The true story of the most despicable political prosecution in American military history—in the book that won a presidential pardon.
On the morning of July 2, 2012, in the most dangerous warzone in the world, Lieutenant Clint Lorance took command of his small band of American paratroopers at the spearhead of the American War in Afghanistan.
Intelligence reports that morning warned of a Taliban ambush against Lorance’s platoon. Fifteen minutes into their patrol, three military-age Afghan males crowded on a motorcycle and sped aggressively down a Taliban-controlled dirt road toward Lorance’s men…
Three weeks earlier, outside the massive American Kandahar Airfield, Taliban terrorists struck by motorcycle, riding into a crowded area, detonating body-bombs and killing twenty-two people. Sixty-three days before that, three Ohio National Guard soldiers were murdered in another motorcycle-suicide bombing. Suicide-by-motorcycle had become a common Taliban murder-tactic against Americans…
It was a split-second decision: Either open fire and protect his men or ignore the speeding motorcycle and pray his men weren’t about to get blown up. Lorance ordered his men to fire.
When no weapons were found on the Afghan bodies, the Army betrayed one of its finest young officers and prosecuted Lorance for murder. Hiding crucial evidence from the military jury and ordering Lorance’s own men to testify against him or face murder charges themselves, the Army railroaded Lorance into a 20-year prison sentence at Fort Leavenworth.
Updated with breaking news, plus a copy of the pardon!
“Gripping…. A true-life thriller... [a] page-turner.”—The Baltimore Sun
“This one will keep you planted in your reading chair from start to finish.”—Sun-Sentinel
