51 of 54 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Self centered and not very interesting, December 12, 2006
This review is from: Class 11: Inside the CIA's First Post-9/11 Spy Class (Hardcover)
The author is really impressed with himself, I mean really impressed. Intelligence work is grueling, frustrating, and tedious work, but Mr. Waters's and his band of young case officers think that just because they have been hired by the CIA they are suddenly James Bond. The description of the Directorate of Operations training program is interesting, but you get the feeling that the author's heart was never in it and that he had a plan to write a book all along. If he was as good and patriotic as he claimed to be, he would still be undercover in the CIA, and not trying to make a quick buck off writing a book exposing CIA sources and methods.
Despite the author's belief that he is really cool, most of his stories are not that interesting. The fact that he has a house in Florida and an attractive girlfriend distracts from the focus of the book. Most of the characters come off as annoying and full of themselves. It was amusing the see how bad the trainees did during their practice exercises in local malls and towns. Local sheriffs and townspeople kept picking them out. How are these "operatives" going to blend into Pakistan or Nigeria, if they can not blend into suburban Virginia?
While the intelligence community is full of dedicated professionals, the ones described in this book, especially the author, do not give me much hope for the future of the CIA. I would skip this one, and focus on the numerous more impressive books written on the CIA and human intelligence.
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34 of 35 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Self-involved, overwrought, dishonest and poorly written, May 1, 2007
This review is from: Class 11: Inside the CIA's First Post-9/11 Spy Class (Hardcover)
The first thing one should know when reading this book is that the author, T.J. Waters, did not pass the CIA training course which is the subject of his book, a fact he conveniently omits. This fact casts some doubt on whether he is really a good source of information on the Agency and its training course.
Another fact which he distorts is his constant claim that his class was the "first post 9/11 class." His was the first class to be hired after 9/11, however, as his class started in July 2002 according to his book, it would seem that the previous class, class 10, was the first post 9/11 class.
The dishonesty and distortions aside, it was difficult to get through the book for many reasons. The main one is that TJ comes off as a self-involved jerk, not nearly as witty, talented or funny as he thinks he is. He takes every opportunity to let you know that his wife is hot, that he lives in an expensive house, and he does cool things like scuba diving and karate. Perhaps he was overcompensating for feeling inadequate for not passing the course.
Although his attempts at humor fall flat, there are many parts of the book which are unintentionally laughable, such as the following passage from the Afterword:
"Bin Ladin. He is our singular obsession - the one man who shook Western society unlike any other before him. This is the reason we scour the Pakistani mountains, interview thousands of Afghan tribesmen, and elicit nefarious individuals in the dusty hinterlands of the Middle East. We cannot stop. We will not stop."
Please. So overdramatic. Not to mention the fact that TJ himself has done none of this. Its another example of his dishonesty.
The passage also illustrates the book's poor writing. At times it sounds like a third-rate romance novel, as in the below passage from page 11, describing his first trip home to visit his wife:
"I slip out from under the covers without waking Cathy and go to the kitchen to start the coffee...It's an absolutely spectacular Florida morning.
A voice startles me from the tranquil scene. 'So, do you miss me or the water?'
Cathy waits until I walk back to the house before applying a coy, come hither tactic.
'I'm glad you came home,' she whispers in my ear.
The coffee will have to wait."
OK TJ, I get it, you had sex with your wife. Good for you.
I also noticed that many of the women in the book "coo" (see page 80). Again, bad romance novel.
The main reason people would read this book would be to find out about the CIA training program. I did not feel like I got a good sense of the program. TJ was too busy talking about himself and his run-ins with the instructors. One thing that was clear was that TJ really bonded with his classmates. But his efforts to capture the spirit of camraderie fail, and some of his classmates come across as being just as self-involved and shallow as he does.
Overall, I regret putting money in TJ's pocket by buying this book. But, perhaps it was worth it for all the laughs I have gotten at his expense by reading passages aloud to my friends.
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96 of 111 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Beneath Contempt and Stupid as Well, December 3, 2006
This review is from: Class 11: Inside the CIA's First Post-9/11 Spy Class (Hardcover)
I am a former spy, with three clandestine tours and three Headquarters tours behind me, and I consider this book to be beneath contempt. Indeed, I believe that individuals such as this author do the Nation a grave dis-service, and should be shunned.
Being a spy is both challenging and enervating. It is not a game and it is not for diletantes who quit when the going gets tough. This is an immature book, an opportunistic book, and it is largely worthless...beneath contempt (as is the similar book by that silly little girl with a cartoon book cover).
The book has many inaccuracies. The one that stands out is the class size. The class size was NOT an increase over the norm, but rather a return to the norm from the period before a series of Directors of Central Intelligence including Woolsey, Deutch, and Tenet, destroyed the clandestine service, finishing the job started by Stanfield Turner.
For those who wish to consider applying for the clandestine service I continue to recommend Miles Copeland's "Without Cloak or Dagger," and Allen Dulles timeless "The Craft of Intelligence." See my two lists for serious books about intelligence as a global craft focused on decision support and the health and death of Nations.
Books like this dishonor the brave men and women who are actually good enough to make it to the field where they risk their lives as well as their marriages to serve the Nation. The author is not among them for very good reasons, and should be ignored on this topic about which he knows nothing. CIA "training" actually starts in the field, the "farm" is simply a means of weeding out the mis-fits.
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