CIA intelligence officer Rick Blayne must use all his skills—and charm—to achieve his mission of infiltrating émigré Cambodian factions in the center of international intrigue, Paris.
Richard “Rick” Blayne has a mission. One of the CIA’s top expert on Cambodia, who escaped the country’s fall to the Khmer Rouge and has monitored the ensuing genocide from Thailand ever since, he has been sent to Paris to further the CIA’s plan to infiltrate the Cambodian resistance to the Hanoi-controlled puppet government in Phnom Penh. Arriving in the middle of a Parisian summer, Rick feels out of place and uncertain if he can handle the assignment. Vying factions seek to form a guerrilla force. As he establishes contact with old Cambodian friends in both the factions vying to control the resistance, he is drawn into an operation to recruit a Russian diplomat serving in Paris. With the help of a Thai fashion designer serving as an access agent, Rick, under the guidance of Sasha—a seasoned CIA Soviet “head hunter” and deputy chief of Paris station—moves the operation forward at a time of great upheaval and change for the Soviet Union.
Barry Broman was a teenage photographer for the Associated Press in Southeast Asia, then a Marine Corps infantry officer in combat in Vietnam before spending a quarter century in Clandestine Service of the Central Intelligence Agency as a ‘head-hunter’ with dozens of recruits in operations around the world.. Mr. Broman received a BA in Political Science in 1967 followed by an MA in Southeast Asian Studies a year later. A lifelong photographer and traveler he has published many articles and books.