Fred Herrin

Tour of Duty 1967 Fred Herrin

Bradley E. Scott has been assigned to a Navy Sea Bee unit in the most active area of the Vietnam war. His job is to pay Navy personnel. He soon receives a more important and more dangerous assignment involving a secretive organization and an enticing female correspondent. Things become complicated quickly leaving Scott confused as to who and what can be trusted. People are dying everyday in brutal ways, but who is killed by the North Vietnamese army and guerillas and who is targeted by other operatives? Russians? While accomplishing the day job as a dispersing agent traveling all through I Corps near the DMZ, Scott meets an old college friend, now a correspondent and soon becomes enamored with her while knowing she's a potential spy. Is she being paid to sleep with him or is she really the woman she presents herself to be? This fast paced story will take you to the jungles of 'Nam whether you've been there or not. You will reel with the realization of what our young men endured. The daily shelling, the constant threat of attack, the fear and shock and noise, making even the silence deadly. You will not understand how anyone could emerge whole after the images they witnessed. Bradley comes to the realization that the man in the foxhole next to him may actually be a spy authorized to kill to save a mission that's unknow to Bradley. Herrin writes an amazing story based partly on actual experiences during his tour in Vietnam as the man who traveled from one dangerous place to the next paying Navy personnel. He points out with subtlety the confusion that was Vietnam and describes how Americans persevered knowing their survival was by no means certain. This book is incredibly insightful, sad and revealing about a time that no one should have experienced. A war that left doubt and confusion more than other wars. It is a must read for any thrill seeker or military buff.