Pham Xuan An was a Communist agent whose espionage adventures - under the cover story of a celebrated war correspondent in the Western Media -- were as brilliant for Hanoi as they were shattering for Washington during the tumultuous days of the Vietnam War. He has been dubbed "the perfect spy" and affectionately referred to by some as "the spy who loved us". Not quite. Journalist and Southeast Asian specialist Luke Hunt prises this story open. He knew and interviewed An for many years, along with many friends and colleagues in journalism who knew him best in war, on the journalistic beat and amid the collapse of South Vietnam.

In the fall of 1965, Army cadet Tom Carhart and five others at West Point Academy pulled off a feat of precision and ingenuity that made them famous: the theft of the Navy's Billy-Goat mascot from their rival academy, Annapolis, just before the biggest game of the year. With U.S. forces in Vietnam swollen to nearly 200,000 and American casualties steadily growing, it was an unnerving time to join the military. At West Point, the young men preparing to graduate the following June were well aware that they would be called upon to serve, and quite possibly die, in that far-off country where war raged. That November would be the last Army-Navy football game any of the six cadets would ever participate in, so they had to make it count. After an embarrassing theft of their mascot ten years earlier, the Navy went to extraordinary lengths to make sure it could never happen again. Formal agreements were made between the two superintendents, who subsequently threatened fire and brimstone to any of their charges who dared go near the other Academy. To reinforce those orders, during the week before The Big Game, the Navy placed their goat in an effectively impregnable lockup under 24/7 guard by U.S. Marines at an intimidating Naval Security Station--a modern day Golden Fleece. The Golden Fleece by Tom Carhart is the incredible true story, told by one of the participants, of how six West Point cadets in the Class of 1966 set out to steal that Golden Fleece, and how they succeeded against all odds. The Golden Fleece is a rollicking non-fiction military caper about a famous prank conducted by these cadets as their one last hurrah before shipping off to a war they might not come back from.