According to the book description of The Final Mission: Spooky 8, “For seventeen years, Bob King, who began his military career as a member of the Special Forces Unit in Vietnam, led an incredible double life, carrying out the U.S. government's high-risk missions-- without involving its military. Then, in 1992, King and his men, secret members of a U.S. Tactical Reconnaissance Team, were sent to Colombia. The mission was "an easy breather," until the men walked into an ambush and found out the real reason they were there. They had been sent to die.

With three men dead, and King himself wounded, the band of mercenaries began a desperate battle for survival-- and for the truth-- that led from South America all the way to Washington, D.C. Now, in this chilling, action-packed book, Bob King goes public: with the covert operations he carried out, the hidden deals he witnessed, and the horrific shadow war he survived-- against a U.S. government desperate to bury its secrets and its own men.”

From Publishers Weekly said of The Final Mission: Spooky 8, “From the very beginning, King assumes a defensive position: "I expect a considerable effort will be made to discredit my past, challenge my veracity, or even attack my mental state to make sure few will take this story and what it represents seriously." What this book represents will surely disturb many readers but not for the reasons King thinks it will. Though he wants us to be shocked by the fact that the U.S. government is willing to betray its covert operatives, what will trouble them is King's own attitude toward events. The book bears obvious similarities to Richard Marcinko's Rogue Warrior series, but readers know that Marcinko's team in both his fiction and nonfiction is under the command of the U.S. Navy and that its existence is therefore a matter of record. By contrast, King writes that his team, Spooky 8, which he joined in 1975, was a covert team designed to work the "dark, classified side of black operations" and that he never knew who was running the show. In an epithet-filled style thick with self-conscious bravado, King describes a Spooky 8 mission gone wrong. In 1992, the team was dispatched to Colombia to set up surveillance equipment to monitor the drug trade. It was ambushed and lost three members. The "final mission" of the subtitle refers to how King and his fellow survivors deduced who betrayed them, kidnapped the culprit and killed him, with King pulling the trigger ("BBLLLAAAMMM! 'That's for Santana'"). One team member collected the spent shell casings to make a necklace. The prospect that King is telling the truth may distress readers more than the prospect that he is fabricating events. Those events are related with a modicum of suspense in adrenalized prose laced with sometimes laughable dialogue. But even if everything that King says happened actually did occur, his telling is so devoid of meaningful moral reflection that it will satisfy only those willing to entertain the most lurid and violent revenge fantasies.”

One reader of The Final Mission: Spooky 8 said, “This book was written as a means of therapy and to give closure to his secret life. While every effort was made to be accurate, names, dates, places, and events were intentionally altered. It is about a secret side to our government that is kept hidden, one that is not elected but controls our lives never the less. The book begins with an easy job that promised big money. (Shouldn't this be a warning?) The team is introduced by their talents. The job was to place some monitoring equipment at a rural airstrip, then return. But an ambush occurred, and team members were killed. They cleaned up the mess, and escaped (pp.62-4). When the remaining members of the team met at the rendezvous in Colorado, they were warned against using a cordless or cellular phone.

Chapters 9 and 10 tell of his entry into the world of black operations in Thailand, where he was involved in transporting "military supplies". In Chapter 16 Chance learns these "military supplies" were opium; this was a forerunner for Iran-Contra drug smuggling. In Chapter 17 Chance found out about the history of his black operations. It was to enrich high-level intelligence operations; they were "the biggest drug dealers in the world" (p.221). All the surviving team members wanted was to be let alone, and not hassled in other ways (pp.233-4). The Appendix gives examples of coded memos from the CIA, the Department of Energy, and the Environmental Protection Agency (what a great cover name!).

A few years before his execution, an excerpt from a letter of Timothy McVeigh was printed in the "NY Times'. It said the Federal Government wanted to recruit him for a secret organization that would execute drug dealers and corrupt politicians in this country and abroad. This book corroborates that statement. The book "Compromised" by Terry Reed tells of higher level drug deals by Government officials. Why were the Spooky 8 teams "contaminated with toxic wastes"? Because they knew too much, and their continued employment presented a future security risk (like that C-5 shot down in 1986 Nicaragua). 1992 was a critical election year. The old saying is still true: "if you sup with the Devil be sure to use a long spoon.”