In 1993, the U.S. Navy Donated Road Building equipment to the country of Cambodia. Author DW Brown (then Sergeant Brown) deployed there to train the Royal Cambodian Armed Forces to operate and maintain that equipment.

While in country, I toured the Killing Fields and climbed inside a four story structure of stacked skulls, an experience that I will never forget…

A team of 10 U.S. Soldiers left the United States with the intent to teach the Cambodians. After seeing the atrocity that Colonel Pol Pot wrought upon his

own people, we were the ones on the receiving end of a history lesson.

Millions of people were killed using the most extreme methods of torture and abuse known to mankind. By killing off all of the skilled tradesmen in the country, Pol Pot put them in the dark ages; they still haven’t recovered.

While on the job site each day, locals would come by selling birds, a Cambodian delicacy for $1.00 Platter.

The locals would iron our clothes the old fashioned way.

Locals offered rides on mopeds and their form of a chariot.

Life at the marketplace in downtown Phnom Penn was something else I’ll never forget. People were begging for money and food at every turn, and 90% of

them had extreme deformities.

It was commonplace to see four to six people on one moped. We paid $1.00 to travel anywhere in the city.

At the conclusion of our training camp, we took the locals to a washed out area and showed them how to build a road with proper drainage.

It was an honor getting to know the local Cambodian soldiers. The two in the front column were our best operators during the training.

20 years later, I decided to write To Know Death, a Fiction novel set in Cambodia. I used many of my actual experiences from my deployment there in

the early 1990’s.

Synopsis, To Know Death:

Two men from different worlds strike up a friendship in the most unlikely of circumstances. While on a deployment in Cambodia to search for the remains of soldiers missing in action from the Vietnam War, a military team unearths a mass gravesite containing over 300 hundred human skeletons. Upon touching one of the skulls, Jason Taylor, the leader of the team and Munny Sum, the local Cambodian interpreter, both receive a jolt of electricity that sends them directly to the hospital, and eventually gives them a unique ability to see death.

Returning to his home, Munny discovers his family has been slain by a murderer. Fearing for his life, he hides out in the cargo area of Jason’s plane, and hitches a ride back to the states. Back at his place, Jason walks in on his wife and another man, and they were doing more than just talking. Using their new talent, the two broken men embark on a journey that prevents numerous murders, and strengthens their bond of friendship.