Douglas Valentine Books

> > The Hotel Tacloban is a book I came to read after unknowingly reading
some of
> > Valentine's previous articles on the web, and then knowingly being
exposed to
> > an interview with him on Black Op Radio, not long after this government
> > unveiled Operation TIPS as a Homeland Security agency program, that
would help
> > helpful U.S. residents turn in their neighbors.
> > His appearance on the internet radio show pointed out the similiarity of
TIPS
> > to HIPS, the
> > "other way of saying" abbreviation for the genocidal program from the
60's and
> > 70's, in Viet Nam, called overall, Operation Phoenix, a program executed
by
> > the cia to root out Civilian dissenters, so that they could be
interrogated,
> > i.e. tortured & hideously executed under the umbrella consolidation of
25 or
> > more intellegence agencies called Phoenix.
> > The suggestion that Phoenix is a grandfather/mentor to Homeland
Security, and
> > a harbinger of things to come for the american citizen is more than a
> > possibility with a high probability .
> > "You have relatives in the homeland?"
> > The Hotel Tacloban is the beginning, a visit to the innocence of an
underage
> > soldier in ww2, (Valentine's father) and his encounter of the forces of
> > respect for military rank and where the beginnings of where real evil
takes
> > us.
> > A story that will stay with me for the rest of my conscious life. Honest
and
> > shocking.

The Hotel Tacloban is a book I came to read after unknowingly reading some of Valentine's previous articles on the web, and then knowingly being exposed to an interview with him on Black Op Radio, not long after this government unveiled Operation TIPS as a Homeland Security agency program, that would help helpful U.S. residents turn in their neighbors.
His appearance on the internet radio show pointed out the similiarity of TIPS to HIPS, the
"other way of saying" abbreviation for the genocidal program from the 60's and 70's, in Viet Nam, called overall, Operation Phoenix, a program executed by the cia to root out Civilian dissenters, so that they could be interrogated, i.e. tortured & hideously executed under the umbrella consolidation of 25 or more intellegence agencies called Phoenix.
The suggestion that Phoenix is a grandfather/mentor to Homeland Security, and a harbinger of things to come for the american citizen is more than a possibility with a high probability .
"You have relatives in the homeland?"
The Hotel Tacloban is the beginning, a visit to the innocence of an underage soldier in ww2, (Valentine's father) and his encounter of the forces of respect for military rank and where the beginnings of real evil takes us.
A story that will stay with me for the rest of my conscious life. Honest and shocking.
An emotional timebomb ... an appropriate introduction to Douglas Valentines thoughts & writings.

The Hotel Tacloban is a book I came to read after unknowingly reading some of Valentine's previous articles on the web, and then knowingly being exposed to an interview with him on Black Op Radio, not long after this government unveiled Operation TIPS as a Homeland Security agency program, that would help helpful U.S. residents turn in their neighbors.
His appearance on the internet radio show pointed out the similiarity of TIPS to HIPS, the
"other way of saying" abbreviation for the genocidal program from the 60's and 70's, in Viet Nam, called overall, Operation Phoenix, a program executed by the cia to root out Civilian dissenters, so that they could be interrogated, i.e. tortured & hideously executed under the umbrella consolidation of 25 or more intellegence agencies called Phoenix.
The suggestion that Phoenix is a grandfather/mentor to Homeland Security, and a harbinger of things to come for the american citizen is more than a possibility with a high probability .
"You have relatives in the homeland?"
The Hotel Tacloban is the beginning, a visit to the innocence of an underage soldier in ww2, (Valentine's father) and his encounter of the forces of respect for military rank and where the beginnings of real evil take us.
A story that will stay with me for the rest of my conscious life. Honest and shocking.
An emotional timebomb ... an appropriate introduction to Douglas Valentines thoughts & writings.

Based on exhaustive research and interviews, this detailed and extensively footnoted history of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics is both a fine reference work for scholars, and an eye-opening, exciting narrative for the general reader. The book itself is the highest quality, made to last for generations, and includes a section of rare photographs, and an appendix consisting of a rogue's gallery from the FBN's files. The FBN, headed by Harry J. Anslinger, was the precursor agency to today's DEA. The War on Drugs that has been waged for years now, with a price is no object mentality, is now being reconsidered by more and more people as either an ill-considered mistake, or perhaps even as a Big Government/Big Brother monkey on the public's fiscal back. The War has surely not stopped the supply of drugs, and if you have ever thought that it was never intended to, but wondered why that was so, The Strength of The Wolf, will provide some answers. There are many books about drug enforcement (or lack thereof) in the recent past, but this work is unique in that it looks at what might be called the dawn of drug enforcement.

Given how much money this country spends to fight drug dealers and to lock up drug dealers & users both, I am amazed how little I hear people question the War on Drugs.

This book provides the historical framework critical to understand this, with the War on Drugs beginning as an attempt to provide what equates to trade protection to the pharmaceutical companies (who competed with the real thing of the day, opium/heroin), and how later racism led to marijuana users being targeted as well (Black Americans in Harlem and Latinos in the SW and California), and of course the violence fueled by the cocaine/crack trade made it a national buzzword.

It is a crime that this assault on our own citizens continues today - one would think that after the dismal failure of Prohibition that we would have learned our lesson.

Hopefully this book can start raising a consciousness to question it, at the very least more public debate (without the hysteria) is long overdue.

This is a fascinating & highly educational book. It is not too complicated though very detailed; a novice can understand. The book is "too cool".

The previous review said more than I can rightfully
say here but I will ad that Tom's show, Midas Report-
True Health is very good as well. Check it out at:
9.985 mhz or 9.970 mhz shortwave one, Mondays and
Wednesdays, 3-4 p.m., WWCR, Nashvegas, TN.

I found yhis book very informative, it gives interesting accounts on every part of the body by recognising responses in the muscles. It gives plain explanations and easy guidedlines to follow, this would assist a student to be able to recognise step by step and help them to recieve messages about healthy or unhealthy parts of the body.' It would also help them to form an opinion as how to help the patient and follow thru with medication in erbel therepies and also make the patient aware of the bodies functions. This book has been thouroughly written with thought, and easy to read and understand without getting very technical.

This book is designed to give readers an introduction to muscle testing used in health assessment and treatment. It is written for the patient rather than as a guide for practitioners, and thus focuses mainly on what treatments are like, what they can accomplish, and what can be expected from these approaches. This book is useful for its intended purpose, but doesn't provide a clear understanding of the science behind kinesiology or ways of developing skills as a practitioner to make therapeutic use of this.

I used this book to get a better background in applied kinesiology principles to help me with my research into the body mechanics and kinesiology of the martial arts. I am a karate, kung fu, and kali/escrima teacher who has developed some ideas especially about punching and kicking techniques, so I thought I'd make a few comments on that, as this book was very helpful in discussing current theory and practice and helping me to sharpen my own ideas on the subject, especially in regard to the analysis of rapid-fire punching techniques.

There are several mechanisms that need to be discussed. The first thing is that rapid-fire punching requires instantaneously unloading the intrafusal muscle spindles by the use of contralateral inhibition of flexor-extensor pairs. This is a well-understood spinal cord reflex, and just means that muscle viscosity and normal muscle-tension dynamics are inhibited and optimized. In terms of the neural pathways, this is mediated by two nerve tracts, the neospinalthalamic and the paleospinalthalamic tracts, or the alpha and gamma motor efferent systems, respectively. But basically, in muscle kinesiology circles, this is known as a "plyometric jerk," and is one way that basketball players use to jump higher.

The second thing is that after the first punch, there are released massive shaking forces which propagate through the various musculo-skeletal systems in a quasi-resonant fashion which can be used to facilitate the acceleration and launch of the next punch in the sequence. These, as you might expect, are very difficult dynamics to control, being nonlinear in their behavior, but it is possible to re-sequence the muscles involved in such a punching series to take advantage of them. I have had some success in setting up "standing waves" to take advantage of this phenomenon. Standing wave may not be quite right, from a neuromuscular control standpoint, as it is perhaps more like stochastic resonance, since it can be shown that the muscle fibers use a process known as recruitment which is quite statistical mechanical in nature.

Third, the overall muscle mechanics of such a sequence must use a massive, avalanche-like, pulse-oriented "starting focus" to launch the technique, after which it essentially goes "ballistic" for most of the trajectory of the punch, until final termination when normal "ending focus" is applied. From a practical standpoint, this means the punches are bouncing off the endpoints of the punch, which are strongly focused, but with nothing much in the way of tension in-between. This method also eliminates the wasteful, continuous power-utilization curve that most even very experienced black belts use when they punch. This is okay for a one or two punch combo, but not for much beyond that, because this method of coordinating the muscles will impede the necessary fast switching constants that the nervous pathways require to make this work. The neural pathways involved in this are known as the alpha and gamma-motor efferent systems, and their workings are well understood by neurobiologists.

This book was a great read. I didn't want to put it down. Valentine really knows how to keep you in suspense. The only problem I had was that I doubted some of his research and he tended to go off on conspiracy theories. But then you have to remember Valentine was interviewed on Oct 17 2001 for a South African Muslim Radio show. This happened after the many tragic deaths due to Anthrax and after the Terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center. The interviewer ask Valentine if the CIA could responsible for sending Anthranx to American People. Valentine said "CIA happens to be the prime suspect in all these incidences, and the CIA may have a very good reason for sending, and I don't know that it is doing it, but hypothetically speaking, it may well be that the CIA sent the Anthrax letters to the individuals in the US simply to perpetuate the hysteria in the US." When I read that, much of "TDY" suddenly lost credibility. Other than that it reads ok.

1.
TDY = "Temporary Duty".
2.
Work of fiction.
3.
Contact author by mailto:redspruce@douglasvalentine.com
4.
Before you enlist go to objector.org and see consequences.
5.
Douglas Valentine has a new title forthcoming in 2004-May;
ISBN: 1858945681
"THE STRENGTH OF THE WOLF:
The Secret History of America's War on Drugs" (nonfiction).
6.
In J Heller's "Catch-22", Yossarian identifies the enemy as
ANYONE LIKELY TO GET HIM KILLED.
7.
Jst because you're paranoid doesn't mean that they're NOT
out to get you...
8.
I rated this book 4 stars rather than 5 because the subject is
war-related, and therefore unappetizing; otherwise, the work
"TDY" is a good read.

Doug Valentine has really impressed me with his writing. The story itself is very spellbinding if you are at all interested in military covert operations. But not as important as the superb was the tale is unwoven.

Before going to bed I made the mistake of thinking I could just read the first chapter... I could not put the book down until I finished at 5:00 am. And after the gut wrenching toll on my emotions, I was thanking myself to be alive after what I just went through. The attention to detail gave me, and everyone I have lent the book to, the same reaction. You felt you were right there in the moment. I don't give this review lightly, it is that riveting!

The story is based on a real incident somewhere in Southeast Asia. No need to give the plot away, but if you want to hear the author discuss this book. An archived interview is posted at Black Op Radio.

This is the kind of book that you will want to lend to a friend the minute you finish the last page.

I doubt you will ever volunteer for any kind of 'temporary duty' after reading this.

I highly recommend this book.

Len Osanic osanic@prouty.org

The author's intent is very obvious, however, his structure is too detailed in facts that clouded the issues by making a boring and difficult read. The flow and continuity were just not there. I am quite surprised the editor did not have a field day rewriting much of his work.

One reviewer writes: "It is a sad but telling fact that the CIA's secret supporters have managed to suppress this book"...

Hmmm. If the book is "suppressed," then why can you buy it on Amazon? (In fact, a REPRINT of the original version!)

Maybe the answer is in my motto: never trust anyone, esp. an "author," who talks about himself in the third person. :)

I regret that I purchased this book. Douglas Valentine demeans the HEROISM of two close personal friends that were part of the Phoenix program. After many years of silence both have shared their experiences with me. Both were wounded several times and have continuing disabilities to this day. The Viet Cong atrocities that each discovered over and over are treated lightly or not at all by Valentine. Neither friend committed any atrocities, ordered any atrocities committed or witnessed any atrocities committed by U.S. or friendly forces. Each friend relives the death of every enemy soldier they killed nightly in their dreams. They never killed in anger or unjustly.

Valentine's book quotes many persons that are either malcontents, liars, Viet Cong spies, or fictional persons with no actual service record.

The book reads like a very dry high school history text. It meanders back and forth through time with little continuity. Valentine's agenda to discredit "Real Soldier's" who served their country is obvious. I forced myself to read this entire book only to find it a "Complete Waste Of Time."

This book is an excellent imitation of a historical work, but falls apart in light of Valentine's own methodology and the actual historical work done by real historians. The text comprises a tenuous web of interviews and dubious sources, including a surprising amount from known frauds Elton Manzione and Kenneth Osbourne. To maintain his belief that the US government supports evil for evil's sake, Valentine makes a great number of unfounded accusations, and astute readers will notice that his most controversial claims come with no footnote whatsoever. A professional writer, Valentine was able to ape historical writing very well, and unfortunately the conspiracy theorists who patronize his work are ready to believe anything on scant evidence.
Readers interested in the truth about the Phoenix Program would be much, much better served by consulting Andrade's Ashes to Ashes or Moyar's Phoenix and the Birds of Prey. First-person accounts are provided by Herrington in his Stalking the Vietcong or by Cook in his The Advisor. All of these researched, reputable works contradict Valentine's portrayal of the program, and remedy to some extent the damage his work has caused to the historical record and to men who fought in Vietnam.

After having read Douglas Valentine's essay on how the Phoenix is coming home to roost via Homeland Security on his website, I decided to look into his book, The Phoenix Program. Besides his comprehensive, journalistic coverage of the details involved with the program, unafraid to uncover the deeds of all sides involved, two things impressed me even more.

First, this type of book usually has alphabet soup groups, projects and missions labeled with acronyms, and so many individuals' names woven through that I grow weary of reading half way through, if that far. Not so with Valentine's opus. Somehow he presents all these details in a readable fashion, which if you begin from the beginning, unfolds those normally boring and confusing details without losing the reader. At least not this one, who is easily confused by such matters.

Second, and even more impressive were his interviews. It was more like watching a good documentary than reading. Valentine conveyed the characters and their personalities so that they became real people to me, and he let them tell their stories in a very human, honest way. At times even touching, those interviewed were equally human regardless of rank, station, deed or misdeed. It's rare that an interviewer gets the interviewee's real voice and viewpoint. Great stuff, really soulfull and heartfelt. Read it and check out his article on his website, the Phoenix Program is not just history, and it's not just Vietnam.

My review in three words? Don't buy it.

This is the kind of story that interests me. Unfortunately, the author is no author. As a soldier, I sure he is the best, but his storytelling ability leaves a lot to be desired. I'm not interested in the exact names of the places involved, nor do I need the exact locations of everything in the control perimeter. I want stories about the events that took place. Not the background fluff and filler. I'm halfway thru this book, and it hasn't gotten my attention or interest, yet. I can't even finish it. The only good thing about this book, are the pictures. They had some interest, to me.

I wonder how John McCarthy feels about Dan Marvin using his (McCarthy's) experiences in Vietnam and thereafter to rationalize Marvin's controversial claims (see the video).

McCarthy's words of six years ago* (see below) are almost prescient:

"It is my desire that you not include my name or the circumstances of my personal predicament...or the circumstances under which these occurred in your own personal writings of your own adventures in Vietnam."

As far as this book is concerned: caveat emptor.

Allan Eaglesham

*Lifted from
http://www.jfklancerforum.com/dc/dcboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=3&topic_id=2975&mesg_id=2975&listing_type=search

-------------------------------------------------

From: John McCarthy
To: marvin@trineday.com
Cc: ray kohlman ; larry odaniel
Sent: Monday, August 19, 2002 1:10 PM
Subject: Erroneous Online Assertions


Ltc Dan Marvin

Dear Dan,

This email will confirm our conversation by phone last evening, August 18, 2002.

I was utterly astounded to read an internet posting at:

http://expendableelite.com/

In an article attributed to you titled; "The Unconventional Warrior, by LTC Dangerous Dan Marvin, Part Three - Orders to Kill, dated August 16, 2002, in paragraph five, line 7, you wrote the following sentence:

"This fact, coupled with similar information that fellow Green Beret Captain John McCarthy told me of a failed CIA/Miami Mafia "Hit" on JFK in Florida during the President's visit there prior to his fatal trip to Dallas, confirmed the conspiracy in my mind."

When I questioned the veracity of your sentence and its attribution to me you said you had a memo of record on the matter and immediately began reading your memo. No where in your memo is the word or phrase, "CIA /Miami Mafia "Hit"." I have never used this name and phrase in any conversation with you or anyone else. I find your rendition of our 1995 conversation to be whole cloth fabrication. Your fabrication places me as a prognosticator for the events in Dallas, Texas, on November 22, 1963. I would certainly hope that the remainder of your conclusions in your manuscript stand the test of time with respect to accuracy. Your interpretation of our 1995 conversation posted on August 16, 2002, gives new meaning to the name "Dangerous Dan" Marvin.

Then you immediately started reading from an online document reference an NSC meeting in June of 1966 in which LBJ directs the CIA and State Department to cease and desist all support for Khmer Serei operations in Cambodia. This document is from the LBJ Presidential Library in Austin, Tx, and is available on line. It is incomprehensible to me how you wish to justify your mis-characterization of your online posting of August 16, 2002, with this document.

I demand an immediate correction, removal and clarification of the above mentioned August 16, 2002, posting on www.expendableelite.com and any other .com posting, periodical, and other promotional means for your soon to be published book. It is my desire that you not include my name or the circumstances of my personal predicament with respect to any pending litigation I have before the US Courts or the circumstances under which these occurred in your own personal writings of your own adventures in Vietnam. However, if you choose to quote from the public record with respect to my personal dealings with various agencies of the US Government, I strongly suggest that you and your publisher/editor check with my attorney as to pending civil action in those areas.

You are aware, I'm sure, that your August 16, 2002 posting has made it to numerous Special Forces Web sites. One of these sent the above referenced article to me.

You are now on Notice, that if the above corrections are not made, a civil action for libel will be filed against you and your publisher. It is also my desire that you not use my name in the promotion of your book.

A copy of this email is being sent to my attorney, , Esq. I strongly suggest that any and all further correspondence to me be sent to Mr. ---- at his office at: --------

I would also advise you to inform any prospective publisher/editor of your manuscript of this Demand Letter. By law, you are required to do so.

Sincerely,

John J McCarthy

Watch Video Here: http://www.amazon.com/review/RC0438YG67B0Q Expendable Elite: One Soldier's Journey into Covert Warfare

Marvin's book is well-written and detailed. What he reveals is typical CIA maneuvering from that era. I do not understand why the Special Forces Association attacked him. All they did was draw attention to the book.

I finished reading Lt. Colonel Daniel Marvin's book Expendable Elite recently. I'm flabbergasted by the criticism some have voiced regarding their mistaken opinion that most of what he writes about is fabrication.
I'm not a military person and don't have a background in military affairs, but I don't need that experience to conclude unequivocally that this book is truthful, accurate, and real. First of all, I lived through
the debacle of the Johnson Whitehouse and the despicable way in which he attempted to manipulate public opinion during the Vietnam War. Secondly,
he and all of his associates and aides knew how important it was for our military forces to attack the enemy in their staging grounds in Cambodia. Of course, we didn't do that effectively and that in itself was a major reason why we lost the war but never lost a battle. Thirdly, logic is all one needs to understand to know that the depiction of events, details, military actions, humanitarian gestures, and so much more in this book could never have been fabricated. And then, too, how about the court trial and the unanimous deciscion in favor of the lieutenant colonel and his publisher. Was the court's decision a fabrication too?
Nonsense! What you will read in this book is what happened to a very loyal, conscientious, honorable, and brave soldier. What history has already said and will continue to report about Johnson and Westmoreland is that they were bumbling idiots. Lastly, do any of you really believe that the United States government, regardless of which party is in power at the moment, is immune from covert assasination attempts and the inevitable coverups which follow them whether they are successful or not?
If you do, you are living in a world of fantasy. Our government leaders
are human beings who are just as susceptible to intrigue, duplicity, and illegal actions as any other political leaders. It's generations far in the future who will, maybe, find out what really happened in Korea, in Vietname, in Cambodia, in Iraq, and so on...

On a positive note, I found this book to be extremely information, detailed, and heart-warming. The book is informative on more than one level. First, I remember the controversy about whether or not the U. S. military should or should not enter Cambodian territory. I also remember that the Johnson Whitehouse tried very hard to make everyone believe that the U. S. forces would never do such a thing. Your explanation of how critical it was to attack and silence the VC forces in their protected staging areas was eey-opening. On another level, the interaction you had with that CIA agent was more than informative; it was darn right frightening. I've only heard of stories about our government attacking its own troops or getting other forces (Vietname forces in this case) to attack us. I don't think I ever believed it was true. Well, there is no doubt in my mind now! On a third level, this book was informative because I had not knowledge of the Hoa Hao people and their culture. Also, I didn't know that our special forces did so much humanitarian work: construction projects, hospital and medical assistance, etc...

The book is detailed in a positive sense. It describes the military engagements, the meetings with the Vietnam major, the humanitarian projects, the various outposts and military strategies, the daily routine of the special forces, and the plans for military success. Specific details about the men under your command are also given. How in the world they could have decided to turn against you is beyond my understanding. I know you explained what you believe caused them to do so, but I just don't understand the decision to defame you. Loyalty is a man's honor. These men had served you and their mission and their country well, but their honor sure didn't withstand the test of time and politcal pressure.

I mentioned that the book was heart-warming because I was impressed with how loving and caring the Hoa Hao group of people were toward you personally and toward the efforts of lyour men to assist them.

I would consider it an honor to shake your hand Dan. That will probably never happen since I'm way out here in CA, so, as a substitute, please accept my personal thanks and praise for your service, commitment, courage, and determination to do what was right for your men, our country, the Hoa Hao people, and me, a fellow citizen of the greatest country on Earth.

I agree with the recent review that says he bought it because the detractors did not disprove the authors exploits. While it is almost impossible to prove a negative, it seems as though it should be relatively easy to discredit the author if he is being untruthful; and apparently a jury agreed. This mans experiences remind me of the treatment that Terry Reed, the covert CIA operative and Air Force intelligence veteran, got when he attempted to expose the agency using his company for drug trafficking out of Mena; while Reagans' administration was telling our kids to just say no.
Anyone who doesn't or won't believe that the Presidency is co-opted from Langley is delusional. I found this book to be very credible and supported by facts and evidence. Where is the other sides info?!

Since this was a true story of what happened in World War II, I learned lot of our history in that war. Good buy if anyone is a history buff like me.

Looking at other Amazon reviews this book has reviews from very good to very bad. I was expecting to be somewhere in the middle but it turned out to be quite a bit better than I expected. I would say it is worth reading if you come across it.

Until recently, I thought that this book could be safely ignored as a pathetic, misleading blot on the broad canvas of POW history.

As other reviewers have noted, the Publisher (Angus & Robertson) has added a disclaimer that, "...it has not been possible to prove that the events did occur". Actually, A&R only added this inadequate note (in small type) after an eminent Australian history professor warned them that the book was packed with historical errors and was undoubtedly fiction.

However, right now in 2008, one can see many Internet sites where Douglas Valentine is still presenting his Tacloban fiction as if it was history. Even more worryingly, these websites are being used to vilify the record of a genuine Prisoner of War, presidential candidate John McCain. In response, I'd like Amazon readers to be clear on how much of "Hotel Tacloban" they should accept as historical truth. The answer is ZERO percent.

I'm an Australian. I've worked in the Philippines and personally hiked in the battlefields of New Guinea that Valentine purports to describe. I've researched extensively on POW history and I've also had an academic article published in the USA describing the detection of historical fraud. I'm very familiar with the archival material that can be used to check works such as "Hotel Tacloban".

Other reviewers are correct that this book "reads well". - Yes, exactly like polished fictional prose, not oral history! The landscapes described in Northern Papua are quite wrong. The grassy and swampy coastal plains are portrayed as "mountains" with "rainforest". The vicious siege of the Japanese at Buna in November 1942 is described as some sort of minor patrol action. Valentine obviously didn't bother to properly read the history books that he lists in his bibliography, which accurately describe this country and these battles, where the Australian Army and the US Army fought and died. Valentine's laxity is disrespectful in itself.

Valentine describes his father walking for "days" after captivity (but the Japanese pocket was only a few hundred yards deep!) and then being calmly loaded into a Japanese freighter. No Japanese freighters were anywhere near the Buna siege area in November 1942. The Allies dominated the sky. So every aspect of the purported capture and evacuation of Valentine's father is quite impossible.

It just doesn't ring true that Valentine or his father have ever set foot in Papua. (At one point Valentine lets slip that his father's record says he was in the 375th Harbor Craft Company. This unit actually departed the USA in 1944 and briefly transited through Hollandia in Dutch New Guinea before moving to - surprise, surprise - Tacloban in the Philippines, after the US Leyte landings. In 1944, Valentine Snr. would have been at the legal enlistment age of 18, rather than Valentine's implausible "16" in 1942. (The photo of Valentine's dad on the paperback cover of "Hotel Tacloban" shows him in front of a 1944-pattern US tent, but looking fit and still in possession of the front teeth that the Japanese had supposedly knocked out!)

More dire narrative problems emerge when the book re-locates to the purported Tacloban POW camp in the Philippines and its "interesting" Australian occupants. Unfortunately for Valentine, The Australian War Memorial clearly states that no Australian POWs were held in the Philippines! The names of Valentine's key characters *cannot* be found in Australia's Veterans Affairs database. The US NARA database also shows no released US POW named "Douglas VALENTINE", and no US military POWs liberated anywhere on the island of Leyte. There is no evidence that Valentine Snr. ever experienced captivity in the hands of the Japanese at all.

The depictions of the Australians in the POW camp are laughably divorced from reality. Valentine certainly has never lived with any Australians. Instead we get ridiculous sheep-shagging caricatures! The dialogue sounds wrong. The nicknames sound wrong. The descriptions of life in Australia sound dead wrong.

There is no "Major R. L. Cumyns" (Valentine's murder victim) buried in any Commonwealth war grave anywhere in the world, let alone the Philippines. If Valentine was going to make up a key character name like this, then he shouldn't have chosen one that's so easy to disprove! (And Cumyns sounds like a caricature straight out of the movie "Bridge on the River Kwai".)

Valentine's description of the POW camp itself is also hokey - the local geography sounds wrong; he gets the wet season five months out in timing; and the buildings are too small, with the wrong construction for a former Philippine Army camp. Also, in contrast to every other POW memoir that I've ever read, "Hotel Tacloban" almost ignores the captors, the Japanese. There is no mention of Japanese-language commands or essential camp procedures such as bowing, which were life-and-death matters for POWs. It's pathetic that Valentine couldn't make a better job of creating a fictional POW camp, when his bibliography lists six excellent POW memoirs. He simply can't have read them..

And don't get me started on "The Enforcer" and his devilish five-minute torture sessions! (On the positive side, the wild inaccuracies of this book at least show that Valentine is not a plagiarist!)

Finally, some choice quotes from Douglas Valentine himself:

"... when I write, it is too hard to write the truth..." Frontispiece quotation page xv.

" ...Fooling an audience into believing the most preposterous, the most blatant of fictions, through an elaborate fabrication of plausible half-truths and downright deceptions, was a Digger's highest level of achievement..." p39.

"... at the risk of being called anti-Asiatic or racist by enlightened people, I must confess that for many years I secretly wished that more bombs had been dropped on Japan..." p69.

As an historian who had devoted some 15,000 hours researching and documention the Pacific POWs, I can say, unequivacably, the the story is PURE fiction.
Valentine conflates numerous actual events to this make believe story about a POW. No record exists, any where, that his father was on such a patrol, that such a POW camp existed or that any of the named POWs existed.

It is a good "yarn" but don't ever call it history. It demeans tha valor and honor of thousand of American and allied POWS who suffered and died for your freedom. To even infer it is true is disgraceful

Amazon.com is wrong when it says my book is out of print and that a picture of the dust jacket is not available. The Hotel Tacloban is published by iUniverse.com as an Author's Guild Backinprint book. You can get it by going to my website and clicking on the dust jacket for the Hotel Tacloban, which will take you directly to iUniverse.com, where you can order the book.

Like others have said, this book doesn't pass the "b.s." test.

The book starts off suspiciously with the canned "emotionally-scarred-soldier-struggling-with-PTSD-years-later" scene we've all seen in the movies, then very quickly devolves from the improbable to, by around p. 85, the absolutely unbelievable. Never being told you're actually in sniper school? Getting orders to take out two people with similar identifying facial scars? Conveniently having absolutely no records to support your story? Being sent to execute Buddhist monks by . . . a Buddhist monk? Come on.

Even when viewed as a work of fiction, the writing comes off as cliched and repetitive. After reading the phrases "I realized then that I was expendable" and "I knew I was never getting out alive" approximately 100 times apiece, you too will wish you had saved your money.

It takes a special brand of courage to operate as a sniper in combat - but Gary Mitchell displayed greater courage in telling his story. This book is absorbing and is the first 'real' portrayal of post traumatic stress syndrome that I have read. Every war produces many unsung heroes - Gary Mitchell is one of them.

I had great hopes in enjoying a book about the sniper's world as pertains to the CIA and its contracting out shooters from the ranks..having met a few through my years overseas. As it was I found the copy more of a recollection of events that are lost to history and emotional blocking: it was way too convenient memory-wise to have the first two kills both have scars above the eye--the officer and the woman...please!

Still, I can recommend this book, as I found it to have a similar PTSD section to my own memoir that is also available on Amazon. I like the variety in letter responses from different PhDs specializing in the recognition of PTSD and treatment...which is what I can see resulted in Mitchell's book...considering the topic I sure wish I could give it more stars, but this was very thin in description and clarity of rememberance...a very far departure from Valentine's co-written pieces.

I would suggest getting this book, as I did, to read the PTSD and then resell it on Amazon, which is what I'm preparing to do right now...the 3 stars are mainly for the PTSD section.

In "A Sniper's Journey" Gary Mitchell (with Michael Hirsh) lays out a supposed story about a small-town Texas youngster, new to the Army, who is pulled into the Phoenix covert program as a sniper in Viet Nam. In fairness, the reviewer is far more familiar with the Marine's program, but this overall story simply did not seem to ring true to a real sniper's techniques and mental processes from that long-ago time.

Possibly as much as a third of the book deals with Mitchell's domestic problems with his wives and for filler, outlined a primer on PTSD. All this was "part of his journey" I suppose, but of marginal interest to outsiders.

We should thank Mr. Mitchell for his 24-year service to our country, but in respect for the fine Army snipers, the great Carlos Hathcock and other 'Corps "One Shot-One Kill" shooters from the past, I cannot recommend this book.

Whenever I see a veteran start to opine about his PTSD, it sends up a red flag for me, especially when mixed with assassination stuff.

The book deals with a guy who was selected for a very short sniper school while in Vietnam, and he then is sent into the field in order to basically assassinate people. He also claims the word "sniper" was never once used during his training.

As I read on, my suspicions were confirmed when he described being assinged to the "2nd Battalion, 7th Infantry", (in the 1st Cav Div), which he also described as "the Garry Ownen battalion". Now those two gaffes right there show me he's a poseur. And I don't think you can hang that one on his ghost writer, who also allegedly was in VN.

He also slipped up later, when he described being shown a photo of his intended target, who had a scar over his eye. After dispatching that guy, a couple missions later he looks through his scope and identifies a female he is supposed to snipe, and he recognizes her by a scar over her eye. Oops! The other thing is: you can not expect me to believe that he could just be given a photo to examine for a few seconds. That's ridiculous.

Yeah, the book is a joke and the last half of it has a bunch of useless filler about PTSD etc.