Customer Reviews

The Central Intelligence Agency: Security under Scrutiny (Understanding Our Government)

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Very impressed, and I appreciate the way the book is set up.

Basically, you have an introductory chapter of a dense 80 pages that goes through the whole history. People, places, events, results, trends under each President, etc. Following that is a series of analysis essays, that really underline the more important aspects of the organization and provide an in-depth look at specific issues. It's definitely a textbook (as opposed to some of the more enjoyable books on the same subject), so you sacrifice some readability for the dense content.

Overall, I learned more from this book than any other one I had read, but I did slow way down and took notes on each chapter. Suggest taking a week of intense reading to completely understand the first section, and you can then read the analysis essays with ease.

THE CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY: SECURITY UNDER SCRUTINY edited by Athan Theoharis and others joins others in the 'Understanding Our Government' series to provide college-level readers with a primer on the CIA's history, purposes, and activities. Chapters describe its organization, intelligence operations, controversies and events, considering the changing role and perception of secrets and intelligence work over the decades and spying and interception projects fostered by the CIA.