“Cobra”, a book review

it’s a slow news day for some reason, so luckily I finished reading Frederick Forsythe’s latest novel “Cobra” and it kind of surprised me. First, for those of you who don’t know Forsythe, he wrote some of the best spy/action novels of the 70s. The Day of the Jackal, Dogs of War, No Comebacks were my favorites. In fact The Day of the Jackal was the first novel I read without a teacher assigning it to me. I have autographed first edition copies of many of his books on my shelf.

I never knew much about his personal politics until 2003 when he wrote this open letter in The Guardian to George W. Bush upon the occasion of Bush’s visit to the UK;

Dear Mr President,

Today you arrive in my country for the first state visit by an American president for many decades, and I bid you welcome.

You will find yourself assailed on every hand by some pretty pretentious characters collectively known as the British left. They traditionally believe they have a monopoly on morality and that your recent actions preclude you from the club. You opposed and destroyed the world’s most blood-encrusted dictator. This is quite unforgivable.

I beg you to take no notice. The British left intermittently erupts like a pustule upon the buttock of a rather good country. Seventy years ago it opposed mobilisation against Adolf Hitler and worshipped the other genocide, Josef Stalin.

It has marched for Mao, Ho Chi Minh, Khrushchev, Brezhnev and Andropov. It has slobbered over Ceausescu and Mugabe. It has demonstrated against everything and everyone American for a century. Broadly speaking, it hates your country first, mine second.

Eleven years ago something dreadful happened. Maggie was ousted, Ronald retired, the Berlin wall fell and Gorby abolished communism. All the left’s idols fell and its demons retired. For a decade there was nothing really to hate. But thank the Lord for his limitless mercy. Now they can applaud Saddam, Bin Laden, Kim Jong-Il… and hate a God-fearing Texan. So hallelujah and have a good time.
Frederick Forsyth
Novelist

So, he became my favorite novelist once again. Which leads me to the “Cobra”. Basically, it began with our current President becoming distressed at the death of a White House maid’s son from cocaine abuse. The president calls on a retired CIA agent to see if he can figure out a way to end the cocaine trade from Colombia. After a week of navel-gazing and research the Cobra tells the White House, that yes he can. Forsythe describes the preparations and political actions that the president makes to make it workable and Cobra executes his plan in cahoots with the Brits and some DoD assets. This is where Forsythe shines – he accurately details the minutiae of preparations for war. If I remember correctly, someone once used “Dogs of War” as a blueprint for taking over some small African republic a few decades ago.

Now, I thought Forsythe liked our president from his actions in the beginning of the book, until the Cobra was successful in turning the Colombian, US and European drug gangs and they began to wipe each other out supposedly in the months before the 2012 election,, but the administration gets cold feet because of the bodies in the streets and orders Cobra to end his operation just as the operation is about to be successful. I can see that happening, especially with Obama and his crew making politically expedient decisions on national security issues. The riots in the Middle East are a good example.

I won’t ruin the end of the book for anyone who hasn’t read it yet, but I wanted to recommend it to you and introduce you to Frederick Forsythe in case you haven’t met him yet.

Category: Barack Obama/Joe Biden, Military issues