The CIA and the Cold War: A Memoir

by Scott D. Breckinridge

Overview

This book gives the true inside picture of the CIA during the Cold War and how the agency saw the events in which it was involved. Breckinridge started his career with the CIA as a briefing officer (and within a year had become White House Briefing Officer) in 1953 and concluded it as Deputy Inspector General in 1979. The issues Breckinridge reports on—the Bay of Pigs, the Warren Commission Report, Vietnam, Watergate, Chile, plots against foreign leaders, the Ramparts controversy, Laos, the Church and Pike committees—are among the most controversial in the lives of Americans since the mid-twentieth century. Breckinridge demostrates that the CIA was not a rogue elephant but an agency acting under high level policy directives, and he reveals a great deal about the internal life of the CIA.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780275945473
Publisher:	Bloomsbury Academic
Publication date:	07/20/1993
Pages:	336
Sales rank:	809,768
Product dimensions:	6.14(w) x 9.21(h) x 0.75(d)

About the Author

SCOTT D. BRECKINRIDGE joined the Central Intelligence Agency in 1953 and served for twenty-six years. During that time he served as the CIA's briefing officer for the White House staff liaison with the Australian intelligence services, a member of a special policy staff in Washington and he spent sixteen years on the staff of the CIA's Inspector General, the last six of which were spent as Deputy Inspector General. Twice he was assigned as a special liaison officer with special congressional investigating committees. Breckinridge received the CIA's highest award—the Distinguished Intelligence Medal—two times during his service. He retired from the CIA in 1979 and taught at the Patterson School of Diplomacy and International Commerce of the University of Kentucky. He is the author of The CIA and the U.S. Intelligence System (1989), which received a best book award from the National Intelligence Study Center in Washington, D.C.

Table of Contents

Prologue
Joining the CIA
Settling In
Caught Up in the Work
Running With the Tide
Down Under
Back Home
CIA's Inspector General
Detail and Labor
Assassination—Plots against Foreign Leaders
Continuity and Change
Laos: A Secret War?
Vietnam
The Shifting Scene
Toward the Maelstrom
The Gathering Storm
Into the Investigations
The Congress Inquires
The Congress (continued)
After the Storm
End of the Line
Epilogue
Appendix

Editorial Reviews

Breckenridge recounts his career in several divisions of the Central Intelligence Agency, 1953-79. His aim is to explain and defend the agency rather than to produce an expose. He finished the book just before the collapse of the Soviet Union, but already considered the Cold War a historical era that was completed. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

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