Review (Guest): Eyes on Havana: Memoir of an American Spy Betrayed by the CIA

READ THIS WELL-WRITTEN BOOK!!! Why? For a reality check. Americans, even those who work for the federal government, have a distorted view of reality. Here's what one U.S. government employee said about this work: “I can't possibly believe that the United States of America would send a CIA official to Cuba to poison school children's milk.” Well, Verne Lyon worked for the CIA, that Agency sent him to Cuba, and the CIA ordered him to poison school children's milk. (See pp. 103-104 ).

I've known Verne for years, from when we were both members of the Association of National Security Alumni to the present. His remarks and remembrances and analysis in this work jibe with what he's told me personally. And, in “Eyes on Havana”, he supplies much greater detail.

I don't know which is more frightening, disgusting, or horrifying: that the CIA exists; that it recruits students on campus; that it engages in covert actions, such as poisoning school children's milk; or that there are no controls on it or on its actions, many of which involve the overthrow of governments, murder of politicians, and interference in U.S. internal affairs.

Verne, amazingly, is not bitter over what the United States of America did to him. The government destroyed his life and refuses, decades later, to own up to it. However, he is steadily getting his own back. He and I co-wrote a good bit of “Unclassified”, the above-named association's publication, exposing CIA idiocy and dangerous activities. In “Eyes on Havana”, Verne does it in spades. The information he provides shows, in first-person detail, the shocking manner and consequences of his CIA recruitment. An aerospace engineer, Verne was blackmailed into working for the Agency, and, when he tried to resign, was twice kidnapped, jailed after a kangaroo court trial, and forced to divorce his wife and family in Cuba.

Again, read this book. The CIA has a sign on its wall: “And Ye shall know the Truth and the Truth shall make you free.” Well, the Truth is not on the wall of the CIA; it is here, in Verne Lyon's book “Eyes on Havana”.