November 8, 2019
Colloquium Topic: UNCOMMON VALOR: Recon Company Medal of Honor Heroes of FOB-2
Author Stephen Moore will discuss his latest book, a project that began by his interviews with a family member who served as a Green Beret in the U.S. Army’s Special Forces division during the Vietnam War. It is the story of a classified unit called MACV-SOG, which ran cross-border operations into Cambodia and Laos to disrupt enemy activities along the Ho Chi Minh Trail.
Moore will relate the story of the small group of men who built and operated Forward Operating Base 2, or FOB-2. Small spike (reconnaissance) teams were sent in by helicopter to gather intelligence, perform wiretaps, assault enemy compounds, and even attempt to capture North Vietnamese prisoners. During the war, ten SOG recon teams went missing and another 14 were overrun and destroyed.
In 1969, MACV-SOG documented the ratio of NVA soldiers killed to each Green Beret lost as 150 to 1. Uncommon Valor presents the incredible stories of five FOB-2 Green Berets who earned the Medal of Honor while operating behind enemy lines.
Colloquium Speaker: Stephen Moore
Stephen L. Moore is the author of 19 books on military history and the Texas Revolution. He is a graduate of Stephen F. Austin State University in Nacogdoches, Texas, where he studied advertising, marketing, and journalism. He currently serves as the marketing director for a Dallas-based electronics manufacturer.
His World War II books have covered the early 1942 carrier battles and the submarine war in the Pacific. One of his more critically acclaimed titles, As Good as Dead, relates the incredible escape of eleven U.S. servicemen who survived the massacre of their POW camp in the Philippines during late 1944. Steve was also selected by the History Channel to write the non-fiction companion book to the ten-hour mini-series Texas Rising, which chronicles the early Texas Rangers and the Texas Revolution.
He has presented at a number of historical organizations, including the National World War II Museum in New Orleans and the Pritzker Military Museum in Chicago. His most recent book, Uncommon Valor, details the once-classified missions of a Special Forces recon company during the Vietnam War. Uncommon Valor was a finalist for the 2018 Army Historical Foundation’s Distinguished Writing Awards.
Steve has three children, and lives with his wife in North Texas.