The part about the CIA having people on tap for information on just about anything is true. I once had a history professor who worked for the Central Intelligence Agency back in the '60s. He was one of the fellows who pored over photos of the Soviet generals and politicians standing on top of Lenin's Tomb in Red Square during military parades, trying to figure out who was who and what their position in the lineup meant. It was the CIA's version of reading the tea leaves.
A couple of readers pointed out some similarities to the Harry Harrison's 1967 The Technicolor Time Machine. Here's the Wikipedia synopsis: "The narrative revolves around the efforts of a mediocre film director to save his job, his livelihood and, incidentally, the studio he works for. To do this, he enlists a mad scientist, the crooked studio owner, a jazz tuba player, a cowboy, two fabulously stupid movie stars, and a real live ocean-crossing Viking. He ends up making history, but in a way he never dreamed of." To be honest, I had forgotten it, but once it was mentioned, I remembered it fondly. Absolutely hilarious! I highly recommend it to everyone! I just added it to my Amazon wish list.
I need to thank some people. I can't do this without great editors. Since so much of the story takes place in the British Isles, I needed British help. I also needed medical editing and American military assistance. This is a list of just some of my editors, and they deserve all our respect: BGoldFinger3, stickpuppy, Emmeran, liamberkey, DJ of the Hudson, SpikeCO, piccolodoc1962, n44w69, jjmcdonald7911, Old Rotorhead, N12614, MarissaHorne4, johnew19534, fotophile69, MrWulf, Trev. As always, the screwups are all mine.
Case in point - When I first wrote the story, I made the senior Ranger Battalion NCO a Master Sergeant. One of my editors pointed out that the proper rank would be a Sergeant Major. I edited the story but missed a few spots. I fixed Chapter 5, which I uploaded today, but the errors are in the version on bookapy. The plan is that I will wait until I finish with the SOL version (fixing all the typos found) and then upload a repaired version to bookapy. At that point I will let everybody know and they can download a corrected version. Thanks.