The Books
Military Deception
Col. John Randal and Lady Jane arrive in London just before Christmas 1943. They find themselves caught up in the murky world of Military Deception. MI-5 had captured every German spy in England and given them the choice of a firing squad or becoming a double agent working for the Double Cross Committee XX. Raiding Forces has been tapped to carry out the boots on the ground part of Operation Fortitude South—designed to convince Hitler of what he already believed—that the D-Day landing will take place at the narrowest part of the English Channel—in Calais. The invasion, when it goes in, will actually land in Normandy. The idea is to tie down the German 15th Army in Calais to give the Allies a chance to get ashore and set up a beachhead strong enough to fight off German counterattacks. Raiding Forces is tasked with conducting a series of raids in Calais to simulate strategic forward reconnaissance/prepare the battlefield.
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The Magnificent Mission
In this sequel to Economy of Force, Colonel John Randal returns in The Magnificent Mission.
Col. Randal has been summoned to London to meet with Major the Lady Jane Seaborn’s Godfather, Lieutenant Colonel John Henry Bevan, the Chief of Deception. Lt. Col. Bevan is in charge of the super-secret London Controlling Section. Major General Sam Houston Blackwell sends his personal aircraft to fly the party to the meeting — Lady Jane has a shopping safari on her calendar. Before they can depart, Raiding Forces is tasked with rescuing a photo reconnaissance pilot who has been shot down. The pilot is under the command of Colonel Elliott Roosevelt — President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s son. The resulting action became known as The Magnificent Mission.
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Economy of Force
Leros has been a catastrophe. The Germans invaded, overran and captured the island leaving Castelrozzo (ABC) as the last one still in Allied hands. The Luftwaffe now has air superiority over the entire Aegean Theatre of Operations. Neither the U.S. nor Royal Navy will risk capital ships in the AO due to the threat posed by enemy air. The Long Range Desert Group has been reduced to approximately fifty patrolmen. The fabled reconnaissance unit is now attached to Raiding Forces as is the Small Boat Service which also suffered heavy causalities. Middle East Headquarters is paralyzed by the extent of the debacle caused by their bad command decisions which resulted in a total defeat of British Forces in the theatre. On ABC, Col. John Randal sees opportunity. Raiding Forces goes over to the attack.
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The War That Never Was
The 575th Ranger Task Force, Raiding Forces are conducting a fighting withdrawal back to the Salerno Beachhead following their drop on Benevento, Italy. The jump was widely scattered with one plane load missing the drop zone by in excess of 100 miles. While the 575th RTF has been away conducting a hit and run guerrilla campaign, blocking roads by downing trees, cutting rail lines and blowing bridges, an element of Sea Raiders from the Brandenburger Regiment have raided Castelrozzo. Major the Lady Jane Seaborn is MIA. On his return to friendly lines Colonel John Randal takes the first men to arrive back and are immediately flown to Alexandria by Major General Sam Houston Blackwell in two of his Troop Transport Command’s C-47s to marshal for a drop on Raiding Forces Advanced Base Castelrozzo (ABC). Meanwhile the Special Boat Squadron (SBS) and the Long Range Desert Group (LRDG) are attached to Raiding Forces. The problem is they are on Leros which is being invaded by a combined German amphibious/airborne force. Col. Randal decides to rescue the remnants of the two units even though he has no authority to do so. The mission continues.
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Always So Few
The war in the Aegean heats up as Raiding Forces has completed its transition from gun jeeps to small boats. The SAS LRDG and the Greek Sacred Squadron are being transferred to Raiding Forces. A major reorganization is underway. Raiding Forces continues its anti-diamond smuggling activities in the Belgian Congo. The invasion of Salerno runs into trouble. Raiding Forces Ranger Task Force conducts a night drop behind enemy lines at Benevento, Italy. Meanwhile, Nazi Brandenburger Commandos have conducted a raid on Advanced Based Castelrozzo (ABC).
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The Tip of the Sword
Raiding Forces Small Operations Group with Colonel John Randal in command makes a night drop on the Italian held Island of Castelrozzo located a mile off Turkey’s southwest coast. The plan is to capture the island in order to use it as a base of operations for Commando raids on Axis held islands in the Aegean Sea. Admiral Sir “Razor” Ransom, the Deputy Commander of Operations (Irregular), wants Raiding Forces to reorganize into a small scale amphibious raiding unit to carry out pinprick raids. With Field Marshal Rommel’s Afrika Korps driven off the continent of Africa, gun jeep desert patrolling has come to an end. A major reorganization for future operations is underway. Instead of jeeps, the Raiders will transition to high speed MAS Boats, PT Boats and caiques. Major the Lady Jane Seaborn is shot outside the Gizera Restaurant. Commander Ian Fleming arrives and tasks Raiding Forces to carry out a Top Secret Golden Fleece mission. And, Raiding Forces carries out a night combat jump on Sicily to capture a vital bridge at Gela for Major General George S. Patton.
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Strategic Services
The Nazi’s need industrial diamonds to build precision instruments and harden tools. Germany has an eight month supply. The only way the Germans can get more diamonds is for DeBeers Diamond Company to supply them through neutral Switzerland. Raiding Forces has been tasked with shutting down the illicit diamond buying. Meanwhile, Col. John Randal and a party of the 575th PIR aka Rangers make a combat jump on an artillery battery on the flank of Dieppe working in conjunction with Lord Lovat’s 4 Commando. And later, during OPERATON TORCH, Col. Randal leads a party of the 10th Ranger Battalion up a 12 mile river onboard the destroyer USS Dallas to capture the Port Layety airfield in one of the most daring operations of WWII.
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Raiding Rommel
Col. John Randal and Raiding Forces continue the mission in Book XI, Raiding Rommel. OPERATION CRUSADER has had a devastating effect on the Desert Patrol gun jeep patrols due to the constant non-stop pace of operations and being misused by Middle East Command. The new US troops of the 575th Parachute Infantry Regiment (Separate) (Special) aka ‘Rangers’ are being amalgamated into Raiding Forces after rotating through the British Commando School and completing ‘Blood in the Sand’ training under Capt. ‘Mad Dog’ Reupart and Sgt. Maj. ‘March or Die’ Mikkalis ably assisted by the ex-French Foreign Legion veterans of Blue Patrol. Brandy Seaborn alerts Col. Randal to a SOLID GOLD mission to assassinate Nazi Hauptman Alfred Seebohm, Rommel’s Merlin — the commander of the Afrika Korps signals intelligence unit that has exploited the Eight Army’s total lack of radio security. Meanwhile ‘Wild Bill’ Donovan, the chief of the Office of Strategic Services, invites Col. Randal to become the head of Special Projects.
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The Sharp End
The United States has entered the war. However, it will take time before America can commit ground troops to the battle. Col. John Randal and the men in the American Volunteer Group who have been serving with Raiding Forces are back in US Army uniform serving under their own flag. Raiding Forces is being expanded into a joint US/UK outfit. As it is, reorganizing events in remote parts of the world require Col. Randal and a team of his Raiders to carry out a pair of long range operations of national strategic importance. Meanwhile, there is a mole in Middle East Command HQ that Rommel calls his “Good Source” and the German 621 Radio Intercept Company is providing the Desert Fox with the Allied Order of Battle that have become serious threats. Lady Jane is under suspicion of being the mole and Raiding Forces has been ordered to track down and kill the 621st’s Nazi commander. The action is nonstop.
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Africa 1941 – Released December 2016
In Book 9 of the Raiding Forces Series U.S. Lieutenant Colonel John Randal returns in Africa 1941. Lieutenant Colonel Randal has established a clandestine base at Oasis X on the far side of the Great Sand Sea from which to launch hit and run gun jeep raids on isolated enemy positions, airfields and fuel tank farms up to a thousand miles behind the lines with Desert Patrol while his Sea Squadron carry out amphibious pinprick Commando raids off a Landing Craft Tank along the Mediterranean Coastline. Raiding Forces is also tasked with raiding the Italian roadhouses located every fifteen miles along the only blacktopped road Rommel has in Africa, which runs from Tripoli to Tobruk, the Via Balbia. Lieutenant Commander Ian Flemming, RN recruits Raiding Forces to conduct ‘pinch operations’ targeted against remote Africa Korps weather stations to capture code books, keys and signals devices that can be used by MI6 to penetrate the Ultra Secret German Enigma machines. In addition he has to spring Colonel Dudley Clarke from a Spanish prison and rescue his men being held in two Italian POW camps.
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Private Army
IN THIS SEQUEL TO DESERT PATROL LT. COL. JOHN RANDAL RETURNS IN PRIVATE ARMY Raiding Forces is undergoing a major reorganization to be better able to carry out small scale raids against Rommel’s only hard topped road, the Via Balbia. It runs along the coast from Tripoli to Tobruk. The plan is for Raiding Forces to be able to strike from the desert out of the Great Sand Sea with gun jeeps and from the Mediterranean using amphibious DUKW’s. While this is taking place, the unit is alerted for the invasion of Persia. US Army personnel who have resigned from the army in order to volunteer for the Middle East contingent of the American Volunteer Group (AVG) arrive and are integrated into the unit.
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Desert Patrol
The siege of the RAF base at Habbaniya is lifted after the defenders launch a surprise counter attach followed up by an intense air campaign and assault on Bagdad by Habforce that force marched to their aid. Back in Cairo, Raiding Forces is ordered to interdict the Via Balbia, Rommel’s 1500 mile supply route along the Mediterranean coast. Maj. Randal forms Raiding Forces Desert Squadron (RFDS) and Raiding Forces Sea Squadron (RFSS) to conduct gunjeep and amphibious pinprick raids against the Afrika Korps exposed line of communication.
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Necessary Force
Maj. John Randal is back in Book VI in the Raiding Forces Series. He travels to the RAF Base located at Habbaniya sixty miles south of Bagdad to see Lt. Pamala Plum-Martin be awarded her pilots wings from the flying school located there. RAF Habbaniya is a base that the war has passed by, senior officers at the end of their career are assigned as well as pilots who are not considered good enough for combat flying or pilots who have become combat fatigued from flying combat tours and need a rest. Maj. Randal, the MI-6 senior officer Jim ‘Baldie’ Taylor and Lt. Penelope Honeycutt-Parker fly into the RAF Base the same day the Iraqi rebels of the Golden Square lay the place to siege by occupying the heights just outside the perimeter wire. They find themselves in a situation that is described to Maj. Randal “in terms an American can understand…this is 1836 and you just checked in to the Hotel Alamo”. What happens next is an action packed story of a battle that has been lost to history.
Click to download and read Chapter 1.
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Guerrilla Command
Guerrilla Command is the Fifth in the Raiding Forces Series. Maj. John Randal has raised five Mule Raiding Battalions of Abyssinian Patriots 600 miles behind Italian lines commanded by British officers, deserters from the the Vichy French Foreign Legion, volunteers for Special Service from the Cavalry Division, adventurers, big game hunters and mercenaries from the colonies. Even one American, Capt. Geronimo Joe McKoy. The major’s mission is to cut the Italian strategic roads and the single rail line that runs from Addis Abba to the coast and to prevent Fascist Forces from freely shifting troops from one front to another as the Emperor, escorted by Col. Orde Wingate, the Kaid out of the Sudan and East Africa Force out of Kenya launch their three-pronged invasion.
Click to download and read Chapter 1.
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Roman Candle
In this sequel to Blood Wings, U.S. Major John Randal, commander of Strategic Raiding Forces, returns in Roman Candle, the second book in a trilogy within the Raiding Forces Series about the Abyssinian Campaign.
Major Randal is raising a guerrilla army 600 miles behind the enemy lines in Italian East Africa. In the north Col. Orde Wingate will be leading a column of rag-tad band of Patriots to install the exiled Emperor back on his thorn, out of the Sudan the Kaid will be attacking with two Indian Divisions into the mountainous Kern stronghold and from the south out of Kenya the East Africa Force will be attacking up the Red Sea coastline to clear it of Italians in order for the British Middle East Command to qualify for Lend Lease. The Empire Forces are attacking against at least 10 to 1 odds. The only hope of success is for Major Randal’s guerrilla army, called Force N, to disrupt the Blackshirts lines-of communications and for the attacking army’s to maintain the element of surprise. At the last minute it is learned the Italians have a master spy in Kenya. Unless he is discovered and eliminated the invasion will fail.
Click to download and read the first chapter.
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Blood Wings
In Blood Wings, the third book of the Raiding Forces Series, Major John Randal parachutes into the heart of Abyssinia to raise a guerrilla army—in order to tie down the Italians in advance of an invasion by British Empire Forces out of the Sudan and Kenya. The Abyssinian Campaign is a colonial war right out of the 19th Century—replete with bi-planes, camel caravans, mule cavalry, bandits who wear Tom Mix, a runaway Emperor whose slave carries the world’s only Royal Umbrella and a column commanded by a British officer who wears an alarm clock tied to his wrist by a blue ribbon. And, it’s all based on historical fact. Blood Wings is the first in a three-book trilogy within the Raiding Forces Series about the Abyssinian Campaign.
Click to download and read the first chapter.
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Dead Eagles
In this sequel to Those Who Dare, U.S.Major John Randal, Commander of Strategic Raiding Forces is back, leading a crew of British Commandos, Royal Marines and Royal Navy raiders on bigger and bolder missions to foil Hitler’s Third Reich. Off the Gold Coast colony in Africa, the Germans are operating a naval intelligence ring that gathers information about British convoys in the southern sea-lane. Couriers carry the data to nearby Rio Bonita, a tiny Portuguese island protectorate, whence they are broadcast to Nazi U-boats and surface raiders from a clandestine radio station onboard one of three interned enemy ships. As a result, British convoys vital to the war effort are ravaged. Major Randal and the Raiding Forces mission is to invade neutral Rio Bonita and spirit away the three ships. Failure means either imprisonment or hanging for piracy-and that Portugal will declare war on its oldest ally. Peopling Dead Eagles are colorful characters new and old. There is Wild West showman Captain “Geronimo Joe” McKoy, the stunning Special Operations Executive operator Lady Jane Seaborn, who adopts the Raiding Forces as her own pet project; and Lady Jane’s bombshell of a driver, Pamala Plum-Martin. Even Commander Ian Fleming puts in an appearance, submitting a plan for “Operation Ruthless”, the goal of which is to board a Luftwaffe bomber and crash it into the English Channel in order to capture an Enigma coding device from a Nazi air-sea rescue craft. This action packed adventure story features Lovat Scout Snipers, the take down of the Vichy French fleet in English ports, daring Commando raids, an epic sea battle, beautiful spies and culminates in a deadly shoot-out in a crowed bar in Occupied France.
Download the first chapter, Staging for Deployment.
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Those Who Dare
The surprise, speed, and violence of the forebears of U.S. Army Rangers, U.S. Navy SEALs, and SAS Commandos prove that “those who dare, win.”
By May 1940, panzer divisions had decimated Belgium, sliced through France, and reached Calais. Lieutenant John Randal, a veteran of the U.S. 26th Cavalry Regiment, volunteers to help slow their advance. What unfolds is a blend of military guerrilla tactics, suspense, humor, and brotherly camaraderie—plus a little romance between the American GI and the widowed Lady Jane Seaborn.
Along the way readers meet such colorful characters as the movie star Captain David Niven in MO-9 and Captain “Geronimo Joe” McKoy with his Traveling Wild West Show and Shooting Emporium. The author—a decorated Ranger—covers the details of war extensively, from the five points of contact of a parachute landing fall to descriptions of a British raider’s A-5 flinging Jerries like rag dolls before the first shell casing even hits the floor.
As the novel ends, Major Randal’s men, fresh from Operation Tomcat—the first British parachute raid in France—learn they’ll deploy via sea transport within forty-eight hours on their next mission. The second book, which has already been written, tells that tale.