tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19217611.post7580816776119137385..comments2024-03-24T20:07:23.560-04:00Comments on KIKO'S HOUSE: CIA II: Book Review on 'Legacy of Ashes'Shaun Mullenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14964214385216513188noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19217611.post-7677569464813153242009-01-14T06:54:00.000-05:002009-01-14T06:54:00.000-05:00I have also just completed this book and found the...I have also just completed this book and found the detail fascinating. The CIA's record has been appalling and the pandering to Presidential whims was a real eye opener.Syrexhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08682577903168943376noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19217611.post-84660461125023400032008-12-14T21:54:00.000-05:002008-12-14T21:54:00.000-05:00We have to learn from this. There is sameness in t...We have to learn from this. There is sameness in the recruiting with-out identifying the common traits of the recruited. I got the feeling...but no proof...that half-right wingers made up most of the incompetents, but were incompetent not because of stupidity or lack of education, but how they saw the world. There was little long term thinking with a couple of exceptions like John McCone who should be given sole credit for avoiding the worst results we could have had from the Cuban Missile Crisis. We are still recruiting from the same sources for somehow we think that those who like the derring do and are anxious to use force somehow best serve us. History shows otherwise.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19217611.post-24979436178057758532008-01-14T14:16:00.000-05:002008-01-14T14:16:00.000-05:00Shaun,I just read Legacy of Ashes and I concur wit...Shaun,<BR/>I just read Legacy of Ashes and I concur with your synopsis.<BR/>My overarching thought as I laid the book down was this: <BR/>If the money and man power wasted/expended by the CIA since WWII had been directed into international USA humanitarian endeavors a la a Peace Corp, digging latrines and providing warmth, economic and agricultural expertise and shelter, literally millions of people would have not died in scores of fruitless vainglorious militaristic or quasi militaristic ventures.<BR/>Given that the CIA approach and its track record resulted in a net negative achievement quotient, simply being the good guys could not under any system of logic have had such deplorable results. Add to this that during these years our knowledge of other ethnicities and intelligence therefrom was pis poor. Had we been the good guys, here and there we would have been on the inside track and actually been have been exposed to local intel as a natural byproduct. We also would have represented an ideal and therefor a reason to elicit loyalty and intel.<BR/>My favorite part of the book was a comment that Jimmy Carters' mindset that the underlying ethics and modi operandii of the Soviets was inferior to man's higher aspirations worried the Soviet hierarchy. They could deal with the illegal tradecraft of a right wing bellicose opponent but a holistic appeal to man's 'godly' nature made them nervous.<BR/>My point exactly, then as now.cognitorexhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05092226654355873888noreply@blogger.com