Don Bendell Criminal Investigation Detachment

Criminal Investigation Detachment

Don Bendell

Berkley, Jan 2006, $6.99

ISBN: 0425207382

At Fort Benning, Criminal Investigation Detachment Major Bobby Samuels successfully completes a disgusting case involving a commanding officer abusing his position of authority to almost rape a direct-reports enlisted soldier. After reading the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ) rights to Colonel Rodriguez, Smith leaves Fort Benning to return to his duty station at the Pentagon. Bobby thinks his late wife would have supported his return to active military after 9/11 as a CID cop, having been an LAPD civilian homicide detective, and not a Special Forces soldier as he was during his first tour.

Commanding General of the US Forces in Iraq Jonathan Perry briefs Samuels on his next Top Secret assignment. Samuels is to go undercover as an enlisted man to investigate several bombs that killed Americans in the Baghdad Green Zone and other locations in Iraq. Working undercover he must identity the Saboteur, who probably is an Al-Qaeda operative working inside.

CRIMINAL INVESTIGATION DETACHMENT is a terrific look at the work of the CID, insight into the UCMJ, and from a military perspective the Global War on Terrorism (GWOT), especially in Iraq. Though prejudiced on the side that the war in Iraq is just and part of the GWOT (reminiscent of Sergeant Barry Sadler's Ballad Of the Green Berets), the storyline is action packed, as Major Samuels tries to uncover who the saboteur is. The hero is a fabulous ethical patriot trying to do the right honorable thing for his country and for the military. Readers, whether they agree with Don Bendell's position on Iraq or not, will agree that he has written a delightful military police procedural that provides insight into those who really have sacrificed plenty during the GWOT.