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TDY
A CIA thriller based on a true Vietnam War story.
This novel by Douglas Valentine, author of the nonfiction best seller The CIA as Organized Crime, is based on a true story, one told to him in his youth by his father, and barely, yet grippingly, fictionalized here.
In early 1967, a bored, adventurous photojournalist on an Air Force base in Texas is offered a Temporary Duty (TDY) assignment somewhere overseas. The mission is steeped in secrecy, but Pete is promised a large bonus and hazardous duty pay. So he agrees.
He and a small group of photojournalists, each with a special skill, are isolated on a Special Forces base where they are kept under constant surveillance by a group of highly trained and menacing soldiers. The small band of 12 men is flown overseas on a transport plane large enough for 120 men. They are never told where they are going, until they arrive. And when they finally reach their destination, the mission that unfolds is terrifying beyond anything Pete ever imagined.
TDY tells how “black operations” are organized and conducted. Meticulous in detail, and accurate in every aspect of “over the fence” missions deep into enemy territory, it reveals for the uninitiated the skill, determination, and self-sacrifice of American soldiers.
In stark contrast to the honor and commitment of these soldiers, TDY reveals the unimaginable duplicity and corruption of powerful men for whom American soldiers and civilians are pawns in a ruthless game.
Written in sparing prose, TDY is a story of Pete’s journey through the underworld and his awakening to the reality of the Vietnam War and the CIA role in Southeast Asia.
This novel by Douglas Valentine, author of the nonfiction best seller The CIA as Organized Crime, is based on a true story, one told to him in his youth by his father, and barely, yet grippingly, fictionalized here.
In early 1967, a bored, adventurous photojournalist on an Air Force base in Texas is offered a Temporary Duty (TDY) assignment somewhere overseas. The mission is steeped in secrecy, but Pete is promised a large bonus and hazardous duty pay. So he agrees.
He and a small group of photojournalists, each with a special skill, are isolated on a Special Forces base where they are kept under constant surveillance by a group of highly trained and menacing soldiers. The small band of 12 men is flown overseas on a transport plane large enough for 120 men. They are never told where they are going, until they arrive. And when they finally reach their destination, the mission that unfolds is terrifying beyond anything Pete ever imagined.
TDY tells how “black operations” are organized and conducted. Meticulous in detail, and accurate in every aspect of “over the fence” missions deep into enemy territory, it reveals for the uninitiated the skill, determination, and self-sacrifice of American soldiers.
In stark contrast to the honor and commitment of these soldiers, TDY reveals the unimaginable duplicity and corruption of powerful men for whom American soldiers and civilians are pawns in a ruthless game.
Written in sparing prose, TDY is a story of Pete’s journey through the underworld and his awakening to the reality of the Vietnam War and the CIA role in Southeast Asia.
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First published September 14, 2000
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About the author
Douglas Valentine
18 books117 followersDouglas Valentine is the author of four books of historical nonfiction: The Hotel Tacloban, The Phoenix Program, The Strength of the Wolf: The Secret History of America's War on Drugs, and The Strength of the Pack: The Personalities, Politics and Espionage Intrigues that Shaped the DEA. He is the author of the novel TDY, and a book of poems, A Crow's Dream. He is also the editor of the poetry anthology With Our Eyes Wide Open: Poems of the New American Century (West End Press, 2014). He lives with his wife, Alice, in Massachusetts.
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
February 29, 2020
As an amateur naturalist and natural history painter I lean toward gaining a holistic understanding of an organism’s behavior in its environment so I can visualize it accurately. Likewise I look to historical accounts to gain knowledge based on primary source experiences, observations and factual evidence. Valentine’s telling of Pete’s story in TDY delivers all the goods with impact.
I think we need to let the psychological damage and sacrifice the book’s anti-hero endured and endures to this day sink in. It’s too easy to encamp on an ideological island (without empathy) when we face the harsh realities of the Vietnam War and its lingering effects. The defining disparaging truth about the war has been revealed in TDY and it’s a blockbuster.
This novella grabs you and doesn’t let go; it’s impossible to put down so make some time for it. Fortunately it’s short duty but while you’ll be breathless at the end you’ll also be ready for more. Adrenaline works on you like that. So read it again, it’s based on a true story and it’s forbidden fruit. You just don’t find books like this very often, and that’s what makes Pete’s Temporary Duty experience in ‘67 so important today. His mission has been over for 53 years but its legacy lives on as an endemic rapidly spreading plague of surveillance, corruption, coercion, abuse and murder. The TDY mission is now on a need to know basis – for everyone!
I think we need to let the psychological damage and sacrifice the book’s anti-hero endured and endures to this day sink in. It’s too easy to encamp on an ideological island (without empathy) when we face the harsh realities of the Vietnam War and its lingering effects. The defining disparaging truth about the war has been revealed in TDY and it’s a blockbuster.
This novella grabs you and doesn’t let go; it’s impossible to put down so make some time for it. Fortunately it’s short duty but while you’ll be breathless at the end you’ll also be ready for more. Adrenaline works on you like that. So read it again, it’s based on a true story and it’s forbidden fruit. You just don’t find books like this very often, and that’s what makes Pete’s Temporary Duty experience in ‘67 so important today. His mission has been over for 53 years but its legacy lives on as an endemic rapidly spreading plague of surveillance, corruption, coercion, abuse and murder. The TDY mission is now on a need to know basis – for everyone!
November 22, 2021
A brutal and unflinching look at CIA drug smuggling during the Vietnam war. Impactful. Exciting. Dusturbing.
October 13, 2024
If you want to learn more about how futile and senseless the efforts of the US military and the CIA are, then this is worth a read. Well written until the end. The epilogue could be reworked...
September 2, 2016
the main portion of the book is a high intensity war novel that sort of turns almost a little bildungsroman at the end after the heavy action, but I feel like a real solid section of the content actually is in the epilogue where you get a sort of cross-section of what the overseas duty has done psychologically to the main character. this part's definitely a lot more centered on the facts of the Phoenix Program (the author's main research subject) and paints a very dirty yet realistic picture of things on the ground during the American invasion of Vietnam. the shift from the violence of the body to the blase nature of the end is purposefully drastic and you find yourself as a reader looking upon the narrator more and more unsympathetically as he becomes disillusioned by the events. in a certain sense the bleak nihilism and hopelessness of the main character is perhaps a personal illustration of one of the main accomplishments of the CIA's big '60s operations.
February 28, 2020
This book is about one young man's experience with TDY (temporary duty), being used by the U.S. military to spy on the CIA's covert drug smuggling operations in Southeast Asia. What he and his team went through is unbelievable but unfortunately,it is true. This is just one of possibly tens of thousands of stories similar to this incredible tale, I recommend this book to anyone interested in covert military operations, the CIA, or the secret World of drug smuggling.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews