KNIGHT'S CROSS by Nathanson, E. M. and Aaron Bank

New York 1993, Birch Lane Pr, First US edition , hard bound in dust jacket, 6x9, Fine/Fine condition, 318 pages, end paper maps.  First, the true story... "Get Hitler!" That was the secret order given to OSS Captain Aaron Bank in the winter of 1944-45 as massive battles against the Nazi war machine raged across Europe. For Bank, it was his most extraordinary and dangerous assignment, and he relished it. For the Office of Strategic Services, the United States' young, covert agency for aggressive intelligence gathering and unconventional warfare, it was the biggest and most important mission they had ever undertaken.Unable to reveal even to his own men the true purpose of the operation, Bank trained a company of approximately two hundred fighting men, including an ersatz unit of German mountain infantry, a Jager Einheit. By April 1945, after months of training, Bank's Jager Einheit was ready to jump into the Austrian Tyrol, blend with Wehrmacht and SS units operating there, and kidnap Hitler and other Nazi leaders expected to seek sanctuary or fight to the death in the mountains.But events delayed and then cancelled the "Go!" In the nearly fifty years since, Bank, who went on to become Colonel Bank, Founding Father of American Special Forces, the Green Berets, has wondered, "What if we had gone ahead? Knight's Cross tells that tale. "Get Hitler!" is the order given to OSS Captain Dan Brooks, Aaron Bank's alter ego. ° Knight's Cross" is the code name of his secret mission. Hitler enters the novel as an unidentifiable, enigmatic, and bizarre character. His identity is ultimately revealed to Brooks. In complete secrecy, he manipulates the disguised Fuhrer to help him complete the Knight's Cross mission beyond anyone's imagining.