Customer Reviews

The Game Player

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Miles Copeland's book the Game Player is an interesting autobiography of one of the CIA's first political operatives i.e. working covertly to drive American interests in states such as Britain, France, Egypt, Iran etc., contrasting with the overt, paramilitary operations in Vietnam, Guatemala etc.

His thesis is where the methods worked, they were unseen, perceived as natural, local progressions that just happened to generate regimes favorable to American interests. Some of the hidden levers have been revealed over the years in other tell-all books yet the most successful have not been detailed in Copeland's opinion.

Another theme is the success of small teams of bright people achieving greater success than armies of infighting bureaucrats with inward focused objectives.

Perhaps the most interesting section was the targeting of occult belief systems, particularly Scientology and Astrology to influence target groups, a devious, subtle move. Why move tanks divisions when you can skew astrological predictions or 'audit' away opposition?

FYI I would shop around for the best price on this book.

This is easily one of the most honest books i have ever read about how hidden and covert politics REALLY work and how an intelligence operative's life is. This book has not received the fame it deserved(unlike its predecessor,"The game of nations");instead,only hardcore lovers of espionage and politics are the only ones who really appreciated this book. want to know from where Reagan REALLY(and,dare i say,bizarrely)brought his principles of political policies? want to REALLY know why the Cooperation Council for the Arab States of the Gulf (CCASG) countries has one of the highest GDP per capitas in the world? want to REALLY know why and how Iran's shah's was overthrown? Want to know why Jamal Abdul-Nasser was chosen to rule Egypt after King Farouk? these are questions that I have not been able to answer to this day until i read this book(oh,and by the way,if you CAREFULLY read this book you will soon learn that your media was NEVER honest to you in anything). Here's a spoiler, in the last page,if you were not able to figure out the answer to Copeland's final quiz question then here it is,its answer is:Amorality...