Books like From the shadows by Robert Michael Gates

Commander of the CIA and NSA Michael Hayden tells the inside story of America’s intelligence wars, detailing how his "play to the edge" philosophy shaped the nation’s response to terrorism, technology and surveillance.

A young Cambodian girl, Raami, struggles to survive the Khmer Rouge era, clinging to her father's stories while facing death, starvation, and forced labor amid Phnom Penh's chaos.

“[The United States’ goal in Angola] was not to keep out the Cubans and Soviets but to make their imperial efforts as costly as possible and to prove that, after Vietnam. we were still capable of response, however insane. It is this story that has been told, and in impressive and convincing detail, by John Stockweli, the former chief of the CIA’s Angola task force.’ His hook should not he missed. Since strategic thought survives by ignoring experience, it has a highly professional interest in avoiding accounts such as this. By the same token, all who are alarmed about the tendency toward such strategic thinking should strongly welcome Mr. Stockwell’s book.” —John Kenneth Gaibraith. New York Review of Books In Search of Enemies is much more than the story of the only war to be found when the CIA sought to recoup its prestige after the Vietnam debacle. Though no American troops were committed to Angola, only “advisors,” many millions were spent, many thousands died, and many lies were told to the American people, in waging a war without purpose to American vital interests and without hope of victory. In Search of Enemies is unique in its wealth of detail about CIA operations and convincing in its argument that the clandestine services of the CIA should be abolished. John Stockwell, who lived in Africa for ten of his early years, is a graduate of the University of Texas and an alumnus of the U.S. Marine Corps. After twelve years as a CIA officer, he resigned from the agency on April I. 1977

Explores how definitions of 'good' and 'bad' Muslims are politically constructed, tracing the rise of political Islam and the emergence of contemporary Islamist terrorism in the context of Western interventions.

"Using the Star Wars missile defense program as a magnifying glass on his presidency, Frances FitzGerald gives us a wholly original portrait of Ronald Reagan, the most puzzling president of the last half of the twentieth century.". "The idea that America should have an impregnable shield against nuclear weapons was Reagan's invention. His famous Star Wars speech, in which he promised us such a shield and called upon scientists to produce it, gave rise to the Strategic Defense Initiative. Reagan used his sure understanding of American mythology, history and politics to persuade the country that a perfect defense against Soviet nuclear weapons would be possible, even though the technology did not exist and was not remotely feasible. His idea turned into a multi-billion-dollar research program. SDI played a central role in U.S.-Soviet relations at a crucial juncture in the Cold War, and in a different form it survives to this day.". "Drawing on research, including interviews with the participants, FitzGerald offers new insights into American foreign policy in the Reagan era. She gives us portraits of major players in Reagan's administration, including George Shultz, Caspar Weinberger, Donald Regan and Paul Nitze, and she provides a radically new view of what happened at the Reagan-Gorbachev summits in Geneva, Reykjavik, Washington and Moscow."--BOOK JACKET.

A detailed account of Israeli intelligence operations gathering strategic information for the CIA and its participation in covert military support across the globe.