Ebook Download A Look over My Shoulder: A Life in the Central Intelligence Agency, by Richard Helms, William Hood
A Look Over My Shoulder: A Life In The Central Intelligence Agency, By Richard Helms, William Hood. Welcome to the very best website that available hundreds sort of book collections. Below, we will provide all books A Look Over My Shoulder: A Life In The Central Intelligence Agency, By Richard Helms, William Hood that you require. Guides from popular writers as well as authors are supplied. So, you could delight in now to obtain individually kind of publication A Look Over My Shoulder: A Life In The Central Intelligence Agency, By Richard Helms, William Hood that you will search. Well, related to the book that you want, is this A Look Over My Shoulder: A Life In The Central Intelligence Agency, By Richard Helms, William Hood your selection?
A Look over My Shoulder: A Life in the Central Intelligence Agency, by Richard Helms, William Hood
Ebook Download A Look over My Shoulder: A Life in the Central Intelligence Agency, by Richard Helms, William Hood
A Look Over My Shoulder: A Life In The Central Intelligence Agency, By Richard Helms, William Hood. In what situation do you like reviewing a lot? Exactly what regarding the type of the book A Look Over My Shoulder: A Life In The Central Intelligence Agency, By Richard Helms, William Hood The have to review? Well, everybody has their own reason ought to check out some e-books A Look Over My Shoulder: A Life In The Central Intelligence Agency, By Richard Helms, William Hood Mainly, it will connect to their need to get understanding from the e-book A Look Over My Shoulder: A Life In The Central Intelligence Agency, By Richard Helms, William Hood as well as intend to review merely to obtain home entertainment. Stories, tale publication, as well as various other amusing books come to be so prominent today. Besides, the scientific books will certainly additionally be the most effective reason to decide on, particularly for the students, educators, doctors, entrepreneur, and other occupations who love reading.
Do you ever before recognize the e-book A Look Over My Shoulder: A Life In The Central Intelligence Agency, By Richard Helms, William Hood Yeah, this is a really interesting book to check out. As we informed formerly, reading is not sort of responsibility activity to do when we need to obligate. Reading ought to be a routine, a good habit. By reading A Look Over My Shoulder: A Life In The Central Intelligence Agency, By Richard Helms, William Hood, you could open the new globe as well as get the power from the globe. Everything can be gotten with the book A Look Over My Shoulder: A Life In The Central Intelligence Agency, By Richard Helms, William Hood Well briefly, book is extremely powerful. As exactly what we provide you here, this A Look Over My Shoulder: A Life In The Central Intelligence Agency, By Richard Helms, William Hood is as one of reading e-book for you.
By reviewing this book A Look Over My Shoulder: A Life In The Central Intelligence Agency, By Richard Helms, William Hood, you will certainly get the finest thing to acquire. The brand-new point that you do not have to spend over money to get to is by doing it by yourself. So, exactly what should you do now? Visit the link page as well as download and install the book A Look Over My Shoulder: A Life In The Central Intelligence Agency, By Richard Helms, William Hood You could obtain this A Look Over My Shoulder: A Life In The Central Intelligence Agency, By Richard Helms, William Hood by on-line. It's so easy, right? Nowadays, innovation really sustains you activities, this online publication A Look Over My Shoulder: A Life In The Central Intelligence Agency, By Richard Helms, William Hood, is also.
Be the first to download this publication A Look Over My Shoulder: A Life In The Central Intelligence Agency, By Richard Helms, William Hood and let reviewed by surface. It is really easy to read this e-book A Look Over My Shoulder: A Life In The Central Intelligence Agency, By Richard Helms, William Hood because you don't should bring this published A Look Over My Shoulder: A Life In The Central Intelligence Agency, By Richard Helms, William Hood almost everywhere. Your soft data publication could be in our gizmo or computer so you can appreciate checking out everywhere and each time if required. This is why whole lots numbers of people also review guides A Look Over My Shoulder: A Life In The Central Intelligence Agency, By Richard Helms, William Hood in soft fie by downloading guide. So, be among them who take all advantages of reviewing the book A Look Over My Shoulder: A Life In The Central Intelligence Agency, By Richard Helms, William Hood by on the internet or on your soft data system.
A Look Over My Shoulder, by Richard Helms, begins with President Nixon’s attempt to embroil the Central Intelligence Agency, of which Helms was then the director, in the Watergate cover-up. Helms then recalls his education in Switzerland and Germany and at Williams College; his early career as a foreign correspondent in Berlin, during which he once lunched with Hitler; and his return to newspaper work in the United States. Helms served on the German desk at OSS headquarters in London; subsequently, he was assigned to Allen Dulles’s Berlin office in postwar Germany.
On his return to Washington, Helms assumed responsibility for the OSS carryover operations in Germany, Austria, and Eastern Europe. He remained in this post until the Central Intelligence Agency was formed in 1947. At CIA, Helms served as a division chief; as chief of operations for Frank Wisner; as deputy director for plans (operations); as deputy director; and, ultimately, as director, from 1966 to 1973. He was appointed ambassador to Iran later that year, and he retired from government service in January 1977.
A Look Over My Shoulder focuses on subjects such as intelligence collection, covert action, the uses and misuses of intelligence, and the problems secret intelligence encounters in an open society. Helms discusses
• working with Allen Dulles in Berlin in the early days of the Cold War.
• the amazing results of CIA’s Berlin tunnel operation, code name GOLD: “[Soviet officers’] unvarnished comments on the quality of Soviet military equipment, the intellectual capacity of fellow officers, and the wisdom of Moscow’s military policies were in more than one sense priceless.”
• the remarkable progress of high-altitude spying: “[The U-2 photographs] permitted resolution to some thirty inches—not quite enough to limn a football, as some press accounts have suggested, but quite good enough to spot a Soviet soldier perched on an open privy a discreet two hundred yards from [a guided missile] site in Cuba.”
• his relationship with presidents and other key figures of the Cold War: After an Air Force briefing on the destruction of the electric grid in North Vietnam, LBJ’s only question to Helms was “Are the lights on in Hanoi?”; J. Edgar Hoover once offered Helms “a forty-five-minute uninterrupted history of the FBI in peace and war.”
• how President Nixon attempted to embroil CIA in the Watergate cover-up: “The telephone call that set in motion the events that would eventually end my intelligence career came as I was preparing for bed, Saturday, June 17, 1972. . . . ‘I’ve just learned that the District police have picked up five men in a break-in at the Democratic Party National Headquarters at the Watergate.’”
It was often thought that Richard Helms, who served longer in the Central Intelligence Agency than anyone else, would never tell his story, but here it is—revealing, news-making, and with candid assessments of the controversies and triumphs of a remarkable career.
- Sales Rank: #959406 in Books
- Brand: Random House
- Published on: 2003-04
- Released on: 2003-04-08
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 9.47" h x 1.53" w x 6.38" l,
- Binding: Hardcover
- 496 pages
- Great product!
From Publishers Weekly
Director of Central Intelligence from 1966 to 1973, and with an intelligence career spanning three decades, Helms offers an insider's defense-and occasionally critique-of the frequently maligned agency's performance during the turbulent 1950s, '60s and early '70s. He argues that criticisms of the CIA are misdirected because the agency made no policy and had no agenda of its own-it merely did the president's bidding. Helms doesn't sensationalize. Instead, he describes how the CIA successfully influenced geopolitical developments in ways that benefited the U.S. The strength of the book is in the breadth of history it encompasses. Helms's career spanned WWII, the Cuban missile crisis, the U.S role in the ouster of Chile's President Allende, Vietnam, numerous Middle East meltdowns and much of the Cold War. Along the way he battled with the Pentagon about the relative troop strength of the Vietcong and with the Department of Defense over the nuclear capability of the USSR. Helms's impressions of the men of his times, from Hitler to Reagan, makes for sometimes surprising reading. For example, President Johnson is sympathetically treated, while Sen. Frank Church, who headed Senate hearings into the CIA, is depicted as an ambitious political opportunist. Although it is only by implication, Helms raises provocative questions about the proper scope of congressional oversight of the CIA that are especially relevant in the post-September 11 world. Photos not seen by PW.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Booklist
Helms was director of the Central Intelligence Agency from 1966 to 1973. "This is a memoir I never expected to write," he says in the preface to the memoir we're glad he did write, for in looking over his 30 years in the intelligence field, he presents a book as compelling as a good thriller. (Perhaps a lot of credit for the fluidity of the prose should go to his coauthor, but, ultimately, that's an unimportant issue.) In terms of a profession, Helms was involved first in journalism--in Germany during the Third Reich--but during the war and postwar years, circumstances drew him into intelligence gathering. He was high in the CIA during such bruising times for this country as the Vietnam War and Watergate; his character insights into Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon are gut-real. Helms has a point of view, of course; readers would be naive to think otherwise. For instance, he insists that when it comes to the government's need to gather intelligence, "Americans will never believe that secrecy is essential." We learn spy talk here--such as what "counterintelligence" is and does. Particularly in the post-September 11 climate, inside information on the CIA is bound to generate considerable reader interest. Brad Hooper
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
Review
“Gripping . . . Helms’s account is fascinating, acute, and subtle. . . . There was no public servant I respected more. It was an honor to be Richard Helms’s colleague; it enhanced my life to be his friend.” —from the Foreword by Henry A. Kissinger
Most helpful customer reviews
0 of 0 people found the following review helpful.
Five Stars
By Custerbookstore1874
Thanks!
51 of 59 people found the following review helpful.
Sometimes Bland, But Priceless Collection of Gems
By Robert David STEELE Vivas
Richard Helms is, after Allen Dulles, arguably the most significant US spymaster and intelligence manager in history. It is a fortunate circumstance that he overcame his reluctance to publish anything at all, and worked with the trusted William Hood, whose own books are remarkable, to put before the public a most useful memoire.
Below are a few of the gems that I find worth noting, and for which I recommend the book as a unique record:
1) Puts forward elegant argument for permissive & necessary secrecy in the best interests of the public
2) Defends the CIA culture as highly disciplined--he is persuasive in stating that only Presidents can order covert actions, and that CIA does only the President's direct bidding.
3) Makes it clear in passing, not intentionally, that his experience as both a journalist and businessman were essential to his ultimate success as a spymaster and manager of complex intelligence endeavors--this suggests that one reason there is "no bench" at CIA today is because all the senior managers have been raised as cattle destined to be veal: as young entry on duty people, brought up within the bureaucracy, not knowing how to scrounge sources or meet payroll...
4) Compellingly discusses the fact that intelligence without counterintelligence is almost irrelevant if not counterproductive, but then glosses over some of the most glaring counterintelligence failures in the history of the CIA--interestingly, he defends James Angleton and places the blame for mistreating Nosenko squarterly on the Soviet Division leadership in the Directorate of Operations.
5) Points out that it was Human Intelligence (HUMINT), not Imagery Intelligence (IMINT), that first found the Soviet missiles in Cuba.
6) He confirms the Directorate of Intelligence and the analysis it does, as the "essence" of intelligence, relegating clandestine and technical intelligence to support functions rather than driving functions. This is most important, in that neither clandestine nor technical collectors are truly responsive to the needs of all-source analysts, in part because systems are designed, and agents are recruited, without regard to what is actually needed.
7) He tells a great story on Laos, essentially noting that 200 CIA paramilitary officers, and money, and the indigenous population, where able to keep 5 North Vietnamese divisions bogged down, and kept Laos more or less free for a decade
8) In the same story on Laos, he explains U.S. Department of Defense incapacity in unconventional or behind the lines war by noting that their officers kept arriving "with knapsacks full of doctrine".
9) In recounting some of CIA's technical successes, he notes casually that persistence is a virtue--there were *thirteen* satellite failures before the 14th CORONA effort finally achieved its objectives.
10) He gives Lyndon Baines Johnson (LBJ) much higher marks at a user and leader of intelligence, such that we wondered why Christopher Andrew, the noted author on US Presidents and intelligence, did not include LBJ is his "four who got it" (Washington, Eisenhower, Kennedy, and Bush Senior).
11) He confirms, carefully and directly, that the Israeli attacks on the USS Liberty were deliberate and with fore-knowledge that the USS Liberty was a US vessel flying the US flag on US official business.
12) He expresses concern, in recounting the mistakes in Chile, over the lack of understanding by President Nixon and Henry Kissinger (who writes the Foreword to this book) of the time lags involved in clandestine operations and covert actions.
13) In summary, he ends with pride, noting that all that CIA did not only reduced fear, it saved tens of billions of dollars in defense expenditures that would have been either defeated by the Soviets, or were unnecessary. There can be no question, in light of this account, but that CIA has more than "paid the rent", and for all its trials and tribulations, provides the US taxpayer with a better return on investment than they get from any other part of the US Government, and certainly vastly more bang for the buck that they get from the US Department of Defense.
Richard Helms is a one-of-a-kind, and this memoire should be read by every intellience professional, and anyone who wishes to understand how honorable men can thrive in the black world of clandestine and covert operations. RIP.
20 of 23 people found the following review helpful.
Revealing: politics is personal, too
By epic phlegm Hooha
This book is not afraid to look at fundamental problems in the area of intelligence, which America today is finding amazingly similar to the problems that Richard Helms observed in Germany immediately after World War Two. Helms was uniquely qualified to see the big picture, having been a newspaper reporter who had lunch with Adolf Hitler (Chapter 2 is called `Lunch with Adolf') the day of a big rally in Nuremberg in 1936, a privilege that Americans willing to spend a thousand dollars a plate to attend a fundraiser with American presidents more recently might be jealous of, if being a millionaire is not enough to make them happy. Henry Kissinger was happy to report in the Foreword that Helms was even invited to lunch with President Nixon after an early NSC meeting. (p. xi). There is even a picture of the famous Tuesday lunch group with LBJ, Rusk, Clark Clifford, General Wheeler, Walt Rostow, George Cushman and Walt Johnson. There is even a picture of a lunch with Vice President George Herbert Walker Bush with the caption, "At lunch in the Vice President's office. Aside from George Washington, the elder George Bush is the only President who had firsthand knowledge of the intelligence world."
The Preface reports that February 2, 1973, was the day James Schlesinger was sworn in as head of CIA and Richard Helms lost the position which was his main claim to fame. Richard Nixon had something to do with it, and Chapter 1, `A Smoking Gun' reports enough about the Watergate break-in to give the CIA perspective from the top, and ends with "Five months later, and a few days after his reelection, President Nixon called me to Camp David. It was the last time we spoke while he was in office." (p. 13). The Preface even claims "President Nixon had ended my intelligence career with a handshake at Camp David." (p. vi). If Helms is right about that, there was no personal contact between the Director of the CIA and the President of the United States in December 1972 and January 1973, when the Vietnam ceasefire was being hammered into place and a record number of B-52 bombers were being shot down by North Vietnamese anti-aircraft guns and SAMs. That figures.
The German spies are most fascinating in the beginning of the book. Helms calls Martha Dodd an American, as she was the daughter of the American ambassador to Germany from 1933 to 1938, but she was also girlfriend of Boris Vinogradov, the press secretary at the Soviet embassy in Berlin. After being charged with spying in 1957, she fled to Czechoslovakia. "Martha was seventy when she died in Prague in 1990." (p. 20). Spies and Richard Nixon have an acute sense of which side someone is on, and Helms seems to be particularly sensitive to the issues that Nixon would be prone to notice. Other major personalities are easy to locate in the index: Allen Dulles, James Angleton, Dwight D. Eisenhower, John F. Kennedy, Henry Kissinger, Yuri Ivanovich Nosenko, and Frank Wisner.
Chapter 8, "The Gehlen Organization," deals with the group most responsible for allowing German intelligence after World War Two to maintain some continuity with the information that had been accumulating while Hitler was in power. As the only employer in West Germany that was not averse to employing the upper echelons of the previous regime, it had no trouble recruiting four thousand former Nazis, but Helms did not find them reliable. " . . . the American officers working with Gehlen in Washington neglected to insist upon being given the names of and biographical data on the RUSTY staff personnel. . . . Even in the confusion of the immediate post-war intelligence picture, this oversight violated one of the fundamental rules of secret intelligence, and helped to set the stage for the security disasters that in time all but destroyed the entire effort." (p. 86). A lot of people have been jumping to this conclusion without having the kind of in-depth knowledge of the situation which Helms observed.
On "fundamental rules of secret intelligence," (p. 86), Helms seems most upset that he received a felony conviction for denying something in testimony to Congress that he felt compelled to deny. Helms was bitter that in his confirmation hearings to be appointed ambassador to Iran, he was asked questions by people who knew that the answer was officially secret, so he was being forced to lie to maintain a cover story that was maintaining dubious deniability. This is the area of books on intelligence that I find most interesting. Nosenko was not allowed to participate in a free debate in America over the nature of KGB activities regarding Lee Harvey Oswald because the entire nature of the KGB was a matter of exclusive CIA jurisdiction within the American system, and holding Nosenko a prisoner for years was the perfect symbol of the amount of control that the CIA believed it was entitled to maintain over such information. Convicting Helms of a felony for lying to Congress was a matter of attempting to establish the principle that laws have a higher function than rules, and any individual within the American system is subject to the possibility of being hauled into court to be a patsy for whatever law the administration of justice intends to glorify in its present incarnation.
Helms doesn't exactly vilify Richard M. Nixon in this book, but just honestly stating "It has long been clear to me that President Nixon himself called the shots in the Watergate cover-up," (p. 13) is damn close. On our most recent impeachment, I think the movie "Candy" (1969, DVD 2001) with Enrico Maria Salerno as Jonathan J. John provides a better joke, when the police ask, "Did you see what happened to the girl in the blue dress?" Film buff J.J.J. responded, "I don't know. Who directed it?" That is the way most Presidents feel about the CIA.
A Look over My Shoulder: A Life in the Central Intelligence Agency, by Richard Helms, William Hood PDF
A Look over My Shoulder: A Life in the Central Intelligence Agency, by Richard Helms, William Hood EPub
A Look over My Shoulder: A Life in the Central Intelligence Agency, by Richard Helms, William Hood Doc
A Look over My Shoulder: A Life in the Central Intelligence Agency, by Richard Helms, William Hood iBooks
A Look over My Shoulder: A Life in the Central Intelligence Agency, by Richard Helms, William Hood rtf
A Look over My Shoulder: A Life in the Central Intelligence Agency, by Richard Helms, William Hood Mobipocket
A Look over My Shoulder: A Life in the Central Intelligence Agency, by Richard Helms, William Hood Kindle
No comments:
Post a Comment