How could this guy Bazata assist the 9/11 Commission if he died two years ago in 1999?
I agree. A mystery, but a mystery created by bad writing.
The sentence should have read like this: "He ended his career as an aide to President Ronald Reagan's Navy Secretary John Lehman, [who later became] a member of the 9/11 Commission and adviser to John McCain's presidential campaign."
Anyway, thanks to all the posters who identified the movie plot "The Brass Target". The much younger novel by Christopher Reich "The Runner" also has as plot motif the eventual killing of General Patton.
Here are a few lines from the editorial review on Amazon:
hese "set pieces" stand awkwardly apart, like dour history professors coaxed into supervising the machinations of rambunctious students. Reich's general fidelity to detail also means that the moments in which he temporarily throws accuracy to the wind are painfully apparent: how on earth would Judge, a well-fed and well-dressed American, manage to look as if he belonged in a German work-group detail? And when would any three-star general ever tolerate the gum-cracking insouciance of Judge's driver Darren Honey, a sergeant with no regard for military hierarchy? Oddly enough, the authorial liberties Reich takes with General George Patton, saddling him with a megalomaniac's hatred of the Russians and a schemer's plot to redraw the boundaries of postwar Europe, are largely successful and add a welcome note of barely contained evil.
Anyway, a very interesting thread, and I duff my cap to all those Freepers who either themselves served, or whose fathers, served in the 3d Army.
Thanks for your service, Gentlemen.