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The Spymasters

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Member Reviews

Many thanks to NetGalley for the ARC of this!

I have read this author before and really enjoyed this new work as well!

Anyone that is interested in US Government, US History, or US Politics will really benefit from reading this. Highly recommend. This is why I read. This reads like an insider view of the CIA Director role. Great stuff.

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Part biography, part spy novel Chris Wipple takes you behind the curtain of the CIA's leaders - the challenges they face, the choices they have made, and how it affects us all.

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A excellent character study of CIA directors. It provides more in depth details on the earlier directors, which isn't surprising given that the efforts of more recent directors are still largely classified,

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Bookstores are filled with biographies of presidents, especially Washington, Lincoln, and the Roosevelts. There are even numerous biographies of prominent senators and representatives. I've appreciated Chris Whipple's books for highlighting unelected public servants who are often just as important as the people we see in the news every day. Whipple's "Gatekeepers" was a fascinating look at the chiefs of staff who helped the White House run smoothly - or failed to do so. In "Spymasters," Whipple turns his attention to the CIA directors. Like "Gatekeepers," the book expands upon a Showtime documentary (also by Whipple).

CIA directors typically have an internal and external role. They manage one of the most important and powerful intelligence services in the world. The director needs to both defend the agency staff to preserve morale and be able to push for reforms against bureaucratic fiefdoms when appropriate. They also need to ensure that the president receives the agency's intelligence products. The director needs to have a good relationship with the president, but also tell him (or her) politically inconvenient truths.

Whipple focuses on both aspects of the job, but generally the book focuses more on the politics and relationships with the president than the day-to-day management of intelligence services. Each chapter focuses on a particular director - or directors if their terms were short - and his or her relationship with the president.

Indeed, it becomes quite clear that the CIA has had its share of political drama during the past 70 years. Agency directors have found themselves in the middle of high-profile political controversies, and not only related to the gathering of intelligence abroad. Overall, Whipple's assessment of the CIA is fair and generally favorable to the directors, although he does paint a picture of a surprisingly beleaguered agency. At several points, the agency faced existential crises that almost led to its shuttering.

Then again, as several directors noted, in Washington, there are policy successes and intelligence failures. Politicians have regularly tried to deflect blame for their mistakes onto the intelligence services. Few directors emerge from the job without at least some intelligence failures on their watch.

Unlike "Gatekeepers," which concluded with a fairly clear set of "best practices" for White House chiefs of staff, "Spymasters" ends on a more ambiguous note. There isn't a single model for success at the agency. Whipple gives high marks to Robert Gates - who rose up through the ranks as an analyst - and Leon Panetta - a consummate politician and outsider. To some extent, the only recipe for success is intelligence, hard work, and luck.

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The Spymasters is not a spy novel, but it is none the less intriguing. Highly informative, Chris Whipple carves out a stark look at the men and the lone woman who has led the intelligence agency. It is less a "how-to" be an operative or analyst, but a study in management. There are those managers that are long on style and less on substance and the truly successful (that is touted both externally and internally) are a combination of both. There is a great deal to unpack in each vignette and the build-up is palpable, however it tends to lose a little steam towards the end of each. Often power grabs are at the heart of the ill-fated and while the answers lie in rectitude there is no easy defense when those in authority cannot tell truth to power. Intriguing and somewhat troubling given the current environment.

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An easily read and digestible book on the men and women who have led the CIA. The personalities, the successes and the failures, the results (intended and unexpected). The book flows along well, from director to director. Along with a lot of personal insights by the former directors.
Where the book really shines, in my opinion, is in what it tells of the events of the past several years. Truly horrifying. Let's hope the cooler heads prevail.

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This was a wonderful book. The only thing that troubles me is that according to works by another author, the CIA told the Bush White House that there were no WMD in Iraq before the war ever started. The CIA never gave the White House bad information. It was the White House who falsified the data it was given. Furthermore, the motives of terrorists who were in Iraq never met with Saddam. There was no collusion. The Iraq war was totally drummed up by George Bush. This book convinced me that I will never vote for Donald trump again.

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