Public Intelligence Blog – Page 4142 – The truth at any cost lowers all other costs — curated by former US spy Robert David Steele.

0Shares

Crystal-clear insights into intelligence failure in Viet-Nam,

April 8, 2000

Orrin Deforest

This is one of two books I regard as essential to an understanding of our intelligence failures in Viet-Nam. DeForrest was a former military enlisted man who ended up managing a great deal of the prisoner interrogation for a major Agency facility in-country. His story ties together a number of important themes, from the failure of Ivy League types to understand what they were dealing with to the inadequacies (and sometimes the superiority) of vast numbers of “contract” case officers who would normally not have been hired, to the very real value of systematically debriefing all prisoners and entering the results into a database amenable to search and retrieval, something we don't know how to do today. Across every major military operation since Viet-Nam, it has been my experience that we have no table of organization and equipment, completely inadequate numbers of trained interrogators and translators, and no commitment to the tedious but essential work of extracting knowledge from large numbers of hostile prisoners.

2000/04/082009/10/24

Review: War Without Windows

4 Star, Intelligence (Government/Secret)

0Shares

Essential reference on intelligence failure in Viet-Nam,

April 8, 2000

Bruce Jones

Sam Adams may be more famous as the whistle-blower on CIA and U.S. military falsification of the numbers of Viet Cong and regular North Vietnamese army personnel confronting the U.S. in Viet-Nam, but this book is the very best account I have found of the intimate details of how politics, bureaucracy, bad judgment, and some plain downright lying falsified the military intelligence process at all levels of the U.S. military in Viet-Nam.

2000/04/082009/12/04

Review: The Tunnels of Cu Chi

6 Star Top 10%, Asymmetric, Cyber, Hacking, Odd War, Insurgency & Revolution, Intelligence (Government/Secret)

9Shares

Required Reading for All Command & Staff Officers,

April 8, 2000

Tom Mangold

This is required reading for every commander and every staff officer, and for every intelligence professional, both at the entry-level and at mid-career. Two things really hit home from this book: 1) the fact that we were completely clueless about the physical, mental, and cultural toughness and dedication of the Vietnamese who opposed our interference in Viet-Nam; 2) the fact that we are completely unable to detect tunnels under our base camps or in the tactical environment (although new technology is coming along). They dug 200 miles of tunnels by hand, including extensive networks under the major Bien Hoa complex.

2000/04/082009/10/24

Review: The Tet Offensive–Intelligence Failure in War

5 Star, Intelligence (Government/Secret)

0Shares

Very detailed review of intelligence failure in Viet-Nam,

April 8, 2000

James J. Wirtz

Jim, a very respected member of the faculty at the Naval Postgraduate School, has provided us with a very well documented study of how the U.S. missed the Tet Offensive in Viet-Name. Among his findings: we knew fully two months in advance at the tactical collection level, with several additional collection successes and some modest analysis successes in the weeks preceding the offensive. We were distracted by Khe Sanh, the commanders did not want to hear it, “intelligence to please” was the standard within the Military Assistance Command Viet-Nam intelligence bureaucracy, and when we finally did grasp, one day before the attack, its true strategic nature, we failed to disseminate the warnings to the tactical commanders with sufficient effectiveness.

2000/04/082009/10/24

Review: From the Shadows–The Ultimate Insider’s Story of Five Presidents and How They Won the Cold War

4 Star, Intelligence (Government/Secret)

0Shares

Useful benchmark on intelligence-policy relationship,

April 8, 2000

Robert M. Gates

I wore out one fountain pen on this book. Bob Gates has served his country, and five presidents, as earnestly and capably as anyone might, and there is much to learn from this book. The level of detail is quite good. He is very critical of the Directorate of Operations for both misbehavior and a lack of management control in relation to Central America, and as one who was there I have to say, he is absolutely right. We disagree on the point of intelligence (he would say, “secrets for the president”, I would say “knowledge for the Nation”) but I believe we would agree on this: intelligence is important, and intelligence merits deep and sustained interest by the President.

2000/04/082009/10/24

Review: In from the Cold–The Report of the Twentieth Century Fund Task Force on the Future of U.S. Intelligence

4 Star, Intelligence (Government/Secret)

0Shares

Essential Citizen-Led Reference on Intelligence Reform,

April 8, 2000

Allan E. Goodman

The Director of Central Intelligence now serving refuses to accept the word “reform” and persists in the traditionalist view that only incremental change is needed within the U.S. Intelligence Community. This book, by a very respected team of private sector authorities with experience in the business of intelligence opens by noting that “informed opinion overwhelmingly holds that many of the important questions about the intelligence agencies have yet to be addressed.” Their book, and mine, and the books coming out this year by Greg Treverton, the team of Bruce Berkowitz and Allan Goodman, and a group of ten authors including Mel Goodman and Bob White, are part of the responsible effort from the private sector to get the incoming President and the incoming Congress to finally accept their own responsibility for engaging these issues and legislating reform that will never come from within the U.S. Intelligence Community if it is left to its own devices and inclinations.

2000/04/082009/10/24

Review: INSIDE THE COMPANY–CIA DIARY

4 Star, Impeachment & Treason, Intelligence (Government/Secret)

0Shares

Best Cold Look at Day to Day Clandestine Operations,

April 8, 2000

Philip Agee

I despise what Philip Agee did with this book, endangering the lives of real people and violating his oath as a commissioned officer in the clandestine service. I was also very surprised by the level of detail in the book, and concluded that he intended to betray the CIA well prior to leaving. I've served three overseas tours and three Washington assignments, and from all that time I can barely remember one cryptonym series and not a single true identity. I think Agee took notes and planned ahead to burn the CIA. This is a good diary, and I include it in this bibliography to represent the pedestrian side of the DO-the day to day monotony of going through the motions and doing agent recruitments and agent handling operations in third world countries where the bulk of what one does really does not contribute to U.S. national security or understanding.

Edit of 11 Jan 08 to add comment and links.

Comment: I am committed to reducing the secret budget from $60 billion a year to $12 billion, and the heavy metal military budget from $950 billion to $250 billion, with the savings directed toward waging peace and offering free education in all languages via free cell phones, the only way we will be able to create a prosperous world at peace.

Other links:
Legacy of Ashes: The History of the CIA
Dark Alliance: The CIA, the Contras, and the Crack Cocaine Explosion
Web of Deceit: The History of Western complicity in Iraq, from Churchill to Kennedy to George W. Bush
None So Blind: A Personal Account of the Intelligence Failure in Vietnam
See No Evil
Sleeping with the Devil: How Washington Sold Our Soul for Saudi Crude
9/11 Synthetic Terror: Made in USA, Fourth Edition

Edit of 12 Apr 09 to add three more links
Who the Hell Are We Fighting?: The Story of Sam Adams and the Vietnam Intelligence Wars
The New Craft of Intelligence: Personal, Public, & Political–Citizen's Action Handbook for Fighting Terrorism, Genocide, Disease, Toxic Bombs, & Corruption
Collective Intelligence: Creating a Prosperous World at Peace