even an investigative reporter. >> well, the book is streamed to. the author is lucinda franks. it has been wonderful being with you they can. >> thank you so much. you are amazing. [applause] and thank you, all of you for coming. >> next on book tv, military forest history and someone talks about the first fund in 1942 none of the maritime unit. this program from the memorial in washington d.c. is just over half an hour.

>> patrick o'donnell is a military historian a military strenuous written a previous but, beyond valor, operative spies and saboteurs, the printer assignment, day care return to missouri wines selected for the mind, not professional reading list. give me tomorrow and dog company. his most recent is the first -- "first seals." the numerous words are the way nick obey award in the oss sean baller word. has also provided consultation with band of brothers and for documentaries produced by bbc, the history channel and fox news. he served as a combat historian and a mean by full platoon during the battle of falluja and is in demand as an expert speaker on world war ii sabotage from the special operations and counterinsurgency on the battlefield. over the past 20 years, o'donnell has interviewed more

than 4000 -- now 5000 veterans wanted america's worst world war i to afghanistan and specializes in unearthing and told stories that read like novels. please welcome patrick k. o'donnell. [applause] >> well, it's really a pleasure and honor to be here. this is the beginning of my book tour which just came out this week. as jim said, i've interviewed 5000 world war ii veterans. i spent an entire lifetime studying world war ii and the story of going to tell you tonight or today is an untold story and probably the most interesting story and never come across in the 44 years that i've been here on this earth.

the story begins right here in washington d.c. only a few blocks away at the shore infotel. it's november 17, 1942 in the short hotel is good though, only been there since 1933. kind of the host for president than everything else, but that night in 1942, and the doors were barred, and they tested something that was unique. they tested the first rebreather, a precursor to screw the and the beginning of the navy seals only a few blocks away from this location right now. that day in the collector group of individuals that form the first deals. they are part of the oss. that evening, a dentist from hollywood, california named jack taylor straps on a rebreather, the first scuba gear and he starts to go into the pool and

tailors an extraordinary individual. he travels halfway around the world i himself, sales and yachts, flies planes come even prior to the where he dug his way out of the goldmine after being buried alive. this is not your average tennis. joining him is young medical student named christian langer said who has to stick away from the university of pennsylvania. can you tell what he's doing, but he is developing the first scuba gear. they tested in the pool and it's a success. joining them is an unusual person. the british liaison officer in washington d.c. his famous speech gm wally, the commander. he was a first world war i factoring. he's able to take an idea and turning into reality reality and that's exactly what they do.

it's a race against time. in 1942 the united states does not special operations forces are an intelligent agency. everything was based on cold war or the spanish-american war mentality. this is a time a gentleman to reach elements mail. special operations didn't exist. it was born in many ways in the mind of one individual who had a vision, general william donovan, wild bill thomas and was appointed the chief is something called the oss at that time can the coi information. this is the time when american intelligence was stovepipes. nothing went to the president. the state department had some activities for intelligence gathering, but the coordinator of information was to sort of collate that and put it into one package for the president. didn't completely work that way,

but the oss was dynamic and pioneering amazon renaissance man and that is what the book is about taking some extraordinary things overnight. they had to build the first navy seals. the entire washington area was turned into a specialized training ground. for instance, congressional club, the fairways they are, explosives, combat, knife fighting et cetera was conduct that they are by the oss special operations groups. this group was called the maritime unit, but they didn't have a spy base at the time, said they had to make it overnight. what is quite interesting and a place called area d., which right now is a bunch of weeds and a few remains of buildings, et cetera directly across from quantico, virginia and that is

where they begin training these guys. there was no money at all. they just had an idea, a vision. so there wasn't a separate available, so they rented a rotting cabin cruiser for $50 a month called america and made it a submarine and they conducted -- they used the rebreather in the money waters of the potomac and that is where their training again. these guys, it was unbelievable the capabilities they developed committee equipment, for instance, the first miniature submarines in the sleeping ute borrowed from the iso week, they these devices overnight. as time went on to have to develop all this equipment and not only the sleeping beauty

came about, but they also developed parachute operations, et cetera, combining seaborne operations with airborne operations. no one during world war ii was combining all these things together. these sort of extraordinary individuals were spurred on by something several months earlier that occurred. alexandria harbor in december december 1941, 6 italians writing human submersibles, human torpedoes effectively destroyed two british battleships. they sunk them and change the balance of power in the eastern mediterranean overnight. the asymmetric warfare created an underwater arms race with all the world's powers trying to catch up to the italians. the only group equipped to handle this at the time was the oss. donovan assigned woolley taylor

and a smaller group of men teaser to solve this problem. area d. comes into effect and it is from there that the sort of joe. the entire washington area has been mentioned as a training ground and taylor is not h. airborne officer. he's a man of action and he wants to go overseas. it's early 1943 and he gets assigned -- he demands to be assigned to a base in alexandria, egypt. he's one man that goes overseas by himself and has to set up the fact is that an entire area and that is what he does. he's a lowly captain at the time, but he commandeers he saw the small boat called khakis, which then infiltrate the entire eastern meditene