Although he was grievously wounded during his first tour of duty in Vietnam and told he would never walk again, Benavidez fought his way back-ultimately earning his green beret.

Orphaned at the age of seven, Benavidez had picked cotton alongside his family as a child and dropped out of school as a teen before joining the Army.

When Special Forces Staff Sergeant Roy Benavidez heard the distress call, he jumped aboard the next helicopter bound for the combat zone without hesitation. Soon they found themselves surrounded by hundreds of NVA, under attack, low on ammunition, stacking the bodies of the dead as cover in a desperate attempt to survive the onslaught. What the team didn’t know was that they had infiltrated a section of jungle that concealed a major enemy base. Their objective, just miles over the Vietnam border, was to collect evidence that proved the North Vietnamese Army was using the Cambodian sanctuary as a major conduit for supplying troops and materiel to the south via the Ho Chi Minh Trail. A twelve-man Special Forces team had been covertly inserted into a small clearing in the jungles of neutral Cambodia-where U.S. In Legend, acclaimed bestselling author Eric Blehm takes as his canvas the Vietnam War, as seen through a single mission that occurred on May 2, 1968. Army’s 240th Assault Helicopter Company and Green Beret Staff Sergeant Roy Benavidez, who risked everything to rescue a Special Forces team trapped behind enemy lines.

The unforgettable account and courageous actions of the U.S.

Legend by eric blehm