Renegade Hero

Book excerpt: A Royal Air Force helicopter pilot fakes his own death to join a CIA paramilitary unit in this remarkable Cold War biography. RAF helicopter ace Terry Peet had a well-earned reputation for sheer guts. While in Malaya and Borneo, he cheated death time and again, earning a Queen’s Commendation for Valuable Service in the Air. But Peet suddenly disappeared without trace—supposedly having drowned while scuba diving. Then, six years later, Peet reappeared. The media hailed him as a renegade hero when the story of his extraordinary double life was revealed. Peet had in fact been recruited by the CIA for clandestine paramilitary operations in the former Belgian Congo. He was then sent to Nigeria, where he led a UNICEF mission saving refugees from the Biafran War. Peet’s work with the CIA had the tacit approval of British Intelligence, but his departure from the RAF had to be covert. Yet none of this was mentioned in the summary presented at his court martial. Now Renegade Hero recounts the full story of the mysterious affair as told to the author by Peet himself.