This is a story about profligate waste, unscrupulous politicking and bureaucratic empire building which involves both America and Australia. The story paints America, under the

Bush administration, as a righteous but naive giant treading the thespian boards of the world stage with the grace and style of a three hundred pound truck driver in a tutu. It is a story of Australia’s almost paranoid search for a guardian starting with Prime Minister Curtin’s frantic trip across the Atlantic in 1942, being rebuffed by Great Britain and finally finding the Lion of Luzon in the nick of time before the Japanese invasion. And from that moment, falling into lock-step with America to traipse through Vietnam and the Middle East in the conga-line of wishful hearts. It is a story about waste of public monies in defense procurement, of arrogant opinionated bureaucrats who have done untold damage to force structure which is the basis of public security in times of war. It is a story of old senior officers who sat on their hands when they should have acted, and young senior officers too eager to change for changes’ sake. It is a story that sheds light on elite powerful men who are made less, as a result of failure to help the people who look to them for leadership and succor.

 
About the Author

Born in Shanghai China in 1939, Krasnoff became a stateless refugee in 1949 when communism took over from the Nationalist Chinese government, spent time on a Philippine island of Tubabao before emigrating to Australia. He graduated from the Officer Cadet School in 1961 as a second-lieutenant and served in the Pacific Islands

Regiment in New Guinea for three years. Served in Vietnam in 1967/68 with U.S. Special Forces on Operation Rapid Fire under command of Major James ‘Bo’ Gritz and started the LRRP (long range recon) school at Ba Ria. Worked in Army Office, Canberra as a Lieutenant-Colonel in Operations Branch and commanded an infantry battalion in 1980. Krasnoff has recently had two books published by Allen & Unwin, Sydney: Shadows On The Wall and Krazy Hor.

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