The book is about how Colonel Zygmunt Berling, a disgruntled Colonel of the Polish inter-war army - once captured by the Red Army and imprisoned - betrayed his country whilst in captivity between 1939-1941.

The book is about how Colonel Zygmunt Berling, a disgruntled Colonel of the Polish inter-war army - once captured by the Red Army and imprisoned - betrayed his country whilst in captivity between 1939-1941, and after 1941 vied, in his mind with General Anders, for power in establishing a Polish Army out of the hundreds of thousands of Poles captive