Summary
Legacy of Ashes traces the history of the CIA from its post-WWII founding to the early 21st century. It presents the CIA in a very poor light and comes off as very one-sided. I am wary of the author’s negative bias, which could have led to cherry-picking sources, but it seems remarkably well-researched, drawing from primary sources including tens of thousands of pages of de-classified documents. However, it’s probably safe to assume that while many of the CIA’s failures have been declassified, many of its successes remain secret.
Takeaways
Poor intelligence gathering: The intelligence failures seem to stem first from the agency’s failure to set up an effective spy network to gather information. This was especially true in the US’s attempts to understand the Kremlin’s plans: the CIA found volunteer spies in the Soviet Union, most of whom had zero clue of the Kremlin’s inner works, who provided little to no useful information. The ones that did find anything valuable were discovered and executed by Moscow, betrayed by double-agent Soviet spies within the CIA.
Deceptive/Incomplete intelligence reporting: In addition to having little to no useful, accurate intelligence collected by its spy network, the agency also failed in transparently and truthfully synthesizing the intelligence for the President. This was not just the fault of the agency: the Presidents, especially Johnson and Nixon, were notoriously reproachful towards hearing information they didn’t want to hear. So the intelligence heads became sycophants, twisting and contorting their efforts to fit the President’s personal beliefs and agenda. This culture of withholding disconfirming intelligence carried all the way down through the analysts, distorting both the way information was gathered as well as how it was reported. It’s no wonder the agency experienced so many failures through the 20th century.
Do ends justify means? The book was full of interesting tidbits I had no idea about, including the CIA’s involvement in failed (and possibly successful) assassinations, coups in South America and Southeast Asia, and other activities that would get at least an eye raise from most people. One could make the (tenuous) argument that while certain CIA actions harmed individuals, communities, and countries, they acted rightly in that they prevented even greater harm in the world. However, this argument relies on both counterfactual narratives and believing that the ends justify the means. The same logic could be used to say it was OK that Henry Kissinger ordered the secret carpet bombing of Cambodia, since it would help “contain communism.” Of course, the bombing killed tens or even hundreds of thousands of civilians and led to the rise of the Khmer Rouge that murdered millions. The book was also written in 2007, so it doesn’t really provide much info on the post-9/11 CIA, which (I’d hope) has learned from its numerous failures.
Spying on Americans: Lastly - I learned how, despite being legally prohibited from conducting intelligence gathering against US citizens, the CIA has historically spied on US citizens at the order of presidents. The big two examples of this were when LBJ used the agency to spy on US citizens involved in race riots, and when Nixon spied on anti-war dissidents, both on the pretenses that the protests were funded by communists. Despite their illegal efforts, the agency found little to no evidence any of these protests were funded by communists. But Henry Kissinger ignored the CIA’s report, as it “tends to dismiss the communist and other outside influence as a factor.” Wasn’t that the point?
I wish I had learned this stuff in high school. I do believe the US is the greatest country on the planet, but that’s not an excuse to ignore its 20th/21st century missteps.
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