The Recruit: Walter Mitty Revisited

By Sheldon Cohen

While characters like James Bond (Bond 007) get all the notoriety in films and books, others like our protagonist, Shelly Cohen, do the everyday nuts-and-bolts work of the spy business.

Join our hero as he shares his adventures with you. Theres no fanfare for his achievements, but nevertheless, his work is very important for the preservation of our democratic way of life.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Sep 11, 2017
• ISBN: 9781543450385

Book preview

Copyright © 2017 by Sheldon Cohen.

Library of Congress Control Number:   2017913892

ISBN:      Hardcover            978-1-5434-5040-8

                Softcover              978-1-5434-5039-2

                eBook                   978-1-5434-5038-5

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Rev. date: 09/09/2017

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Contents

The Recruit

Adventure in Fulda

DC on the Rocks

East Meets West

A Catalina Weekend (and Beyond)

For my dear wife Leona.

Chapter 1

Perhaps I can write about this now. It’s been about twenty years since I was last contacted, and then that contact wasn’t of any major significance. I guess I’m probably one of their forgotten people.

My initial connection with the Company was made in 1953 while I was finishing Army Leadership Training at Camp Chaffee, Arkansas. There were about fifty of us who had taken the course and were about to go on leave before being assigned to units in Europe. I was one of the lucky ones that hadn’t been selected for duty in Korea, but the Fates had other plans for Private Sheldon Cohen.

The call came from my company office for me to report to camp headquarters at 3:00 p.m. in full dress uniform. I would be told where to go when I arrived. Immediately my mind began to conjure up all kinds of scenarios. What the hell was this all about? Had I broken some military rule? Was my assignment in Europe being changed? I guess I’d have to wait and see. Besides, orders were orders and were to be obeyed fully. You don’t get very many choices in the army.

When I arrived at headquarters, the orderly at the front desk ushered me into an austere small room that contained one desk, a lamp, and two straight-backed wooden chairs. I was told to wait there and that a Lieutenant Jacobs would be in shortly.

In the short time I was alone, a flood of thoughts once again came into my mind. What was this all about? Why was I being singled out? Of course, no answers came. The lieutenant arrived and took his seat behind the desk. I stood at attention, saluted, and waited for him to speak. The tone of his voice was pleasant, but I sensed a seriousness about the occasion. It wasn’t something tangible, but it was surely there. He had a folder in front of him and referred to it often.

I responded to his questions with short answers and a lot of Yes, sir and No, sir. I tried to grasp the purpose of his queries but to no avail, except when he asked me about my attitudes on the current world situation and especially my views on communism. Then he asked me questions about my father and his union affiliations. I was becoming apprehensive. Did my father subscribe to the newspaper the Daily Worker? Did I ever volunteer for work at the union? No, I had not done any of those things, and for that matter, neither had my dad. I guess at this point I was getting a little angry. The questions seemed extremely personal and, I thought, highly intrusive. The last area of questioning revolved around why I had enlisted in the army and especially why I had volunteered for leadership school. My response was forceful and straightforward. I, Shelly Cohen, wanted to serve my country—a purely patriotic act—although perhaps a youthful one. At this point my curiosity got the better of me. I felt compelled to find out the reason for all the questions and asked him point-blank. Lieutenant Jacobs responded in vague terms about a security check and that I would be interviewed at some later date. Then as quickly as it began, the meeting was over, and as military protocol dictated, I stood, saluted, then turned and headed for the door. But Lieutenant Jacobs was not finished with me yet. Private Cohen, remember, don’t speak with anyone regarding this interview. Is that clear? I acknowledged his order and left headquarters for my barracks.

On the way back, I pondered his last remark, then chalked it up to some military procedure. As I found out later, I was dead wrong.

Chapter 2

My army career then followed what most of my fellow leadership school graduates experienced, that is, a furlough and a troop ship journey across the Atlantic to Bremerhaven, Germany, ending with a permanent assignment in an artillery unit. I was assigned to the 597th Armored Field Artillery Battalion located outside Hanau, a small town near Frankfurt.

My unit was a 155 mm Howitzer Battalion with twenty-four cannons and all the accompanying support groups necessary to carry out our mission, and that mission was to oppose any communist military advance into West Germany. A tall order at best, considering the Russians and their satellite countries had much more men and equipment in the field than we had. Perhaps the real deterrent in any conflict was our possible use of atomic weapons. We certainly had them in Europe and, I believe had the situation become serious enough, would have used them.

Upon arriving at my new assignment, my company commander, Captain Woodruff, reviewed my qualifications and assigned me to the Battery B Survey Section. The survey team was responsible for pinpointing our gun position so we might be able to fire them more accurately. It was a very interesting job that required the use of trigonometry and slide rules (not one of my strong points), but I persevered.

The chief of the Survey Section was a lanky Minnesotan named Glenn Ross. A nicer human being you’ll never find. We got along famously. He took me under his wing and began to groom me as his replacement. Glenn would be finished with his tour of duty in about six months.

I enjoyed my job in survey, but deep down I would have preferred to be connected with my passion, music. I made an attempt to get transferred into the 7th Army Symphony as a violinist but was unsuccessful. As things turned out, I would have missed the greatest adventure of a lifetime had I not stayed where I was.

After a few months on the job training, I was selected to attend an advanced survey school located at a nearby army facility. It involved traveling a short distance by truck to attend classroom studies in the morning, lunch, then field experience in the afternoon. The course was to last a month, culminating in qualification exams. To me it was a pleasant change of duty, and in addition, I relished the opportunity to improve my meager survey skills.

It was about two weeks into the course when something unusual happened. We were working outside our classroom, honing our skills with the aiming circle (a measuring device related to a surveyor’s transit) when out of the corner of my eye, I spied an officer standing near a building across the field. He looked familiar to me and was looking in my direction. I casually turned