Tiger Force

A True Story of Men and War

By: Michael Sallah, Mitch Weiss

Narrated by: Harry Chase

Length: 5 hrs and 52 mins

Publisher's summary

At the outset of the Vietnam War, the Army created an experimental fighting unit that became known as "Tiger Force". The Tigers were to be made up of the cream of the crop, the very best and bravest soldiers the American military could offer. They would be given a long leash, allowed to operate in the field with less supervision. Their mission was to seek out enemy compounds and hiding places so that bombing runs could be accurately targeted. They were to go where no troops had gone, to become one with the jungle, to leave themselves behind and get deep inside the enemy's mind.

The experiment went terribly wrong.

What happened during the seven months Tiger Force descended into the abyss is the stuff of nightmares. Their crimes were uncountable, their madness beyond imagination, so much so that for almost four decades, the story of Tiger Force was covered up under orders that stretched all the way to the White House. Records were scrubbed, documents were destroyed, men were told to say nothing.

But one person didn't follow orders. The product of years of investigative reporting, interviews around the world, and the discovery of an astonishing array of classified information, Tiger Force is a masterpiece of journalism. Winners of the Pulitzer Prize for their Tiger Force reporting, Michael Sallah and Mitch Weiss have uncovered the last great secret of the Vietnam War.

©2006 Michael Sallah and Mitch Weiss. All rights reserved. (P)2006 Time Warner AudioBooks. All rights reserved.

Critic reviews

"In the best tradition of investigative journalism, the authors let the story speak for itself." (Publishers Weekly)

Amazing story, well told

Reader does a great job covering the story and investigation in an intriguing manner. I heard about this war crime from my Captain's Career Course instructor and was disturbed to see just how bad the massacres were, and how terrible men can be when they are not held accountable for their actions.

I don’t know

I feel bad for the villagers and I feel bad for the troops. However I thought the story is well told and the narrator doe’s a good job

Interesting Story About An Experimental Unit

I was hoping for something a little more fact based about Tiger Force, but this book is interesting nonetheless. It is a story pieced together by interviews and accounts of many people like many war stories. Americans should know about things like this that happened in Vietnam to help them have a full perspective of the US influence on what was essentially a civil war.

Tiger Force by the Tail!

It’s a shocking heinous tale of leadership run amuck during combat. This is a raw narrative of misguided Army superiors causing PTSD to men in their charge. Troops received sustained exposure to unlawful orders resulting in random killing of Vietnamese civilians during the Vietnam War. Yes, murder in the jungles. I feel much compassion for these men carrying their burden post war. Bless you my Brothers!

No Different Than Nazis

Amazing book that talks about the war crimes committed by these criminals. Unfortunately, most books on Vietnam valorize the US as heroes but in reality they were war criminals no different than the nazis.

Need more works like this.

The monsters killed babies, women, children and unarmed people regularly. They would go up to a village and kill everyone, then burn the entire village down.

They would then report that the people they killed were Vietcong but SURPRISINGLY NO WEAPONS WERE FOUND.

unbelievable

could not stop listening. The reader was remarkable and extremely reliable with each new chapter.

interesting story-surprising end

Well read with nice inflection betwixt the differing personalities. The ending is surprising but not at the same time.

Wish this was available as Unabridged version.

Incredible story of horrendous acts. And that's the thing about it, that there was so much of it. This story suffers from the abridgement which cuts out much of the story.

Hard On The Soul

In my opinion, this book is one that falls under the category of "if you weren't there, it's tough to judge exactly what went on". If what they say is all true, it's a terrible indictment of sanctioned US Forces in action. In the "Fog Of War" however, their charter was to "out VC the VC". Now, being ex-military from during the Vietnam era, I know exactly what that directive meant. The men that I knew and served with who went and did their duty were nothing like the men portrayed here so my perspective more than likely will be different from yours. The VC were relentless. Everything the book was able to document about the activities of Tiger Force was done in triplicate by the VC to the peasants in the South.

Such an important book

A raw description of the price of war. There are no winners, just casulties and the second you sign up - you have already lost.