Dave Ferman Author

During the Cold War between the United States and our allies, and the Soviet Union and their surrogate allies was an extremely tense, bitter mix of threats and counter threats teetering on the brink of a nuclear World War III. Beginning soon after World War II and continuing unabated until the fall of the Berlin wall, a portion of this often misunderstood period of our history (i.e., 1952 - 1956) is presented through the eyes of a college athlete, a Marine recruit, an infantry grunt, a drill instructor, a military policeman, a fledgling fighter pilot, and a Navy air intelligence spook; all wrapped up in one person.

This accumulation of sea stories is a mini-memoir, but certainly not a diary. A tradition among Navy and Marine personnel, sea stories are traditionally true, usually first-person yarns about interesting, didactic, unusual and/or wondrous adventures that occurred during active or reserve duty. Although the sea stories are basically in chronological order, they are generally short, selected snapshots that are occasionally separated by days, weeks, and occasionally months. Comparitive tactical and strategic comparisons are scattered among the observations and descriptions.

Each chapter in each book builds upon the preceding chapters, leading from 1953, Making A Marine Grunt Warrior and finally evolving into a hopeful career Marine fighter pilot in 1954, Making A Marine Pilot Warrior. The stars were incredibly well aligned to jump start an aviation career until I crashed, burned and nearly drowned in a Florida swamp. That event led to the third book in the trilogy, 1955, VAH-7 The Navys Secret Atom Bomber Squadron, and a tour of duty as a covert spook reporting to Naval Intelligence on the combat readiness of a secret Navy atomic bomber squadron operating in and around the Mediterranean Sea. In the Middle Eastern tinderbox, I worked covert missions at sea, on the ground and in the air; all of which were potentially deadly. On several occasions, those threats came rushing to fruition.

Brief summaries as well as sample sea stories from each of the three books that comprise the Cold War Warrior Trilogy are presented in the book section herein.