The Assault on Intelligence is not just another polemic about a truth free President with a lack of intelligence as to information and cognitive skill. The reason is that it can be read in conjunction with his earlier book Playing on the Edge. Playing was written prior to this presidency and so contains analysis that can not be said to be shaded by the inadequacies of the present incumbent in the White House. These books should be read together.
The discussions with President Bush regarding detentions, renditions and interrogations and the briefings to President Obama regarding covert programs in Playing on the Edge show presidents intent on learning the minutia of these actions. Though the author was not in office during the present administration it is clear from his background that he knows how Trump is perceived by the intelligence agencies and why. The classic example he refers to is the visit of the President to the CIA when he talked about how he caught the media in a lie regarding the size of his inaugural crowd. This to a group of people who stake their reputations on checking and rechecking facts which is detailed in Playing on the Edge.
During the campaign the incumbent turned the intelligence briefers into political props and campaign tools and alleged that he could tell what they were thinking from body language which it is apparent from Playing would never happen.
Interesting, in Assault it is made clear that the intelligence institutions took down Mike Flynn, not the Obama administration. From Playing, it is clear why.
From the two books it is apparent that Michael Hayden contributes a cohesive understanding of the full picture of the damage the present administration has done to the professionals in the intelligence community. These books make it clear that agree or not with what covert action has been carried out in the past the average intelligence analyst has reason to wonder whether there is a thinking rational being at the other end of his work product. As a politically liberal reader, these texts make it possible to understand the threat to real facts communicated to the incumbent President in what he might do with them. Marge Haskell Instructor, Political Science Berkeley City College
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