictionalized account" of the experience of a door-gunner during the Cambodian Incursion of U.S. Forces during the last few years of America's debacle in Vietnam is first rate!. The book was put out by the people of "Soldier of Fortune" Magazine. I was a bit leery of it at first, but this book turned out to have a very powerful kick full of truisms and factual occurrences that actually transpired during the U.S. foray into Cambodia in April, 1970 that made my trepidation of this book unwarranted. Very often I have read fictionalized accounts of the "Vietnam Experience" that were labeled as such to avoid naming individuals or events that involved still classified details. This could very much be one of them. I tried to find more of the author's literary contributions, but apparently this is the only literary effort Michael Williams ever wrote. I e-mailed "Soldier of Fortune" about who Mr. Williams was, with no response. Written in 1987, this book surrounds the glee and relief every American soldier in Vietnam expressed when then President Richard M. Nixon authorized an "incursion" into Cambodia in April, 1970. Across the hotly contested Vietnamese border were the Communist North Vietnamese sanctuaries along with their enormous caches of ammunition, medicine, rice, i.e. all the material that went down the Ho Chi Minh Trail for the enemy for usage against Americans! While Nixon and his emissary, Dr. Henry Kissinger had the attention of the media and the world on the Paris, France "Peace Talks", the "Policy of Vietnamization (turning the war from a joint "American-South Vietnamese" venture to solely the South Vietnamese alone e.g. "Asians fighting an "Asian War") and the complete withdrawal of American troops, American bombers and ground troops poured over the border to challenge the NVA in Cambodia, which up to this point had been "out of bounds." While not wanting to be a "plot spoiler", Mr. Williams (a "nom de guerre"?) uses this slice of American history as the backdrop to this ultimately tragic story of a Huey door gunner. Regardless of the degree of fiction vs. fact in this story, Mr. Williams surrounds this book with a rich detail of actual occurrences that will greatly enrich the student of this conflict's knowledge and understandi

שנה

1987

הוצאה

Tor Books

מהדורות

1

עמודים

320

ISBN

9780812512021

מקור הנתונים: Wikidata