Karalekas, Anne.
History of the Central Intelligence Agency. Laguna Hills, CA: Aegean
Park Press, 1977. Karalekas, Anne.
History of the Central Intelligence Agency. Laguna Hills, CA: Aegean
Park Press, 1977.
Clark comment: This is a reprint from Book IV, Supplementary Detailed Staff Reports on Intelligence and Military Intelligence, of the Church Committee Report. This reprint has itself been reprinted, with an additional documentary appendix: William M. Leary, ed., The Central Intelligence Agency: History and Documents (University, AL: University of Alabama Press, 1984).
Pforzheimer comments that while it is "somewhat biased and uneven ... on the role of clandestine collection and covert action, this 'History' is probably the best text publicly available on the history of the CIA."
For Constantinides, the Karalekas history is "a well-researched study that reflects the author's training as a scholar, her knowledge of U.S. history and government, and her grasp of intelligence work.... Good as it is, however, it is not flawless, particularly where judgments are made."
Kim, Young Hum, ed. The Central Intelligence Agency: Problems of Secrecy in a Democracy.
Lexington, MA: Heath, 1968.
Constantinides notes that this relatively brief (108 pages) compendium contains items written between 1947 and 1967. The items included "vary in quality," but the work does allow "for a balanced participation of points of view."
Kirkpatrick,
Lyman B. Jr. The Real CIA. New York: Macmillan, 1968.
Clark comment: Kirkpatrick describes his career in OSS and CIA. Among other positions, he served as the Agency's Inspector General and Executive Director- Comptroller (then the third ranking job in the CIA). He left the CIA in 1965 to teach political science at Brown University. Because of the senior positions he held, Kirkpatrick's account of events in the CIA's first 18 years are worth reading. Lyman Kirkpatrick died 27 February 1995. His obituary appears in the New York Times, 6 Mar. 1995, A16 (N).
In his comments on the book, Constantinides finds Kirkpatrick selective in what he chose to write about. He also identifies some dated material in the book, but notes that that there is much here of "historical value." Lowenthal finds Kirkpatrick's work to be a "useful and sometimes critical insider's memoir, with insights on several key events and developments through 1965."
Leary, William M., ed. The Central Intelligence Agency: History and Documents. University, AL: University of Alabama Press, 1984.
This is a reprint of the Karalekas study with the addition of a documentary appendix.
Marchetti, Victor, and John D. Marks. The CIA and the Cult of Intelligence. New York: Knopf, 1974. London: Jonathan Cape, 1974. Revised ed. New York: Dell, 1980. [pb]
Petersen calls this book a "well-researched attack on CIA by two former mid-level intelligence officers. Informative, but to be used with caution." To Pforzheimer, the work is "marked by its heavy attacks on CIA's Clandestine Services ... and covert operations.... It is an uneven book whose polemics tend to unbalance what valid material it may contain."
It is the opinion of the NameBase reviewer that "[a]long with Philip Agee's 'Inside the Company: CIA Diary,' this was one of the most important works on the CIA to appear in the 1970s. While Agee's book is a detailed look at one officer's activities in several Latin American countries, Marchetti and Marks give an overview of the CIA's administrative structure and operational history."
Constantinides argues that, despite the authors' tendency to mix fact and opinion, "the amount of accurate material that is divulged is enormous." The 1980 edition contains passages previously deleted.
Hugh Tovar, IJI&C 13.2/224, reminds us that while "Marchetti has been touted over the years as a senior Agency officer, an authority on virtually everything," he was in actuality neither of these. "As an assistant to the Deputy Director, he served in much the same capacity as a general's aide...-- a good paper-pusher, knowledgeable on many topics, but not a key personage and certainly not privy to all that he claims to know about."
Munves, James. The FBI and the CIA: Secret Agents and American Democracy. New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1975. [Wilcox]
Paine, Lauran. The CIA at Work. Levittown, NY: Transatlantic Arts, 1978.
Wilcox sees this as a "[s]ympathetic account."
Powers, Thomas. The Man Who Kept the Secrets: Richard Helms and the CIA. New York: Knopf, 1979. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1980. New York: Pocket Books, 1981. [pb]
Clark comment: This is one of the best books written about American intelligence by a non-intelligence-trained individual. It reads easily and amuses in the author's clear desire to denigrate his subject and his frustration in his failure to be able to do so. In one of the limited cases where we agree on something, NameBase notes that "[w]hen it first appeared in 1979, this book was widely regarded as one of the best ever written about the CIA."
Pforzheimer says The Man Who Kept the Secrets is simultaneously one of the most comprehensive books on the CIA and "seriously flawed with errors of fact and concept." A serious shortcoming is Powers' "failure to weave the world situation into his CIA tapestry.... The author does not understand Helms and is sometimes very unfair to him. This is a book ... which should be approached ... with a full recognition of its many errors, although it should be read by the professional."
Constantinides advises a careful reading of Powers' notes, which "often contain more revealing, comprehensive, and perceptive comments or explanations than the main text." Whatever Powers may have missed or misinterpreted -- and the list is long -- this book "can be classified as outstanding, especially for an intelligence outsider."
Also, see Kenneth L. Adelman, "A Clandestine Clan," International Security 5 (Summer 1980): 152-171. This is a review essay on The Man Who and Roosevelt's Countercoup. Adelman was Director of ACDA, 1984-1987.
An adaptation of Powers' work was published as: Thomas Powers, "Inside the Department of Dirty Tricks," Atlantic Monthly 244, no. 2 (Aug. 1979): 33-64. [http://www.theatlantic.com]
Quirk, John Patrick, David Phillips, Ray Cline, and Walter Pforzheimer, eds. The Central Intelligence Agency: A Photographic History. Guilford, CT: Foreign Intelligence Press, 1986.
Ranelagh, John. The Agency: The Rise and Decline of the CIA. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1986. Revised & updated. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1987. JK468I6R29
Pforzheimer, http://www.cloakanddagger.com/dagger/ciabib.txt, calls Ranelagh's "probably the best single book on the CIA." On the other hand, Lowenthal rates it only "a useful and comprehensive history of the CIA's first 25 years." Petersen notes that the "1987 edition reflects the correction of certain errors in the 1986 version."
While viewing The Agency as a "fine book," Wirtz, IJI&C 3.1, also suggests that it overrelies "on the testimony of CIA officials." Additionally, it lacks "analytical detachment, [as] evidenced by a compulsion to provide a complete, albeit sometimes contradictory, record of events."
Jeffreys-Jones, I&NS 3.2, opines that "Ranelagh has produced a mainly unoriginal book." Nevertheless, it "provides a readable account of the whole of the CIA's history, with even coverage and many fascinating quotations culled from participants." Thomas, Washington Post, 31 Jan. 1999, terms the book an "encyclopedic and fair-minded overview of the agency into the 1980s."
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