Abandoned in Hell: The Fight For Vietnam's Firebase Kate

Product Description

In October 1969, William Albracht, the youngest Green Beret captain in Vietnam, took command of a remote hilltop outpost called Fire Base Kate, held by only 27 American soldiers and 150 Montagnard militiamen. He found their defenses woefully unprepared. At dawn the next morning, three North Vietnamese Army regiments - some 6,000 men - crossed the Cambodian border and attacked.

Outnumbered three dozen to one, Albracht's men held off repeated ground assaults by communist forces with fierce hand-to-hand fighting, air support and a dangerously close B-52 strike. For days, the NVA blanketed Kate in a rain of rockets, mortars, artillery, machineguns, and small arms, blocking efforts to resupply, reinforce, or evacuate the outpost. Albracht continually exposed himself to enemy fire to direct air strikes, to guide re-supply helicopters, to distribute ammunition and water to his men, to retrieve the dead and to rescue the wounded, often shielding men with his own body. Wounded by rocket shrapnel, he refused medical attention or evacuation. Exhausted from days without sleep, he continued to rally his men to beat off each new enemy attack.

After five days, Kate's defenders were out of ammo and water. Aerial resupply was suicidal, and reinforcements were denied by military commanders who had written off Kate. Albracht refused to surrender or die in place. Refusing to allow his men to surrender, Albracht led his troops, including many wounded, off the hill and on a daring night march through enemy lines.

Abandoned in Hell is an astonishing memoir of leadership, sacrifice, and brutal violence, a riveting journey into Vietnam's heart of darkness, and a compelling reminder of the transformational power of individual heroism. Not since Lone Survivor and We Were Soldiers Once, And Young has there been such a gripping and authentic account of battlefield courage.

Includes Photos

'Why read a book about a battle in a war everyone is trying to forget? Because you will learn an important secret. Are there other ways to learn it? Yes, but you do not want them. Abandoned in Hell is an epic tale of junior officers and NCOs salvaging a cluster f**k with minimum losses and maximum damage to the enemy. Nasty war. Great book.' Jim Morris, Author of War Story and Above and Beyond

'Surrounded, vastly outnumbered, pounded day and night by incoming fire and all but abandoned, tiny Firebase Kate should have fallen within twenty-four hours. That it did not is a testament to Captain Albracht and the fighting tenacity of those around him. This is an exceptional account, told in much detail.' Major John L. Plaster, U.S. Army Special Forces (ret) and Author of SOG and Secret Commandos

'The siege of Firebase Kate was a microcosm of the war in Vietnam, just as that conflict was emblematic of America's wars-to-come through the 1990s and into the 21st century. Marvin Wolf and William Albrecht have produced in Abandoned in Hell a riveting, dead-true account in the tradition of Black Hawk Down and We Were Soldiers Once . . . and Young - that is, an in-detail narrative of events that could be studied by historians or by cadets in academies of war, but that also reads like a breathless, hair-raising novel. Gripping, relentless, and superbly-written, Abandoned in Hell is a testament to the courage of the Montagnard tribesmen and their U.S. Army Special Forces brothers, who endured the unendurable and survived.' Steven Pressfield, National Bestselling Author of The Lion's Gate

'A tale of heroism above and beyond the call of duty. Albracht's gallantry defending Kate, and his actions in the days that followed, reached mythical proportions. A true story told as only a combat veteran can tell it, Abandoned in Hell is essential reading about t