* A fascinating eyewitness combat account of America's earliest
days in the Vietnam war
* Written from the unusual perspective of a young army lieutenant
advising a veteran set-in-his-ways South Vietnamese commander
* Includes accounts of search-and-destroy operations targeting the
elusive Viet Cong

In September 1962, when Martin Dockery landed in Saigon, he was a young, determined, idealistic US Army first lieutenant convinced of America's imminent victory in Vietnam. While most of the 12,000 US military advisers in-country at the time filled support positions in Saigon and other major cities, Dockery was one of a handful of advisers assigned to Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) combat units.

For eight months, Dockery lived and fought in the heart of the Mekong Delta with an ARVN infantry battalion on missions and operations that often lasted several days. And for most of that time, whether tramping through the steaming, leech-infested jungle, hiking across canals, or engaging in sudden firefights, Dockery was the only American soldier with the unit.

Dockery's solitary assignment with ARVN during the infancy of US involvement in South-East Asia afforded him an understanding of Vietnam far more profound than that of most other Americans. Lost in Translation is his riveting account of the largely overlooked role of American combat advisers in the Vietnam war.