Protect and Defend

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No words of thanks would be appropriate unless they began with my wife Marina, who nurtures both me and my children as we all go through the sometimes arduous process of writing a book.

I am also indebted once again to the U.S. Army Reserve’s 147th IMA Detachment, who wargamed this book… twice. (The first time, the war didn’t go so well for the United Nations’s forces.) And finally, a special word of gratitude to a select group of men whom I have never met. They did in real life what I described in this work of fiction. In a cold so bitter the saliva froze on the roofs of their mouths, 25,000 U.S. Marines were suddenly and unexpectedly attacked by 120,000 Chinese soldiers. Under the most brutal conditions ever visited upon man they exhibited extremes in bravery and military prowess not soon to be repeated. What began for me as research for a novel now ends with these humble and inadequate thanks to the men of the 1st Marine Division — living and dead — who fought at the Chosen Reservoir in Korea from November 27th to December 10th, 1950.

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