From 1985 to 1988, Scott W. Hawley, the son of a U.S. Air Force officer, lived on Rhein Main Air Force Base, a bustling U.S. military installation located in the heart of what was then West Germany. One of six hundred children of U.S. military personnel attending Frankfurt American High School, he lived the unique experience of being an American teenager in Germany during the Cold War.

While Hawley and his friends studied calculus and chemistry and sold candy bars to send the track team to Brussels, their parents commanded tank battalions, flew transport aircraft, and honed their combat...