While at Purdue University on an NROTC scholarship in 1971, Roland Haas
was recruited to become a CIA deep clandestine operative. He underwent
intensive training to prepare for insertion into hostile areas,
including High Altitude Low Opening (HALO) parachuting and weapons
instruction. In the course of his first mission (to East and West
Germany, Turkey, Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, Bulgaria, Romania,
and Austria), he assassinated several international drug dealers. On his
return, he was thrown into an Iranian prison, where he was physically
and psychologically tortured. Over the next thirty years, he served the
agency on an as-needed basis, engaging in such activities as hunting
down and eliminating members of the Red Army Faction and extracting
Soviet Spetsnaz officers from East Germany. His cover jobs included
being a part owner of an Oakland health club, which brought him into
close contact with steroid abuse in professional athletics, drug abuse
in general, and the Hell's Angels, whom he believes tried to have him
killed. He also served in Germany as site commander for the Conventional
Forces in Europe weapons treaty. His most recent cover was as the deputy
director of intelligence in the U.S. Army Reserve Command, which
involved him with the Guantanamo detention facility.A true story that
pulls no punches, Enter the Past Tense also chronicles Haas's descent
into, and recovery from, alcoholism that resulted from the stress of
this extraordinary life. It is an eye-opening look at the dark, but many
would argue necessary, side of intelligence work--and one that readers
won't soon forget.
